8 tips on Google AdWords campaigns from the CEO of a digital marketing agency

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Jackie is a star contributor for Tech in Asia and publishes exclusive, high-value content that serves the Asian tech community. Read more from star contributors here.

Google AdWords is one of the strongest marketing tools in a digital marketer’s arsenal. However, it is also most likely to rack up your ad spend without giving you the returns. Unlike other PPC marketing channels such as Facebook and Instagram, Google AdWords is highly technical and will require far more tweaking.

On the bright side, it is also most likely to give you high conversion rates, as it is based on search intent. Yup, users are searching for your keywords because they are looking for your exact product/service.

As the founder of a Google AdWords agency, here are some lessons I’ve learned from our clients’ campaigns.

1. You may not be using the right keywords

The most relevant keywords to use are the products/services themselves. However, these generally won’t be enough to run the entire campaign.

For example, when we were running preschool campaigns for our client, we ran not just the keyword “preschool,” but “preschool Singapore,” “Singapore preschool,” and more. While certain keywords like “kindergarten” and “childcare” might seem related, they are not directly relevant. After experimenting with these for a while, we turned them off, as they did not produce results.

2. Too many keywords in a single ad group affects quality score

Google’s Keyword Planner is a great tool to explore and expand on your existing keywords. However, don’t go trigger happy and add every keyword that Google proposes! Having too many in an ad group means that your ad copy won’t match your keywords exactly, which causes a low quality score.

Why is your quality score important? As we’ve experienced, a good quality score means that ads will appear higher in searches and cost less, while a poor one will make ads cost more to appear.

The quality score is comprised of your ad’s:

• Click-through rate
• Keyword relevance to the ad group
• Landing page quality and relevance
• Ad text relevance
• Historical AdWords account performance

While it makes sense to have only one or two keywords per ad group for razor-sharp targeting, it can be too much work to manage. I’d recommend no more than 10 keywords per ad group.

We tested this with one of our clients’ campaigns and it did result in a 63 percent lower cost per click. If you’re interested, the full case study can be found here.

3. Using negative keywords

Negative keywords are super critical in managing ad spend, especially when you use a lot of broad keywords. While broad keywords give you more impressions and clicks, it also has the potential to give you a lot of irrelevant searches.

4. Sending traffic to the wrong landing page

5. Your landing page may need improvement

6. Don’t ignore ad extensions

7. Testing your ad copies

8. Testing optimal ad positions

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