Google Ads- The 10 Golden Rules for Writing Great Ads

Google Ads, have you ever wondered what the building blocks of a successful Google Ads are?

Keywords, CTA, choice of capital letters, and punctuation are all elements that can impact the performance of your ad. We give you the keys to writing great announcements in this article.

Why use Google Ads?

During your research on Google, the small rectangle “ads” have surely already caught your attention. These text ads are displayed above the Google search results (maximum 4 ads), but also below.

Appearing this way on Google (the most used search engine in the world), brings you many advantages:

1. a) Improve your visibility

Improving your natural link building through SEO can sometimes prove to be long and laborious. Coupling your SEO strategy with SEA will help you appear above other search results, and potentially your competition, with keywords targeted to your industry and offerings.

1. b) Generate qualified traffic

Google Ads allows you to target your prospects according to their search intent thanks to a selection of carefully chosen keywords, but also through audiences created from demographic data, the type of devices used, or even areas geographic. We are therefore on behavioral, demographic, and intention targeting, which represents a considerable advantage over social paid. Also, the ads redirect to the landing page of your choice. If it is well optimized, it will allow you to increase your conversion rate.

1. c) Obtain an ROI quickly.

As soon as the Google ads are launched, the first results are immediately accessible and measurable ROI.

However, to be able to reap these benefits, it is still necessary to succeed in writing your text ads effectively. And the exercise can be more complicated than it seems. To help you get started and ensure results, here are our tips.

Our 10 golden rules for writing great ads on Google Ads

Use your keywords in google ads

A textual advertisement is made up of at least:

• 3 titles: 30 characters maximum each (the third title is not always displayed but is strongly recommended);
• 2 description lines: 90 characters maximum each (the second description is not always displayed but remains mandatory to prepare);
• 1 URL: which will appear next to the mention “Announcement” and which can be personalized with two optional fields called “path” of 15 characters each.

Good practice: Make your keywords appear in headings 1 or 2, in a description, and the URL path. This will allow you to increase the relevance score of your ad on Google Ads and to comfort the Internet user in his research. Indeed, the ad will come as close as possible to the request made on the search engine.

Do you need advice for your keyword strategy?

To avoid :

• Use a keyword more than 3 times in an advertisement;
• Exceed the imposed character limit.

Highlight what makes you unique

Text ads on Google Ads help you improve your visibility by making you appear above search results. Take the opportunity to put yourself forward and explain to Internet users why they should choose you over your competitors.

Best practice: Describe the benefits that prospects can derive from your offer. Put yourself in their shoes: they are looking for a solution to their problem and want to be reassured.

Avoid: Being too generic or too vague in the description of the functionalities.

Use CTAs to engage prospects in Google Ads

In addition to the previous point, continue to encourage the Internet user to take an action by using clear call-to-action. These will push him to achieve the goal of your campaign.

Examples of successful CTAs:

• Download the white paper;
• Request your free quote;
• Contact our experts;
• Discover our offers.

Bad practice: Your ad will be automatically rejected by Google if you use the “Click here” CTA. Why? Because the latter does not precisely indicate the action to be carried out. It is considered too general and can be applied everywhere.

Put a “!” at the end of the first description

Good practice: Adding an exclamation point at the end of the first description will unconsciously push the user to act by attracting his attention.

Avoid Excessive use of punctuation. You shouldn’t overdo it. An exclamation mark is sufficient. Your ad will be refused if you use too many “!!!”, “??” or “+”.

Capitalize on important keywords

Once again, one of the benefits of text ads on Google Ads is the visibility they give you. But depending on your industry and your strategy, you may have more or less competition. A little tip to differentiate yourself and be quickly recognizable is to use capital letters for certain words.

Best practice: Use capital letters for keywords and other important words in the ad. This makes your ad more readable and more impactful by highlighting certain terms. On the other hand, it is unnecessary to add capital letters to prepositions or linking words.

To avoid the abuse of capital letters. Your ad will be refused for the following cases: MARKETING, MARKETING, or even MaRKeTiNG.

Putting figures are more concrete!

Good practice: To be convincing, you need hard evidence. Using numbers in your ads will allow you to be impactful and transparent.

You can share numbers on:

• your prices ;
• your promotional offers;
• the amount of a reduction;
• the number of consultants that you make available to your clients;
• the number of products available in stock;
• the number of people who already trust you;
• your delivery times;
• your years of seniority in the industry;
• your customer satisfaction rate.

Avoid: Lying! Remember that someone who clicks on your ad but doesn’t convert is an unnecessary expense. Lower this risk by providing as much information and reassurance as possible early on in your ad message.

Pay attention to spelling and grammar

A user will get an opinion on your business as soon as he sees your ad. And if you want to be taken seriously, you need to be irreproachable with your spelling and grammar.

Best practice: Read your ad again, respect the maximum number of characters, and pay attention to spaces. Your ad may be refused for a single double space or because there are too many spelling mistakes. You can use many free tools like Grammarly.

To avoid :

• use special characters or emojis;
• words were written entirely in capitals (except for a few abbreviations or trademarks);
• repeating words or information;
• use bullets.

Harmonize your landing page and your Google Ads

The ad will redirect the Internet user to the landing page indicated in the URL. For people to stay on your page and take the desired action, the ad promises must match the ad content.

Good practice: Integrate the main phrases of the page into your ad. The Internet user will be comforted by your communication when he arrives on the landing page and this will also allow you to improve your quality score. Indeed, the algorithm recognizes the words used on your ad and those which are on your landing page: if it evaluates that it corresponds, it will give you a good score of relevance.

What not to do:

• Do not put the correct URL on the ads;
• Have a speech that differs between the ad and the landing page (eg by putting different numbers).

Put ad extensions For Google Ads

Different features allow you to complete your ads by providing additional information. These are the ad extensions. These do not appear all the time but it is essential to consider them. The more you will use extensions the better because you will be giving Google Ads more ways to make your ad visible.

You may find that this also impacts the CTR. Indeed, the extensions make it possible to give more information to Internet users about your company or your offer. Reassuring and convincing them will increase the chances that a user will click on the ad, which will therefore have a positive impact on your CTR.

Type of extensions:

• sitelink extensions;
• hook extensions;
• extension of site extracts;
• extension of place;
• call extension;
• price extension.

Good practice: Use extensions as much as possible, depending on the possibilities, and favor extensions of secondary links, hooks, and site extracts which are those favored by the algorithm.

To avoid :

• Do not put an extension;
• Do not respect the number of characters in extensions;
• Do not adapt extensions to advertisements.

Do A / B testing with Google Ads

There is no limit on the number of ads per ad group, but it’s best to avoid just writing one. Indeed, Google’s algorithm will make sure to alternate the distribution of the different ads, which will allow you to study the performance of each one of them and to assess which ones work best and why. Nothing like it to put into practice all the advice given in this article and study their effectiveness.

Good practice: Write at least 3 ads per ad group, varying the titles and descriptions, trying to change places, and changing the call-to-action.

To avoid: Be content to duplicate the same ad 2 or 3 times. As perfect as it is, all clones, as well as the original, will be refused by Google which does not like repetitions.

(BONUS) Add a responsive ad per ad group

Responsive Google Ads ads allow you to add up to 15 titles and 4 descriptions in the tool. The ads generated will adapt to display a message that looks exactly like regular text ads, but that will be more relevant to your potential prospects. Indeed, you thus give the possibility to the algorithm and its learning system to display the combinations which have the most probabilities of functioning compared to the research of the user.

Good practices :

• Vary headlines and ads, for example taking those that worked best in-text ads;
• Put at least 5 titles and 3 descriptions;
• Pin the title or an essential description to ensure that he or she will appear necessarily;
• Use the ad effectiveness indicator to improve the ad.

Do not do :

• Have an advertising efficiency lower than “Good”;
• Repeat the same titles and descriptions. This will be redundant and will not allow machine learning to improve its combinations;
• Do not show keywords in responsive ads. The same rules and tips mentioned in this article also apply to responsive ads.

What you must remember

And there you have it, you now have more than 10 keys to properly building your ads on Google Ads:

• Use keywords in ads
• Highlight what makes you unique
• Use CTAs to engage prospects
• Put one “!” at the end of the first description
• Capitalize important keywords
• Putting numbers is more concrete
• Pay attention to spelling and grammar
• Harmonize LP and announcements
• Put ad extensions
• A / B testing with ads
• Add a responsive ad per ad group

These best practices should help you improve your visibility, your CTR, but also the quality score of your ads. If not, don’t panic! The trick is to test to understand your target and perfect your Google ads.

Originally published at Entrepreneur News and Startup Guide.