- The first step in creating a Google Search campaign is to open the Google Ads editor. Unlike in other campaigns such as Shopping where you would use the front end of Google Ads, it is easier to create a Search campaign in the editor.
- Following this, you need to open the account you want to create a Search campaign for.
- The next step is to go into campaigns and click add campaign.
- After adding a new campaign, you will need to make changes to some of the boxes. For example, you will need to name your campaign and set its status to active or paused. You will also need to set the budget and make sure the budget type is set to daily.
- You will also need to set your bid strategy. We recommend that your campaigns start with maximise clicks and then after around 1 month, change to maximise conversions. This can be done on the front end of Google Ads.
- The next thing that we would recommend is that you untick the boxes for “include search partners” and “include display network”. They will automatically be enabled; therefore you will need to disable both. The reason for this is that leaving them enabled usually leads to a lot of waste and it is a low-quality network.
- You will then need to change the start and end date for the campaign if required. As well as this, you need to set your language targeting, usually this will be set to English.
- Following this, you will need to make some changes to location targeting. Firstly, you will need to choose where you would like to target. For example, you may target the whole of the UK, or you could narrow it down to a specific county, town, or city. Changing the targeting method to “people in or regularly in your targeted locations” is also recommended, as this helps to avoid traffic from people in different areas that only have an interest, rather than someone in the area that has a good chance of converting.
- After these changes have been made, you can move on to creating an ad group. To do this, click the campaign, followed by “add ad group”. Following this, you will need to name your ad group.
- After naming your ad group, click into the “keywords & targeting” drop-down list and click keywords.
- From here, click ‘add keyword’ and add some keywords related to the ad group. Set the keyword match type to phrase. Despite the push on broad match keywords by Google, we would not recommend these as they lead to a lot of waste.
- After you have added keywords, click the ads drop-down and click ‘responsive search ads’.
- To create a responsive search ad, you will need to add headlines, descriptions, paths, and final URLs. Headlines are a maximum of 30 characters, and you can have up to 15. Descriptions are a maximum of 90 characters, and you can have up to 4. You can add 2 paths, with a character limit of 15 for each.
- Following this, you can post the changes you have made, with the ‘post’ button in the top right corner. Following this, you need to head to the front end of Google Ads and open the campaign.
- In the front end of Google Ads, go to ‘assets’ in the menu bar.
- In here, you will need to add all the relevant assets. For example: sitelinks, callouts, structured snippets, call, images, and location. Some others may be relevant depending on the business; however, these are the main ones.
- Finally, add negative keyword lists to your new campaign. Go into ‘tools and settings’ in the top bar of Google Ads, then ‘negative keyword lists’.
- To create a keyword list, click the blue + and give the list a name. You will need to add negative keywords as the list cannot be left empty. To start with, create a ‘competitors’ and ‘general’ list.
- Finally, you will need to apply the list to your new campaign. The campaign will now be good to go.
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