Brand vs Non-Brand Ratio
What AdGradr checks
Section titled “What AdGradr checks”AdGradr evaluates the balance between brand and non-brand spend in your Microsoft Ads account. The logic mirrors the Google check, but context matters more on Bing. Brand CPCs on this platform are often extremely low ($0.50 to $1.00), which means an account that is “90% brand” by spend might only represent a few hundred dollars. Dollar amount matters more than percentage.
AdGradr flags accounts with zero brand spend (competitors may be capturing your branded searches), accounts where non-brand represents a very small share of total spend (the account is not driving new demand), and accounts with a moderate brand-heavy tilt. The severity scales with how imbalanced the spend is.
Why this matters
Section titled “Why this matters”Brand campaigns on Bing convert at high rates and low CPCs. They look great in reports. But they capture people who already know you. Non-brand campaigns are where you find new customers, test new markets, and actually grow. An account running 90%+ brand spend on Bing is essentially paying for traffic that would likely visit your site organically through Bing search anyway.
The Bing-specific wrinkle: because brand CPCs are so low on this platform, even a small dollar amount of brand spend can look like a high percentage. AdGradr accounts for this by weighting dollar amounts, not just percentages.
What good looks like
Section titled “What good looks like”- Brand campaigns isolated in their own campaigns with separate budgets.
- Non-brand campaigns receiving at least 40% of total account spend.
- Brand campaigns using Manual CPC (Smart Bidding overcharges for brand clicks on any platform).
- Clear naming conventions that distinguish brand from non-brand campaigns.
Common mistakes
Section titled “Common mistakes”- Letting brand and non-brand keywords share campaigns. This makes it impossible to control budget allocation between the two and inflates reported conversion rates.
- Celebrating low CPAs driven entirely by brand. A $5 CPA on brand and a $45 CPA on non-brand, blended to $15, hides the real economics of customer acquisition.
- Not bidding on brand at all. On Bing, competitors can bid on your brand terms cheaply. Even if organic covers most of your brand traffic, paid brand protects your position.
- Over-investing in brand because “it works.” Brand converts because the customer already chose you. The question is whether your non-brand budget is large enough to fill the top of the funnel.
How to fix it
Section titled “How to fix it”- Separate brand and non-brand keywords into distinct campaigns if they are not already.
- Set brand campaigns to Manual CPC with bids just high enough to maintain 85%+ impression share.
- Allocate freed-up budget to non-brand campaigns.
- Report brand and non-brand performance separately to stakeholders so the true cost of acquisition is visible.
When to ignore this check
Section titled “When to ignore this check”Pure brand-defense accounts (where the only goal is preventing competitors from capturing branded searches) are legitimate. Newly launched accounts that only have brand campaigns running while non-brand is being built out will also trigger this flag temporarily. If your non-brand budget is intentionally limited due to seasonal strategy, the flag is informational.
Want someone to handle this? The Click Makers team manages Microsoft Ads accounts for companies spending $5K+/month. Get in touch to see if we are a fit.