What's a Step-by-Step Process to Improve My Quality Score in Google Ads?

TL;DR: Quality Score is Google's 1–10 rating of how relevant your keywords, ads, and landing pages are to a user's search. A higher score means lower CPCs and better ad positions. To improve it, you need to tighten keyword-to-ad relevance, boost your expected CTR, and fix your landing page experience—in that order. This guide walks you through exactly how to do that, step by step, without needing a spreadsheet or a separate dashboard.

Whether you're a freelancer managing a handful of campaigns or an agency running dozens of accounts, this process is repeatable and practical. We'll cover how to diagnose where your scores are tanking, how to restructure ad groups for tighter relevance, how to write ads that actually earn clicks, and how to make sure your landing pages don't kill the deal after the click. Each step builds on the last, so work through them in order.

Step 1: Diagnose Your Current Quality Scores (Before You Touch Anything)

Before you change a single headline or restructure a single ad group, you need to know exactly where you stand. Jumping straight into rewrites without diagnosing first is one of the most common mistakes I see when auditing accounts. You end up fixing the wrong things.

To pull Quality Score data, go to your Keywords tab in Google Ads, click the columns icon, and add these custom columns: Quality Score, Expected CTR, Ad Relevance, and Landing Page Experience. You can also add the historical versions of each (labeled with "hist.") to track changes over time.

Once those columns are visible, you'll see each sub-component rated as Below Average, Average, or Above Average. This is where the real diagnosis happens. A keyword with a score of 3 but "Above Average" landing page experience tells you the problem is in your ad copy or CTR signals, not your page. Context matters.

Here's a rough way to think about score ranges:

1–3: Something is seriously misaligned. Usually a combination of poor ad relevance and low expected CTR. These keywords need immediate attention or should be paused.

4–6: Average territory. There's room to improve, and small changes to ad copy or ad group structure can move the needle here. This is where most keywords in underoptimized accounts tend to cluster.

7–10: You're doing well. Don't over-tinker. Focus your energy elsewhere unless one sub-component is still flagged as Below Average.

When prioritizing, sort by spend. A keyword burning $500/month with a Quality Score of 3 is a much bigger opportunity than a keyword spending $10/month with a score of 5. Focus your effort where the cost impact is highest.

One quick win: filter for keywords where all three sub-components are rated "Below Average." These are your biggest levers. Export or note them before moving to the next step, because you'll be revisiting them throughout this process.

Step 2: Audit Your Search Terms Report for Relevance Leaks

Here's something most advertisers miss: low Quality Score is often a symptom, not the root cause. And the root cause, in many accounts I audit, is a dirty search terms report.

Every time your ad appears for an irrelevant query and nobody clicks, Google records that as a negative signal against your Expected CTR. Do that enough times across enough irrelevant queries, and your Expected CTR score degrades. It compounds quietly in the background, and most people don't connect the dots.

To access the Search Terms Report, go to Keywords > Search Terms in your Google Ads interface. What you're looking for are queries that are triggering your ads but clearly don't match the intent of your ad group.

Common patterns to watch for:

Branded competitor terms: If you're running non-branded campaigns and your ads are showing for "[Competitor Name] reviews" or "[Competitor Name] pricing," that traffic is unlikely to convert and will dilute your CTR signals.

Informational queries hitting transactional ad groups: If your ad group is built around "buy running shoes" but you're showing up for "how to choose running shoes," those users aren't in buying mode. Your ad won't resonate, and they won't click.

Irrelevant product categories: Broad match and phrase match can pull in some surprising queries. A campaign for "leather office chairs" might start showing for "leather car seat covers" if left unchecked.

The manual process here is tedious. You'd normally export the report, flag irrelevant terms in a spreadsheet, then go back into Google Ads to add them as negatives. It's the kind of task that takes 30 minutes and gets skipped because of it.

This is exactly where a tool like Keywordme speeds things up. It works directly inside your Google Ads Search Terms Report as a Chrome extension, letting you flag and remove irrelevant search terms with a single click, without ever leaving the interface or opening a spreadsheet. For agencies managing multiple accounts, that time saving adds up fast.

Clean search terms are the foundation of a healthy Expected CTR score. Don't skip this step.

Step 3: Restructure Ad Groups Around Tighter Keyword Themes

Once your search terms are clean, the next thing to look at is your ad group structure. This is where Ad Relevance scores live or die.

The core principle is simple: every keyword in an ad group should map to the same user intent, so a single ad can serve all of them well. When one ad is trying to speak to 10 loosely related keywords, it ends up being generic enough to cover all of them and compelling enough for none of them. That's what tanks Ad Relevance.

You've probably heard of SKAGs (Single Keyword Ad Groups). The idea is that each ad group contains one keyword, giving you maximum control over ad-to-keyword relevance. SKAGs can work well in tightly controlled, high-value campaigns where you have the time and budget to manage them properly. But for most accounts, they create maintenance overhead without proportional gains.

A more practical middle ground is intent-based grouping. Rather than splitting by topic alone, group keywords by what the user is trying to do:

Buy-intent keywords: "buy running shoes online," "running shoes free shipping," "order trail running shoes." These users want to purchase. Your ad should speak to availability, price, and trust.

Compare-intent keywords: "best running shoes 2026," "Nike vs Asics running shoes," "running shoes comparison." These users are evaluating. Your ad should speak to selection and guidance.

Problem-intent keywords: "running shoes for knee pain," "best shoes for flat feet running." These users have a specific need. Your ad should speak to the solution.

Each of these groups deserves its own ad copy. When you write an ad for a buy-intent group, it should feel nothing like the ad for a compare-intent group, because the user's mindset is completely different.

Identifying bloated ad groups manually is straightforward: look for ad groups with more than 10–15 keywords and a single RSA. If the keywords span different intents, that's your signal to split.

Keywordme's keyword clustering feature helps with this by grouping keywords by theme and intent, so you can see at a glance which keywords belong together and which ones need their own ad group. It's particularly useful when you're restructuring larger accounts where manually sorting through hundreds of keywords would take hours.

Tighter ad groups mean more relevant ads, which means better Ad Relevance scores. It's a direct line.

Step 4: Rewrite Your Ads to Match Search Intent (and Boost Expected CTR)

Of the three Quality Score components, Expected CTR is the hardest to move. It's based on historical performance data, which means it takes time and accumulated impressions to shift. But ad copy is your primary lever, and it's worth getting right.

The goal here is simple: your ad should feel like the most relevant result a user could see for that search query. When someone searches "buy trail running shoes," your headline should reflect that exact language back to them. Not "Shop Our Footwear Collection." That's generic. "Buy Trail Running Shoes Online" is specific, and specific wins clicks.

There are two approaches to headline relevance:

Dynamic Keyword Insertion (DKI): DKI automatically inserts the triggering search term into your headline. It can boost relevance scores quickly, especially in large accounts with many keyword variations. The downside is that it can produce awkward or grammatically odd headlines if your keyword list isn't clean. Use it carefully, and always set a sensible default headline as the fallback.

Manually written intent-matched headlines: This takes more time but gives you full control over messaging. Write a headline that includes the core keyword phrase, then use the second headline to address the outcome or solve the problem. "Trail Running Shoes | Free Shipping Over $75" is more compelling than two generic brand-statement headlines stacked together.

Don't overlook ad extensions. Sitelinks, callouts, and structured snippets give your ad more visual real estate in the SERP and signal additional relevance. More real estate generally means more clicks, and more clicks improve your Expected CTR signal over time. If you're not running at least 4 sitelinks and a set of callouts on every campaign, you're leaving CTR on the table.

For testing, run 2–3 RSA variants per ad group with meaningfully different approaches, not just swapped synonyms. Let them run for 2–3 weeks before drawing conclusions. What you're watching for is a lift in CTR and, eventually, the Expected CTR component moving from Below Average to Average in your Quality Score columns.

One thing to avoid: writing ads that are clever but vague. Wordplay and brand voice have their place, but not at the expense of clarity. The searcher should know exactly what they're getting before they click.

Step 5: Fix Your Landing Page Experience

You can have a perfectly structured ad group and a high-performing ad, and still watch your Quality Score stall because the landing page experience is poor. Google evaluates what happens after the click, and it factors that into your score.

The three things Google looks at for Landing Page Experience are: relevance of the page content to the keyword and ad, page load speed (especially on mobile), and ease of navigation.

Check your current Landing Page Experience rating per keyword using the custom columns you set up in Step 1. If you're seeing "Below Average" across multiple keywords pointing to the same page, that page needs work.

The relevance fix: Your landing page headline, body copy, and offer should directly reflect what the ad promised. If your ad says "Buy Trail Running Shoes, Free Shipping," your landing page should open with trail running shoes and make the free shipping offer visible immediately. No bait and switch. No sending traffic to a generic homepage and hoping people find what they need.

The technical fix: Use Google PageSpeed Insights (free, at pagespeed.web.dev) to check your load time. Focus on mobile, because that's where Google's evaluation is most weighted. Slow pages lose users before they even see your offer, and that bounce behavior sends negative signals back to Google. Aim for a fast experience; even moderate improvements in load time can make a meaningful difference in user retention.

The UX fix: Reduce friction. One clear call to action, no intrusive popups on arrival, readable font sizes, and a layout that doesn't require scrolling to find the main offer. If a user has to work to figure out what you want them to do, they'll leave.

If you don't have direct control over the landing page (common in agency setups), the practical workaround is to build dedicated landing pages per ad group theme rather than routing everything to the homepage. A page built specifically for "trail running shoes" will always outperform a generic footwear homepage on relevance signals.

Step 6: Build and Maintain a Negative Keyword List

Negative keywords are often treated as a budget control tool. They are, but they're also a Quality Score maintenance tool, and that second function is underappreciated.

Here's the mechanism: every irrelevant impression where your ad doesn't get clicked sends a quiet negative signal to your Expected CTR. Over time, those signals accumulate. A well-maintained negative keyword list prevents your ads from showing for irrelevant queries in the first place, which protects your CTR signals and keeps your Ad Relevance intact.

There are two levels of negative keyword lists to think about:

Shared negative lists: These apply across multiple campaigns and are managed at the account level. Use these for exclusions that apply universally, like competitor brand names (if you're not running competitor campaigns), irrelevant industries, or terms that are never relevant to your business regardless of campaign.

Campaign-level negatives: These are specific to one campaign and are better for excluding terms that are fine in one context but wrong in another. For example, "free" might be a valid term for a campaign promoting a free trial but a negative for a campaign selling premium products.

Building your negative list systematically means starting with obvious exclusions, then mining the search terms report weekly to catch new irrelevant queries as they surface. This is especially important after launching new campaigns or expanding match types, when Google's matching tends to cast a wider net.

Again, Keywordme makes this part of the workflow significantly faster. From within the Search Terms Report, you can add negatives with a single click directly inside Google Ads, without exporting anything or switching tabs. For accounts with heavy search term volume, this is the kind of time saving that makes weekly audits actually happen instead of getting pushed to "when I have time."

Treat negative keyword maintenance as a recurring task, not a one-time setup. Your Quality Score will thank you for it.

Step 7: Monitor, Iterate, and Track Score Changes Over Time

Here's the part most guides skip: Quality Score doesn't update instantly. After you make improvements, expect to wait 2–4 weeks before you see meaningful changes reflected in your scores. Google needs to accumulate new impression and click data to recalibrate. If you check the day after restructuring your ad groups and nothing has moved, that's normal. Be patient.

To track changes over time, use the Quality Score (hist.) columns in Google Ads. These show you the score as it was recorded on a specific date, which lets you see whether your changes are having an effect week over week. Without this, you're flying blind.

A practical review cadence that works for most accounts:

Weekly: Search terms audit. Flag and remove irrelevant queries, add new negatives. This is your ongoing maintenance task and the one that has the most compounding effect on Expected CTR.

Bi-weekly: Ad copy review. Check CTR by ad variant, pause underperformers, and introduce new test variants if you have enough data to make a call.

Monthly: Landing page check. Review Landing Page Experience scores per keyword, flag any pages that have degraded, and check PageSpeed scores if you've made site changes.

On realistic targets: a Quality Score of 7–8 on most keywords is a solid, achievable goal for a well-structured campaign. Scores of 9–10 are possible but rare, and chasing them beyond a certain point yields diminishing returns. When most of your keywords are in the 7–8 range and your sub-components are Average or Above Average, your energy is better spent on bidding strategy and creative testing than on squeezing out another point.

The compounding effect here is real: better Quality Score leads to lower CPCs, which means your budget goes further, which means more conversions at the same spend. It's one of the highest-leverage optimization activities in Google Ads.

Your Quality Score Improvement Checklist

Here's a quick summary of the full process you can use as a reference each time you run through this workflow:

Step 1: Diagnose. Pull Quality Score columns in Google Ads. Identify keywords with low scores and Below Average sub-components. Prioritize by spend.

Step 2: Clean your search terms. Audit the Search Terms Report for irrelevant queries driving impressions without clicks. Remove them and add as negatives.

Step 3: Restructure ad groups. Split bloated ad groups by user intent. Make sure every keyword in a group can be served by the same ad message.

Step 4: Rewrite ads. Mirror the searcher's language in your headlines. Use extensions. Run 2–3 RSA variants per ad group and let data guide decisions.

Step 5: Fix landing pages. Match page content to the ad's promise. Improve load speed. Reduce friction. Build dedicated pages per ad group theme where possible.

Step 6: Maintain negative keywords. Build shared and campaign-level lists. Mine the search terms report weekly. Protect your CTR signals from irrelevant impressions.

Step 7: Track and iterate. Use historical Quality Score columns. Set a review cadence. Expect 2–4 weeks before changes show up in scores.

Quality Score improvement isn't a one-time project. It's an ongoing process that rewards consistency. Steps 2, 3, and 6 in particular are tasks you'll repeat regularly, and that's where Keywordme saves the most time. It lets you take action directly inside Google Ads without spreadsheets or tab-switching, which means the work actually gets done instead of getting deferred.

If your campaigns have issues beyond Quality Score, it's worth doing a broader audit. Check out our guide on what is wrong with my Google Ads campaign for a fuller diagnostic framework.

Ready to speed up the process? Start your free 7-day trial and see how much faster your optimization workflow can be when everything happens right inside your Google Ads account.