Very soon you will start to see new recommendations from Google that will encourage you to use broad match while you're in Google Ads.
Smart Bidding Elevates Broad Match
Last Month Google published a blog post talking about broad match. “Using broad match and smart bidding together can help with relevant search queries that meet your performance objectives… By pairing this keyword with Smart Bidding, you can use auction-time signals to set the right bid for each of these queries. This means that you no longer need to anticipate and manage every potential search.”
To give you an example, the broad match keyword “men’s shoes” will be able to match “winter boots for men” or “men's footwear”. Google has been pushing the strategy of having keyword to query matching up to the algorithm. And as it progresses over time we have seen close variants continue to expand.
Should we Trust Broad Match?
If you feel skeptical about trusting broad match and smart campaigns together, you are not alone.
Google has shared a couple of examples to show how strong this blend of broad match and smart campaigns works. Here is one:
“Advertising agency iProspect, a dentsu company, used broad match with Smart Bidding to generate long-term growth while keeping performance steady. “We had our doubts using broad match, since we’ve tested it in the past and found we had less control over search queries that impacted performance. With Smart Bidding’s predictive signals as the safety net, we saw an increase in unique search terms generated by broad match, leading to a 20% increase in conversions,” - Kasper Spanjer, PPC strategist.
For most digital marketers, the idea of using broad match keywords is a ludicrous idea. Most ppc marketers have spent years working around broad match and making successful campaigns. However,Google made changes to search terms and how they are shown. This change makes it harder to get search queries, which now makes broad match keywords more important than ever.
There are a few reasons why incorporating broad match keywords is something we should all consider and perhaps start using again. Google's changes constitute a drastic shift compared to its past approaches. These new updates are pushing us towards a place where segmenting will be less common and the Google algorithm will take over.
The ability to leverage smart campaigns as the filter for broad match will let you help keep out the drastic broad match keywords. This will be more than likely the new way for marketers to leverage broad match versus the norm of manual bidding. To start getting used to this possible new change, start by changing one adgroup to broad match and testing it.