Mastering Google Text Ads

Google Ads is the dominant advertising platform on the web, accounting for nearly 74% of all traffic.

Google Text Ads are one of the best ways to reach online users and are especially powerful when targeting keywords and search queries.

Ads occupy almost the full space above the fold on the search engine result page, making it difficult for users to see organic results.

Users are more likely to click on the top results rather than the ones at the bottom.

Advertising with Google Ads is the best way to make sure your results appear at the top of the SERP.

Keywords are the most essential part of a Google Ads account.

You can "intercept" users' queries through keywords that you upload on the Google Ads platform.

The purchase intent of users browsing on Google is way higher than those on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter.

You need to be advertising on Google. You need to put your product or service in front of users looking for it.

What users look for in Google is called "Search Query".

For example, "home insurance quotes in London".

Depending on the match type (find more info here), the "home insurance quotes in London" search query will trigger your keyword.

Your keyword, in turn, will trigger a text ad that you specifically wrote to advertise your home insurance products.

Search Query > Keyword > Text Ads

As you can see, the ad is very relevant to the user's search query.

This is because the marketer made a god job in pairing a relevant keyword (on the right of the screenshot) with an ad that advertises exactly a home insurance quote service.

Chances are that the user is going to click on this ad and visit the advertiser's website.

Negative Keywords are searches that are not related to your business.

You can add them to your account to make sure that your ads won't show up for irrelevant search queries.

Google Ads has two types of Text Ads: Expanded Text Ads and Responsive Search Ads.

Expanded Text Ads have three headlines, two descriptions, a Display URL made of two optional "paths", and the final URL.

Responsive Search Ads have up to 15 headlines and 4 descriptions. The system will rotate the headlines and descriptions to show up to 3 headlines and 2 descriptions at the same time. Google will choose the best combination of text that is relevant to any given search query.

Beware of the character limit for both Expanded Text Ads and Responsive Search Ads.

Google rewards you with higher ranking and lower cost per click for using its features in full.

Using all characters is hard work. You really need to get creative and get used to it.

Ads need to be relevant to the keywords in the same ad group

Use specific call-to-actions

Test your ads out!

Use descriptions to drive click-throughs