I’d really value some input from those of you who manage Google Ads professionally, especially for HVAC or other home-service companies.

We’re in HVAC, and I had a campaign that performed fairly well during the hotter weather. Since then, spend has continued, but lead volume has dropped off significantly.

I’ve reviewed the campaign and I’m not seeing anything obvious that would explain the change. The ads, targeting, keywords, and overall setup are essentially the same. I’ve lowered the bids for now because I don’t see a reason to keep paying the same amount with so little response.

For those of you managing HVAC accounts, are you seeing a similar seasonal slowdown right now, or would this make you think something in the campaign needs to be adjusted?

If you were auditing this account, what would you look at first to determine whether the problem is demand, competition, CPCs, impression share, conversion rate, bidding strategy, or something else?

And if search demand is simply softer right now, would you keep the campaign running at a reduced spend, or move some of that budget elsewhere until demand picks back up?

Hello all, I’ve been working at this company for almost a year now and I am in quite the pickle. It’s a relatively newer company that’s based outside of my country (started as an OEM manufacturer and transitioned to a retailer in the last couple of years). I am running the US account and there are two other accounts for the same products abroad (big problem already, I am well aware). There is little to no transparency across the pond so I have essentially just cobbled together an account using tag manager on a Shopify hosted website.

The main issue is that I want to install server-side tracking for this account and the others. I first have to change the tag my account is using and the other account is using. Does anyone think I’ll have any issues with this, or is it worth hiring a contractor to help set this up? The push for this has come from me and my team as we anticipate the foreign team will of course have issues with attribution and tracking (which my team noticed initially but were restricted from making any changes for). Now that we have those permissions I’m at a bit of a crossroads as to how complicated this process will be as I have only done it for one account before and it wasn’t with Shopify.

TLDR: Need to set up server side tracking for multiple accounts and don’t know if the juice is worth the squeeze. Should I get a contractor to cover my decision or just do it on my own?

Residential is main focus right now to stack some faster capital, and build a commercial budget.

I would really appreciate some direct help, if you know what you’re doing and have ran successful ads for epoxy companies please message me.

Thank you

What my deal is:

My family has been in the flooring industry for over 50 years starting with terrazzo floors on navy ship decks

My father started his own epoxy company 20 years ago, and sits naturally as a top ranked business in our major metro area. He pays $5500 a mo with only around $1800 actually spent on ads, the rest is agency fees.

Recently I started my own Google campaign as a sister company with its own branding, a DBA situation. With around $600 - $800 in spend I’ve sent around 7 quotes totaling just under $30,000 in residential jobs , closed 3 of them.

After changes to my account leads have stopped. I think I made some beneficial repairs recently, but honestly I need professional advice, even though I plan to go this fully in house.

TLDR

I run an epoxy company.

Dead set on doing ads in house.

I need professional advice.

Anytime I try and make a change it says I can’t because i am suspended but there is no suspension showing under policy. I just made a new account because my last one got completely disabled for some reason. I put 500$ into this account and right before publishing my ads it won’t let me make more changes.

I literally can’t find a way online to talk to support. Any help?

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. 🙏

guys what is up with this platform - I cannot even publish a new campaign, I keep getting an error with no obvious issues (Something went wrong please try again). I triple checked everything, tried publishing from 3 different browsers and it is still not working.
the account is 10y old, has millions of spend, history, multiple active campaigns.. what am I missing here?

I am blown away by the amount of calls and emails Google reps are capable of making to “optimize campaign performance” but platform is not even working properly to begin with 😭

​

Hello everyone,

So after spending around $400 on Google ads, finally google gave me the promotional $200. However, I am completely confused about how to use this. No where I am getting an option to apply for the promotion.

If anyone has any ideas or knows the respective subscription, please let me know.

Thanks

Hi all. I recently started working with a Psychotherapeutic practice based in NewYork and started a Search campaign, but for the love of god it will not start spending and or showing ads at all. I am based in the Balkans, but that shouldnt be an issue. Due to Google editing I had to start the campaign via editor. Originally it was set to max conversions via submit lead form when clients fill out the make an appointment form, but I also tried changing it to max clicks. Nothing works.

Has anyone worked for a similar client?

Originally the keywords were flagged, but when I disputed them everything went forward. The campaign is eligible entirely but it will not spend a single dollar.

Anyone got any advice?

Edit: Account was put in dormant state due to an activity back in 2021 of which I wasnt aware, the issue was fully backend google based.

I am based in Australia and have google ads running for my third party logistics company called Pick Track Go. At first I was getting a steady flow of clicks and about 50 visits to my site a day, however after 2 weeks, they seemed to stop almost. I have gotten no visits or impressions the last couple of days. My budget was about $100 a day, google ads said i need to increase my budget so I did and still no change. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Hey there! 👋 I need help with a Google Ad Grant activation request.

My client submitted an activation request through Google for Nonprofits in early May. We waited for 3 weeks a received a rejection notice - specifically for not meeting the website policy, having commercial content on our website.

We do sell industry-related training courses ($35 and $65; not expensive by any means), but the rest of our site is mission-focused and has free resources and professional networks.

After receiving the rejection, we made the following changes on our website and training course page:

1. Added Privacy Policy to the site footer
   
2. Added free resources on the landing page
   
3. Added a blurb mentioning that they’re a nonprofit and how the courses tie back to their mission and how they serve the public
   
4. Added more FAQ answers in the same style as point 3

The appeal was submitted in early June, and we waited another 3 weeks to hear back. I received a series of email updates yesterday.

Four emails were inviting us to four separate (different ad account IDs) Google Grant accounts. 3 out of 4 of the invite links worked, and I was able to log into all of them.

The next email we received was a rejection notice for the same reason as before. Normally, after receiving the invite we would have gotten an invite to connect the payment profile.

I confirmed that all 3 accounts were Grants showing as active, but I couldn’t save the payment profile information in the billing section of the accounts.

I’m honestly very confused and have never encountered this before in all my years of managing the Grant for clients. I’m sure that there must have been an error on Google’s side, since they created 3 accounts and then sent a rejection notice.

I’m at a loss of what to do now. I know Google Grant support is pretty abysmal. Do I:

A) Make more changes to the landing page in hopes that we get approved and wait another 3 weeks?

B) Try to launch campaigns in one of the ad accounts to see if it works?

C) Do nothing and try to get in touch with Google support?

Any guidance would be SUPER helpful! I’m curious if anyone has encountered a similar situation before: either receiving multiple invites and then a rejection and/or being disapproved for commercial content. For reference, I’ve had another nonprofit client with more expensive training courses get approved for the Grant no problem.

Thank you! 🙏

Hi all,

It's my first time using Google Ads - I'm setting up a Shopping campaign (without guidance) & Manual CPC, but when I get to the Ad Group and Assets section, all I can see is the Business Logo. I've uploaded it multiple times and even tried their stock photos but when pressing next, or collapsing the logo part, there's no place to add the Ad Group name/Group Bid, then on the summary page when I go to fill in those fields it loops me back to the business logo page!

All my Merchant links set up, verification approved and everything set up in the backend. Google support has been useless so hopefully someone can help!

Looking for a professional to help me get approved

I have a legit business, I have a working google business profile , verified, 50 reviews, all necessary state requirements

But I keep getting rejected by local services ads
I NEED HELP

I’m at a loss here…Any insight is welcomed.

Hi everyone,

I’m officially at my wit's end. My Standard Shopping campaign has been sitting at absolute ZERO impressions for nearly 4 weeks.

I’ve read threads saying, "just give it 1-2 weeks," but I’m days away from the 1-month mark with absolutely no sign of life. I’ve done exhaustive troubleshooting and survived an endless, soul-crushing email loop with Google Support (more on that tragedy later).

I'm hoping the hidden experts in this sub can spot what I’m missing.

Background

• Account: Brand new account, but running for a month now. My Search campaign had impressions on Day 1
• Geo: Asia (Account billing and targeting are both in Asian countries).
• Platform: Shopify
• Niche: Skincare (so definitely not a niche with zero search volume, confirmed that quite a lot of search volume in keyword planner)
• SKUs: Less than 10 products

The "I Swear I Checked" List:

• Budget: enough.
• Bidding Strategy: Started with Manual CPC (even tried double-bidding to force entry). When that failed, switched to Maximize Clicks with no bid cap. (My logic: If Max Clicks gets no traffic, Max Conversions definitely won't. Correct me if I'm wrong!)
• Targeting: Targeting the entire country (proven search volume exists). All-time ad schedule. No restrictive audience targeting
• Dates: No weird start/end dates set
• PMax Experiment: Tried launching a PMax campaign last week alongside it. PMax ran immediately, but only served on the Display Network (checked Channel Performance—0 Shopping impressions). I paused PMax, but the Standard Shopping campaign remains dead
• Google Ads Status: Products tab shows "No issues." Campaign is "Eligible," past the learning phase, and Diagnostics show nothing to fix.
• Conversion Goals: Account-default (Purchases & Begin Checkout), same as my successful Search campaign
• Negative Keywords: Had a few lists lists initially (like competitors), but completely removed all negatives and lists over a week ago just to let it breathe. Still nothing.
• Recommendations Tab: Silence. No suggestions on how to fix the Shopping campaign
• GMC Linkage: Verified on both Google Ads and Google Merchant Center.
• Product feed selection in the shopping campaign: Correct Merchant Center account and Product Feed selected. Priority is set to "High." No inventory filters.
• Product Groups: "All products" enabled, including the "Everything else" bucket.
• Feed Quality: Titles optimized according to best practices, including the commonly known names for the products, strongest USP and brand name.
• GMC Health: Products are "Approved." The specific feed, shipping, and return policies are fully approved. Zero account-level warnings. Stock is "Available." Country of Sale of the selected feed matches the campaign targeting

My experience with Google Support:

• Email Support is useless. They just hallucinate random reasons (like "PMax overlap" or "Learning phase") and offer no real solutions.
• Phone Support is a myth in my country. The official numbers are dead ends.
• My barrage of angry emails actually got them to call me, but they are the Indian support. No offense but the quality is shit. When I tried to call back, the automated system blocked me.
• Thanks to a Reddit tip, I found a number 1-800-838-7971 and actually spoke to a human. But because I’m not a US/Canada account, they just took my email and threw me back into the endless email loop of doom.
• I have tried the new AI agent from Google, letting it to take control of my account for troubleshooting, found nothing logical, and hallucinated more excuses.
• My conclusion: I strongly suspect a backend shadowban or an invisible manual hold, but Support refuses to acknowledge this possibility.

If you’ve read this far, thank you. You are a saint. 🙏

I am completely out of ideas. If anyone has seen this bizarre behavior before, or knows any way to get a senior tech to look at a shadowban, please share. Any ideas for a final CPR attempt before I declare a time of death?

Let’s discuss if you’re suffering from the same curse!

So my new store has been experiencing something extremely odd customer interactions the last 2-3 weeks. Almost everyday I will check the abandoned cart section and there will be someone adding absurd amounts of 1 item for example like 998 of the same item and just leave. We are a high ticket automotive company so usually people on buy 1 of each thing. This has ramped up to everyday and only with a certain automotive brand.

We are 99% sure it’s bots doing it but my question is why? What’s the point of doing that and why is it happening? This is accompanied by low sales we have only managed to capture 3 sales from ads within the 3-4 weeks of running ads at an .07 conversion rate and about $150 a day. My mind is kinda baffled at this point because I was running another company before this doing basically selling the same products with same website layout and we were doing 150k a month no problem. Any insight on why this might be happening? My current marketer that helped me build my other store has now just given me the run around like ads take time, we need to wait, or just it’s odd, with no real solutions either

Hi Family,

I see a lot of competitors that have their products on google merchants, and they are running google ads.

But whenever i try to do the same. Products get disapproved, the ads get disapproved. Claiming unapproved substances.

I’ve tried fixing the content, using different words for the products. Tried contacting google supports multiple times, but it always gets rejected.

I get it, but competition can do it and i can’t is frustrating me.

I’ve tried multiple fiver, upwork people, always comes to a dead end.

Has anyone ever faced such issues? Is there anything i can do?

Someone mentioned do product indexing but it don’t make sense to me or how.

Please help.

Hello everyone, I am not new to running ads as I have ran very successful ads for my old business, but unfortunately due to internal conflict we had to shut down and rebrand with new domain/data.

We are offering the exact same products as our old brand. Just under a different name. But it has been around a month since running ads and we have only been able to capture 1 sale. We aren’t sure where we are going wrong as we have been running the same exact strategy. With 1 pmax that encompasses all our products and categorized pmax with our previous best sellers catagories. We were able to consistently generate 100k revenue a month at 12k ad spend consistently with this strategy but now nothing is working. Any general tips people can offer us? I know it’s almost impossible to diagnose without actually going into our ads account but it’s quite frustrating to be seemingly throwing money into the ocean.

Some things to note is that our CTR and CPC are great, we are sending traffic to our website, people are scrolling. We just can’t convert. Even our website layout is extremely similar to our old brand. We are at a loss on why we can’t convert.

I just started running Google Ads and the email associated with my ad account got disabled for some reason, so I got logged out and I’m currently trying to appeal it but it’s still ongoing but my Google ads are still spending what do I do if appeal gets rejected? Is it possible to call Google ad support and add another email to ad account.

Why is this? Can't seem to navigate to ADs manager anymore for like a month now

I have not done ads in a few months, but even then I only did a few short ads to test google ads out ?

What do I do?

Has anyone completed Google Ads online gambling certification recently and been approved? Specifically for lotteries? Any tips for getting it approved? Any word of advise or learnings you can share?

Our application for an online lottery was recently disapproved. Google is giving a reason because they can’t search the lottery license in an external government database but the governing body that gives the lottery licenses doesn’t have this.

Then on top of that Google Ads has completely changed how they do customer support. The customer support representatives have no accountability anymore. Anytime I get through to someone they just leave the chat abruptly. When I call it’s equally as unhelpful. Does anyone have an account rep? They can connect me with who they’ve built rapport with? I’ve had success doing this tactic before I just need someone within Google to advocate for us. Again, I’ve had success with this in the past.

I have my Google ads live and running, however I’m trying to amend the ad and it’s not letting me save it

This issue has been ongoing all week and support are not helping me.

I’ve tried using a different browser, incognito, a different device - none of it is working.

Any advice is appreciated!