EP5: So You Say Google Ads Don’t Work

So you've been thinking about running Google Ads, or maybe you've talked to somebody who's run Google Ads and they're like, oh, but they don't work.

Nobody clicks on them. Or I didn't have success.

Welcome to The Visibility Boost. My name is Glenneth and let's talk about why that isn't exactly true.

So when I talked to people about Google Ads, and I asked them if they run it or how successful, I typically get, “Yeah, I ran it. It was a waste of money. Didn't get any leads from it. All of that.” That's what people say to me.

Then I asked them two questions.

The first question I asked them is, well, how many negative keywords did you have, and they're like, huh?

The second question I ask them is what kind of conversion tracking did you have set up? And they're like, huh?

So if you've ever run Google Ads before and they didn't work, or if somebody's telling you that Google Ads don't work. There is some caveats – you need to make sure that you are tracking data when you are running Google ads.

That is going to be the number one way to know if they are working.

If you have your conversions set up properly in Google Analytics, Google Analytics not only will help, you know, your SEO, your social, but also your Google Ads. And you will have even more information in Google Ads than in Analytics itself.

So you have to have a conversion at least set up for the landing page that you are using for Google Ads. Because you have to know what keywords are causing that conversion and which ones aren't.

Some of the best converting Google Ads campaigns have five key words or less. They have spent months or years determining what keywords their ideal clients are searching for that brings them in new business. And that's all that they are advertising on is these five keywords potentially.

Now the second thing – you need negative keywords. And that's the question that I love asking people because they're like, well, I've never even heard of them.

So let's say that you sell pink sneakers and you're bidding on pink sneakers. What are good negative keywords?

Well, first of all, every other color besides pink, because if you only sell pink sneakers, you don't want to show up when somebody is searching for blue sneakers. Or if somebody is searching for pink stilettos, you don't sell stilettos. You sell sneakers. Your negative keyword list should be far more expansive than the keywords that you are actually bidding on.

In fact, when I take over people's Google Ads accounts, that's the thing I do in the first month.

I go through their keywords, which typically are 500 to a 1000 key phrases. I pair that down to about 20 to a 100 based on how many landing pages, ad groups, campaigns, et cetera. And then I go look at the negative keywords and I'm like, what can we add?

Typically, they don't have a place to start.

I actually have a guide of like a hundred or so that I look and I'm like, okay, these fit this client. Let's add them in. I go look at the search terms that Google provides and see what people have searched for. That costs them money and say, is this one they would really want to show up for or not? And I go through that list for a couple of months and I just keep adding negative keywords. With the goal being that they spend less and get more conversions.

So when people tell you that Google ads don't work, I will admit sometimes it isn't the best for some businesses, but if they've tried it without using those two features, they don't actually know if it worked for them or not. Want to talk about how Google Ads could work for your company? Schedule a discovery call HERE.