How can I make my ads appear above the search results?
On google search results pages, the highest ranking AdWords ads are eligible to appear in the top positions above the search results. While we show only up to three ads above the search results per page, several top-performing ads can be eligible for these positions. Therefore, we cycle through all eligible ads for subsequent pages until there are no eligible ads left; when this happens, we'll return to showing the first competing ad at the top of the page.
Google believes strongly in providing high-quality and relevant advertising to our users, so google AdWords does not rank ads solely on cost. There is no way to reserve top placement in the AdWords program.
For the search network, ad placement is based on the matched keyword's maximum cost-per-click (CPC) bid times its Quality Score. Your keyword's Quality Score is based on its clickthrough rate (CTR) on google, the relevance of its ad text, the quality of the ad's landing page, historical keyword performance, and other relevancy factors.
For the top positions above google search results, we use a slightly different formula. First, only ads that exceed a certain Quality Score threshold may appear in these positions. Second, for ads that do surpass this Quality Score threshold, we use the actual CPC rather than the maximum CPC when determining the ad position for these spots. This ensures that Quality Score plays an even more important role in determining the ads that show in these positions.
By adjusting your keywords' Quality Scores and maximum CPC bids, you can better control the position of your ad. Remember: The higher the quality, the lower the CPC, and vice versa.
