A while ago I wrote a post on the Hard Truths of Google Ads. Since then a number of people have asked where are the first places I look when I inherit a Google Ads account.
There are a lot of bases to cover, but there are some checks that are always the same and although they might sound obvious, it is hard to believe how often they are hindering an accounts success.
Here are my “favourites” – bad choice of word, but you know what I mean.
Account time zone
If you don’t pay attention to the time zone of your account you will run into issues further down the line.
Most new advertisers are just keen to get ads up and running – but somewhere (hopefully sooner rather than later) they realise that they get better results on certain days – and time of day.
Some find that weekends are better than weekdays, others – the other way around. Some find that mornings work better than evenings.
Sometimes these things make sense, others they seem counter-intuitive. But these patterns start to emerge – and it makes sense to adjust your campaigns to leverage these patterns.
If your time zone is incorrectly set, you might find yourself running ads, or bidding higher at precisely the wrong time.
If you are then running ads in different countries in different time zones and need to adjust your schedules accordingly you need to get a pen and paper and write down the times to make sure your ads are running when you want them to – and when you think they are.
Too often have I audited Google Ads accounts only to discover that the time zone setting is not correctly set – it’s best to set it to the advertiser’s time zone and work from there.
Side Note – it doesn’t matter which time zone the target is in – the timezone that dictates when ads show is the advertiser time zone. So if you are in Europe and want to advertise to people in New York from 9am to noon – your ads need to target New York from 3pm to 6pm.
Location Targeting
Be sure that you are targeting people where you expect them to be. If you want to target people in Toronto, but sure to not only select Toronto, but also be sure in the Advanced Location Settings to choose the correct setting. There are three. and you probably do not want the default – that just makes more money for Google – and you pay for that.
One option is “Reach people in or regularly in your targeted location” this is the presence option. So people who live in Toronto or who regularly visit – perhaps people who live outside, but who work in the city.
Another is “Reach people searching for your targeted locations” this is the search interest option. This would be useful if, for example, you are advertising hotels or tourist attractions in Toronto. Or perhaps you sell property there.
The default setting, however, is a combination of both – “Reach people in, regularly in, or who’ve shown interest in, your targeted locations” – so anyone, almost. Anyone who might have run a search on anything Toronto related. Anyone who lives or visits there.
So why is this default setting so damaging? Because it gives Google a free rein to include almost anyone they want. And can include people from all over the world. when you want to target people in Toronto the last thing you want is to pay to run an ad to someone on the other side of the world who ran a search last week on the Raptors.
Side Note – if you do nothing about your location targeting you will be targeting the entire world. This isn’t a good option for anyone… except maybe McDonalds, or Coke.
Language Targeting
Again, of you do nothing about your language settings you will target everyone. But even when you target selected languages, you must be careful – because Google is not careful for you.
Imagine you want to target English and Spanish speakers in Miami – there’s a real mix, so you need to cover both options.
So you add English keywords and Spanish keywords, and you write ads in both languages.
Unless you split these into different campaigns – language targeting is managed at campaign level so having keywords and ads in separate ad groups doesn’t fix this – you can have someone searching in Spanish being served an English ad, and if they click on the ad, being taken to an English language page, where what you ideally want is the language being the same throughout the whole process.
Side Note – as a general rule run separate campaigns for each of the languages you wish to target – this helps avoid cross contamination.
Conversion Tracking
Way too often I see Google Ads accounts that are not correctly linked to Google Analytics. Without the linkage goals in Analytics cannot be recorded as conversions in Google Ads and, without this being correctly configured, you will not be able to evaluate the success or otherwise of your campaigns.
I have often explained to clients that at its core online marketing is simple – you have to do more of what works and less of what doesn’t – but without goal and conversion tracking you cannot tell which is which.
So ensure that you have meaningful goals configured and imported back into Google Ads as conversions to be in a position to properly review performance.
Side Note – the really important word in the sentence above is “meaningful” – one client had a conversion goal which was triggered by a visit to the landing page. 100% conversion rate – totally meaningless.
Budget Control
Even if you are getting low levels of traffic – set your budgets. If you leave yourself exposed to high levels of spend, you are inviting Google to spend right up to the limit. You wouldn’t give a teenager a credit card without a limit. Don’t give Google one – they are less responsible.
Instead, set your budgets for what you want to spend. If you don’t spend the entire budget, then you can increase bids, or add more keywords. But don’t set a daily limit that you don’t want to see multiplied by 30.4 at the end of the month.
Remember also that the key to a successful Google Ads campaign is not found in traffic levels. It’s found in the conversion rate. And once you have a decent conversion rate you can ramp up the budget so long as the conversion rate is maintained.
A well managed Google Ads campaign can be very profitable. Imagine being able to buy $100 for $80. The question changes from the seller asking “How many do you want?” to the buyer asking “How many do you have?” – in this case from Google asking “How much traffic do you want to buy?” to the advertiser asking “How much traffic is available?” This is the place we want to get to.
Side Note – the more you advertise the more money Google makes – regardless of how well this works for you – think about this.
Most of these checks are quick to run and easy to fix. In some cases they can lead to an immediate reduction in wasted ad spend. If you’d like us to audit your Google Ads account why not request a FREE consultation?
