Disable Ads and Keywords For Out of Stock Items

UPDATE 2016-01-26: In response to some common issues, this script has been updated to include some enhancements. Please see the change log notes for v1.2.

As a follow up to my questions about cool scripts for Black Friday / Cyber Monday, today I put together a script to run through your urls and check if the item is out of stock on the website. If it is, we will pause the AdGroup.

This script has some of the same elements of my script on checking for broken links in your account, but it actually pulls the html source of each page and searches for a configurable string that lets it know when it is out of stock.

Let's walk through an example. I love some of the quirky gifts I find on ModCloth.com. But like any online store, some items go out of stock. Here is one I found while testing this script.

In order to get this script to work, I need to find out what is different about the page when it goes out of stock. If I right click and view the page source, and search for the work "stock", I can see a few different places where it is used. One of them is the following that says "in_stock":false.

That looks promising. I check on an in stock item and sure enough, "in_stock":true is on that page.

Alright, so now I know what text I need to use to fill in the OUT_OF_STOCK_TEXT variable in my code. Now each site is going to be a little different, so I have a simple script that uses the same url logic as the complete script that you can use for testing.

Once you find some HTML text in the source of the landing page that identifies if an item is out of stock, you should be good to go on the full script. There are a few other options in the script that allow you to enable or disable various url manipulations in the script. And remember, this will pause only the Ads or Keywords that link to the page with the out of stock item.

Thanks,
Russ

Automate Your Ads Based on Your Baseball Team's Schedule

I know everyone is focused on March Madness right now, but opening day for Baseball season is right around the corner. I wondered if it were possible to enable and disable specific ads based on the schedules of your local MLB team.

It turns out, the MLB has every team's full schedule in an easy to parse CSV format. All you need to do is search Google for " downloadable schedule" and look for the page that ends in "downloadable.jsp". It will look something like this:

The link you need is circled in the image above. You can see from the url what the team_id value should be in the code below. And if you right-click and download that .csv file, you will be able to see what value to use for the home_field as well. In the example below, I used my hometown teams of the Cubs and the White Sox, but you can use any teams you want.

The script itself will run through and look for a home game for your team. If the team is playing today and it is a home game, it will enable any ads that are tagged with the label you configured in the TEAM_INFO. If the team isn't playing a home game today, it will pause those same ads.

In the example below, I only used a portion of the data in the csv files. It would also be possible to enable ads only during the actual game, or enable ads for all game days, not just home games.

I encourage you to play around with the data and see what you can come up with. If you find anything useful, please leave a comment.

Thanks,
Russ

//-----------------------------------
// Enable/Disable Ads Based on the MLB Schedule
// Created By: Russ Savage
// FreeAdWordsScripts.com
//-----------------------------------
function main() {
  var TEAM_INFO = [
    { team_id : 112, home_field : 'Wrigley Field', label : 'cubs' }, // Cubs
    { team_id : 145, home_field : 'U.S. Cellular Field', label : 'whitesox' } // White Sox
  ];
  //hopefully you've already created and tagged some ads with these labels
  //but just in case...
  createLabelsIfNeeded(TEAM_INFO); 
  
  var SEASON = (new Date()).getFullYear();
  var is_home = false, is_game_day = false;
  for(var t in TEAM_INFO) {
    var team = TEAM_INFO[t];
    var url = "http://mlb.mlb.com/soa/ical/schedule.csv?team_id="+team.team_id+"&season="+SEASON;
    var html = UrlFetchApp.fetch(url).getContentText();
    var date_list = html.split("\r\n");
    for(var i in date_list) {
      if(i == 0) {continue;}
      var [start_date,start_time,start_time_et,
           subject,location,description,
           end_date,end_date_et,end_time,end_time_et] = date_list[i].split(",");
      
      var today = new Date();
      var game_day = new Date();
      game_day.setFullYear(SEASON,parseInt(start_date.split("/")[0])-1,parseInt(start_date.split("/")[1]));
      
      is_home = (location == team.home_field);
      is_game_day = (diffDays(game_day,today) == 0);
      
      if(is_home && is_game_day) {
        enableBaseballAds(team.label);
        break;
      }
    }
    if(!(is_home && is_game_day)) {
      disableBaseballAds(team.label); 
    }
  }
  
}

function enableBaseballAds(label) {
  Logger.log("Enabling all ads with the "+label+" label.");
  var ads = AdWordsApp.ads().withCondition("LabelNames CONTAINS_ALL ['"+label+"']").get();
  while(ads.hasNext()) {
    ads.next().enable(); 
  }
}

function disableBaseballAds(label) {
  Logger.log("Disabling all ads with the "+label+" label.");
  var ads = AdWordsApp.ads().withCondition("LabelNames CONTAINS_ALL ['"+label+"']").get();
  while(ads.hasNext()) {
    ads.next().pause(); 
  }
}

function createLabelsIfNeeded(team_info) {
  var label_iter = AdWordsApp.labels().get();
  var label_list = [];
  while(label_iter.hasNext()) {
    label_list.push(label_iter.next().getName());
  }
  for(var i in team_info) {
    if(label_list.indexOf(team_info[i].label) == -1) {
      AdWordsApp.createLabel(team_info[i].label);
      label_list.push(team_info[i].label);
    }
  }
}

//A helper function to compare dates.
//Copied from: http://goo.gl/uW48a
function diffDays(firstDate,secondDate) {
  var oneDay = 24*60*60*1000; // hours*minutes*seconds*milliseconds
  return Math.round(Math.abs((firstDate.getTime() - secondDate.getTime())/(oneDay))); 
}

Manage Ads Based on Airport Delays

There are tons of APIs out on the internet today. Any of these can be incorporated into your AdWords scripts to automate some of your account management.

The script below uses the Airport Status Service from FAA.gov to enable and pause ads when there is a delay at a major airport. This would be useful for any business that is near an airport that may benefit from delays such as restaurants, bars, or hotels. Your ads could say things like:



You can add or remove airport codes from the list at the top. All you need to do is tag your ads with the label [airport_code]_delay ("ORD_delay","ATL_delay").

What other dynamic data could you use to optimize your ads? Movie times? Sports games? Let me know in the comments below and I'll see what I can come up with.

Thanks,
Russ

/*********************************************
* Pause/Enable Ads Based On Airport Delays
* Version 1.1
* ChangeLog v1.1 
*  - Added ability to completely pause non-delay ads
* Created By: Russ Savage
* FreeAdWordsScripts.com
*********************************************/
// For this to work, you need to add a label to all
// the ads for each airport.  For example, PIT_normal
// or SFO_normal
var PAUSE_NORMAL_ADS_DURING_DELAY = false;
var DELAY_SUFFIX = '_delay'; //the suffix on the label for delayed ads
var NORMAL_SUFFIX = '_normal'; //the suffix on the label for normal ads

var AIR_CODES = ["ATL","ANC","AUS","BWI","BOS","CLT","MDW","ORD","CVG","CLE",
                 "CMH","DFW","DEN","DTW","FLL","RSW","BDL","HNL","IAH","HOU",
                 "IND","MCI","LAS","LAX","MEM","MIA","MSP","BNA","MSY","JFK",
                 "LGA","EWR","OAK","ONT","MCO","PHL","PHX","PIT","PDX","RDU",
                 "SMF","SLC","SAT","SAN","SFO","SJC","SNA","SEA","STL","TPA",
                 "IAD","DCA"];

function main() {
  var faaUrl = "http://services.faa.gov/airport/status/";
  var args = "?format=application/json";
  for(var i in AIR_CODES) {
    try{
      var resp = UrlFetchApp.fetch(faaUrl + AIR_CODES[i] + args);
      if( resp.getResponseCode() == 200 ) {
        var json = Utilities.jsonParse(resp.getContentText());
        if(json.delay == "false") {
          Logger.log("No delays at "+json.IATA+". Pausing delay ads if any are running.");
          turnOffDelayAds(json.IATA);
          if(PAUSE_NORMAL_ADS_DURING_DELAY) {
            turnOnNonDelayAds(json.IATA);
          }
        } else {
          Logger.log("Delays in "+json.IATA+" Reason: "+json.status.reason);
          Logger.log("Turning on delay ads if there are any.");
          turnOnDelayAds(json.IATA);
          if(PAUSE_NORMAL_ADS_DURING_DELAY) {
            turnOffNonDelayAds(json.IATA);
          }
        }
      }
    }
    catch(e) {
      Logger.log("Error: " + e.message);
    }
  }
}

function turnOffDelayAds(airportCode) {
  var labelName = airportCode + DELAY_SUFFIX;
  var adIter = AdWordsApp.ads()
    .withCondition("LabelNames CONTAINS_ANY ['"+labelName+"']")
    .withCondition("CampaignStatus = ENABLED")
    .withCondition("AdGroupStatus = ENABLED")
    .withCondition("Status = ENABLED")
    .get();
  while(adIter.hasNext()) {
    adIter.next().pause();
  }
}

function turnOffNonDelayAds(airportCode) {
  var labelName = airportCode + NORMAL_SUFFIX;
  var adIter = AdWordsApp.ads()
    .withCondition("LabelNames CONTAINS_ANY ['"+labelName+"']")
    .withCondition("CampaignStatus = ENABLED")
    .withCondition("AdGroupStatus = ENABLED")
    .withCondition("Status = ENABLED")
    .get();
  while(adIter.hasNext()) {
    adIter.next().pause();
  }
}

function turnOnDelayAds(airportCode) {
  var labelName = airportCode + DELAY_SUFFIX;
  var adIter = AdWordsApp.ads()
    .withCondition("LabelNames CONTAINS_ANY ['"+labelName+"']")
    .withCondition("CampaignStatus = ENABLED")
    .withCondition("AdGroupStatus = ENABLED")
    .withCondition("Status = PAUSED")
    .get();
  while(adIter.hasNext()) {
    adIter.next().enable();
  }
}

function turnOnNonDelayAds(airportCode) {
  var labelName = airportCode + NORMAL_SUFFIX;
  var adIter = AdWordsApp.ads()
    .withCondition("LabelNames CONTAINS_ANY ['"+labelName+"']")
    .withCondition("CampaignStatus = ENABLED")
    .withCondition("AdGroupStatus = ENABLED")
    .withCondition("Status = PAUSED")
    .get();
  while(adIter.hasNext()) {
    adIter.next().enable();
  }
}

Update Ads for the New Year

This is a companion to one of my earlier posts about updating your keywords for the new year.  You can easily run through each ad you have and update them all for the new year using the script below.  It will also pause the old ad as well, making sure your staying relevant to your customers.  You should schedule this to run every year on January 1st if your advertising relies heavily on dated traffic.

Thanks,
Russ

//-----------------------------------
// Update Ads for 2012
// Created By: Russ Savage
// FreeAdWordsScripts.com
//-----------------------------------
function main() {
  var OLD_YEAR = "2011";
  var NEW_YEAR = "2012";
  //You probably shouldn't update destination urls unless you know what you are doing.
  var FIELDS_CONTAINING_YEAR = ["Headline","Description1",
                                "Description2","DisplayUrl"
                                /*,"DestinationUrl"*/
                               ];
  
  for(i in FIELDS_CONTAINING_YEAR) {
    var field_iter = AdWordsApp.ads()
        .withCondition(FIELDS_CONTAINING_YEAR[i] + " CONTAINS " + OLD_YEAR)
        .withCondition("Status = ENABLED")
        .get();
    
    _iterateThroughAds(field_iter);
  }

  //---------------
  // Private Helper Functions
  //---------------  
  function _iterateThroughAds(ad_iter) {
    while (ad_iter.hasNext()) {
      var ad = ad_iter.next();
      var ag = ad.getAdGroup();
      _createNewAdFromOldAd(ag,ad);
    }
  }
  
  function _createNewAdFromOldAd(adgroup, old_ad) {
    //get the updated ad texts replacing all the old years with the new years
    var new_headline = old_ad.getHeadline().replace(OLD_YEAR,NEW_YEAR);
    var new_desc1 = old_ad.getDescription1().replace(OLD_YEAR,NEW_YEAR);
    var new_desc2 = old_ad.getDescription2().replace(OLD_YEAR,NEW_YEAR);
    var new_display_url = old_ad.getDisplayUrl().replace(OLD_YEAR,NEW_YEAR);
    var new_dest_url = old_ad.getDestinationUrl();/*.replace(OLD_YEAR,NEW_YEAR);*/
    
    //now create the new ad and pause the old one.
    adgroup.createTextAd(new_headline,new_desc1,new_desc2,new_display_url,new_dest_url);
    old_ad.pause();
  }
}