What are the 10 Most Expensive AdWords Categories and Why are They So Expensive?

Google has earned their reputation as one of the behemoths of the tech industry. What other company commands the same level of recognition, and even respect, as Google? The company was once exclusively in the search engine business.

However, they have since expanded their operations into a number of other areas. Among the many areas that Google now operates in are driverless cars, artificial intelligence, and even visual search with Google Lens.

However, the internet continues to provide the most fruitful ground for Google's innovations, and it is here that the company is generating the vast majority of their considerable profits.

It will come as no surprise to learn that Google's profits last quarter were an impressive $32 billion. However, what might surprise many observers is to learn that 97% of that revenue was generated from their online advertising platform.

Cost Per Click

Google's advertising platform, AdWords, is an auction-based marketplace. Advertisers bid for keywords with the highest bidder appearing at the top of sponsored search results for that keyword. Because of this system, different keywords have different values, and, as you would expect, the keywords that generate the most traffic are the ones that command the highest prices.

Any website which is serious about trying to outdo its competitors will need to be prepared to invest in their digital marketing strategies, including the procurement of keywords that are most relevant to their business.

How Does AdWords Work?

Whenever a user makes a search through Google, Google looks through the AdWords database and determines whether an auction should be initiated. If there are one or more advertisers currently bidding on keywords relevant to the search query, then an auction will begin.

It is up to advertisers to decide which keywords they want to bid on and how much they want to bid. When an auction begins for a relevant keyword, Google automatically enters the maximum specified bid.

What Are the Most Expensive Keywords

Advertisers must pay a certain price for every click on their adverts. This is known as cost per click, or CPC, advertising, and the cost for every click can vary dramatically.

The price is determined by a number of different factors, these include how popular the keyword is and how much traffic is generated from searches for it, but costs also vary between advertisers. The cost is largely determined by the quality score that Google assigns to the advertisers themselves. The system is designed to favour high-quality sites by offering them lower prices per click.

Taking the United States market as an example, the top 10 most expensive keywords, for the majority of advertisers, are as follows:

Lawyer - $46.25
Workers Comp - $23.14
Insurance - $22.62
Health and Fitness - $20.81
Child Charities - $20.44
Business Software - $20.36
Internet - $20.15
Business Services - $19.74
Finance - $19.74
Degree - $18.38

As you can see, there is a high degree of variability in prices, and this is only the top 10 most expensive keywords. Prices can be as low as a few pennies for the more niche groups of keywords. It is also worth noting is that the most expensive keywords tend to be those that are related to money or finance in some way.

If you’re feeling a bit lost and in need of some help managing your Google AdWords accounts with the aim of maximising the efficiency of your digital marketing and reducing your cost per click as much as possible, Matter Solutions can help.

Consult our AdWords experts and find out more about how our AdWords management can help your business.