PPCIs This the End of AdWords Editor?

Is This the End of AdWords Editor?

While updates to the AdWords interface come out frequently, AdWords Editor continues to be left behind with the same functionality. Will Google continue to support AdWords Editor, or will it be phased out in favor of the web interface?

Google AdWords EditorThe recent chatter about the upcoming AdWords announcement “Step Inside AdWords” made many search marketers wonder – great, what now? With last year’s major enhanced campaign changes still fresh in our minds, those of us in the industry wince a bit when we hear Google is once again announcing new features and tools.

While the latest revelations did disclose some neat things (the visualization tools to allow you to create tables is a great option), there was one thing that was noticeably absent.

No changes to AdWords Editor tool.

Again.

While updates to the AdWords interface come out frequently, AdWords Editor continues to be left behind with the same functionality. This was particularly true when enhanced campaigns launched last year.

Google created an easy how-to application with AdWords, but with Editor, the process was much more complicated and cumbersome. And as the new features for Enhanced Campaigns rolled out, AdWords Editor releases did not keep up at the same pace, which made it difficult to handle changes.

For example, the enhanced site link changes had to be done in the AdWords interface, because the support was not immediately available in AdWords Editor. While this has historically been true that Editor has been behind functionality-wise, it seems now that more of the heavy lifting tasks that we love about Editor are now standard features in AdWords.

Editor is a great tool for doing large bulk actions, but with the latest Google announcement comes the ability to do bulk changes for extensions and settings. Instead of having to upload those changes, you can now do them right in the AdWords interface.

In Larry Kim’s article back in December, he references a lot of the same concerns. Undo changes? You can now do that in AdWords. The find and replace option in Editor is very helpful when updating URL changes. However, you can now do this in AdWords:

Find and Replace Option in AdWords

With AdWords Editor being consistently behind in functionality, I find myself now using the web interface more. Honestly, I never thought that would happen – I pretty much lived in Editor on a daily basis. And while there are still certain tasks that are easier to do in Editor, I’m not using it to the extent that I once did.

Which begs the question – will Google continue to support AdWords Editor, or will it be phased out in favor of the Web interface? With Google putting so much more development effort into making AdWords the ‘tool to use,” and less time on new AdWords Editor releases, we must assume AdWords Editor isn’t going to be around much longer. Think about it – the resources needed to maintain both could be better utilized working on an enhancing one.

As we all know with AdWords, change is a constant. And we have to embrace it.

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