I’m an avid user of MSN AdCenter, but for research - could not figure out how to import a campaign from AdWords or Yahoo that worked in AdCenter.   Now, as earlier reported, AdCenter has been updated on Feb 18th according the official MSN AdCenter Blog.

The first set of improvements were to make it easier to start and maintain campaigns - they really needed to improve that as it was awful before.

• 1. When you sign in, the first page you see is now the "Campaigns" tab, and there’s a greater distinction between campaigns and orders. Campaigns and orders now have their own elements, historical stats, and summary pages.
• 2. There’s a simplified order creation process; it’s now 4 steps: Order Settings, Ads, Keywords and Pricing. And, the Order Settings tab includes targeting elements.
• 3. You’ll be able to delete campaigns and orders without first deleting all keywords and ads.
• 4. Edit your budget, bidding, and incremental pricing options in one place — the new Pricing tab.
• 5. Do research while you create orders.
• 6. There’s a new Keyword Research Tool as well, with keyword alternatives, pre-sales data, and demographic info.
• 7. When you create your keyword lists, you’ll see the keyword research and idea tool on the Keywords tab.

Point 5 I could do before; point 6, the keyword research tool, does not look much different to me except the geo-location of the clicked ads is much more detailed than before.  Also, the only data that’s being shown is for this month, even when you select "last month".

Except for the Campaign setup and more details in the GeoLocation - I don’t see any real difference so far.

AdCenter claims to have improved what happens when you try creating an Ad.

• 8 -When you create or edit ads, you’ll see a real-time preview on the right.
• 9 - As you type ad text and titles, the character limits update to match what you’ve got in the text field.
• 10 -All keyword/ad rejections will now show reason codes.
• 11 -The “Ad Description” field is now called "Ad Text."
• 12 - The “negative match” option is now called "excluded keywords."

I haven’t tried it - because I could not figure out the interface for Ads late last year - I gave up on it for that and just used the research MSN provided - i’ll try again and post about it later.

And when you run your ads, your have more control than before

• When using incremental bidding, you can set a relative percentage applied across all keyword bids instead of a specified dollar amount, so if you change your base bids, the additional targeted bid now adjusts automatically.
• Apply your negative keywords at the order level.
• If you want, apply your base bid amounts across all of your orders.
• U.S. city-based targeting options now include a corresponding state.

I’ll have to post on that as well.  All in all, it’s a major improvement if your actually running Ads in AdCenter.