Negative keywords are keywords that you place in your Adwords account to prevent your ads showing up for irrelevant search phrases and give you the traffic you want based on the goals of your campaign. There are many benefits to this with the main one being getting the most out of your budget. They follow the same rules as regular keywords in that you can use them as exact match, phrase match, broad match and modified broad match terms.
To get the most out of your ad account, it is best to start discovering your negative keywords from day one, this will make sure your campaigns are tidy and easy to manage going forward. However, you must always add your negative keywords with caution, as you do not want to divert wanted traffic away from your site and lose money.
How to identify and add Negative Keywords
– Go through each of your campaigns in your Adwords account and look at the keywords, you can choose the length of time to view these keywords, and also sort them by different titles including the number of Clicks, Impressions, and the Cost. Once you find an irrelevant keyword or search term, just add it straight to your negative keywords list – located in Tools.
– Within Adwords itself, you can use the Keyword Planner (also located in Tools). Simply type in your keyword to see a list of suggestions, this will also tell you what the estimated competition is and suggested bid amounts. You can also limit your search to any location giving you a more specific result. This planner will help you to judge your keywords relevance, and add negative keywords before they begin to eat into your budget.
– To add your negative keywords into Google Ads, you can either click into Tools – Negative keyword lists and click the + symbol. There you can give your list a name and start typing in your negative keywords line by line (this can be single words or phrases). Once you have created this list, you can scroll to the bottom and apply the list to different campaigns within your ad account. Another way to add negative keywords is to simply place a – symbol directly in front of your keyword in your Ad group Keywords.
Advantages of identifying Negative Keywords
– Figuring out what your negative keywords are will also improve your targeting, this is done by showing your ads to potential leads who are genuinely interested in your service. The way to get the best out of this is to identify your negative keywords in all of your campaigns.
– Managing your Adwords Account efficiently also includes regularly checking up on your campaigns, negative keywords could come up at any time so it is a necessity that your reviewing these terms frequently.
– The use of negative keywords will also give your campaigns a higher Click Through Rate (your CTR is the number of clicks your ad receives divided by the number of times your ad is shown) due to the fact your companies website is now only showing up for customers who are specifically interested in you and not in completely irrelevant searches that have nothing to do with your business. It could be a landing page, your main website, contact page or product page – they will all count as a click. If your site comes up to a searcher and they don’t see your business as relevant to them, they’re less likely to go further.
– As mentioned at the beginning of the post, using negative keywords ensure that you do not unnecessarily spend any of your budget; as it narrows down the relevant keywords and stops unwanted keywords driving traffic to your business, so you are not paying for visitors who are not interested in your business. This practice will reduce your Cost Per Click (your CPC is the amount you pay for each click in your PCP marketing campaigns) by keeping uninterested consumers out, only accepting those that have the desire to purchase what your business is offering. You do not want this kind of attention as it is unlikely you will get a lead from these searchers.
– Identifying negative keywords can also increase your Quality Score, your Quality Score is a rating from Google that indicates the relevance and quality of your keywords you are using. If visitors to your website are not finding what they’re looking for then this could make your CPC higher and give you a lower ad ranking.
