The Importance of Using Negative Keywords

If you are running (or planning on running) PPC ads on the Google Search or Bing Search networks, adding negative keywords is a crucial step in ongoing management. For campaigns containing phrase match, broad match modified, or broad match keywords, there is a large possibility that you are wasting money on unrelated clicks. These keyword match types can still prove to be a valuable tool for you to reach a wider audience that's still related if you follow the tips below.

You can benefit from determining which types of words and search terms are irrelevant to your company and don't add value. From there, begin to compile these into an ongoing negative keyword list which you can apply to specific ad groups, or the campaign as a whole. Some of the most common negative keywords to add right from the start can be added to a shared keyword list which can be applied across your account.

However, that is just the beginning. Consistency is the name of the game here and by adding irrelevant and unrelated keywords you will ensure you only spend on terms that are most likely to lead to a conversion.

The search terms tab is an extremely important place to monitor and analyze on a regular basis. Here, you can see the exact search terms which triggered each ad to show as it relates to the keywords in their respective campaign. As you begin to sort through these on a regular basis, you might be surprised that you are literally throwing money in the garbage for searches that add zero value to your brand or company.

One of the major money wasters is people searching for unrelated locations.

For example, let's say you run a car wash in Tampa, FL. You are running a Google Search campaign with phrase match keywords such as "car wash" targeting people within a 5 mile radius. If John lives in Tampa but works in Saint Pete, he might end up conducting a Google Search from home because he wants to get a car wash after work.

If he happens to search "car wash saint pete" and click on your ad that comes up you just wasted money on that click. This can be resolved by adding 'saint pete' and all its variations as negative keywords in the campaign. Put yourself in the users perspective when building out your keyword and negative keyword lists to be sure you cover all the bases.

Just like with normal keywords, negative keywords also play by the rules of "match types". It is crucial that you completely understand the impact each different match type has.

One of the most common things we see when auditing PPC accounts is wasted spend due to lack of negatives. You may be targeting awesome keywords, but if you are not staying on top of your search terms serious money could be getting spent on unrelated searches.

Even more important than the money lost is the opportunity cost. Instead of spending on irrelevant clicks, that money could have been allocated towards what ACTUALLY IS working in the campaign.

Often times a campaign has a handful of top performers and a plethora of underperforming ones. By identifying the strategy that adds the most value to your business and placing the focus on that, the more success you will achieve.