How do you read the search terms report?

You read the search terms report by pulling the last 7 days of searches for each campaign, sorting them by clicks, and judging each one on whether the person behind it could become a customer, not on what it cost.

The search terms report lists the searches that actually triggered your ads, as people typed them. Keywords say what you meant to bid on. Search terms show what you paid for. ReClick manages Google Ads for 35+ businesses that rely on lead generation, and reads this report every week in every account, because it's where wasted spend, new keyword ideas, and match types running too wide all show up first.

What is the search terms report?

The search terms report is the Google Ads report of the searches that triggered your ads, with the impressions, clicks, cost, and conversions each one produced. Google's page on the search terms report defines a search term as the word or set of words a person enters when searching, which is what separates it from a keyword. Each row also shows:

• Match type: how the search matched your keyword, such as phrase match or "Exact match (close variant)." It can differ from the keyword's own match type, since a broad match keyword can match a search exactly.
• Added or excluded: whether the search is already a keyword in the account, already blocked by a negative, or neither.
• Campaign and ad group: where the search served, which shows when one search reaches more than one ad group.

How do you open the search terms report?

Open the search terms report in Google Ads by selecting Campaigns, then Insights and reports, then Search terms. Choose one campaign before opening it to see only that campaign's searches. To see the searches behind particular keywords, select those keywords on the keywords page first, then open Search terms.

What is the difference between a search term and a keyword?

A search term is what a person typed. A keyword is what you added to an ad group to choose which searches your ad can show on. One keyword matches many search terms. For example, a testing lab's phrase match keyword "mold testing" can bring in "mold testing for apartment buildings," "free mold testing," and "mold testing kit," and only the first one comes from a buyer the lab can serve.

What does the search terms report leave out?

The search terms report leaves out searches that don't have enough query activity, so part of what you paid for never appears by name. That's one more reason to block root words rather than whole searches: a root word also blocks the rare variants the report never lists.

How do you read the search terms report each week?

Read the search terms report each week in 4 steps, one campaign at a time:

1. Pull the last 7 days for the campaign. A week is short enough to catch new searches before they cost much and long enough to show patterns.
2. Sort by clicks, descending. The searches people clicked most sit at the top, where the most money goes.
3. Judge each search on relevance. Ask whether the person who typed it could become a customer. Cost doesn't decide it, and neither does a lack of conversions so far.
4. Decide what each search needs. Exclude it, give it an ad group of its own, route it to the right ad group, or leave it alone.

ReClick removes obvious waste in the same pass, even searches that have barely spent. An irrelevant search is excluded with impressions and no clicks, because its words already say it won't convert.

Why sort by clicks rather than cost?

Sort by clicks rather than cost because the question is relevance, and clicks show which searches reach the most people. Sorted by cost, an irrelevant search with many cheap clicks sits below a few expensive ones until it has spent enough to climb. Sorted by clicks, it sits near the top, and judged on its words, it gets caught in its first week.

What makes a search term irrelevant?

A search term is irrelevant when the person behind it can't become a customer, and in lead generation that usually falls into one of 5 kinds:

• Wrong intent: researching rather than buying, such as "how to test for mold yourself."
• Wrong audience: the right topic for the wrong customer, such as "lemon law attorney for car dealers" reaching a firm that represents car owners.
• Wrong service: something the client doesn't offer, such as "mold removal" for a lab that only tests.
• Competitor names: someone looking for another business by name, unless a campaign targets competitors on purpose.
• Wrong place: a location the client doesn't serve, such as "apartments for rent in San Diego" for a Los Angeles property manager.

Competitor searches get checked more often than the rest. When they're taking a meaningful share of the budget, ReClick checks them daily.

What do you do with each search term?

Each search term gets one of 4 outcomes:

• Exclude it. Find the word that makes it irrelevant and add that root word to the right negative keyword list, not the whole search. Google adds negatives from the report as negative exact match by default, which blocks that one search and nothing else, so change the match type before saving. ReClick uses phrase match by default.
• Give it its own ad group. A relevant search with an intent none of the ad groups covers yet earns an ad group of its own, with keywords, ads, and a page that answer it.
• Route it. When the same search serves in 2 ad groups, an ad group negative in the general one sends it to the ad group whose ads speak to it.
• Leave it. A relevant search that hasn't converted yet stays, and its keyword gets judged as a whole.

Searches that match well tell you something too. Reading the top search terms beside an ad group's ads and its landing page headline is the first step of an audit of message match between ad and landing page, because each step should repeat what the searcher asked for.

Should you add every converting search term as a keyword?

No. New keywords follow the intent of each ad group, not a search's conversions. The question to ask of a new search is whether it shows an intent that warrants its own ad group. If it does, it gets one, with keywords, ads, and a page that answer it. If it fits an existing ad group's intent, that ad group's keywords already reach it, and a second keyword adds nothing.

How do you judge a search that spends without converting?

Judge a relevant search that spends without converting through its keyword, not its own handful of clicks. ReClick pauses a keyword only after it has spent 3 to 5 times the target cost per qualified lead with no conversions. For example, at a target of $200 per qualified lead, the threshold is $600 to $1,000 spent with no conversion. A few clicks without a lead is not enough data to judge a keyword. The target itself is a cost per marketing-qualified lead, or whichever qualified stage the account bids on, not the cost of every form.

Which campaigns should you review?

Review every Search and Performance Max campaign, one at a time. Reading campaigns separately keeps each search next to the keywords, ads, and budget it was meant for, so a search that's fine in one campaign and wrong in another is easy to see.

Should you read Performance Max search terms too?

Yes. Performance Max campaigns show search terms in the same report, and their waste is the same kind as a Search campaign's. ReClick reviews them in the same weekly pass and feeds what they turn up into the account's shared negative lists.

What else does the search terms report show?

Beyond waste to exclude, the search terms report shows how wide your match types run, which searches send unqualified leads, and why cost per lead moved.

How wide do your match types run?

The match type column shows how each search matched, close variants included. When Google's matching reaches searches the client doesn't serve, the report is where it shows, and a negative keyword pulls it back. A rising share of close variants in a campaign built on phrase and exact match is a reason to read its keywords again.

Which searches send unqualified leads?

A search that sends forms can still send the wrong people. When your sales team reports junk leads, the search terms behind them are the first thing ReClick checks, before bids or budgets.

The Promobile Marketing case study shows that loop on a business-to-business account: categories of searchers whose inquiries never close are excluded as they're found, and the negative lists are pruned weekly.

Why did cost per lead move?

When cost per lead rises and conversion rate falls with it, the search terms report shows whether the searches changed. A campaign whose top searches drifted toward research or other services will convert less without any change to its ads or page. Splitting cost per lead into cost per click and conversion rate, as the cost per lead formula does, shows which side moved, and the search terms show why.

How often should you review the search terms report?

Review the search terms report every week, over the last 7 days for each campaign. That cadence runs in every account ReClick manages, with competitor searches checked daily when they take a meaningful share of the budget.

Longer windows suit different jobs. Every month and every quarter, ReClick reads search terms over the longer period to check that each ad group, or each Performance Max asset group, still holds one cluster of search intent, and to measure cost per lead over a quarter rather than a week. A week shows new searches early. A quarter shows whether the account's structure still fits how people search. When a campaign needs more volume, ReClick also reads the last 90 days of search terms for long-tail and question searches worth adding as keywords. After a new campaign launches, the weekly review is the one piece of work that doesn't pause: ReClick holds other changes until results are stable, and keeps excluding irrelevant searches from the first week.

The weekly review is also what keeps an exclusion system current. The page on Google Ads for real estate describes how a weekly search terms review keeps leasing accounts' negative lists closed as new variants of subsidized-housing, landlord, and sublet searches appear.

How does ReClick review search terms?

ReClick reviews search terms every week in every account: 7 days at a time, campaign by campaign, sorted by clicks and judged on relevance. Irrelevant searches become root-word negatives that day, searches with an intent no ad group covers get an ad group of their own, and searches serving in the wrong ad group get routed. Every month and quarter, a longer read checks that the ad groups still match how people search. Sales team feedback on unqualified leads sends the review back to the searches that produced them.

The review is one part of the work ReClick does as a Google Ads agency for lead generation, where the account is judged on cost per qualified lead, and the search terms show who that budget is reaching.