If you run a keyword on exact match, then it’s to be expected that when you analyse the search results, the only search term should be your keyword appearing as an exact match. So why are there ‘Other search terms’ appearing for an exact match keyword?
This demanded a phone call to Google AdWords headquarters for an explanation. Quickly; to the bat phone!
We went through the usual rigmarole of getting to the source of the question and I asked what kind of other search terms would trigger an exact match keyword. The answer was that a lack of spacing in a user’s search term with this particular word could cause it to trigger the keyword, as could additional characters or punctuation that wouldn’t deviate the search term from the keyword’s essence (I never thought I’d use the word ‘essence’ when describing an AdWords issue).
The upshot? Exact match isn’t 100% exact. Is that big news? Probably not, but it’s worth investigating whether you should find cross-competition between exact matches where two words are together in one match and separated in another.
