How to Optimize Google Ads: 9 Expert Tips for Higher ROI

Optimizing Google Ads involves ongoing keyword management, leveraging audience insights, and adding ad assets. Learn our top tips to improve campaign performance.

Google Ads campaigns can be a powerful tool to reach your target audience, increase conversions, and scale your business — as long as your strategy includes ongoing optimizations.

But with all the possible Google Ads optimizations, how do you determine which are worth your time and deliver the highest return on investment (ROI)?

From refining your audience targeting to using pivot tables, we’ll share nine highly effective ways to optimize Google Ads that will help you avoid wasting your ad budget and increase the impact of your campaigns — with expert insights from digital marketing expert Steven Dang.

What is Google Ads optimization?

Google Ads optimization is the process of examining your Google Ads data and making incremental changes to your campaign elements for improved performance.

Google Ads optimization focuses on key elements, including:

• Keywords
• Audience targeting
• Bidding strategies
• Budget
• Quality Score
• Ad types
• Ad copy and assets
• Campaign structure
• Landing pages
• Conversion tracking

9 tips for optimizing Google Ads

From bids to landing pages to keywords, it’s tricky to know what tasks can have the biggest impact.

So, where should you begin?

In this list, we narrowed down some of the most important optimizations to focus on. These will make the best use of the time you spend on your account.

1. Use negative keywords

Negative keywords are search terms that you want the algorithm to exclude your ads from showing up for.

In other words, when a user inputs a search term from your negative keyword list, your ad won’t be eligible for the auction. Therefore, it won’t show up.

Here’s an example of how it works. A law firm specializing in family law may want to include negative keywords around other types of law, such as “employment lawyer” or “personal injury attorney.”

In addition to ad group and campaign-level negative keywords, Google also offers account-level negative keywords. The account-level negatives will come in handy when you want to stop showing up for some searches across your whole account.

Some examples might be terms like “free,” “jobs,” “reviews,” and similar terms.

Use people’s interests to help target your ads in new ways. (Image: Unsplash)

2. Expand your target keywords

Once you’ve decided which keywords to exclude, let’s do a 180 and think about some that you might want to include.

Use Google’s Keyword Planner to discover new search terms. To start the keyword research process, simply enter keywords you already target or think may be relevant.

Keyword Planner will provide insights into those keywords and variants, as well as an estimated cost per click.

Your search terms report also offers insight into which search queries have triggered your ads so you can identify the highest performing keywords as well as low-performers.

Choosing the right keywords and keyword match types will help you achieve the performance you want on the Search Network. Rather than focusing on short keywords to optimize your Google Ads, also look at long-tail keywords (keywords that are around 3-5 words long).

Long-tail keywords’ greater specificity means that typically fewer people search for them, and as such, fewer businesses target them. The lower competition gives you a higher chance of ranking.

Longer keywords also tend to reach a more defined audience with higher intent, much like exact match keywords do.

3. Monitor metrics that correlate with revenue

Vanity metrics, such as impressions or clicks, may appear impressive. But without a direct correlation to revenue, they aren’t worth tracking.

The most important metrics to determine ad performance include:

• Conversions: A purchase, sign-up, lead form fill, or any other action that drives your business forward.
• Cost per conversion (CPA): How much you’re spending to achieve a single conversion.
• Conversion rate: The percentage of clicks that result in conversions.
• Return on ad spend (ROAS): Revenue generated for every dollar spent on advertising.

How to properly track valuable conversions

Focusing solely on clicks and impressions can lead you down the wrong path. Here are some expert tips to avoid getting sidetracked by vanity metrics:

Track micro-conversions: While the ultimate goal might be a sale or a lead, tracking smaller actions (micro-conversions) like newsletter sign-ups, video views, or time spent on-site can give you insights into user engagement and the effectiveness of your funnel.

These micro-conversions help you understand which stages of your funnel need improvement.

Use custom metrics: Develop custom metrics that align more closely with your business goals.

For instance, if customer loyalty is important, you might track repeat purchases or subscription renewals. This can provide a clearer picture of long-term campaign effectiveness.

Segment your data: Analyzing overall clicks and impressions doesn’t tell you much about performance. Segment your data by device, geography, time of day, and audience demographics to uncover more meaningful insights.

For example, you might find that mobile users convert at a higher rate during weekends, suggesting you should allocate more budget to mobile ads over the weekend.

4. Make the most out of in-market segments

“In-market segments” are Google’s way of grouping users based on their recent browsing and search behavior to identify people who are actively considering a purchase in a specific category.

You can review your in-market audience report inside Google Analytics to learn how to reach your target audience.

The first step to get the most out of in-market segments is to ensure your Google Ads account is connected to Analytics. Then:

• Make sure your Google Ads conversions are set up as goals in Google Analytics
• Look at the in-market segments report, filtered by that specific goal, to see which audience segments convert best
• Then take those high-converting segments back into Google Ads and add them as audiences with a bid adjustment (depending on which bidding strategy you’re using)

5. Leverage assets

Assets (formerly called ad extensions) are supplementary pieces of information that can be added to search ads to provide more detail, multiple paths of entry, and increased visibility without additional cost.

Some ad assets to consider using include:

• Call extensions: add your business phone number directly to your ads, which mobile users can click on for an instant call.
• Location extensions: add your business address to your ads
• Sitelink extensions: provide additional links to specific pages on your website.
• Price extensions: showcase your products or services with their respective prices.

Further reading: 11 Google Assets: How to Set Them Up (+Examples and Tips) 

6. Track everything, but only optimize for your most valuable action

Google’s smart bidding strategies (like Maximize Conversions or Target CPA) learn entirely from the conversion data you feed them. Give them the wrong signals, and they’ll optimize for the wrong outcomes.

This is why proper conversion tracking is so important.

And while you can track many actions across your site — form fills, PDF downloads, MQLs, SQLs — you should only set your most valuable, bottom-of-funnel actions as your account-level goals.

This tells Google exactly what a “win” looks like, so it can focus its energy on finding more of those users.

“To borrow from algebra, we provide the independent variables so the system can help us solve for the dependent ones,” explains Dang.

For example, a B2B SaaS business may track basic form fills or PDF downloads (valuable), MQLs (more valuable), and SQLs (most valuable).

All three are worth monitoring, but if SQLs are the actions that actually drive revenue, those are what Google should be optimizing for.

Too often, companies track conversions diligently but then include too many of them as account goals — which dilutes Google’s focus.

Instead, narrowing that signal to your highest-value actions is one of the most impactful adjustments you can make to improve lead quality and efficiency.

7. Target specific audiences using RLSAs

While remarketing lists are typically known for being an invaluable tool for improving display campaigns, they can also help you optimize your search campaigns.

RLSAs (Remarketing Lists for Search Ads) let you tailor your search campaigns based on whether someone has previously visited your site.

When you layer a remarketing list on top of your campaign, the search engine narrows the queries to audiences that have already been to your site.

This has obvious benefits in terms of optimizing your search ads, including more flexibility when targeting broad-match keywords and a higher chance of reaching a relevant audience.

If you are new to RLSAs, here are some best practices to remember:

• Use a large remarketing list: Audience lists need to be at least 1,000 users to be targetable in search campaigns. However, using a larger list of around 5,000-10,000+ users will yield better results.
• Duplicate existing campaigns to test RLSAs: RLSAs should run alongside a campaign, not in place of it. Duplicate your top-performing campaigns and then run them as RLSAs.

8. Look at the finer details

When you’re looking for optimizations, don’t just scratch the surface. Dive deep into the details of your campaign.

Review the best-performing times of the day. Do some times perform better than others? There may be times of day when your cost per click (CPC) is very high.

Set an ad schedule that excludes expensive and non-converting times of day to reduce wasted ad spend and improve CPA.

Here are some of the finer details you can look into:

Demographics

Are there specific age groups, genders, or household income levels that perform better than others? This information can help you tailor your campaigns to target the most responsive segments.

For example, if you run ads for a luxury skincare brand, you might find that women aged 35-54 are more likely to convert than other age groups. Use this insight to adjust your targeting and bids to prioritize this demographic.

Geographical targeting

Geographical targeting allows you to focus your ads on specific locations where your message resonates the most.

You can target broadly by countries or continents, or get super granular by regions, cities, or even postal codes.

For example, if your business sells sunblock, you might find that ads perform better in sunny states like Florida and California compared to less sunny regions.

Adjust your bids to be more aggressive in these high-performing areas, and consider reducing or eliminating spending in areas where performance is low.

Also, double-check your advanced location settings to ensure you’re targeting users physically located in your chosen areas, not just those showing interest in them. This can prevent wasted spend on irrelevant clicks.

Ad scheduling

Ad scheduling is a powerful feature that allows you to adjust your bids based on the time of day or day of the week. Analyze your campaign data to identify the best-performing times and set your ad schedule accordingly.

For example, if your ads perform best on weekdays from 9AM to 5PM but tend to underperform in the evenings and on weekends, adjust your schedule to spend more during peak times and reduce spending during low-performance periods.

Search partners

Deciding whether to use Google Search Partners can be tricky. While they can provide additional traffic, this traffic is often of lower quality. Assess your campaign goals and performance to make an informed decision.

If your campaign is already high-performing and you’re looking for more exposure, enabling search partners might be beneficial.

However, if quality over quantity is your goal, or if your return on ad spend (ROAS) is marginal, you might want to opt out of the search partner network.

Ad formats

With Performance Max campaigns playing a part in most advertisers’ strategies, breaking down performance by ad formats is important.

While you may not be able to run this report in Google right now, there are scripts that allow you to see performance by format. Many times, you’ll see that display ads or videos are spending more but not performing as well.

Use this data to plan your campaign strategies, or even decide whether or not to keep your Performance Max campaign running.

9. Revisit ad quality

A well-written ad helps keywords obtain a good Quality Score and attracts potential customers. You’ll know your ad copy resonates with the audience when it has a high clickthrough rate (CTR).

Your ads should include a call to action (CTA) and key details about your business.

A high Quality Score means searchers will see your ads often and will be inclined to click. Here are some ways to raise your Quality Score.

• Include popular keywords in your headlines and description lines for text ads in your Google Search campaigns
• Add promotional offers
• Include the benefits of working with your business
• Mention the features your business or product has

Remember, a high-performing ad comes from both A/B testing and competitor research.

When you have written an ad that has good ad relevance, expected CTR, and auction time ad quality, you’ll also have the benefit of a good ad rank.

A look at assets in action on the search engine results page.

How often should you optimize your Google Ads?

We recommend regular account optimizations once a month, with smaller adjustments on a daily or weekly basis.

Monthly optimizations allow you to check in with your goals, campaign performance, and the evolving market landscape.

This can minimize wasted ad spend on strategies that are no longer working.

Daily or weekly adjustments keep your account agile and allow you to adapt to any immediate issues like underperforming keywords, ad groups, or new trends in the market.

This way, you’re not wasting your budget on things that should have been fixed weeks ago.

While it can take anywhere from 4 to 8 weeks to gather enough data for meaningful optimizations, this timeline can be shorter or longer based on:

• Larger budgets
• Sufficient historical data
• A highly competitive landscape
• Unique goals

So, if you have a hefty ad budget and a treasure trove of historical data, you might see actionable results in just a couple of weeks.

In contrast, a smaller budget with limited data might stretch out to 8 weeks or more.

How to prioritize Google Ads optimizations

Google Ads has many parts to learn, and it can be hard to know where to start.

When you’re optimizing, you should prioritize three areas:

• Keywords
• Ad copy
• Campaign structure

“[Start] by doing a high-level audit or check of your campaign-level settings, double-checking your conversion tracking, and making sure that you have the ideal bidding strategy selected for your particular objectives,” advises Dang.

Next, evaluate your campaigns to ensure they follow best practices and are free of anything that might needlessly waste your budget.

Dang explains that this means:

• Evaluate every keyword to make sure it’s worth targeting
• Remove any costly or irrelevant keywords
• Stick to exact and phrase match types only
• Use a healthy list of negative keywords
• Use the right ad group structure (smaller ad groups with fewer keywords)

Pro tip: Refine your ad copy to ensure that your responsive search ads achieve high ratings from Google — aim for “good” or “excellent” ratings.

The takeaway

To see sustained growth in your PPC campaigns, optimizations need to be done regularly. Continuous monitoring and management is the key to Google Ads success.

But optimizations are about more than ad copy tweaks here and there.

Effective management involves strategic testing and monitoring, which demands expertise and time.

If you need help with your digital marketing strategy, reach out to HawkSEM. From PPC to SEO, our team of experts bring in an average 4.5X ROI for our clients.

This article has been updated and was originally published in October 2022.