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Google Ads Not Showing

Marketing, social media, advertising

ProcessPro

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Hi everyone. I'm trying to launch some ads and I'm getting this message on the keyword level:

'This keyword is not triggering ads to appear on Google right now due to a low Ad Rank. Ads are ranked based on your bid and Quality Score.'

I think the ads themselves are good quality as they echo the search terms and have good copy which coincides with the landing page itself. Also, some of the keyword bid suggestions for page 1 is a mere ~$1.50 - I've tried bidding as high as $10, I've tried raising my daily budget to $50 and nothing. I do have about a dozen keywords, so I'm not sure if that would dilute the budget in a way.

I did upload these ads in bulk via Google Ads Editor, and the statuses were immediately 'Eligible' rather than 'under review' etc. I'm wondering if I just need to give it time then come check tomorrow?

Any ideas?

cc @Andy Black

-Processpro
 
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Andy Black

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Hi everyone. I'm trying to launch some ads and I'm getting this message on the keyword level:

'This keyword is not triggering ads to appear on Google right now due to a low Ad Rank. Ads are ranked based on your bid and Quality Score.'

I think the ads themselves are good quality as they echo the search terms and have good copy which coincides with the landing page itself. Also, some of the keyword bid suggestions for page 1 is a mere ~$1.50 - I've tried bidding as high as $10, I've tried raising my daily budget to $50 and nothing. I do have about a dozen keywords, so I'm not sure if that would dilute the budget in a way.

I did upload these ads in bulk via Google Ads Editor, and the statuses were immediately 'Eligible' rather than 'under review' etc. I'm wondering if I just need to give it time then come check tomorrow?

Any ideas?

cc @Andy Black

-Processpro
Check the quality score metrics at the keyword level for a clue.

Also check Tools > Ad Preview & Diagnosis
 

ProcessPro

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Check the quality score metrics at the keyword level for a clue.

Also check Tools > Ad Preview & Diagnosis
Thanks for the tips. These are brand new ads, so no quality score metrics yet.

The Ad Preview & Diagnosis isn't showing the ad...getting this message: This keyword is not triggering ads to appear on Google right now due to a low Ad Rank. Ads are ranked based on your bid and Quality Score.

It's currently 1 campaign with about a dozen ad groups with one kw per ad group. I'm going to try 3 ads per adgroup to see if that helps.
 

ProcessPro

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Thanks for the tips. These are brand new ads, so no quality score metrics yet.

The Ad Preview & Diagnosis isn't showing the ad...getting this message: This keyword is not triggering ads to appear on Google right now due to a low Ad Rank. Ads are ranked based on your bid and Quality Score.

It's currently 1 campaign with about a dozen ad groups with one kw per ad group. I'm going to try 3 ads per adgroup to see if that helps.
Oh, I do have about 100 negatives (br and ph). Not sure if that might be a contributing factor.
 
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Oh, I do have about 100 negatives (br and ph). Not sure if that might be a contributing factor.
Click Review or Analysis or whatever it is. It’s a menu item that can sometimes show why an ad isn’t being triggered (low budget, blocking negatives, etc).

The warnings given sometimes don’t make sense.
 

ProcessPro

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Click Review or Analysis or whatever it is. It’s a menu item that can sometimes show why an ad isn’t being triggered (low budget, blocking negatives, etc).

The warnings given sometimes don’t make sense.
Are you referring to the keyword diagnosis report which generates a csv?
 

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I've had this happen a couple of times before. The error made no sense, it was like Google just didn't want to show my ads. What I did was change the bidding to maximize clicks, just to get something going. I also wrote one of those responsive ads in the ad group. Once the ads had been running with data for a couple weeks, I turned off the responsive ad, I went back to my normal bidding strategy.
 
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ProcessPro

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I've had this happen a couple of times before. The error made no sense, it was like Google just didn't want to show my ads. What I did was change the bidding to maximize clicks, just to get something going. I also wrote one of those responsive ads in the ad group. Once the ads had been running with data for a couple weeks, I turned off the responsive ad, I went back to my normal bidding strategy.
Thanks BizyDad. I'll try that as a last resort. The ideal/most common ad type is expanded text, right?
 

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This is the part I meant:

1618098636529.png



Agree with @BizyDad.

Sometimes there's no rhyme or reason for what happens in an account.

Campaigns didn't run in one account. As a last resort I loaded into another account and they ran. Stupid crap like that.

You can always get into a DM with someone in Google and ask what's up. They'll have better diagnosis tools than us. Remember they're on a helpdesk getting grief from all sides. You want to get them onside. I go for the "My client is asking us why the ads aren't working" angle. If it's your own account then you can replace "client" with "boss".
 

Andy Black

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The ideal/most common ad type is expanded text, right?
I think the default now-a-days is responsive ads... the interface certainly tries to make us create those now.

We still create standard text ads first. IF we're split-testing we'll create a responsive ad.
 
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ProcessPro

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I think the default now-a-days is responsive ads... the interface certainly tries to make us create those now.

We still create standard text ads first. IF we're split-testing we'll create a responsive ad.
Thanks for all the tips. Definitely some actionable ideas!
 

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Thanks BizyDad. I'll try that as a last resort. The ideal/most common ad type is expanded text, right?
I typically find I get the best results with the expanded text ads, yes. As Andy said, they try to force responsive on us; it wouldn't surprise me if that's the most common one in use now.
 

ProcessPro

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I typically find I get the best results with the expanded text ads, yes. As Andy said, they try to force responsive on us; it wouldn't surprise me if that's the most common one in use now.
@Andy Black @BizyDad

Quick update. My ads are showing at least sometimes. I think creating a new ad account is what helped here. I'm still getting a lot less impressions than I expected after 48 hours with inflated bids. I do notice my optimization score keeps dropping, so maybe I need to improve that. I think I'll try following their recommendations and see how that goes.

Another issue is that my dashboard is showing 1 click, yet Google billed my credit card early for 7 clicks. Is this normal? Will it be refunded? Is my dashboard lagging? Any insights will be appreciated.

Thanks.
 
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Another issue is that my dashboard is showing 1 click, yet Google billed my credit card early for 7 clicks. Is this normal? Will it be refunded? Is my dashboard lagging? Any insights will be appreciated.
No, not normal. I'm totally guessing, but it sounds like they billed you, and then realized that six clicks were fraudulent. If that's the case, they do credit you the money in your account. You should be able to verify this credit in your billing section.

I do notice my optimization score keeps dropping, so maybe I need to improve that. I think I'll try following their recommendations and see how that goes.
A Google rep told me that a low optimization score could impact how often your ads show. So I do work to keep my optimization score above 90%. But that doesn't mean that I implement everything that they suggest. Sometimes I simply dismiss things I don't think will work.

That said, it is so early in your campaign, I doubt that this is playing a role. How are you targeting your keywords? Are you using all exact match?
 

ProcessPro

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No, not normal. I'm totally guessing, but it sounds like they billed you, and then realized that six clicks were fraudulent. If that's the case, they do credit you the money in your account. You should be able to verify this credit in your billing section.


A Google rep told me that a low optimization score could impact how often your ads show. So I do work to keep my optimization score above 90%. But that doesn't mean that I implement everything that they suggest. Sometimes I simply dismiss things I don't think will work.

That said, it is so early in your campaign, I doubt that this is playing a role. How are you targeting your keywords? Are you using all exact match?
Ah okay. My optimization score at the moment is 58%. I'm going to try setting up conversion tracking (thought I already did) and site extensions to start.

I'm using all exact match. 1 Campaign, about 2 dozen ad groups, 1 ad & keyword per ad group. Not sure if one keyword/ad per adgroup is something that GA dislikes.

I have a list of negatives in an Excel I plan to upload, but I was holding off when I created the new account just in case that's why they were not running initially. I'll continue delaying until I start gaining some traction.
 

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Ah okay. My optimization score at the moment is 58%. I'm going to try setting up conversion tracking (thought I already did) and site extensions to start.

I'm using all exact match. 1 Campaign, about 2 dozen ad groups, 1 ad & keyword per ad group. Not sure if one keyword/ad per adgroup is something that GA dislikes.

I have a list of negatives in an Excel I plan to upload, but I was holding off when I created the new account just in case that's why they were not running initially. I'll continue delaying until I start gaining some traction.
Ok, all exact match may be part of the problem. Try adding the phrase match too.

I don't think it's one keyword per ad group, I usually use two keywords per ad group (exact and phrase). But I don't think Google would have as much of a problem if I went down to using just phrase match per ad group. I suspect you're trying to be too precise with Google.

Also, you should add as many ad extensions as possible.
 
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Andy Black

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Get as many account wide ad extensions created. This will boost CTR when you show.
 

ProcessPro

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Get as many account wide ad extensions created. This will boost CTR when you show.
Thanks Andy. I just got my first lead!!!!!!! Talk about excitement!

I'm scared though because my dashboard is still showing 1 click. Not sure what my current billings truly look like if my dashboard is really not updating. I really need to keep my adspend within budget. Any ideas?

cc @BizyDad
 

Andy Black

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Thanks Andy. I just got my first lead!!!!!!! Talk about excitement!

I'm scared though because my dashboard is still showing 1 click. Not sure what my current billings truly look like if my dashboard is really not updating. I really need to keep my adspend within budget. Any ideas?

cc @BizyDad
Have a daily budget you’re prepared to spend twice as much. See how things run for a few days.
 
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ProcessPro

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Have a daily budget you’re prepared to spend twice as much. See how things run for a few days.
Great advice, because indeed yesterday my spend was about $90 with a daily budget of $50.

Turns out that setting up 2-step verification fixed my issue. My dashboard instantly updated to show what was truly going on. 16 clicks, 200+ impressions and over $130 adspend.

My next step is to try to optimize bids for positions 2/3 to try to leverage cost/clicks for now. I want to tinker with my bids and keep checking Ad Preview/Diagnosis until I hit my optimum positions. How long should I wait before checking Ad Preview after making a bid change?

cc @BizyDad
 

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How long should I wait before checking Ad Preview after making a bid change?
First off, congrats on your first lead. That's awesome.

Usually see it pretty quick. But I don't sit there and make a bunch of changes to try and optimize it, so I don't know if that works repeatedly or not. I question whether that's a good use of your time or not. Keep in mind the Ad preview still adds some personalization effects too, so it's good for diagnosing problems, but not good for showing you what everybody else is seeing all the time.

What I watch is the "top of page" percentage to give me an idea of when I'm above the fold, and I'll compare that to "abs top of page" which is how often you're showing up in position one.

On a brand new campaign, depending on the traffic, I might check it once a day or every other day. That eventually turns into once a week, once every other week, once you have it dialed in.
 

Andy Black

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As @BizyDad said, your ad position isn’t constant.

More importantly, there isn’t an optimum position. There’s an optimum CPC based on your EPC (Earning-Per-Click).
 
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ProcessPro

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First off, congrats on your first lead. That's awesome.

Usually see it pretty quick. But I don't sit there and make a bunch of changes to try and optimize it, so I don't know if that works repeatedly or not. I question whether that's a good use of your time or not. Keep in mind the Ad preview still adds some personalization effects too, so it's good for diagnosing problems, but not good for showing you what everybody else is seeing all the time.

What I watch is the "top of page" percentage to give me an idea of when I'm above the fold, and I'll compare that to "abs top of page" which is how often you're showing up in position one.

On a brand new campaign, depending on the traffic, I might check it once a day or every other day. That eventually turns into once a week, once every other week, once you have it dialed in.
Great idea. I guess optimizing for position 2 is a moving target anyway because competitors' bids might changes throughout the day, new competitors etc. I just have a limited budget ($30 daily max for now) and would like to try to attain some sort of cost/visibility leverage. So using the metrics top impressions % and Abs top % - if I were to try to accomplish the aforementioned, I would have to try to maximize top impressions, yet minimize abs top %? Am I understanding that right?

Today I adjusted my bids to the minimum top of page amount, and I'm hoping to gradually push those bids to stay in the top fold but avoid position 1. Once I have enough data, I'll then adjust based on my earnings per click, cost per click and target profitability.
 

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Great idea. I guess optimizing for position 2 is a moving target anyway because competitors' bids might changes throughout the day, new competitors etc. I just have a limited budget ($30 daily max for now) and would like to try to attain some sort of cost/visibility leverage. So using the metrics top impressions % and Abs top % - if I were to try to accomplish the aforementioned, I would have to try to maximize top impressions, yet minimize abs top %? Am I understanding that right?

Today I adjusted my bids to the minimum top of page amount, and I'm hoping to gradually push those bids to stay in the top fold but avoid position 1. Once I have enough data, I'll then adjust based on my earnings per click, cost per click and target profitability.
Yes, you got it.

One other metric I've started using is click share, which is eye opening. Sometimes I'll think I have ads that are doing terribly, low clicks, low ctr, that sort of thing, but then I look at click share and they'll be at 85%. Which means that whole search term just doesn't get a lot of click on ads. Other times, I'll be struggling to get a decent top impression rate, but the click share will be at 50%, which means people are actually clicking the ads at the bottom of the page.
 

ProcessPro

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Yes, you got it.

One other metric I've started using is click share, which is eye opening. Sometimes I'll think I have ads that are doing terribly, low clicks, low ctr, that sort of thing, but then I look at click share and they'll be at 85%. Which means that whole search term just doesn't get a lot of click on ads. Other times, I'll be struggling to get a decent top impression rate, but the click share will be at 50%, which means people are actually clicking the ads at the bottom of the page.
Hmmm, never heard of that metric. I'll research it and see how I can use it to gauge my progress.
 
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ProcessPro

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Hmmm, never heard of that metric. I'll research it and see how I can use it to gauge my progress.
Yes, you got it.

One other metric I've started using is click share, which is eye opening. Sometimes I'll think I have ads that are doing terribly, low clicks, low ctr, that sort of thing, but then I look at click share and they'll be at 85%. Which means that whole search term just doesn't get a lot of click on ads. Other times, I'll be struggling to get a decent top impression rate, but the click share will be at 50%, which means people are actually clicking the ads at the bottom of the page.
Hey Bizy Dad
cc @Andy Black

Can you point me in the right direction for this?

So I'm a copywriter that does listings for Amazon. My current conversion tracking only captures part of the funnel: Ads>Landing Pages>Lead form submissions

Is there a way to track the next step - actual listing copy jobs? I want to link actual jobs back to each keyword.

Not asking for the trouble of a tutorial. Just want to know if this is possible? What is this sort of tracking called? What should I search in google to learn more?

Thanks.
 

BizyDad

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Hey Bizy Dad
cc @Andy Black

Can you point me in the right direction for this?

So I'm a copywriter that does listings for Amazon. My current conversion tracking only captures part of the funnel: Ads>Landing Pages>Lead form submissions

Is there a way to track the next step - actual listing copy jobs? I want to link actual jobs back to each keyword.

Not asking for the trouble of a tutorial. Just want to know if this is possible? What is this sort of tracking called? What should I search in google to learn more?

Thanks.
I'm afraid I can't help much. My job is to get phone calls/form fills/chats for my clients, so I track the steps you track. My clients are smallish so if we want to know that data, it is usually pretty easy to manually track the closed deals back to origin.

The couple/few clients that do a good job of traking the full funnel will use software like Salesforce or other another CRM to automate it.
 

Andy Black

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Hey Bizy Dad
cc @Andy Black

Can you point me in the right direction for this?

So I'm a copywriter that does listings for Amazon. My current conversion tracking only captures part of the funnel: Ads>Landing Pages>Lead form submissions

Is there a way to track the next step - actual listing copy jobs? I want to link actual jobs back to each keyword.

Not asking for the trouble of a tutorial. Just want to know if this is possible? What is this sort of tracking called? What should I search in google to learn more?

Thanks.
Add parameters to the end of the ad URL. Capture the URL in the lead form submission as a hidden field.

We put this at the end of ad URLs:
  • utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=d*{ifmobile:mb}{ifnotmobile:dt}_k*{keyword}_m*{matchtype}_c*{creative}_p*{adposition}_n*{network}

  • Prefixed with a ? or a & depending on whether a parameter has been passed prior.
 
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ProcessPro

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Add parameters to the end of the ad URL. Capture the URL in the lead form submission as a hidden field.

We put this at the end of ad URLs:
  • utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=d*{ifmobile:mb}{ifnotmobile:dt}_k*{keyword}_m*{matchtype}_c*{creative}_p*{adposition}_n*{network}

  • Prefixed with a ? or a & depending on whether a parameter has been passed prior.
@Andy Black

This is awesome! Thanks so much!
 

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