Advertisers BEWARE - your phrase match and exact match keywords can trigger from entirely different terms

Anonymous
2017-04-28T23:21:19+00:00

Did you know that when you create a phrase match or exact match keyword that***(similar but)***different terms can trigger your ad and cost you clicks? This seems to conflict directly with the keyword documentation I am reading. https://advertise.bingads.microsoft.com/en-us/resources/training/keyword-match-options Phrase Match *"triggers your ad when all of the words in your keyword match the words in a user’s search query, in exactly the same order, even if other words are present in the search term."*Exact Match "triggers your ad when the exact words in your keyword appear in a customer's search query, in exactly the same order — including singular and plural forms."

There is a table that lists types of "close variations" of a grammatical nature with examples that seem to be entirely reasonable and understood. However there is no explicit mention that a phrase match or exact match keyword could also be triggered by a "close variation" term...that Bing deems "similar or close". This is what a customer service rep informed me of when I spotted some strange terms being triggered by a phrase match keyword of mine. It was even suggested to me that the responsibility of cleaning up this mess was up to me adding a whole bunch of negative keywords. Can I even trust in that functioning properly? 

![](https://learn-attachment.microsoft.com/api/attachments/77b3016d-662c-497c-a9f1-659aeacf29bb?platform=QnA)

I know that when I am planning keywords for a campaign and ad group that my most optimized keywords are phrase match and exact match because they are intended for specifically relevant keywords. I have no expectation that additional keywords are going to be thrown into the pool and cost me clicks that I don't want and that my ad and landing page is not accurate for.

Needless to say I have set aside a lot of time to comb through this disaster, pause keywords and add a number of negative keywords. If you are unhappy about this please upvote my suggestion.

Microsoft Advertising | Customer tools | Microsoft Advertising Copilot

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  1. Anonymous
    2017-05-09T15:47:00+00:00

    Good morning HeatherPaske,

    I wanted to follow up with you to let you know that I received a response from our technical support team on this matter. We did see that the account received thirteen impressions that triggered “medals” keywords with “badges” in them. One of the algorithms that we use and are constantly refining basically allows very similar terms to be used in very specific context (in this case, I would assume our system closely associates military medals with military badges based on Bing user search queries which is probably why you’re seeing these matches).

    If the issue is flagrant, consistent, and generates a lot of traffic we can take a closer look at the keyword matching on the backend, however for issues like this, we’d suggest simply adding “badge” or badges” as a negative keyword as a phrase match negative keyword to the campaigns or ad groups where you are seeing these matches happen.

    Thank you for choosing Bing Ads!

    Darin P.

    Bing Ads Support

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