How to Optimize Search Terms in Google Ads: A Step-by-Step Guide

TL;DR: Optimizing your Google Ads search terms is one of the highest-ROI activities you can do in your account—yet most advertisers either skip it entirely or do it so inconsistently that they're basically lighting money on fire. This guide walks you through the exact process to analyze, clean up, and leverage your search terms report to cut wasted spend and scale what's actually working. Whether you're managing one account or fifty, these steps will help you turn raw search query data into a competitive advantage.

We'll cover how to access and filter your search terms, identify the junk queries draining your budget, build strategic negative keyword lists, discover high-intent keywords worth adding, and set up a sustainable optimization routine. No fluff, no theory—just the practical workflow that experienced PPC managers use to keep campaigns profitable.

Here's the thing most advertisers miss: the keywords you bid on and the actual searches triggering your ads are two completely different things. You might be bidding on "project management software," but your ads are showing for "free project management templates" and "project manager job openings." That gap between intent and reality? That's where your budget disappears.

What usually happens is advertisers set up campaigns, add some keywords, and then never look at what's actually triggering their ads. Months go by. Thousands of dollars get spent on completely irrelevant clicks. And when performance tanks, they blame the platform instead of their own lack of maintenance.

The search terms report is your diagnostic tool. It shows you exactly what people typed before clicking your ad. And in most accounts I audit, at least 30-40% of search terms are either partially irrelevant or complete garbage. That's not a Google Ads problem—that's an optimization problem.

Step 1: Access Your Search Terms Report and Set the Right Date Range

Let's start with the basics. Navigate to Keywords > Search terms in your Google Ads interface. You'll see a table showing every actual search query that triggered your ads, along with metrics like impressions, clicks, cost, and conversions.

The first decision you need to make is your date range. This matters more than you think.

For active accounts spending a few thousand dollars per month or more, stick with the last 30 days. This gives you recent data that reflects current campaign performance and search behavior. You're looking for patterns that are happening right now, not what worked three months ago.

For lower-volume accounts or newer campaigns, extend to 90 days. You need enough data to spot meaningful patterns. If you're only seeing 50 search terms in 30 days, you won't have enough signal to make good decisions.

Here's a workflow tip that saves time: if you're analyzing a specific campaign or ad group, use the filter dropdown at the top of the table. Don't try to optimize your entire account in one sitting—that's how you miss important patterns. Focus on one campaign at a time, especially your highest-spend campaigns first.

For accounts with 1000+ search terms, download the data as a spreadsheet. The Google Ads interface is fine for quick reviews, but when you're dealing with volume, Excel or Google Sheets makes it easier to sort, filter, and spot patterns quickly. For a deeper dive into working with this data, check out our guide on how to analyze search terms in Google Ads effectively.

One thing to watch: make sure you're not filtering out low-impression queries by default. Google sometimes hides search terms with minimal activity, but those can still reveal important negative keyword opportunities. Click "Show all" if you see a notification about hidden terms.

Step 2: Identify and Remove Junk Search Terms Draining Your Budget

Now comes the fun part: finding where your money is going and cutting off the waste.

Start by sorting the search terms report by cost in descending order. The biggest budget drains rise to the top. This is where you'll find the most expensive mistakes—queries that got tons of clicks but zero conversions, or worse, conversions that cost 5x your target CPA.

What you're looking for are clear red flags. Here's what those look like in real accounts:

Competitor brand names you don't want to target: If you're not intentionally bidding on competitor terms, these are pure waste. Someone searching "competitor name pricing" isn't looking for you—they're comparison shopping or already decided on that competitor.

Job seeker queries: This is probably the most common budget drain I see. You're selling marketing software, but your ads are showing for "digital marketing manager jobs" and "marketing coordinator salary." These clicks never convert because the searcher isn't a buyer—they're looking for employment.

DIY and free-seeking queries: If you sell a paid service or product, searches containing "free," "DIY," "how to make," or "template" are usually low-intent. Someone searching "free project management tool" isn't going to pay for your premium software.

Wrong location signals: Geographic mismatches are sneaky. You serve the US market, but you're getting clicks from searches like "best plumber in Sydney" because your broad match keywords are too loose.

Informational queries when you're selling products: Searches like "what is CRM" or "how does email marketing work" indicate research-phase users, not buyers. Unless you're running a content strategy to capture top-of-funnel traffic, these rarely convert.

Let's say you're running ads for a B2B SaaS product. You might find search terms like "project management certification," "free gantt chart template," "project manager resume examples," and "Asana vs Monday.com" (when you sell neither). Every one of those is a wasted click. Understanding the difference between search terms vs keywords in Google Ads is crucial for spotting these mismatches.

The mistake most agencies make is being too conservative with negatives. They see a junk query and think "well, maybe someday this could convert." No. If the intent is clearly wrong, add it as a negative immediately. You can always remove a negative later if you were too aggressive—but you can't get back the budget you already wasted.

To add negatives directly from the search terms report, check the box next to the irrelevant queries and click "Add as negative keyword" from the action menu. You'll choose whether to add it at the campaign level or ad group level. For most junk queries, campaign-level negatives work fine and save you time.

Step 3: Build Strategic Negative Keyword Lists by Theme

Adding negatives one by one works for small accounts, but if you're managing multiple campaigns or client accounts, you need a system. That's where shared negative keyword lists come in.

Shared lists are collections of negative keywords you can apply across multiple campaigns instantly. Instead of adding "jobs" as a negative in 12 different campaigns manually, you create a "Jobs & Careers" negative list once and apply it everywhere.

Here are the negative keyword categories that work in most accounts:

Jobs & Careers: Include terms like jobs, careers, salary, hiring, resume, interview, employment, recruiter, job openings, and role-specific titles like "manager position" or "coordinator job."

Free & DIY: Add free, DIY, how to make, homemade, template, download, tutorial, guide, course (if you're not selling courses), and similar budget-conscious or self-service terms.

Competitor Brands: List out your main competitors by name. This only applies if you're not intentionally running competitor campaigns. If you are targeting competitors, keep this list narrow and apply it only to non-competitor campaigns.

Wrong Products or Services: If you sell software but not hardware, add terms like equipment, machine, device, physical, installation. If you're B2B only, add consumer-focused terms like "for personal use" or "home edition."

Geographic Exclusions: If you only serve specific regions, add city names, state abbreviations, or country names you don't serve. This catches queries like "best marketing agency in Toronto" when you only operate in the US.

To create a shared negative keyword list in Google Ads, go to Tools & Settings > Shared library > Negative keyword lists. Click the plus button, name your list something descriptive like "Jobs - All Accounts," and start adding your negative keywords. You can add them one per line or paste in a bulk list. For more detailed strategies, read our guide on negative keywords Google Ads strategies to stop wasting budget.

Once your list is created, apply it to relevant campaigns by clicking "Apply to campaigns" and selecting which campaigns should use this list. The beauty of this system is maintenance: when you discover a new junk pattern, add it to the shared list once and it protects all campaigns using that list.

In most accounts I audit, setting up 4-5 solid negative keyword lists in the first month eliminates 20-30% of wasted spend immediately. Then you maintain them monthly by adding new patterns as they emerge.

Step 4: Find High-Intent Keywords Worth Adding to Your Campaigns

Now let's flip the script. You've been cutting waste—time to find opportunities.

The search terms report isn't just for finding junk. It's also your best source for discovering high-performing keywords you're not bidding on directly. These are search queries that already drove conversions through your broad or phrase match keywords, but you haven't added them as exact match keywords yet.

Here's the filter strategy: look for search terms with at least one conversion (or multiple conversions for higher-volume accounts) where you don't already have an exact match keyword. These are proven winners. Real people searched this exact phrase, clicked your ad, and converted. That's gold.

Sort by conversion rate or conversions to surface the best performers. You're looking for queries with strong CTR (usually 5%+ for search campaigns) and conversion rates that meet or exceed your account average.

Let's say you're bidding on the phrase match keyword "email marketing platform" and you discover the search term "email marketing platform for ecommerce" drove 8 conversions at a great CPA. That's a signal. Add "email marketing platform for ecommerce" as its own keyword—probably as exact match or phrase match depending on volume potential.

Why does this matter? When you add proven search terms as dedicated keywords, several things happen. First, you gain more control over bids for that specific query. Second, you can write ad copy tailored to that exact intent. Third, your Quality Score typically improves because you're creating a tighter relevance match between keyword, ad, and landing page.

The decision between exact match and phrase match comes down to volume and intent specificity. If the search term is very specific and you want to protect it with a dedicated bid (like "enterprise email marketing platform for Shopify"), add it as exact match. If it's a pattern you want to capture variations of (like "affordable email marketing software"), phrase match gives you more reach while maintaining control. Learning how to do Google Ads keyword research properly will help you make these decisions faster.

What usually happens here is advertisers see a converting search term and think "well, my broad match keyword already captured it, so I'm good." That's leaving money on the table. By adding it as a dedicated keyword, you can bid more aggressively on proven winners and less aggressively on experimental broad match terms.

In practice, I'm usually adding 5-15 new keywords per campaign per month based on search term performance. These become some of the highest-performing keywords in the account because they're based on actual conversion data, not guesswork.

Step 5: Apply Match Types Strategically to Control Query Matching

Let's talk about match types, because this is where a lot of advertisers lose control of their campaigns without realizing it.

As of 2026, Google Ads match types work like this: Exact match shows your ads for searches that match your keyword or very close variations (singular/plural, misspellings, same intent). Phrase match shows your ads when the meaning of your keyword is included in the search, even if other words come before or after. Broad match uses machine learning to show your ads for searches related to your keyword, considering user behavior, landing page content, and other signals.

Your search terms report tells you when match types are working and when they're too loose.

If you're running phrase match or broad match keywords and seeing lots of irrelevant search terms, you have two options: add more negatives to tighten the matching, or switch to exact match for better control. In most accounts, the answer is both.

Here's the strategic approach: use exact match for your highest-converting, highest-intent keywords. These are your moneymakers. You want complete control over bids and budgets for these terms. If "enterprise project management software" converts at 12% and has a great CPA, that should be an exact match keyword with an aggressive bid.

Use phrase match for mid-funnel keywords where you want some flexibility but still need relevance. Phrase match works well for product category terms or solution-oriented searches where variations are valuable but you don't want complete chaos.

Use broad match sparingly and only with solid negative keyword coverage and conversion tracking in place. Broad match can discover new opportunities, but it requires active management. If you're not checking search terms weekly, broad match will burn your budget on irrelevant traffic.

What I see in most accounts is too much broad match without enough negative keyword discipline. The result? Ads showing for tangentially related searches that have terrible conversion rates. The search terms report makes this visible immediately. If you're struggling with this, our article on Google Ads irrelevant search terms dives deeper into solving this problem.

When you spot a pattern of irrelevant broad match triggers, you have a decision to make. Either tighten the match type to phrase or exact, or build out your negative keyword lists to exclude those patterns. Sometimes the answer is to kill the broad match keyword entirely and replace it with 5-10 exact match variations based on proven search terms.

Step 6: Set Up a Repeatable Search Term Optimization Routine

Here's the truth: search term optimization isn't a one-time project. It's a maintenance routine, like changing the oil in your car. Skip it for months, and performance degrades. Do it consistently, and your campaigns get better over time.

Your review cadence depends on spend levels. For accounts spending $5,000+ per month, review search terms weekly. You're generating enough query volume that new patterns emerge constantly, and wasted spend adds up fast.

For accounts spending $1,000-$5,000 per month, bi-weekly or monthly reviews work fine. You need enough data to make decisions, and checking too frequently just means you're reviewing the same 50 search terms over and over.

For smaller accounts under $1,000/month, monthly reviews are sufficient. Focus your time on higher-impact activities like ad copy testing and landing page optimization.

Create a simple checklist to keep your optimization consistent. Mine looks like this: Sort by cost and add negatives for top budget drains. Filter for converting search terms and add winners as keywords. Review match type performance and tighten where needed. Update shared negative keyword lists with new patterns. Check for geographic or demographic mismatches in queries. For a comprehensive approach, review our best practices for managing Google Ads campaigns.

Track your optimization impact over time by noting metrics before and after each session. I usually screenshot key metrics like wasted spend percentage, conversion rate, and average CPA before making changes, then check them again two weeks later. This creates accountability and helps you see what's working.

The compounding effect is real. Each optimization session builds on the last. Month one, you cut 30% of wasted spend. Month two, you add 10 high-converting keywords. Month three, you refine match types and improve Quality Score. Six months in, your account is dramatically more efficient than when you started—and you're spending the same amount of time, just consistently. Understanding how long it takes to optimize Google Ads helps set realistic expectations for this process.

For agencies and freelancers managing multiple accounts, tools that speed up this process are worth their weight in gold. Manually reviewing search terms across 10-20 client accounts every week is brutal. Anything that streamlines the workflow—whether it's bulk actions, saved filters, or automation—pays for itself immediately in time saved.

Putting It All Together: Your Search Term Optimization Checklist

Let's recap the complete workflow you just learned:

Step 1: Access your search terms report and set the right date range—30 days for active accounts, 90 days for lower volume.

Step 2: Sort by cost and identify junk search terms draining your budget. Add them as negatives immediately.

Step 3: Build shared negative keyword lists organized by theme—jobs, free/DIY, competitors, wrong products, and geographic exclusions.

Step 4: Filter for high-converting search terms you're not bidding on directly and add them as dedicated keywords.

Step 5: Review match type performance and tighten where needed. Use exact match for proven winners, phrase match for flexibility, and broad match only with strong negative keyword coverage.

Step 6: Set up a repeatable optimization routine based on your spend levels—weekly for high-spend accounts, monthly for smaller accounts.

The key is consistency over perfection. Doing this monthly beats doing it perfectly once and then forgetting about it for six months. Search term optimization compounds over time—each session builds on the last, and your campaigns get progressively more efficient.

Remember: the gap between the keywords you bid on and what actually triggers your ads is where most wasted spend hides. The search terms report makes that gap visible. Your job is to close it systematically by cutting waste, scaling winners, and maintaining control through match types and negatives.

In most accounts I work on, consistent search term optimization is the difference between barely profitable campaigns and campaigns that scale predictably. It's not sexy, it's not complicated, but it works.

If you're managing multiple accounts or just want to speed up this entire process, there are tools designed specifically to make search term optimization faster and less tedious. Start your free 7-day trial of Keywordme and see how much faster you can optimize when you're working directly inside Google Ads—no spreadsheets, no tab-switching, just quick, seamless optimization that turns this 60-minute task into a 10-minute routine.