Overture Looks for Deep Matches

Overture Services on Monday introduced broader matching options for advertisers, to bring keyword ads to search queries without a specific match.

The two new matching options, Phrase Match and Broad Match, will serve up advertisers’ keyword listings even when their search term is not entered exactly. In this way, Overture hopes to extend its paid listings to ever more searches.

With Phrase Match, an advertiser’s ad will be served if its keyword listing appears at all in a search query. For example, an advertiser owning the “Hawaii vacation” keyword could be matched to a query for “family Hawaii vacations.” Broad match takes this a step further, requiring only that a keyword term appear somewhere in the query. In that case, the “Hawaii vacation” advertiser’s listing could appear in searches for “Hawaii beach vacations.”

Overture will use Phrase and Broad Match listings to fill in when its database does not have regular Standard Match listings for terms. In addition, advertisers can rule out certain queries through listing excluded words. Advertisers can change their bids for each matching level.

The new matching options follow rival Google’s similar offering. Google allows advertisers to choose broad, phrase and exact matching. Unlike Overture, however, Google’s default matching is broad, not exact. Google also allows advertisers to rule out searches containing certain words.