10 Google Ads Search Campaign Tips in 2023

When you want to run ads on the web, Google Ads is a great place to start. After all, the reach of the platform is second-to-none and has been fine-tuned over the years to make it incredibly powerful and easy to use with a little know-how. Even if you only have a small budget and just want to test the waters, Google Ads is a smart place to turn.

To help you get started and gain traction with your Google Ads campaigns, we’ve assembled ten tips below for you to consider.

#1 – It Starts with a Budget

Perhaps the best piece of advice you can get on your Google Ads campaign is to set a clear budget before you ever get started. With a budget in place, you’ll be able to structure your campaign in a way that allows you to test ads and explore markets while keeping your spend at a reasonable level. If you don’t know how much you can spend, you’ll be flying blind with regard to the structure of your campaign. A great place to start is with a keyword research tool like Google’s Keyword Planner. The tool will give you an idea of the cost and competition to reach your target audience in Google search.

#2 – Set Clear Campaign Goals

Along with setting a budget early in the process, you also need to set clear goals for what you want these ads to accomplish. Are you trying to make sales, or simply build brand awareness and get prospects into the top of your funnel? Those are two dramatically different objectives, and they will require different techniques to achieve success. Make sure to map your goals to conversion actions within your Google Ads account and ensure that the actions are tracking properly. That way, you’ll be able to better track the ROI of your advertising budget.

#3 – Spend Time on Ad Copy

You can never spend too much time on the copy for your Google Ads. Remember, you only have a very small space with which to grab attention and only a short time in which to grab it. As a result, your ad copy needs to be sharp, to the point, and as clear as possible. It’s very unlikely that the first ad you write will be your best, so create plenty of options and try them out to see which wins. Make sure you have a list of your company’s main selling points and points of differentiation accessible while you write ad content. Include these items in the headlines and descriptions of your ads.

#4 – Test, Test, Test

Speaking of trying out ad options, that leads us right into this next tip – testing your ads relentlessly. A Google Ads campaign is never “done”, as there will always be more you can do to fine-tune the copy, your keywords, your bids, and more. Commit to a relentless schedule of testing your ads to pursue even better results as time passes. Also, make sure to test the various campaign types offered by Google. Google Ads isn’t all about search. For example, you can also reach your target audience on YouTube, Gmail, apps, and other websites all within Google Ads.

#5 – Assess Conversion Quality

Conversions in Google Ads are valuable actions a user takes on your website or mobile app after clicking your ad. Making a purchase, filling out a form, signing up for a newsletter, or downloading an app are examples of conversion actions. Tracking conversions can reveal which keywords, ads, and targeting methods are getting the best results. There are various ways to create conversion actions in Google Ads, including importing conversions from Google Analytics 4 (GA4) or tracking actions via Google Tag Manager (GTM). However, simple conversion monitoring isn’t sufficient. You must evaluate the quality of the conversions. For example, if your primary conversion actions are lead form submissions, are the leads of a high enough quality for your sales team to actually make a sale?

#6 – Review Bids Regularly

Bidding is a complicated process that probably deserves an article of its own. In this space, we will simply say that your bids should be reviewed on a consistent basis to make sure there are no opportunities that have opened up to be exploited. Bidding too low will cause you to struggle to reach conversions while going too high might add unnecessarily to your spend. Your bidding strategy will vary greatly depending on your end goal. Reducing your cost-per-conversion (CPC) or cost-per-aquisition (CPA) are common objectives in bid management. The cost per acquisition measures how much money your company spends to make a sale. What you want to pay per conversion depends on your sales, operating costs, and margins. However, in general, you should still strive for the lowest CPA possible, while still generating your target number of quality conversions or sales.

#7 – Thin the Keyword Herd

Are you sure that all of the keywords on your targeted keywords lists are relevant to the market you hope to reach? If you’ve been running ads for a while, there is a chance that some keywords have snuck into the mix that you don’t really want to use in your ad campaigns. Make it a point to review your Search Terms Report periodically and negative out irrelevant search terms to avoid wasting ad spend. By excluding irrelevant searches, negative keywords can help you save money by preventing your ads from being displayed to users who are unlikely to convert. Also, when your ads are displayed to a highly relevant audience, the likelihood of users engaging with your ads and taking desired conversion actions increases. This, in turn, can improve your ad quality score, leading to better ad positions and potentially lower costs.

#8 – Ad Extensions Are Your Friend

Google Ads ad extensions are additional links and pieces of information that can be added to your ads to make them more informative and useful to potential customers. Ad extensions provide more details about your business, products, or services and can help increase the visibility and performance of your ads. I recommend using as many as extensions as possible that are relevant to your business. Be sure to keep a close eye on your Google Ads account, as new extensions are periodically released in beta, and you won’t want to miss out on the latest additions.

#9 – Match Your Ads to Your Site Structure

It’s critical that the people who click on your ads enter your site at a point that makes sense based on the ad they found interesting. If the landing page you offer doesn’t quite connect to the ad that was presented, the site visitors are more likely to hit the “back” button than anything else. Your goal should be to have very close relevancy between your keywords (and audiences), the offer in your ads, and the landing page that users land on when they click the ads. A good exercise is to put on your “customer hat” and simulate the user process. If you searched for a keyword and saw the ad and landing page you’re using, would you click and convert? If not, what can you improve?

#10 – Ads in the Context of Your Funnel

If you have a clear funnel structure in place for how you make sales, your Google Ads should play an important – and logical – role in that funnel. Whether you are trying to bring in prospects that are near the top or bottom of your funnel, make sure the ads you write are targeted directly at people in those groups.

Another Approach

Rather than managing your own Google Ads campaign, you could turn the task over to us instead. We’ll apply our extensive experience running ads to find your target audience and bring in leads for a reasonable cost. Reach out today to learn more about how we can help grow your business.

About the Author

Matt Chiera

Matt Chiera is Founder & Principal Consultant at Ice Nine Online. Since forming the company in 2014, he’s helped Ice Nine Online’s clients generate millions of dollars in revenue from digital marketing. Matt taught digital marketing strategy and tactics at the Tribeca School’s Digital Professional Institute. Matt’s book “Digital Marketers Sound Off” has been ranked as the #1 book in the Web Marketing category on Amazon.