I’ve looked inside a lot of Google Ads accounts over the years. Some are great. Most are leaking money, and usually in the same few places.
The annoying part? Google won’t tell you. Your account dashboard looks busy, clicks are coming in and the money’s going out. It’s only when you dig in that you see where it’s going.
Here are the seven mistakes I see most often.
1. Letting Google pick your keywords
Broad match keywords let Google decide what your ad should show for. Sometimes that’s handy. Often it means your “emergency plumber Perth” ad shows up for “plumber salary” or “how to become a plumber.”
Broad match can work, but only with good conversion tracking and a lot of data behind it. For most small budgets, I start with phrase and exact match and keep things tight.
2. No negative keywords
Negative keywords tell Google what not to show your ads for. Skip them, and you’ll pay for clicks from job seekers, students, DIYers and people looking for free stuff.
Have a look at your search terms report (in Google Ads, under Insights and reports). If you’ve never done it, brace yourself. Then add the junk as negatives. Do this weekly at first, then monthly.
3. Tracking the wrong thing (or nothing at all)
If Google doesn’t know what a lead looks like, it can’t find you more of them. I still see accounts tracking “page views” or “time on site” as conversions. Or tracking nothing.
At a minimum, track form submissions, phone calls from ads and calls from your website. If you sell online, track purchases with the actual value. Get this right and everything else gets easier.
4. Sending everyone to your homepage
Someone searches “blocked drain Joondalup,” clicks your ad and lands on a homepage that talks about bathroom renovations. They hit the back button. You just paid for that.
Send people to a page that matches what they searched for. One clear message, one clear call to action, a phone number they can tap. Simple, but it makes a big difference.
5. Accepting every “recommendation”
Google’s recommendations tab has some useful ideas. It also has plenty of suggestions that mainly help Google spend more of your money: raise your budget, switch to broad match, add more keywords.
Your optimisation score isn’t your performance score. Read each recommendation, apply the ones that make sense and dismiss the rest without guilt.
6. Targeting too wide an area
If you service the northern suburbs, don’t target the whole of Western Australia. If you only work weekdays, don’t run ads at 2am on Sunday unless those leads actually turn into jobs.
Also check your location setting. By default, Google can show your ads to people “interested in” your area, not just people in it. For most local businesses, you want “presence” only.
7. Set and forget
Google Ads isn’t a slow cooker. Competitors change their bids, costs go up, new search terms appear and ads get stale. An account that worked a year ago can drift a long way without anyone noticing.
You don’t need to live in the account, but someone should be checking it regularly: search terms, budgets, conversion rates and what’s actually turning into revenue.
The good news
Every one of these is fixable, and fixing them usually means better results from the same budget. No extra spend needed.
If you’d like a specialist to look after your account, check out my Google Ads management or get in touch and I’ll put together a quote. Run a trade business? My tradies page explains how I approach local service ads.
