3 common costly mistakes to avoid when running Google Ads

Google Ads could be your best lead and client generation platform and it could also be a money waster if done wrongly.

After many years of inheriting Google Ads account that are not doing well, I have seen a common trend in all of them that caused them to perform poorly.

These common trend is what I outlined in this article.

Mistake 1. Using Google Ads smart campaign

Google build smart campaigns to help rookies and businesses that don't either have the time or knowledge to create and manage a Google Ads campaign.

Smart campaigns only requires a little of your time to build but once it's built, you won't have to do anything to improve performance as Google will take over the day to day optimization and management of the campaign using AI.

Although, smart campaign relieves you of the stress and knowledge needed to build and managing a campaign, but handing over total control of the building and management of a campaign to Google is committing digital suicide.

I use Google AI to manage accounts but I don't do it by handing over complete control to Google.

I still make sure, i maintain a certain level of control of accounts I manage.

The best results with AI is the one done with the supervision of a human and of which the human can still assert some level of control.

Mistake 2. Using the wrong keyword modifier

Most business know a lot about keywords but very few know about keyword modifiers also known as match type.

You see, keyword modifiers directs Google on the type of search phrases your Ads should show for.

If you add the wrong keyword match type to you keywords, two things will happen:

• You'll either be getting clicks from irrelevant search terms
• Or, your Ads will get very few clicks and impression

Want to learn about keywords and keyword modifiers? I covered it in this article here

Mistake 3. Sending Google Ads traffic to your website

Out of all the mistakes businesses makes on Google Ads, the most profound is sending Google Ads traffic to a website.

In fact each time a client comes to me complaining of not getting a conversion despite spending thousands of dollars on Google Ads, the culprit is always that they were sending their Ads traffic to their website.

The reason why sending your Ads traffic to your website is because it doesn't mirror your offerings to just one conversion goals.

It has so many distractions that can easily distract your audience from performing the actions you need from them.

Your website is built for SEO and to rank high on Google, not for Google Ads. What works for SEO won't work with Google Ads.

And above all, you won't be able to build variations of your landing page and A/B split test in order to pick-out the best performing landing page if you are sending Ad traffic to a landing page.

Want to learn to create a landing page for your business? I covered it in this article here

Mistake 4. Not writing Ad copy based on the keyword intent in an Adgroup

When people do a search on Google, they do it because they need to accomplish a goal which is the intent behind the search they conducted.

When they do the search, they go through the listings on search until they find the one that promises to help them accomplish their goal and click on it.

The trick here is to write an Ad that promises to help the searcher to accomplish their goal.

If your Ads fail to do so, you'll get very little Ad click and you'll pay more per click.

Want to learn how to write great Ad copies? I covered it in this article here

Mistake 4. Creating a poorly structured Google Ad account

I talked about writing Ads copies based on intent in mistake 3, but do you know you can only effectively write Ads copies based on intent if you structured your account very well.

A well structured campaign will ensure that keywords with similar intent are located in same Adgroup.

It will also ensure the settings on your campaigns will help you get more Ad traffic and leads.

Want to learn how to structure your campaign? I covered it in this article here

Mistake 5. Using low monthly/daily budget

Google Ads is an investment and like all investments, you need to put in the right amount of money to get the right ROI.

If your monthly/daily Ad budget is low, you won't be competitive enough to be shown in prominent areas in search and you won't get enough Ad clicks.

Conclusion

If you avoid these common mistakes that has wasted thousands of dollars in Ad spend, you will be on your way to getting the right ROI from Google Ads.