Google has been advocating for broad matches, and how it is more effective compared to the past. However, Advertisers are having a hard time believing the statements, most are still loyal to broad match modified and are sad about the slow transition away from it. So, if broad match modified becomes valueless how can we still get relevant traffic?
One solution is broad match combined with audience targeting. In this post, we will be going overbroad match and audience targeting strategy and set-up.
Why Combine Broad Match & Audience Strategy
As we all know Google announced a few months back that broad match modified will be transitioned out, and that broad match will become more effective due to algorithm improvements to help trigger ads on the proper searches. Google says that it will take three things into account users' recent search activity, content on the landing page you use, and other keywords in the ad group to understand keyword intent.
Most digital marketers still being skeptical about broad matches due to the past. So risking money that is already on a tight budget isn’t something many want to do. If you are looking to scale you might need to resort to broad match, by layering audience targeting you will have the best chance to enhance your account.
Google Ads Broad Match With Audience Targeting Strategy
Using this strategy lets you layer audiences to target on top of your broad match keywords to keep them in check. These audiences aren’t small remarketing, but affinity, in-market, and custom audiences that Google creates that have high impressions.
The way these audiences keep your broad match keywords in check is simple. Broad match can sometimes show less than direct search queries, by having the audiences overlapping at least guarantees that you are marketing to the right person. This is also helpful because in Google Ads we are no longer able to see every single search term that shows up.
This technique will help you reduce irrelevant traffic or increased wasted spending as much as possible for broad match keywords.
Setting Up Broad Match With Audience Targeting
To start it is just like any other search campaign. Either use one that is already created or create a new one with your desired settings, adgroups, broad match keywords, and responsive or text ads. The next step is to select either the entire campaign or an individual adgroup. After clicking into audiences and click the edit pencil to edit your audience targeting. Make sure you have toggled the option of targeting the audiences you select. You can either search for specific audiences or take some browse options or if you created a custom audience you can try that as well. Then all you have to do is hit save and your campaign is all set up.
Extra Tips for Broad Match & Audience Targeting Campaign / Adgroups
Setting up for this strategy is pretty easy, so to make sure your new strategy is a success let's share a few tips to help you out.
Check on Your Bids
Because this strategy uses broad match, you will match with more which means you will spend more overall. So if you are using manual CPC bids it will help you minimize wasted spend while you're collecting data.
If you are using automatic bidding then you won’t have to worry about this issue. Google recommends using automatic bidding with broad match keywords anyways. Automatic bidding knows to bid lower or higher depending on the search query's relevancy. But it doesn’t hurt to confirm that the bidding strategy matches your goal, to make sure your goal is slightly lower so that way your bidding costs stay down.
Check Your Negative Keywords
Another way to curb your bidding costs is to add negative keywords. With broad match, you are giving Google more judgment on what queries you show for, by adding negative keywords you will help steer the queries in the right direction. The areas that you can control will help you hold the reins of broad match. Make a list of all possible keywords that you wouldn't want to show up for and add them to the negative keywords list and make sure to add them before starting up your strategy.
If you feel like you're stagnant on growing your account you should consider broad match combined with audience targeting. Due to the past, the majority of the community is still hesitant to use broad match. With the tips, we provided above as well as keeping a close eye on it you should be able to gain some new insights and growth in your account.