What is the biggest Google Ads mistake small businesses make?

Using broad match keywords with no negative keyword list, which spends the budget on searches that have little to do with what the business actually sells.

Should a small business use Google's automated campaign setup?

Automated setups optimize for Google's definition of success, usually clicks and impressions, not necessarily for the business's actual profit per lead. They're a starting point, not a finished strategy.

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Google Ads

Common Google Ads mistakes small businesses make

The same handful of mistakes drain budgets in small business accounts over and over. Here are the ones that cost the most.

In short

The most expensive mistakes are broad match keywords without a negative keyword list, no conversion tracking to judge results by, mixing search and display campaigns together, and abandoning a campaign before it has enough data to judge fairly. Each one alone can waste a significant share of a small budget.

Broad match without a negative keyword list

Broad match tells Google to show your ad for anything it considers related to your keyword, which can include searches that share only a loose theme. Without a growing list of negative keywords to block irrelevant searches, a plumbing business can end up paying for clicks from people searching for plumbing supply jobs or plumbing school, not customers.

Judging results too soon

A new campaign needs time to gather enough clicks and conversions for Google's own algorithms to learn what a good result looks like, usually at least a couple of weeks. Pausing or drastically changing a campaign after only a few days of data, based on a handful of conversions, means throwing away the learning period and starting over, often repeatedly.

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