Google Ads

Mastering quality score is essential if you want to pay less per click and outrank competitors.

In this article you’ll learn the 80/20 of what you need to know about quality score. 

Let’s dive into it! 

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TABLE OF CONTENTS:

• Quality Score Simplified 
• How is Quality Score Calculated?
• How to audit your Quality Score?
• How to improve your Quality Score?
• Quality Score FAQ

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Quality Score Simplified 

Back in 2005, Google released Quality Score. 

This is a number from 1-10 that Google created to determine how relevant your ads are to what people are searching for (1 being the lowest relevance, and 10 being the highest). 

Google want’s people who search to find what they are looking for.

This way they come back to Google and search again in the future.

Quality Score is how they gamified the system to achieve this objective. 

It’s the perfect trinity between advertiser, searcher, and Google: 

• Advertisers are rewarded with lower costs when having higher quality scores
• People searching for answers on Google will now find more relevant information 
• Because people find relevant information they use Google again in the future 

Before Quality Score was introduced Google was filled with tons of  irrelevant ads leading to a poor experience for searchers and ultimately less people using Google in the future. 

(In my opinion) Quality Score was one of the most important features released that transformed Google into the most dominant search engine in the world. 

The secret to improving Quality Score is relevance.

How is Quality Score Calculated?

Ad relevance, landing page experience, and expected CTR are the three variables that go into calculating your Quality Score. Depending on how relevant each is to your keywords you’ll have a final score between 1-10 (1 being the lowest relevance, and 10 being the highest). 

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Ad Relevance

A metric that determines how relevant your keywords are to your ad copy. 

Above average signifies great relevance, below average signifies room for improvement, below average signifies poor keyword and ad copy relevance. 

Ad relevance is 100% in your control and below average ad relevance is usually the result of poor ad group structure resulting from too many keywords and/or few variations of ad copy. 

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Landing Page Experience

A metric that determines how relevant your keywords, ads, and post click experience matches the search intent of the user. 

It’s not just about having your keywords on the page, it also takes into consideration page load speeds, page structure (ex: H1, H2s, H3s), and mobile optimization. 

Above average signifies a great landing page experience, average signifies room for improvement, and below average signifies poor post click experience. 

Expected CTR

A metric that determines the likelihood of someone clicking on your ads once seen in the Google search results. 

In my experience auditing Google Ads accounts this is the #1 most common variable that drags down quality score for most accounts since it’s the least in your control. 

This is Google’s perception based on historical and predicted performance on how well you believe your ad will be engaged with. 

Above average signifies a highly engaging ad, average signifies room for improvement, and below average signifies poor ad engagement. 

How to audit your Quality Score?

Once you understand the basics of quality score that it is a factor of relevance and three components that determine whether you’re a 1-10 the next logical question becomes:

What’s impacting my quality score performance?

Here’s how to run a Google Ads quality score to find what’s impacting your performance. 

[EMBED YOUTUBE VIDEO]

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Step 1 - Download a keyword report 

Within your Google Ads manager navigate to the keywords section within your account:

Campaigns > Keywords (press G + K for a keyboard shortcut)

Modify your keyword columns to include:

• Quality Score
• Ad Relevance
• Landing Page Experience
• Expected CTR

Once completed download your keywords into a CSV.

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Step 2 - Summarize your keywords into a pivot table

Pivot tables are great for summarizing large amounts of data. 

Within Excel navigate to Insert > PivotTable to summarize your keyword report. 

Once complete format your table as follows:

• Rows = Quality Score
• Values = Count of Keywords
• Filter = Quality score 1-10 (exclude —) 

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Step 3 - Drill down to understand Quality Score performance

With your table setup now you can easily see overall quality score performance and drill down into specific elements such as ad relevance, landing page experience, and expected CTR. 

Switch your rows to drill down into each element of quality score to diagnose performance: 

• Ad Relevance; rows = Ad Relevance, values = count of keywords
• Landing Page Experience; rows = Landing Page Experience, values = count of keywords
• Expected CTR; rows = Expected CTR, values = count of keywords

How to improve your Quality Score?

After completing your Google Ads Quality Score audit it should be pretty clear which factor of QS is hurting your performance? (ex: ad relevance, landing page experience, expected CTR).

Here’s some recommendations on how to improve each QS factor: 

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Improving Ad Relevance

Below average ad relevance is a symptom of poor ad group structure. 

If you have below average ad relevance, fear not! Because this is 100% in your control.

Here’s some tips to improve your ad relevance: 

• Add more headline variations to your responsive search ads to include the keywords within your ad groups. 
• Keep your ad groups tightly grouped with thematic keywords, for the keywords that can’t fit the theme consider putting it into its own group with relevant copy.  
• Consolidate your active keywords and remove below average ad relevance variations that are not receiving any worthwhile impressions or clicks. 

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Improving Landing Page Experience 

Below average landing page experience is a symptom of poor post click experience. 

If you’ve been neglecting your landing pages this is where it’s going to bite you. 

Here’s some tips to improve landing page experience: 

• Include your primary keyword in your headline 1 to match search intent and your ad copy. 
• Run your landing page through PageSpeed Insights to find how you can improve the mobile and desktop experience. 
• Follow on page SEO best practices and have proper headline, and content formatting. Remember Google will crawl your landing pages so make sure it’s technically sound. 
• Install  a session recording tool to see how users behave on your landing page, the insights here are invaluable at understanding gaps. 

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Improving Expected CTR 

This is Google’s perception on how likely your ads will be clicked. 

Unfortunately this aspect of Quality Score is the least in your control but that doesn’t mean there isn’t anything you can do to improve it. 

Here’s some tips to improve your expected clickthrough rate: 

• Use as many ad extensions as possible (ex: sitelink, image, structured snippet, etc). Ad extensions provide more info to the searcher and make your ads larger. 
• Test new RSA ad copy on a monthly basis to consistently try and improve your ad clickthrough rate performance on an ongoing basis. 
• Monitor your account clickthrough rate trends month over month to combat negative trends. You can set up an automated rule within Google Ads to be notified automatically via email. 
• Audit your search terms report and build your negative keyword lists. Block  irrelevant impressions of your ads so that you can actually drive clicks. 
• Experiment with dynamic keyword insertion to see if it positively affects your ad CTR.

Quality Score FAQ

How long does it take to improve your quality score? 

Technically every time your keyword enters an auction quality score is recalculated to determine placement of your ad in relation to your competitors. 

However in my experience it usually takes a month to see significant changes in your overall score. 

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Should you worry about low quality scores? 

Yes, low quality scores should cause concerns but it shouldn’t be your initial priority. The first goal should be to drive relevant traffic and convert users. 

If you’re not currently accomplishing this then stressing about quality score is pointless as it’s really only a factor of reducing your costs and improving visibility. 

If you’re not already converting the visibility you do have, getting more of it won’t help. 

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What is a good quality score? 

A good quality score will fluctuate depending on your keyword strategy but overall I’d recommend having 70% of enabled keywords in your account with a score > 7. 

Just know this is highly circumstantial and if you’re running a competitive keyword strategy you will have lower quality scores by default given the difficulty of including your competitors in your ads. 

Hope you found this article helpful! 🔥

Check out our video tutorial linked if you want a visual walkthrough. 

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Resources for mastering B2B advertising

If you’re serious about mastering B2B advertising then you definitely need to join 1,000+ B2B marketers leveling up their paid advertising skill sets in AdConversion. 

‍Here’s 4 reasons why you should consider joining. Every one of our on-demand courses are:

✅  100% free access.

✅  Taught by vetted industry experts.

✅  Have workbooks, resources, and templates.

✅  Less than 10 minutes per lesson.

We believe every marketer should know how to scale paid ads so they can:

•  Scale their ideas
• Level up their careers
• Make a positive impact

Click Here to Join 1,000+ B2B Marketers Today and start leveling up your advertising skill set.

Takes < 90 seconds to sign up (seriously we timed it 😂)

There’s nothing worse than making bulk changes natively in Google Ads. 

If you’re ready to save hours bulk uploading campaigns, ads, and keywords. 

Mastering the Google Ads Editor is essential. 

Let’s cover everything you need to know 👇

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TABLE OF CONTENTS:

• What is the Google Ads Editor?
• How to get started with the Google Ads Editor?
• How to bulk upload campaigns, keywords, and ads with the Google Ads Editor

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60-second crash course on the Google Ads Editor

What is the Google Ads Editor?

It’s a free tool that you can install to update your campaigns offline including altering campaign settings, adjusting keyword bids, and creating new campaigns, ads, and ad groups. 

Any serious Google advertiser uses the editor to save hours performing tedious tasks. 

Make sure you download the latest version of the editor to follow along in this article. 

How to get started with the Google Ads Editor?

After installation add your Google Ads account within the Account Manager and download all campaigns so you have the most recent version of your account. 

The Google Ads Editor follows the same account structure:

Account > Campaign > Ad Group > Keyword > Ads

Highly recommend using the Hide Empty Types filter to reduce irrelevant options visible. 

How to bulk upload campaigns, keywords, and ads with the Google Ads Editor

The easiest way to bulk upload campaigns into the editor is using a google sheet template. 

This template should have the following fields fields available (at minimum): 

• Campaign 
• Ad Group
• Keyword

Get a copy the example template below here <<

Once you have your template copy you’re ready to get started. 

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Step 1: configure your campaign import template

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Fill in your import template with all the relevant campaign names, ad group, keywords, and ads. 

Do not modify the column headers as these are meant to match the editors default fields. 

Feel free to fill in whichever fields you find most relevant. 

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Step 2: Upload your campaign import template

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Once you’ve completed setting up your campaign import template with all your relevant details it’s time to import your campaigns into the editor. 

Navigate to Account > Import > Paste Text to begin the import process:

Once complete copy all of the column headers and rows you filled in in your import template and paste them into the import from text window:

Don’t worry about the blank “Not importing” columns this is due to the formatting of the import template I provided, instead review the fields that are filled in the column headers. 

Make sure everything is looking accurate according to what you want to import. 

Once complete click Process to import the campaigns, keywords, and ads. 

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Step 3: Configure your campaign settings and publish

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After reviewing your changes make sure to select Keep in order to retain them. 

Now you should have all of your campaigns, ad groups, keywords, and ads that you filled into your import template visible within the Google Ads Editor. 

The final step is to configure your campaign and publish your changes. ‍

Highlight each of your new campaigns at the sametime to apply the same campaign settings across of all them at once 🚀

Review all available campaign settings and uncheck the Display Network for search.

If you don’t want your campaigns to spend when published, change the status to Paused.

Once your campaigns are ready to be published into your live Google Ads account.

Select Post > Post Changes > Selected Campaigns 

That’s it! 🎉you’ve just saved hours and created campaigns in bulk.

Hope you found this article helpful, see you in the next one!

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Resources for mastering B2B advertising

If you’re serious about mastering B2B advertising then you definitely need to join 1,000+ B2B marketers leveling up their paid advertising skill sets in AdConversion. 

‍Here’s 4 reasons why you should consider joining. Every one of our on-demand courses are:

✅  100% free access.

✅  Taught by vetted industry experts.

✅  Have workbooks, resources, and templates.

✅  Less than 10 minutes per lesson.

We believe every marketer should know how to scale paid ads so they can:

•  Scale their ideas
• Level up their careers
• Make a positive impact

Click Here to Join 1,000+ B2B Marketers Today and start leveling up your advertising skill set.

Takes < 90 seconds to sign up (seriously we timed it 😂)

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Google Ads responsive search ads (RSA) don’t leave a ton of room available. 

With 30 character headlines, and 90 character descriptions. 

It’s tough to write persuasive and effective copy. 

In this article you’ll learn a simple 3-step framework to write responsive search ads. 

Let’s dive into it 👇

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TABLE OF CONTENTS:

• The 3-Part RSA Writing Framework
• The Anatomy of a Responsive Search Ad
• Should you pin headlines and descriptions in Google Ads?
• Advanced copy tips for writing Responsive Search Ads

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The 3-Part Google Ads RSA Writing Framework

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Here's a simple 3-part framework for writing Google Ads copy:

• The goal of headline 1 = match intent
• The goal of headline 2 = differentiate between other results
• The goal of headline 3 = provide a clear CTA

Keyword: b2b google ads course

• H1: Free B2B Google Ads Course (matches intent)
• H2: No Lesson Longer Than 10-Mins (differentiates)
• H3: Join 1,000+ B2B Marketers (clear CTA)

Here's what it looks like in practice (image below):

When writing, always assume the H3 isn't visible, and if only the H1 was displayed would they get it? 

(Google is always testing different display variations)

From here you would write different variations per position. 

With ensuring legibility between headline combinations. 

Simple but effective ✌️let’s dive into each headline further. 

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The goal of headline 1 = match intent

You’ve got a fraction of a second for a prospect searching on Google to understand if your ad is relevant to their search term. 

Don’t mess this up by being vague, asking rhetorical questions, or wasting valuable characters. 

When it comes to Google Ads the headline 1 position would be eighty cents out of your dollar. 

Maximize your headline 1 by adding the primary keyword in your copy to match intent. 

This is such a simple thing to do, and equally not to. 

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The goal of headline 2 = differentiate between other results

Now that you’ve caught the searchers attention by matching intent it’s time to stand out. 

Here’s a real example of what NOT to do from ads that appeared searching SOC2 compliance:

The sequence of which you write your headlines matter.

This is why I recommend following the 3-part framework as shown. 

Use the headline 2 position to write a core benefit or outcome for differentiation. 

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The goal of headline 3 = provide a clear CTA

Finally in the third headline it’s time to provide a clear call to action. 

This can be as simple as: 

• Request a Demo
• See For Yourself
• Learn More Today! 

When writing your H3 just assume it won’t be visible most of the time as Google is always experimenting with how they display headlines. 

The Anatomy of a Responsive Search Ad

Now that you understand how to approach writing RSA copy.

Let’s discuss how responsive search ads actually function. 

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Character counts for Responsive Search Ads

• You can write up to 15 headlines, and 4 descriptions. 
• 30 characters available per headline
• 90 characters available per description 

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How Responsive Search Ads work

The idea behind responsive ads is Google will take your 15 headlines and 4 descriptions and automatically combine them to find the optimal variations based on machine learning. 

The promise is you can leverage Google’s AI to do the heavy lifting as it will take into account a multitude of factors including keywords, search terms, devices, audience demographics and more. 

Google also tries to guide advertisers on how well their doing when writing responsive search ads with their Ad Strength metric 💩(which we’ll cover in detail shortly). 

With each headline and description you have the opportunity to pin positions.

This is where you’re forcing Google to only serve those variations within that specific placement. 

Should you pin headlines and descriptions in Google Ads?

The answer here is an unequivocal YES, because if your ads aren’t legible they won’t be clicked. 

In a perfect world Google will automatically combine your headline and descriptions perfectly based on performance AND legibility but in reality it doesn’t happen. 

Instead you end up with a bunch of variations like this: 

I personally would LOVE ♥ ️ if Google’s AI can mix and match ads perfectly for performance and legibility but unfortunately the tech still isn’t there.

So in order to prevent this from happening I recommend strategic pinning. 

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How to pin Google Ads headlines strategically

In order to get the benefits of both Google’s AI to mix and match top performing headline/description combinations AND legibility you’ll need to pin strategically. 

Here’s what it looks like in practice: 

• Write 2-3 variations of Headline 1 and pin to position 1
• Write 2-3 variations of Headline 2 and pin to position 2
• Write 2-3 variations of Headline 3 and pin to position 3
• Write 2 variations of Description 1 and pin to position 1
• Write 2 variations of Description 2 and pin to position 2

This will give you the benefit of testing multiple variations per position but safely as you can control which possible combinations are matched for legibility. 

What is Ad strength and does it matter? 

Ad strength is a score created by Google to help advertisers optimize their ad performance ranging from Incomplete → Poor → Average → Good → Excellent. 

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Ad strength misconceptions to be aware of

1. Ad strength has ZERO bearing on actual performance, it's just a predictor of it. 
2. Having a poor ad strength doesn’t mean your ad won’t actually perform well.
3. Having a poor ad strength doesn’t mean your ads won’t receive impressions. 

What determines if your ad appears is your Ad Rank. 

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Pin strategically with 2-3 variations of headlines and you’ll be ok, it’s also what Google suggests if you decide to pin. 

Advanced copy tips for writing Responsive Search Ads 

Now that you know how to write effective responsive search ads let’s wrap with some advanced tips you can implement to make your ads perform even better. 

Implement Dynamic Keyword Insertion (DKI)

Dynamic Keyword Insertion allows you to change your ad copy in real time based on the keywords that are triggering your ads in order to create more relevant experiences. 

Currently there are 3 types of DKI available:

• Keyword Insertion = insert the keyword that triggers your ad
• Countdown = insert a timer that counts down to an event
• Location insertion = insert the location that triggers your ad 

Test variations of your RSAs using relevant DKI parameters vs not to see if it impacts performance. 

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Leverage Business Name, Logo, and Image Ad Extensions

Now that Google allows you to highlight your business name and logo in your RSA, don't waste the characters anymore referencing your brand in your ad copy. 

Save those valuable characters as you’re already getting brand awareness and instead maximize each character according to the 3-Part Google Ads RSA writing framework.  

Ad extensions should always be used as a best practice but when it comes to writing effective Google Ads copy don’t forget to utilize your extensions to provide more information. 

Hope you found this article helpful, best of luck on your next set of ads! 

‍

Resources for mastering B2B advertising

If you’re serious about mastering B2B advertising then you definitely need to join 1,000+ B2B marketers leveling up their paid advertising skill sets in AdConversion. 

‍Here’s 4 reasons why you should consider joining. Every one of our on-demand courses are:

✅  100% free access.

✅  Taught by vetted industry experts.

✅  Have workbooks, resources, and templates.

✅  Less than 10 minutes per lesson.

We believe every marketer should know how to scale paid ads so they can:

•  Scale their ideas
• Level up their careers
• Make a positive impact

Click Here to Join 1,000+ B2B Marketers Today and start leveling up your advertising skill set.

Takes < 90 seconds to sign up (seriously we timed it 😂)

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Thinking about investing in Google Ads for your SaaS but not sure how much it will cost? 

In this article I’ll break down how to create a winning budget strategy step by step. 

You’ll walk away knowing how much you’ll need to invest on a daily, monthly, and quarterly basis. 

And most importantly if Google Ads makes sense for your business. 

Let’s dive into it 👇

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TABLE OF CONTENTS:

• How much budget is required for a starting Google Ads budget?
• How to forecast a daily, monthly, and quarterly Google Ads budget
• How to allocate Google Ads budget by  campaign strategy
• Frequently asked Google Ads budget questions

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How much is required for a starting Google Ads budget?

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This is the first question that usually comes to mind when considering Google Ads. 

Which will then be met with a variation of questions such as: 

• Is $10/day enough for Google Ads?
• Is $100/day enough for Google Ads?
• Is $1,000/day enough for Google Ads?

And so on, and so on… 

When the reality is it’s all circumstantial based on the keywords you’re looking to target. 

Equally important to how much is required is how many people are searching? 

You could have a keyword that costs $0.01 per click but if only 5 people search is it really worth it? 

So in order to answer this question you have to perform keyword research with the Keyword Planner.

Navigate to Tools > Planning > Keyword Planner within your Google Ads account to access it. 

It doesn’t cost anything to open a free Google Ads account so anyone can access this tool. 

Within the Google Ads Keyword Planner enter your dream keyword you want to research. 

For example, I’ll use “google ads courses” as an example: 

After researching I can see the following keyword costs and monthly volume estimates:

I recommend always using the top of page bid (high range) as your estimate. 

I’ve never seen these estimates be 100% accurate and you’ll never know your real CPC until launch. 

To account for this margin of error I recommend adding +20% on top of your top of page estimate. 

This means in our google ads courses example:

• It would potentially cost me $13.7 per click ($11.42 +20%) 
• I can receive up to 1,600 clicks per month in the USA. 

Based on these two data points we can assume it’s possible to spend up to $21,920 per month on this keyword ($13.7 * 1,600). 

Outside of the return on investment, don’t forget about return on effort. 

If your dream keywords have very limited search volume (ex: < 100/month) it might not be worthwhile. 

How to forecast a daily, monthly, and quarterly Google Ads budget

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Once you know your estimated cost per click you’re ready to put together a forecast. 

We’ve created a free Google Ads Budget Calculator tool that you can use to easily plan your daily, monthly, and quarterly budget. 

You’re going to need the following information for the forecast: 

• Your average cost per click (from the Keyword Planner or real data) 
• Your quarterly sales goal 
• Your average win rate 
• Your average revenue per sale

With all this information at hand you’ll plug these different values into the calculator. 

Based on your landing page conversion rates you can model a worst, moderate, and best case. 

From here you can see how much it will cost to acquire a customer and the budget required to hit your sales volume target. 

I highly recommend paying attention to the number of clicks required per lead, this will help frame expectations on how much traffic you’ll need and if your search volume is sufficient. 

As you’ll see, your landing page effectiveness is essential at reducing costs 💥

With this forecast at hand you’ll know exactly how much to invest. 

How to allocate Google Ads budget by  campaign strategy

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You should be clear on how much you’ll need to invest in your Google Ads campaigns. 

Now the next step is to figure out how you’re going to allocate your budget. 

In my experience managing Google Ads campaigns for B2B SaaS companies, there are five proven campaign themes to invest in; NonBrand, Brand, Competitive, RLSA, and Content. 

Here’s my recommendation on budget allocation by each if you want to maximize volume. 

Use all of these as starting points and modify the amounts based on your data/nuances. 

NonBrand = 40% of total budget

NonBrand campaigns are where you’re bidding on high-intent keywords that don’t include your brand, for example google ads courses would be non brand for us at AdConversion. 

Think about your keywords you’d like to cover that problem aware prospects would search for. 

NonBrand keywords typically contain high-intent modifiers such as: 

• Software
• Platform
• Tool
• Technology
• Solution

If you have enough search volume on non brand keywords there’s no easier way to drive conversions than showing up for people looking for solutions to their problems. 

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Brand = 20% of total budget

Brand campaigns are commonly referred to as “defense” campaigns where you’re bidding on your own brand name to outrank competitors bidding on yours.  

You can make the case that people searching your branded terms would convert anyways and it’s not worth the investment. 

This is why I recommend no more than 20% of the total budget on this campaign initially. 

I’ve seen exceptions here with some of our clients where they saw net new revenue decline significantly from pausing their branded campaigns. 

Let your data guide your allocation. 

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Competitive = 25% of total budget

Competitive campaigns are the opposite of brand where you’re bidding on competitors' names to appear for their existing customers and prospects. 

These campaigns can be really hit or miss depending on your execution.

Make sure you’re doing it in a classy way and have dedicated comparison pages. 

This theme can be really powerful at driving qualified traffic as these searchers are solution aware. 

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RLSA = 10% of total budget

RLSA stands for remarketing list for search ads. 

This just means search remarketing, anyone that searches your keywords AND is part of an audience. 

For example, anyone that has been to your site in the past 90 days and is searching your keywords.

RLSA campaigns can be really powerful when you have enough site traffic and are dealing in competitive niches. 

Depending on your available remarketing audience sizes you can decide if this makes sense initially. 

Given the limitation of size we typically only allocate 10% here to begin. 

Content = 5% of total budget

Content campaigns are great for supporting SEO efforts. 

If you have certain keywords you’re struggling to rank for, content campaigns are worth investigating. 

This is where you’re going to bid on longtail content related keywords that typically have much lower cost per click prices and drive that traffic to a blog or relevant content piece. 

Depending on your content strategy I’d give this some consideration. 

Hope you found this article helpful! and now know how to create a winning Google Ads budget strategy. 

Frequently asked Google Ads budget questions

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Does Google Ads work on a small budget?

Yes, and no. Small is relative to your average cost per click prices. 

I’d recommend being able to afford at least 100 clicks per month. 

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Does Google Ads work for B2B SaaS? 

Absolutely, intent is what makes Google Ads so powerful. 

The biggest challenge for B2B SaaS is scale. 

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What is a good Google Ads budget? 

A Google Ads budget is one where you can support your business objectives. 

Using the following information you can create a forecast to understand what is good: 

• Your average cost per click 
• Your quarterly sales goal 
• Your average win rate 
• Your average revenue per sale

‍

Resources for mastering B2B advertising

If you’re serious about mastering B2B advertising then you definitely need to join 1,000+ B2B marketers leveling up their paid advertising skill sets in AdConversion. 

‍Here’s 4 reasons why you should consider joining. Every one of our on-demand courses are:

✅  100% free access.

✅  Taught by vetted industry experts.

✅  Have workbooks, resources, and templates.

✅  Less than 10 minutes per lesson.

We believe every marketer should know how to scale paid ads so they can:

•  Scale their ideas
• Level up their careers
• Make a positive impact

Click Here to Join 1,000+ B2B Marketers Today and start leveling up your advertising skill set.

Takes < 90 seconds to sign up (seriously we timed it 😂)

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Want to master Google Ads for B2B? 

We’ll dissect Google Ads from a 10,000 foot view in this guide. 

So you can walk away knowing: 

• What is Google Ads? 
• Is your ideal B2B buyer searching on Google? 
• How can you get your ad seen on the top of Google?
• How much does Google Ads cost?

So whether you’re a SaaS founder, performance marketer, or in-house marketer looking to: 

• Scale demo and trial requests for your new B2B SaaS startup 
• Run Google ads for clients or launch  campaigns internally
• Work with  freelancers or agencies running your Google Ads 

It all starts here with the fundamentals, so let’s dive in! 👇

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

• What is Google Ads? 
• Is Your Ideal B2B Buyer Searching on Google?
• How Much Does Google Ads Cost?
• How to Forecast Your Google Ads Budget
• Why is Google Ads So Powerful?
• How Can You Get Your Ad Seen on the Top of Google?

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What is Google Ads? 

Google Ads is an auction place. 

Or as I like to think about it, a battleground. 

Where you have thousands of advertisers competing against each other to show up on the top of Google when their ideal prospect searches for their products & services.

With 8.5B + searchers happening per day on Google there is a very HIGH likelihood your ideal B2B buyer is using Google to find information, and research solutions. 

Is Your Ideal B2B Buyer Searching on Google?

Depending on the niche you’re in Google may or may not make sense. 

You can create a free Google Ads account and leverage the Keyword Planner to validate demand. 

All you need to do is research the ideal keyword your dream buyer would search and review the average monthly search volume and top of page bid estimates.

In the example below, I can see that for “email marketing software” there is:

• 1,000 - 10,000 average monthly searches
• $49.75 top of page bid estimate 

If your ideal keyword has > 100 searches per month, Google can be a worthwhile return on effort. 

How Much Does Google Ads Cost?

Before diving into how much does Google Ads cost? 

With Google Ads you’re only charged on a cost-per-click (CPC) basis. 

Meaning you only pay Google if someone clicks your ad, so unlike traditional advertising you’re not being locked into a fixed contract and paying just for eyeballs (aka impressions). 

So in short if someone sees your Google Ad and doesn’t click, you won’t pay. 

This is what makes Google Ads so attractive, but extremely competitive.

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Here’s two ways to find out how much Google Ads will cost for your ideal keywords:

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1/ Review Top of Page Bid Estimates in the Google Ads Keyword Planner 

As shown in the previous step you can leverage the Keyword Planner to find bid estimates. 

In my experience these estimates are never 100% accurate and recommend adding 20% on top of the top of page bid estimate to be safe. 

For example, with the keyword of email marketing software we have a $49.75 top of page bid estimate, adding 20% makes it $59.70 allowing us a margin of error to better set expectations. 

2/ Launch a Pilot Campaign for $100

Ultimately you’ll never know your real cost per click prices until launching. 

If you’re seriously considering Google Ads I recommend launching a pilot campaign for $100. 

The whole objective of this campaign is to understand; what is my REAL cost per click price? 

Here’s a simple cheat sheet for setting up this campaign: 

• Campaign Name = {Region}_{KeywordTheme}_{MatchType}
• Locations = {Your Target Country/Region/State}
• Match Type = Exact
• Bidding = Manual CPC

This setup will allow you to have the greatest control to discover your real CPC prices. 

How to Forecast Your Google Ads Budget

Once you know the following: 

• Your quarterly sales goal 
• Average cost per click
• Opportunity win rate 
• Revenue per sale 

You can easily forecast a daily, monthly, and quarterly budget using our Google Ads Budget Calculator based on worst, moderate, and best case scenarios. 

Give it a look, there’s a video tutorial on the page for you explaining the process. 

Why is Google Ads So Powerful?

Intention Is what makes search advertising so powerful  🤝

You can reach exactly the right person, in the right place, in the right location searching for your specific product or service. At that point all you have to do is show up and not mess things up.

I always say Google Ads is a blessing and a curse; they bless you with intent, and curse you with scale. 

Given your industry search volume will vary dramatically and it can become hard to scale. 

The key is to win Google’s Ad Rank game to offset competitors and rising click prices. 

How Can You Get Your Ad Seen on the Top of Google?

Every time you search for something on Google (or other search engines such as Yahoo, Bing, and Firefox) the results page you’re directed to afterwards is the Search Engine Results Page (SERP).

I like to think of the SERP as the Battleground in which Google Ads takes place. 

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The SERP is Divided Between Paid and Organic Results.

The Google SERP usually has about 3-4 paid ads at the top and 3 at the bottom.

Ad Rank Determines the Position of Your Ad on the First Page

Which determines if your ad is on top of the first page of or nowhere to be seen.

Your goal is to appear in the top 3 spots as click-through rates decline with lower positions.

Higher Position Doesn't Always Mean Greater Cost

The remarkable thing about Google Ads is that you can be #1 on the page and pay less than your competitors who are in positions lower than you (hypothetical example below). 

If after reading this article you believe Google Ads is worth further exploration. 

Build on this fundamental understanding of Google Ads for B2B. 

Hope you found this useful! 

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Resources for Mastering B2B Advertising

If you’re serious about mastering B2B advertising then you definitely need to join 1,000+ B2B marketers leveling up their paid advertising skill sets in AdConversion. 

‍Here’s 4 reasons why you should consider joining. Every one of our on-demand courses are:

✅  100% free access.

✅  Taught by vetted industry experts.

✅  Have workbooks, resources, and templates.

✅  Less than 10 minutes per lesson.

We believe every marketer should know how to scale paid ads so they can:

•  Scale their ideas
• Level up their careers
• Make a positive impact

Click Here to Join 1,000+ B2B Marketers Today and start leveling up your advertising skill set.

Takes < 90 seconds to sign up (seriously we timed it 😂)

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Looking to research competitor's Google Ads? 

In this guide I'll walk you through how to find their best ads, and reverse engineer their strategy. 

Regardless of if your budget is as low as $10/day or $10,000/day, the same process applies. 

We’ll first focus on analysis in this guide and then dive into strategy. 

Let’s get into it! 👇 

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

• How to Find & Research Competitors Google Ads
• Free Tools to Find Examples of Competitors Google Ads
• Paid Tools to Find Examples of Competitors Google Ads
• How to Break Down Your Competitors Google Ads Strategy

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How to Find & Research Competitors Google Ads

Pablo Picasso once said “good artists copy, and great artists steal” taking inspiration from what works from your competitors and transforming it into  “your own” way is a sound approach. 

Just remember this can sometimes lead to a situation where everyone is copying each other and no one has any real idea of what their doing in the first place 😅

Ultimately beating your own baseline performance is what you should obsess about. 

With this disclaimer out of the way, you first need to know what competitors you want to research. 

You can find who you’re up against with the auction insights report in Google Ads. 

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Find this report by navigating to Keywords > Auction Insights within your Google Ads account. 

• Sort this report by Impression Share to understand how visible you are against your competitors for your targeting criteria (ex: keywords, locations, audiences). 
• Review the Top of page rate as well to understand how often you and your competitors appear within the top 3 positions of Google. 

Now that you have an understanding of who your competitors are. 

Let’s dive into the free and paid tools you can use to conduct Google Ads competitor analysis. 

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Free Tools to Find Examples of Competitors Google Ads

Each of the following competitor analysis tools can be used for free, leverage whichever resonates. 

Google Ads Transparency Center

Source: https://adstransparency.google.com/ 

The Google Ads Transparency Center was released on March 29,  2023 as a way to help you quickly and easily learn more about the ads you see on Search, YouTube and Display.

Since the release of this tool it’s become an absolute goldmine for Google advertisers. 

Here’s how you can leverage the Google Ads Transparency Center for competitor analysis:

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1. Visit the Google Ads Transparency Center and enter your competitors domain URL 

2. Scroll down to see the most recent Search, YouTube, and Display ads

When scrolling through the results take note of the following:

• Number of total ads to understand how active your competitor is. 
• The language the ads are written in to know if your competitor is running localization strategy.
• The primary keyword your competitor is trying to target in the ad copy.
• {Parameters} in the ad copy to know if your competitor is using dynamic search ads or keyword insertion.

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3. Once you find an interesting ad click on it to reveal the target location 

• Click on the show anywhere button to reveal the target location for the ad. 

Armed with this information you can decide if you want to advertise to these same regions. 

If you only used 1 tool for Google Ads competitor analysis I’d recommend the  Transparency Center. 

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ISearchFrom

Source: https://isearchfrom.com/ 

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If you’re planning to advertise somewhere you’re not physically located and want to know which competitors are bidding on your target keywords, ISearchFrom is a great free tool to use. 

Here’s how you can utilize ISearchFrom for google ads competitor analysis:

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1. Visit ISearchFrom and enter your target country and keyword

2. Review the ads to uncover advertisers in your target location you might not be aware of 

From this simulated result for someone “physically” located in the United Kingdom I can see Coursera is advertising on google ads courses in this region. 

From here I can leverage the Transparency Center to uncover more ad examples from them. 

Again this is a great tool for finding competitors you’re not familiar with in locations you’re not in. 

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Paid Tools to Find Examples of Competitors Google Ads

Each of the following competitor analysis tools can be used for a fee,  use whichever resonates and fits your budget.

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SpyFu

Source: https://www.spyfu.com/ 

Price: $39-$79/month

If you’re looking for a simple tool to review examples of competitors Google Ads copy, target keywords, and landing pages.

SpyFu is a great tool to start off with, here’s how you can use it. 

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1. Visit SpyFu and enter your competitors domain 

2. Review your competitors estimated Google Ads budget and quantity of paid keywords

3. Navigate to “PPC Research > PPC Keywords” to see all paid keywords 

4. Head to “PPC Research > Ad History” to see all competitor ad examples by keyword

5. Uncover other top competitors “PPC Research > Competitors” you might know of

With this one tool you can get estimates of competitors' Google Ads budgets, review keywords, ads, and uncover opportunities across new competitors you might not know of. 

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Other paid tools: 

There’s no shortage of paid tools you can use to research your competitors.

Here’s a list of some others worth exploring: 

• SEMRush ($129-$499/month) 
• iSpionage ($59-$299/month)

Don’t get hung up on the tools.

Achieving the end outcome is ultimately key. 

Now that you know how to find and research your competitors Google Ads.

Let’s walk through how to break down their strategy. 

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How to Break Down Your Competitors Google Ads Strategy

Knowing what keywords and ad copy your competitors are using is a great starting point. 

But getting answers to questions like:

• How are my competitors structuring their campaigns? 
• How are they allocating budget? 

are crucial insights that can separate you from them. 

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1. Reverse Engineering URL Parameters

Once you know your competitors landing pages, which you can get from: 

• Searching keywords in Google and clicking on their ads
• Reviewing landing page URLs in SpyFu’s Ad History report

You’ll want to review their UTM parameters to get insights on the goal of this campaign, target keyword, and anything else around how it was set up. 

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URL Parameter Example #1 - Zoho

For example, I searched CRM software and clicked on this ad from Zoho:

When reviewing the URL post click I can see the following parameters:

/?network=g&device=c&keyword=crm%20software&campaignid=14928929712
&creative=552506800726&matchtype=e
&adposition=&placement=&adgroup=130022006802&gad_source=1
&gclid=Cj0KCQjw3tCyBhDBARIsAEY0XNlAKXey
TKDzEJQDpeNh2giI4p8sVSnWKqsvlND5bvZa_J
q62wCqSFoaAsc1EALw_wcB 

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By reviewing the URL structure I can gather the following information:

• Network = g | they’re advertising on Google Search
• Device = c | they’re running ads on Desktop devices
• Keyword = crm software | they’re bidding on crm software
• Matchtype = e | they’re using exact match 

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URL Parameter Example #2 - Freshworks

Let’s use one more example to drive this home with the Freshworks ad that was underneath Zoho:

?tactic_id=6071454&utm_source=google-adwords&utm_medium=FSales-Search-InsideEU-FSE-RLSA-New
&utm_campaign=FSales-Search-InsideEU-FSE-RLSA New&utm_term=crm%20software&device=c
&matchtype=p&network=g
&gclid=Cj0KCQjw3tCyBhDBARIsAEY0XNkaG_AiGqCRYj-AEcuQcnvJS_3eI0bS6jIKu_
M7JRmqOYwSIGwuc6UaAvYqEALw_wcB&gad_source=1 

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Here’s what I’m able to gather from the URL structure:

• Source = google-adwords | they’re advertising on Google Search
• Campaign  = FSales-Search-InsideEU-FSE-RLSA-New | they’re advertising in the EU and running a remarketing list for search ads campaigns.
• Term = crm software | they’re advertising on the keyword crm software
• Device = c | they’re bidding on desktop devices
• Matchtype = p | they’re using phrase match

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With this information you can start to get answers into how your competitors are structuring their campaigns and it’s freely available and ready for those advertisers that are savvy enough to look.

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2. Keyword Classification 

How are your competitors allocating budget?

Now you’ll never know the answer to this question with absolute certainty but with some manual work here’s how you can try and piece together a sense of their strategy allocation. 

You’ll need one of the paid tools listed above in order to perform this keyword analysis. 

I’ll be using SEMRush for the sake of demonstration but the general process is the same across tools. 

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1. Export all of your competitors paid keywords into a CSV 

2. Filter the Last Seen column by the most recent month to see active keywords 

3. Add a new column called “Theme” and classify each keyword by campaign theme. 

This step can take some significant time but can be well worth the effort to understand your competitors keyword strategy and budget allocation priorities. 

With your custom column of “campaign theme” you’ll want to manually classify each keyword. 

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Here’s the four campaign themes you’ll utilize for classification:  

• NonBrand = high-intent keywords that don’t include your brand name
• Brand = keywords containing your brand name
• Competitive = keywords that represent your competitors
• Content = keywords that are informational and research oriented 

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Watch this video for a deep dive on how to perform this advanced classification:

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4. Summarize your classified keywords into a pivot table to understand your competitors strategy and budget priorities 

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From here we can make some assumptions about what is working for our competitors. 

• 87% of Udemy’s keywords are NonBrand, 9% Brand, 4% Content, and barely 0% Competitive. 
• It’s safe to assume that the majority of the budget is supporting NonBrand, followed by Brand, Content, and ultimately Competitive. 

Based on this allocation I might want to focus on NonBrand first given the volume of investment Udemy seems to be spending on it, and avoid competitive keywords to start. 

This isn't 100% exact science but an advanced way to research your competitors Google Ads. 

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Need help calculating your stating Google Ads Budget? 

If you’re in need of help calculating your starting Google Ads budget check out our calculator. 

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Hope you found this article useful! 

See you in the next article or one of our free courses!

‍

Join 1,000+ B2B Marketers in AdConversion

If you’re serious about mastering B2B advertising then you definitely need to join 1,000+ B2B marketers leveling up their paid advertising skill sets in AdConversion. 

‍Here’s 4 reasons why you should consider joining. 

‍

Every one of our on-demand courses are:

✅  100% free access.

✅  Taught by vetted industry experts.

✅  Have workbooks, resources, and templates.

✅  Less than 10 minutes per lesson.

We believe every marketer should know how to scale paid ads so they can:

•  Scale their ideas
• Level up their careers
• Make a positive impact

‍

Click Here to Join 1,000+ B2B Marketers Today and start leveling up your advertising skill set.

Takes < 90 seconds to sign up (seriously we timed it 😂)

‍