Tag Archives: search query reports

What Do Your Search Query Reports Say About You?!

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Search Query Reports (SQR) in Google Adwords can (and should) completely shape your PPC activity. Ever wondered why one of your keywords on a phrase or broad match isn’t giving you a good clickthrough or conversion rate? Search Query Reports tell you everything you need to know. Your SQR’s can say a few different things:

1 – You Need to Review Your SQR’s More Regularly

By having keywords on phrase and broad (I personally think broad terms should be only used on Branded terms) matches, there are all types of keywords that your ads will trigger for. Some of them will be the right type of keywords, but others really won’t. If you’ve got lots of keywords that you think s*it we shouldn’t be appearing for that, then you need to look at SQR’s on a more regular basis. Place negative keywords against:

  • Products you don’t sell
  • Anything that would make your brand look bad appearing against, such as ‘scams’, ‘worst place to buy xx’
  • Things showing in the wrong ad groups – i.e a competitor term might come up on a phrase match in one ad groups, but you have an ad group just for competitor terms – so place it as a negative in this ad group so it shows in the ad group which will have the best ad copy/landing page (see point 3)

2 – You Should Add More Keywords & Restructure Your Ad Groups

A Search Query Report isn’t the best way to find new keywords, mainly because it only shows keywords that have triggered impressions and clicks. But one of the things you should do with your Search Query Reports is to add any search terms you don’t have as keywords. There are many benefits of doing this – separate bids for keywords, ability to review the keyword individually and limit the amount of keywords you have on phrase match.

The more keywords you do add though, the more of a need there is to tightly group your keywords. Restructuring your ad groups with just a few related keywords allows you to tailor ad copy, link to relevant landing pages which in turn improves clickthrough rate (quality score) and conversion rates. Continue reading →