Must-Know 7 Google Ads Best Practices for Novice Advertisers
Posted: Wed Dec 18, 2024 8:39 am
Google Ads has been around for over 20 years already, and it’s still firmly holding onto its spot as the most popular digital advertising platform of them all. There is a good reason for that: the platform allows advertisers to appear on the world’s most used search engine, as well as Youtube, Gmail, and hundreds of Google’s partners.
All that makes Google ads a perfect place to focus all your paid campaigns. That said, advertising on Google Ads is not as easy as it may look. There are some things you need to be especially mindful of when setting up and optimizing campaigns.
Ready to learn all about them? Let’s go through the 7 Google Ads best practices, and try to make your life with the platform a whole lot easier!
Enhance your digital advertising skills with our Google Phone number library Search Ads for Beginners email course. Learn how to create, optimize, and launch successful ad campaigns that yield high conversions and significant ROI.
7 Google ads best practices
Take care of negative keywords
Keep track of your Quality score
Make targeting as detailed as possible
Spend extra time on the creatives
Keep your account organized
Take all Google ads tips with a grain of salt
1. Take care of negative keywords
There’s a trap many of us tend to fall into: thinking that our work ends with setting up the campaign and leaving the rest up to the Google ads platform. Unfortunately, this approach most often leads to burning through the budget and falling down on SERP (search engine results page).
Optimization is extremely important, especially at the beginning of running your Google ads campaign. But at this time, optimization isn’t really about searching for new keywords to add to the list of phrase match. In fact, it’s the opposite.
Related:
1. Are Google ads worth it?
2. How to write Google ads copy that converts
3. How to create Google ads in GetResponse
How Google ads negative keywords work
You can set negative keywords for phrase match, exact match, or broad match
Negative keywords can be set for different scenarios
Negative keywords are the terms that prevent your ad from being triggered when a user types them into the search engine. And they should be your main focus, particularly in those first few weeks.
Let’s say your company sells marketing software. The first things you’d want to add to the negative keyword list of your Google ad campaign are terms like “free” or “development”.
This way, you’re making sure to show your search ads to users who are most likely to be interested in what you actually offer.
At the same time, you will be excluding irrelevant search terms, such as “marketing software free”.
Search intent is a tricky thing to pinpoint. Especially when you’re using broad match keywords in your Google ads (as opposed to the exact match). This is exactly why you should always remember to regularly check the search terms that trigger your ad and get rid of those that are irrelevant to what you’re advertising.
2. Keep track of your Quality Score
Google Ads’ Quality Score has been the topic of many discussions among marketers, with some arguing that its role in a campaign’s performance is way overrated. And while that may be true to some extent, it doesn’t change the fact that the Quality Score is one of the best indicators of whether Google “likes” your ads or not.
How Google ads Quality Score works
Google ads dashboard demonstrating quality score
Quality Score allows you to see how well will your ad rank compared to similar competing advertisements. The score is given on a scale of 1 to 10. Google analyzes several specific factors to estimate this:
Expected clickthrough rate;
Ad relevance;
Landing page experience.
Fortunately, Google is kind enough not to leave you in the dark on this matter.
Google Ads dashboard provides users with an additional status for each factor. As such, each of the three metrics can be estimated as “above average”, “average”, or “below average”. If you see that your Google ad has been marked as “below average”, you should start verifying what exactly seems to be the problem.
Pro tip: It might also be a good idea to create a new ad group, in order to ensure a better fit between the targeted keywords and ad groups.
Generally, the more specific you are with the search terms, the happier Google should be about ad relevance. The changes don’t have to be huge. Something as simple as fixing your landing page loading time can easily boost your Google ads Quality Score.
Let’s say you see a quality score of 4/10 next to one of your keywords. How can you improve it? Simply by going through all three factors one by one.
Check what the expected CTR is and how different it is from the real one. Double-check the settings you’ve created for ad relevance. Go through the landing page to which the ad directs and try to single out any inconsistencies.
This way, you’ll be able to spot what needs to be changed and adjust immediately for the best results.
Make sure to check Google’s guidelines on the matter and see how you can keep improving the Quality Score with every campaign.
3. Make targeting as detailed as possible
It should be your unconscious standard practice at this point to tailor your ad to your potential clients. Aside from the obvious possibility to target your audience depending on their age, gender or location, Google ads allow you to customize and segment your campaign even further.
Audience targetting
When it comes to your audience, you have the possibility to target users based on some pretty specific factors, such as:
their interests
their habits
their most popular search queries
their interaction with your website
You can also create custom audience segments by inserting keywords based on your potential customers’ interests, URLs, and apps that they’re likely to use or that are similar to yours. This way, you’re able to target a very narrow audience, yet the one that is highly likely to engage with your product.
Content targetting
But that’s not the only thing Google has in store. It also enables you to use content targetting. Among other things, it lets you choose the topics related to those of the websites your ads appear on, as well as specific placements (i.e websites or apps on the Google Display Network) where you want the ads to show.
Editor’s note: This form of online advertising largely depends on third-party cookies and will soon become inactive for Google ads users. With third-party cookies, paid ads can use information about the target audience obtained from third-party websites to match the search traffic best.
Once these cookies are banned, marketers will only be able to rely on the first-party cookies, i.e. the user information gathered directly on their own websites.
You can learn more about Google banning third-party cookies here
When it comes to targeting, it’s also important to make use of exclusions and filter out the topics or types of content that you don’t want your m arketing campaign to be associated with.
Just like with negative keywords, you should regularly check the placements where your ads appear and rid of those that are irrelevant or perform badly.
4. Spend extra time on the creatives
Setting up a new campaign takes a lot of research. There are many elements of the Google ads campaign you need to take care of:
Targeting options
Ad group levels
Specific keywords
Bidding strategy
So many, in fact, that it’s fairly easy to treat the actual copy and images for your Google ads as an afterthought.
That approach might have worked a couple of years ago when users weren’t bombarded by ads on every corner of the internet. Now it takes a lot more effort to stand out from the crowd.
So, if you notice that your campaign isn’t performing well, the problem might not lay in the campaigns’ settings, but rather in blandly looking (or sounding) ads.
Related: Learn how to write Google ads copy that converts
How to create Google ads creatives that convert
Your best indicator that something is not right with your ads’ creatives is a low CTR. Fortunately, there is a handful of things you could try and do to address this issue. Here are some Google ads best practices for creatives:
Check if your visuals are in line with Google’s best practices, and make sure the designers at your company always follow them.
Policy violation prompt triggered by the Google ads platform
Google ads will let you know in case any of your creatives disagree with their policy.
Don’t bet it all on one ad — prepare different sets of creatives and test them out to see which ones perform best and continue to improve from that. Try running A/B tests or rely on Google’s custom experiments to help you decide on a winning variation.
Under no circumstances, do not reuse the same copy and visuals over and over again!
Stay creative throughout the process and try to have fun with your campaigns. It pays out in the long run!
Prepare high-quality landing pages
We briefly mentioned the importance of landing pages when it comes to the Quality Score, but this really is a topic that needs its own discussion. You can have a perfectly tailored campaign, but if it leads users to a mediocre page, then it’s not going to bring the results it should.
All that makes Google ads a perfect place to focus all your paid campaigns. That said, advertising on Google Ads is not as easy as it may look. There are some things you need to be especially mindful of when setting up and optimizing campaigns.
Ready to learn all about them? Let’s go through the 7 Google Ads best practices, and try to make your life with the platform a whole lot easier!
Enhance your digital advertising skills with our Google Phone number library Search Ads for Beginners email course. Learn how to create, optimize, and launch successful ad campaigns that yield high conversions and significant ROI.
7 Google ads best practices
Take care of negative keywords
Keep track of your Quality score
Make targeting as detailed as possible
Spend extra time on the creatives
Keep your account organized
Take all Google ads tips with a grain of salt
1. Take care of negative keywords
There’s a trap many of us tend to fall into: thinking that our work ends with setting up the campaign and leaving the rest up to the Google ads platform. Unfortunately, this approach most often leads to burning through the budget and falling down on SERP (search engine results page).
Optimization is extremely important, especially at the beginning of running your Google ads campaign. But at this time, optimization isn’t really about searching for new keywords to add to the list of phrase match. In fact, it’s the opposite.
Related:
1. Are Google ads worth it?
2. How to write Google ads copy that converts
3. How to create Google ads in GetResponse
How Google ads negative keywords work
You can set negative keywords for phrase match, exact match, or broad match
Negative keywords can be set for different scenarios
Negative keywords are the terms that prevent your ad from being triggered when a user types them into the search engine. And they should be your main focus, particularly in those first few weeks.
Let’s say your company sells marketing software. The first things you’d want to add to the negative keyword list of your Google ad campaign are terms like “free” or “development”.
This way, you’re making sure to show your search ads to users who are most likely to be interested in what you actually offer.
At the same time, you will be excluding irrelevant search terms, such as “marketing software free”.
Search intent is a tricky thing to pinpoint. Especially when you’re using broad match keywords in your Google ads (as opposed to the exact match). This is exactly why you should always remember to regularly check the search terms that trigger your ad and get rid of those that are irrelevant to what you’re advertising.
2. Keep track of your Quality Score
Google Ads’ Quality Score has been the topic of many discussions among marketers, with some arguing that its role in a campaign’s performance is way overrated. And while that may be true to some extent, it doesn’t change the fact that the Quality Score is one of the best indicators of whether Google “likes” your ads or not.
How Google ads Quality Score works
Google ads dashboard demonstrating quality score
Quality Score allows you to see how well will your ad rank compared to similar competing advertisements. The score is given on a scale of 1 to 10. Google analyzes several specific factors to estimate this:
Expected clickthrough rate;
Ad relevance;
Landing page experience.
Fortunately, Google is kind enough not to leave you in the dark on this matter.
Google Ads dashboard provides users with an additional status for each factor. As such, each of the three metrics can be estimated as “above average”, “average”, or “below average”. If you see that your Google ad has been marked as “below average”, you should start verifying what exactly seems to be the problem.
Pro tip: It might also be a good idea to create a new ad group, in order to ensure a better fit between the targeted keywords and ad groups.
Generally, the more specific you are with the search terms, the happier Google should be about ad relevance. The changes don’t have to be huge. Something as simple as fixing your landing page loading time can easily boost your Google ads Quality Score.
Let’s say you see a quality score of 4/10 next to one of your keywords. How can you improve it? Simply by going through all three factors one by one.
Check what the expected CTR is and how different it is from the real one. Double-check the settings you’ve created for ad relevance. Go through the landing page to which the ad directs and try to single out any inconsistencies.
This way, you’ll be able to spot what needs to be changed and adjust immediately for the best results.
Make sure to check Google’s guidelines on the matter and see how you can keep improving the Quality Score with every campaign.
3. Make targeting as detailed as possible
It should be your unconscious standard practice at this point to tailor your ad to your potential clients. Aside from the obvious possibility to target your audience depending on their age, gender or location, Google ads allow you to customize and segment your campaign even further.
Audience targetting
When it comes to your audience, you have the possibility to target users based on some pretty specific factors, such as:
their interests
their habits
their most popular search queries
their interaction with your website
You can also create custom audience segments by inserting keywords based on your potential customers’ interests, URLs, and apps that they’re likely to use or that are similar to yours. This way, you’re able to target a very narrow audience, yet the one that is highly likely to engage with your product.
Content targetting
But that’s not the only thing Google has in store. It also enables you to use content targetting. Among other things, it lets you choose the topics related to those of the websites your ads appear on, as well as specific placements (i.e websites or apps on the Google Display Network) where you want the ads to show.
Editor’s note: This form of online advertising largely depends on third-party cookies and will soon become inactive for Google ads users. With third-party cookies, paid ads can use information about the target audience obtained from third-party websites to match the search traffic best.
Once these cookies are banned, marketers will only be able to rely on the first-party cookies, i.e. the user information gathered directly on their own websites.
You can learn more about Google banning third-party cookies here
When it comes to targeting, it’s also important to make use of exclusions and filter out the topics or types of content that you don’t want your m arketing campaign to be associated with.
Just like with negative keywords, you should regularly check the placements where your ads appear and rid of those that are irrelevant or perform badly.
4. Spend extra time on the creatives
Setting up a new campaign takes a lot of research. There are many elements of the Google ads campaign you need to take care of:
Targeting options
Ad group levels
Specific keywords
Bidding strategy
So many, in fact, that it’s fairly easy to treat the actual copy and images for your Google ads as an afterthought.
That approach might have worked a couple of years ago when users weren’t bombarded by ads on every corner of the internet. Now it takes a lot more effort to stand out from the crowd.
So, if you notice that your campaign isn’t performing well, the problem might not lay in the campaigns’ settings, but rather in blandly looking (or sounding) ads.
Related: Learn how to write Google ads copy that converts
How to create Google ads creatives that convert
Your best indicator that something is not right with your ads’ creatives is a low CTR. Fortunately, there is a handful of things you could try and do to address this issue. Here are some Google ads best practices for creatives:
Check if your visuals are in line with Google’s best practices, and make sure the designers at your company always follow them.
Policy violation prompt triggered by the Google ads platform
Google ads will let you know in case any of your creatives disagree with their policy.
Don’t bet it all on one ad — prepare different sets of creatives and test them out to see which ones perform best and continue to improve from that. Try running A/B tests or rely on Google’s custom experiments to help you decide on a winning variation.
Under no circumstances, do not reuse the same copy and visuals over and over again!
Stay creative throughout the process and try to have fun with your campaigns. It pays out in the long run!
Prepare high-quality landing pages
We briefly mentioned the importance of landing pages when it comes to the Quality Score, but this really is a topic that needs its own discussion. You can have a perfectly tailored campaign, but if it leads users to a mediocre page, then it’s not going to bring the results it should.