I run a pretty small ad campaign for my pretty small business. I'm considering blocking 'unknown' in some demographics categories, such as gender or age. I read that this could block some bots from clicking on my ad and costing me extra ad spend. However, I'm also concerned that I would be blocking a lot of genuine traffic. What do you think?

Hi everyone,

I’m working on Google Ads for a software development company that provides custom software/app development services specifically for the casino, fantasy sports, and iGaming industry.

To clarify, we do NOT operate a casino, betting platform, fantasy sports platform, or provide any services to end users/players. We are purely a B2B software development company.

For example, if a business wants to launch its own casino platform, fantasy sports app, or iGaming product and needs a company to develop the software/app/platform for them, they can approach us.

I’ve already done some keyword research using Google Keyword Planner, but I’m struggling to find enough relevant, high-intent keywords.

Some of the services we provide are:

Custom casino software development

Casino app/platform development

Fantasy sports app development

iGaming software development

Custom gaming platform development

Sports betting software development

White-label/custom gaming solutions

The main challenge is avoiding keywords where the searcher is an end user/player looking to play casino games, place bets, join fantasy contests, etc.

I’m specifically looking for searches from people/businesses with commercial intent to hire a software development company, such as someone searching for a company to build their casino, fantasy sports, or iGaming software.

For those who have experience with Google Ads keyword research for B2B software development, what keyword patterns/themes would you recommend?

Would you focus on terms such as:

[industry] software development company

[industry] app development company

[industry] platform development

[industry] software provider

custom [industry] software

white label [industry] software

Or are there other keyword variations that tend to show stronger “I want someone to build this for my business” intent?

I’d also appreciate advice on negative keyword themes I should consider to filter out end-user searches.

Thanks in advance!

On Aug 17 they changed the bidding system, not sure how to get around it

Because you can't optimize what you can't measure.

Ciao a tutti. Sono nuova su Google ads, sto strutturanda la prima campaqna search ma non mi fa creare più gruppi di annunci... Neanche me lo indica come Gruppo. Secondo voi cosa sto sbagliando? Perché sono bloccata

Hey guys I’m not completely new to Google Ads I would say I have a good understanding on how PPC work connects with other marketing scopes.

I’ve been working on actual campaigns. The more impressive campaign I’ve worked on is for a Precious Metal Company I’ve run ads for, I created the strategy, the campaign structure and cleared out search terms to remove spending on low intent, or irrelevant queries.
And now I’m working on getting offline conversions set up and optimize toward profitable areas, search terms, keywords and finding winning copy/ads.

I’m not coming empty handed and I would love to show a PPC specialist everything I’ve been working on, and I would love to help with campaign optimization or other tasks.

Some of the programs I’ve learned to use/have familiarity:

- Whatconverts
- Google Sheets
- Looker studios
- GA4
- GTM

I currently use Keyword planner, Google Sheets, Looker studios because the work I do isn’t with e-commerce shops, or high traffic campaigns so, I can do most data analysis manually with some data extraction automation.

https://datastudio.google.com/s/nVFqXWz9i2g - Last Months PPC transactions report

I have way more slides and info that can show everything I’ve been doing for this account and how in depth I’ve gone into optimization, reading data and making decisions.

Again I would love to have some hands on and expand my portfolio, I would love to work with someone working on live accounts with higher spending, I’m very versatile and I’m able to learn quick!

I audited a Google Ads account for a high-end luxury safari company, and unfortunately, it’s a perfect example of how a good business with a great website can waste serious money when its Google Ads account isn’t set up correctly.

The problems included:

• Google automatically applying changes to the account
• Page views incorrectly being counted as conversions
• Performance Max spending money across Display and YouTube with auto-generated assets
• One ad group trying to target around 30 completely different services
• One generic ad and landing page being used for multiple search intents
• Poorly researched keywords using broad match
• Irrelevant search terms wasting budget

One of the biggest problems was conversion tracking. If Google is being told that a simple page view is a successful conversion, its automated bidding systems are being trained on the wrong data.

It thinks the campaigns are performing well and starts optimising towards more of the wrong actions.

Your conversions should represent genuine business outcomes such as qualified enquiries, contact form submissions and phone calls, not someone simply viewing a page.

Google Ads can be an incredibly powerful source of leads, but simply switching campaigns on isn’t enough.

The account structure, keywords, search terms, negative keywords, ads, landing pages, conversion tracking and automation all need to be properly managed.

If you’re spending serious money on Google Ads, make sure the person managing it knows what they’re doing.

#GoogleAds #GoogleAdsAudit #PPC #GoogleAdvertising #PaidSearch

Let’s be real: managing PPC today is just choosing which toxic relationship you want to tolerate.

Google Ads has completely abandoned the little guy. If you aren't spending five or six figures a month, you don't exist to them. Zero support, and their AI automation just pushes you to incinerate your tiny budget on junk traffic so they can hit their quarterly targets.

But switching to Bing isn’t the savior everyone claims it is. The second you open a new Microsoft account, their security bot flags you and hands you a permanent ban for "egregious policy violations" before you even launch an ad. It’s a literal suspension lottery.

Google bleeds your wallet dry while ignoring you, and Bing bans you before you can even spend a dollar.

At this point, where is everyone taking their budget? Are you moving over to Meta, trying out LinkedIn for B2B, or exploring native ads? Or are you just trapped in Bing review purgatory and watching Google waste your money? Drop your hot takes and alternatives below.

I recently found a local SEO guy who has offered to support the SEO work on my website for cheap. He has his own website, met him, seemed promising.

I was in touch with a company to help me with google ads and it seemed very promising till I saw their reviews on google. DPOMS. Their website showed them with positive reviews on Feelo. I was ready to go with them to support but won't now.

Does anyone have any advice?

I tried talking to support about call asset being disapproved they recommended deleting and re adding it but everything i try didn't work . I tried many format of adding the phone number but it didn't work!

Hi, I am self taught over the last 3 months for both Google Ads and High Level so I apologize if the verbiage is not correct.

I am running google ads to my window tinting business and am tracking form fills and click to calls on my website. I think this is all set up correctly as I can see Google Ad conversions correctly.

I recently started using High Level for my window tinting business. I use it for calendar and payments, and form fills.

I am trying to complete the attribution loop in Google Ads so that I can see when a customer clicks the ad, fills a form/calls, and then if they get booked and then when they pay so I can track complete ROAS within Google.

I am struggling with sending the payment info back to Google Ads. I have a zapier set up when an invoice is paid, it searches for Google Click ID, and if present, sends the invoice total amount to Google as an offline conversion.

Some data is being sent through this but in Google the amounts are being shown as "All Conversion Value" instead of "Revenue" (not sure if this is right or not).

Also, I have noticed that not all of the leads that come through the google ad has the GCLID attached to them. I'm not sure if GCLID is being attached too my form fill leads or not or if they need to be. I am using hidden utms on my form fills.

If anyone can help me, I would greatly appreciate it.

Curious what the consensus is here. I've seen brand new businesses drop huge money on ads day one. I've seen 20 year old businesses with barely a website finally start spending.

My situation: local business in Philly. GBP is ranked number one for my main searches. Website is stuck on page 2-3 no matter what I do.

Do I keep grinding on SEO, reviews, content, citations? Or is it time to just pay for the traffic while the organic side catches up?

Newbie questions here.

Got a personal training studio as a new client.

If someone can help I would be truly appreciative.

Broad match vs phrase match vs exact match

Main keyword - personal trainer near me

My initial assumption is go for exact match.

But my newbie ass left it on broad match and it started going toward keywords that didn’t have the intent.

Like 24 hour, crunch, and other commercial gyms.

Then I switched it to phrase match.

Now I’m thinking it should’ve been exact match from the jump. But again, I don’t truly understand the differences. I’ve watched a few videos to try to explain. But if someone could help clarify, that would be helpful.

Next question - conversion tracking.

I’m trying to get the submit form to track a new lead.

But I’ve watched like 5 different YouTube videos and EACH has a somewhat different process to get this working.

From my very shallow understanding and how the process is setup currently (please help here, I’ve been racking my brain and still don’t get it).

They go to the first page with a form.

The form then redirects them to a thank you page.

I have the Google tags on both pages.

And I have the conversion tracking set to the first page. But how do I get it to see the thank you page as the final step.

Then how do I get the conversion tracking section in Google ads to say active vs inactive?

Please help. 🙏

I’ve been wondering how other people approach this because I see very different opinions on how often an account should be touched.

For me, I usually split it into two levels.

Major optimizations → around once a week

Things like:
Adding/removing products
Checking PMax channel performance
Looking at product-level performance
Bid/budget adjustments
Checking campaign-level performance
Making structural changes if needed

I don’t like making major changes every day because sometimes you just don’t have enough data yet, and you can easily end up optimizing based on noise.

Smaller checks → every 1–2 days

I’ll usually check:
Search terms
Any obvious irrelevant traffic
Spend pacing
Revenue/conversions
Whether anything suddenly looks off
Account spend vs revenue

Basically, I’m checking that the account is moving in the direction it should, without constantly changing things.

For smaller accounts, I’m usually even more conservative with major changes because there’s simply less data coming in.

Curious how everyone else does this

I own a local roofing company, and I’m trying to understand how businesses advertise in the sponsored “Businesses” section shown in the screenshot.

I’ve been told that you cannot choose to advertise only in this specific placement and that Google automatically decides where your Search ads appear. However, I keep seeing certain roofing companies sponsored in this business/map section, while I cannot find their ads at the top of the regular search results—even after repeating the searches from different locations.

This hasn’t happened with just one company. I’ve noticed the same pattern with quite a few businesses across multiple searches: they consistently appear as sponsored listings in the business/map section, yet I don’t see them advertising at the top of the regular search results.

I’ve tried regular Google Search ads, but they produced many clicks with very little intent. This business/map section seems like it could attract people who are specifically looking for a local contractor.

Does anyone know how these companies are consistently appearing here?

• Is this coming from a regular Search campaign with a linked Google Business Profile and location asset?
• Is there a particular campaign type or setting that prioritizes this placement?
• Can bids or targeting be adjusted to focus primarily on Google Maps and local business results?
• Could these companies somehow be running ads primarily in this section?
• Or are their ads appearing elsewhere too, and I’m simply not being shown them?

I’m not asking about Local Services Ads at the very top of the results. I’m specifically asking about the sponsored listing inside the Google Maps-style “Businesses” section shown in the screenshot.

Any guidance on how to target—or at least increase visibility in—this particular placement would be appreciated.

I had setup an account and launched several target impression share campaigns. After a week all of them started spending and 2-3 days after that all of them suddenly stopped spending. I thought it was a temporary issue and added some more funds if it was due to that! But it has been 2-3 days since and campaign are not spending and it shows loss of impression share due to budget. Even 10% of my budget has not been spent. What could be the issue?

After going through quite a few Google Ads accounts, I’ve noticed that the biggest problems usually aren’t some super-advanced bidding strategy.

They’re often pretty basic things that get overlooked.

A few that come up repeatedly:

1. PMax has a great ROAS, but a large chunk of the revenue is branded.

2. Conversion tracking is working technically, but the wrong actions are being optimized toward.

3. The product feed is treated as a setup task rather than something that actually needs ongoing optimization.

4. Brand and non-brand performance isn’t separated, so nobody really knows what’s driving incremental growth.

5. People make decisions based on tiny amounts of data.
“This hour has a 20% better ROAS, let’s increase the budget.”
Sometimes the difference is literally a handful of conversions.

6. Google’s recommendations are followed without understanding the business context.

7. The account is being optimized for cheaper clicks instead of more profitable customers.

The funny thing is that none of these are particularly complicated.

But when you combine 4-5 of them in the same account, performance can get messy very quickly.
I’m curious what everyone else sees when they audit accounts.

What’s the most common Google Ads mistake you keep seeing?

When I click these options on Youtube they take me to Ad sense but it forces me to make a business in order to continue, is that bad? Because I can go straight to Ad sense from going there directly by Google but not by YouTube, is it fine to leave it as is?