The Brave New World of Responsive Search Ads

Google introduced Responsive Search ads in 2020 to increase click rates (CTRs), presumably for advertisers, but primarily for Google. The higher the CTR, the fewer impressions Google needs to serve the ads. Voila! Google makes more money out of the same number of impressions they serve. Remember that Google will serve its own interests first, so it is up to the advertiser to piggyback on what Google is doing, rather than try to run against the grain … to a point.

Last September, when Google announced it was going to do away with regular and expanded text ads in favor of Responsive Search on June 30, 2022, we directed our clients to make the shift immediately rather than wait. Our reasoning was that Google was going to optimize ad delivery in favor of Responsive Search over older ad formats sooner so rather than fight to the end, it was better to launch them as soon as we could. By the end of December all our search clients had made the shift to Responsive Search.

Our performance changes were profound. Some clients saw CTRs jump from the mid 3% range to over 12%. The average CTR increase was about 50%. Conversion rates fell, but because of the increased number of clicks, conversion volume still increased. Overall, we view our shift to Responsive Search as a success.

Along the way we learned a few secrets that are worth sharing to others who may not have made the shift before must now scramble to do so within the next 60 days or so.

1.??????Google is primarily, a text-driven platform. There are image ads, display ads, discovery ads, etc., but even delivery of those as well as Responsive Search are optimized primarily against what is read vs. what is seen. To that end, in any ad format, always fill out the maximum number of headlines and the maximum number of descriptions as you can. The more text you have for Google to optimize against, the more Google will optimize your ad delivery. Use the extensions. Create multiple click channels. A pretty picture in an image extension will not increase the ad strength as much as having a Responsive Search ad that uses all fifteen headlines.

2.??????Ignore Quality Score. It is of little importance. Instead, focus on Ad Strength. As you build your Responsive Search ad you will see an ad strength meter rise, first from poor, then to average, then to good, and finally to excellent. The higher that ad strength, the more tuned your keywords are to your ad, and the more likely your ad will appear in front of a relevant user. There is a reason why the column selections for performance that Quality Score is among the last dropdowns you can open. That is because even to Google, Quality Score a low priority. Ad Strength is critical.

3.??????Less is more. A couple dozen broad-matched keywords will perform better for you than hundreds of exact and phrase match keywords. This is because the headlines drive the search results. The more you have of your targeted keywords in your set of headlines, the greater your ad strength … HOWEVER … you only have fifteen headlines. Your ad strength weakens when you use hundreds of phrase and exact match keywords because you cannot add that many to your ad.?Our experience has been than in the old format, 700-800 exact and phrase match keywords would fall into about 2,000 different search terms a month. Now we use 30-40 broad keywords and they fall into over 5,000 search terms in a month.

4.??????Derive your keywords from your landing page or other web page where you are sending clicks. Build out your list of anywhere between 25 and 40 keywords, using a mix of the normal high-volume keywords in your category as well as others that are more specifically relevant to your user destination. Try to have all of them be “eligible,” meaning there is enough search volume to generate clicks. You can experiment with them and find something close to a word that makes your landing page unique.

5.??????Only use keywords that make sense to be in your ads. If for instance you use, “tire store near me” then at least one of your headlines has to include the word, “near me.” “Near me” is an awkward phrase to try to fit into a 30-character headline. The same with locations. If your keyword list is full of the cities and towns you serve, then your set of headlines must include that same set of cities and towns to improve your ad strength.

6.??????Responsive Search ads, by design, penalize you for including competitor names in your keywords because if you include them, you must include competitor names in your headlines. For example, if you have a Ford dealership, and you include the name of the Chevy or Toyota dealers in your keywords, you must have those same dealers’ names in your headlines. In most cases, you really do not want your ads to describe your competitors. Instead, you must focus on the attributes of your brand, store, or product and let the user search terms, which WILL include competitor names, drift to you because your ad shares high strength against a particular user for reasons more relevant to you.

7.??????Build your ad after you have settled on your list of keywords. As you build it, look at the suggested use of keywords in your headlines. Click on the “more ideas” text to see an expanded list. These keywords are listed in order of impression volume, so you will want to make sure that the first 7-10 keywords all appear in your ads. In the upper right you will see four check boxes that Google will fill as you add headlines and descriptions. This will help you improve ad strength.

8.??????As you build your list of headlines, ensure that any combination of them can tell a complete story. Your ads will have a mix of two or three headlines and one or two descriptions. You do not want a set of headlines to be redundant (i.e., “Best Food in Town, Best Chinese Food in Town, Best Thai Food in Town”). Instead, you want them to be independent, but part of a collective thought such as “Casual Upscale Condominiums, Cultural Community Living, Country Club Environment.”

9.??????Do not use more than one ad per campaign or set of keywords. Keep in mind that, based on headlines and descriptions alone, one “ad” has hundreds of different combinations, so you really do not need more than one. More importantly, if you have two ads running against the same keywords, they could end up competing with each other and hypothetically, could drive up your bids. This is the downside of broad matching. One Responsive Search Ad casts a wide net. A second responsive search ad just casts another wide net over top the first wide net you just cast. You do not catch any more fish. You are just needlessly throwing out more nets. In retail settings where you sell a variety of products, set up a campaign for each product, and define keywords specifically for them. In lead generation efforts, this could mean culling dozens of expanded text ads and replacing them with just one Responsive Search ad.

10.??As you optimize, be aware that when you add or remove keywords, you need to make sure the list stays “in tune” with your ad so you can maintain its strength. Over time, you will need to add or remove headlines and descriptions to evolve the ad so that its strength stays high.

11.??Use the same broad reach strategy with negative keywords as you do with your search keyword lists. Fewer short-tail broad negative keywords instead of more long-tail exact and phrase match negatives reduces the risk of keyword conflict and at the same time increases the filtering capacity of your list. We have gone from about three hundred negatives to 20-25 and we are seeing better filtration and our CPCs have come down a little because we have no conflicts.

12.??Finally… Once you have set up a strong Responsive Search effort in Google, duplicate it in Microsoft. While Google is the dominant search player, Users who search through Google generally DO NOT use Microsoft, and users who search through Microsoft generally DO NOT use Google. Google searches tend to be higher among mobile users. Microsoft searches tend to be higher among desktop users. Plus, the Windows 11 platform is designed to integrate search across a wide range of apps and programs. You do not need to search through a browser to see an ad. If you channel 25% of your total search budget to Microsoft, you should see an increase in performance over keeping 100% of it through Google.

I hope your transition to Responsive Search Ads is successful and that at least some of these strategies are useful to you. We in the advertising community are all on the same team when it comes to getting the most we can out of common platforms and any opportunity to gain experience from each other should be both taken and given.?