Have you been using Google Ads effectively in your business’s marketing? A lot of the time it comes down to the keywords that you’re using – and deciding what ones get used might be one of the most important decisions you can make in your business’s marketing.

Your ads might be filled with the best copy that you could possibly create, or the prettiest pictures or videos to attract the eye, but that won’t make much of a difference if your ad doesn’t reach the right people. That’s where keywords come into play.

Keywords are known as “the words or phrases that describe your product or services that you choose to help determine when, where and to who your ad can appear”. 

Google Ads uses keywords to put your ad in front of the right people. It uses the data that you provide in the form of these keywords, and the data that users provide to Google (generally the common terms that they may use to search for items) to determine when your ad will show up.

That doesn’t mean you can put any keyword into your ads. In order to attract your customer’s attention, you need to make sure that the keywords you select to highlight your product/service are appropriate for use.

Consider the following when working out what keywords might be the best for your business.

How Relevant Are They To Your Customers? 

Don’t think about which words or phrases define your brand. Instead, think about what your customers might be searching for to find products like yours, and look towards using relevant, similar phrasing and words.

Get Specific

Don’t try to oversaturate your ad campaigns with too many keywords. Instead, get specific. Focus on one product or service and work out the keywords for that, rather than trying to blanket them all together.

Getting specific also helps with building keyword phrases, which help the algorithm rank your ad campaigns higher. Take a moment to brainstorm what keywords might generate the most value for you, or reach more of your target audience.

Use Negative Keywords

Negative keywords allow you to work in reverse – rather than trying to reach people, you use negative keywords to avoid people who search for specific phrases so that they don’t see your ad. Negative keywords can help you filter for better leads, and phrases can help you build stronger keyword chains.

At the end of the day, keywords are about helping Google’s algorithm get you in front of your audience, so don’t neglect them.