A word or phrase you tell Google never to show your ad for. "Free", "jobs", "salary", "DIY" and competitor names are the usual first additions.
Negative keywords are the fastest way to stop wasting money in a new account. Broad and phrase match will show your ad against searches you never imagined, and a plumber can easily pay for clicks on "plumber salary alberta" and "how to fix a tap yourself".
They are also how you stop your own campaigns competing with each other, by keeping each ad group to the searches it was actually written for.
| Job seekers | jobs, salary, hiring, apprentice, career |
|---|---|
| Do-it-yourself | diy, how to, tutorial, youtube |
| Price shoppers with no budget | free, cheap, cheapest |
| Training | course, certification, school |
| Wrong intent | wiki, meaning, definition, reddit |
This comes up most often in Google Ads Management. Search campaigns built around intent, with negative keywords, conversion tracking and landing pages that match the ad.
A free consult is twenty minutes and there is no pitch deck at the end of it.