A Beginner’s Guide to Google Ads 2024
We’ll try to tell you everything you need to know about Google Ads (formerly known as Google AdWords, and today as Google Ads) in this text, a beginner’s guide to Google Ads, in order to boost your business.
It doesn’t matter if this is your first or 100th Google Ads campaign.
This beginner’s guide to Google Ads will address the following questions:
What are Google Ads?
Google Ads, formerly known as Google AdWords, is a bid-based online advertising platform that includes search engine text ads, video ads, banner ads, YouTube ads, and other display options.
Google ads can appear in search results on Google and millions of partner sites.
Google Ads is the largest publisher of digital ads in the United States, accounting for 28.4% of total ad revenue.
This ratio varies by country, but Google is considered dominant in the field of digital advertising.
How do Google Ads work?
You write an ad, place an offer, wait a bit and the sale starts. That’s basically it…
It seems simple, but it’s not.
We’ll explain in detail how to create a Google Ads campaign later, but essentially Google ads work on a pay-per-action model, usually calculated as cost-per-click (CPC).
This means that you pay a certain price every time a user clicks on your ad or on an action that you have defined as a goal.
That price changes often and depends on a number of factors, including the number of other brands currently targeting that keyword, search volume, expected reach, time of day or year, and more.
When you place an ad, you set your “maximum bid” – the most you’re willing to pay for a click (or impression or other defined action).
The three main bidding options are:
Cost Per Click (CPC)
You pay when a user clicks on your ad.
Cost per thousand impressions (CPM)
You pay for 1,000 impressions of your ad
Cost per engagement (CPE)
You pay when the user performs a specific action on your ad (subscribes to the list, watches a video, etc.).
For example, if your maximum bid is 50 dinars, and Google says that the value of that click is 80 dinars, your ad will not be displayed.
However, if your maximum offer is 81 dinars, your ad will have a high chance of being displayed on the search engine. It’s important to know that with Google advertising bids, there is a minimum and maximum bid figure for displaying the campaign.
Just so you know, this figure is different from the total campaign budget. You have the option to set a daily average budget and let Google manage individual ad bids, or set an overall budget and set a maximum bid for each ad.
For beginners, we recommend setting a daily budget and allowing Google to optimize individual ad bids.
But this should only be done at the beginning, until you gain experience and understand what actually looks like placing ads on Google.
For example, if you want to spend a total of 10,000 dinars, you can start a 30-day campaign with a maximum daily budget of 330 dinars. And you can create a campaign that will have a maximum daily budget of 660 dinars during 14 days.
It is very simple and you decide when, to whom and how your ad will be displayed on the Google search engine.
That’s budgeting in a nutshell, but there are exceptions for certain industries.
However, there is another important factor when bidding, and that is the Quality Score.
Does Google Pay Attention to Quality Score?
Quality Score is how Google Ads determines who has the “best” ad to display for a given keyword. It is a numerical ranking from 1-10.
For example, a lunch restaurant might get a 10 (high rating) for the keyword “prosciutto sandwiches” but would probably get a 1 (low rating) for the keyword “local plumber.”
Your Quality Score does not directly affect your ad position or budget, but it can have indirect effects.
A high Quality Score means that your ads match the search intent of potential customers.
Creating ads that match what people are looking for means they’ll be shown more often, which means you’ll get more clicks.
Quality Score is not a metric you should track in detail. It’s more of a guide to show if your ad targeting is fine.
This way, you can easily compare yourself to other ads competing for the same keywords.
Types of Google ads
Google Ads has changed over the years, always adding new features and ad types.
Currently, Google Ads includes the following types of ads:
1. Google Responsive search ads
These ads are the basic ad format and should be a part of every campaign. These are text ads on the Google search results pages.
Instead of writing just one ad, responsive search ads allow you to write several small variations, and Google’s AI technology chooses the best combination of ad components that match the search and user intent.
Advertisements are marked with “Sponsored” above them and usually appear in the first four positions on the page.
When to use them:
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Google Search ads are the most basic form of Google ads and any brand can only benefit from them.
Specifications:
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Titles: Minimum three and maximum 15 titles. Up to 30 characters each.
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Display URL: Must contain your domain, but does not have to be the final URL. May include a simplified “Path” of up to 15 characters.
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Descriptions: Ad text. A minimum of two descriptions is required, but you can have up to four. Maximum of 90 characters each.
2. Google Performance Max ads
Google Performance Max ads are less of a type of ad and more of an entire strategy. Google describes Performance Max as a combination of all of its best machine learning algorithms and AI-powered bidding strategies. Along with data you provide, such as target groups. The idea is to get the best possible results for your goal.
Google claims Performance Max campaigns get 18% more conversions than traditional search engine advertising campaigns.
When to use them:
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Google suggests using a Performance Max campaign as a supplement to basic search engine ad campaigns.
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When you have a clear goal.
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When you have additional data that helps Google target your ads, such as target groups from Facebook, previous campaigns, e-commerce, etc.
Specifications:
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It provides different ad formats and creative formats. For best results, create different elements – images, video, text options.
This is how you will achieve the most in Google Ads campaigns.
3. Google Discovery Ads
Google Discovery ads appear in places where people are most likely to research products or view product reviews. This includes YouTube front pages and “Watch Next” pages, Gmail inbox ads, Google search ads and on the Google homepage itself.
As a mix of display ads and shopping ads, Google Discovery ads use existing content in different formats.
When to use them:
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When you already have several other campaigns and resources in Google Ads. Discovery ads use your existing resources in different formats.
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To increase sales.
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For retargeting previous customers by defining the target group.
Specifications:
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Google Discovery ads include different ad formats, including text, graphics (display), and video. For best results, have multiple options for each visual format.
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To run a Google Discovery campaign, you must have a Google tag installed on your site (formerly known as “sitewide tagging”).
4. YouTube ads
Known to almost all Internet users. YouTube ads play either before you watch a video, during a video, or appear elsewhere on YouTube. Most often, these are the homepage, subscription pages, watch later or playlist pages.
Who will see your video ads depends on several factors. Most often, whether the user is logged in or not, their interests, viewing history, campaign objective and campaign targeting settings.
When to use them:
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For product launches, new offers or increasing brand recognition. YouTube video ads work for almost any goal and campaign, but only if you have high-quality video content.
Specifications:
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Skippable in-stream ads: No maximum length, recommended to stay under three minutes.
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Non-skippable in-stream ads: 15-30 second intervals.
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In-feed and outstream ads: No maximum length. Existing videos from your channel can be used.
5. Google Display Ads
Google Display ads are images or videos that appear on millions of websites around the world that are part of the Google Display network, as well as on Google sites like YouTube.
You can define each ad yourself or upload a collection of resources – graphics, videos, logos and headlines. You can let Google Ads use artificial intelligence (AI) to come up with the best combinations to target your audience, as part of a Google Smart Display or Google Performance Max campaign.
As a 2024 recommendation, it is considered a best practice if you want to convert your respective Display Ads campaigns to Performance Max campaigns. This is because individual image ads no longer appear in Gmail and other high-paying places, while Google Performance Max ads can. In addition, Google claims that advertisers who convert their campaigns to Performance Max campaigns achieve an average of 15% more conversions at a similar cost per action.
When to use them:
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As soon as you finish the graphic or video. In our opinion, everyone should try Google Display Ads.
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If you want to retarget an existing audience, such as re-engaging past customers.
Specifications:
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Image ads: Various specific dimensions, including banners, square ads, and more. For best results, create versions of your images in all ad sizes under Display ads.
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HTML5 Ads: Brands that have spent $9,000 or more on Google Ads and have an account older than 90 days can apply to access the HTML5 ad format. You create HTML5 ads using Google Web Designer.
6.Google Shopping Ads.
Google Shopping Ads use your product catalog to show optimized ads across the Google Search and Display Network, YouTube and Gmail. Google’s automatic targeting displays what it considers the most relevant product for the user’s search.
When to use them:
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This is the required Google ad format for every e-commerce store.
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Google Shopping ads are especially valuable if you use Shopify, WooCommerce, BigCommerce, or GoDaddy to take advantage of Google Performance Max Shopping ads.
Specifications:
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Product data must be structured in a way that Google Ads understands. This means it includes a unique ID number, description, URL, images and other data for each product. Product information must be updated (manually or automatically) every 30 days.
7. Google App Ads
As the name suggests, Google app ads direct users to download your iOS or Android app. However, there are a few additional campaign options available for Android campaigns compared to iOS because Google owns the Google Play Store.
When to use them:
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If you have an app, though you need 50,000 app installs to be eligible (not valid for Android pre-registration campaigns).
Specifications:
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Images: In .PNG or .JPG formats up to 5 MB each in recommended sizes of 1200×1200, 1200×628 or 1200×1500 pixels.
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Video (optional): You must first upload a video to YouTube or use a video from your app’s store page.
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Text: Up to five titles of 30 characters or less and five descriptions of 90 characters or less.
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HTML5: Select advertisers may use HTML5 resources as part of an app campaign.
8. Google Smart Campaigns
Normal mode, smart mode, expert mode… What to choose? Essentially, any campaign can be a “Google Smart Campaign” if you set it up to use Google Ads’ AI-powered bidding, targeting, or ad placement strategies.
When to use them:
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If you’re new to Google Ads, Google Smart Campaigns are a great way to get started and take less than 15 minutes to set up.
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For experienced brands, Google Smart campaigns often still deliver better results than standard campaigns with less time required to manage.
Specifications:
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Each ad in a Google Smart campaign consists of several separate components: Title, description, URL, name of your business and, if possible, phone number, address or map location (for physical locations).
How much do Google ads cost?
Google ads cost as much as they are bid for. Each keyword has a minimum and maximum value. It is determined by all those who participate in Google advertising.
The one who bids the highest price will be in first place.
But if there are two identical maximum bids, Google will determine which will take the first place at the top of the page based on some other parameters.
Below we will give you several examples of how much Google ads cost in 2024. They are based on the average CPC (cost per click) by industry in the United States of America. The education industry on Google has an average CPC of $9.35, but the same niche in Germany has an average CPC of $1.89.
The situation is similar for real estate: the average CPC is $1.87 in the United States, $0.78 in England, and $0.63 in Canada.
Each industry has a significantly different cost per click which also varies from country to country. So there is no “true” average cost of a Google ad.
The average cost per click on Google Ads in the US is $1.99 and the highest in the world. There is a big difference even between North American countries.
In Europe, England and Switzerland take the top spots with $1.22 and $1.13 on average per click.
Average costs will vary even among competitors in the same industry and location. There are so many other factors that affect Google ad costs, including:
Targeting strategy
Creative ad content
Keywords
Copy of title
Campaign objective
Whether it is a Performance Max campaign or not
Do you use manual or automatic bidding
Prices for Google ads in Serbia are significantly lower.
If you use the Google Ads platform, you can easily check the prices for the keywords you are interested in.
How to create Google ads in 5 steps?
We will try to explain it as simply as possible.
Well, let’s get started:
1. Open a Google Ads account
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First, complete all the basic steps, including opening a Google Ads account
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Enter the name of your business and the URL of your website
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Link any existing Google-owned accounts, such as a YouTube channel and/or Google My Business profile
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Fill in your billing and payment information
2. Create your first campaign
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Click “New Campaign” at the top of the main Google Ads dashboard.
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Select a goal for your campaign and click “Continue”.
3. Set up a bidding strategy
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Once you’ve chosen an objective and ad format, tell Google Ads how much you want to spend and how you want to optimize that budget (eg conversions, leads, traffic, etc.).
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Optionally, you can set a target cost per action, although we recommend leaving this unchecked for new users. Sometimes it’s not a bad idea to let Google optimize your bidding as much as possible.
4. Target your audience
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Here you tell Google where to find your audience. Select the locations and/or languages you want to target as well as an optional additional interest category. Advanced users can upload custom audiences, fine-tune demographics, and more.
5. Create ads
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Creating ads is an extensive process and we can’t cover everything in a few sentences. A lot depends on your industry, goals, existing resources and more. But you need at least a few ad groups to start advertising on Google.
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Google guides you very easily through this process, looking for your URL and relevant keywords.
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Finally, Google Ads asks you to write several ads. You will be shown a preview on the right as you build your ad.
For everything to be good and complete, you must include the following:
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URL
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Up to 15 titles
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Up to 15 titlesUp to 15 titles
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Pictures
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4 or more additional specific links that appear below your ad.
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Additions: Short attributes, e.g. “free shipping, open 24/7”, etc.
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Plus, all optional details like phone number, app store link, etc.
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You don’t need to have all of these items right away. If you’re new to Google Ads, keep things as simple as possible. You can always measure and adjust your ads later.
4. Tips for Creating Winning Google Ads
1. Focus on headlines
You can include up to 15 headlines per ad, so take advantage of that opportunity and maximize your ad’s potential. Depending on the ad format, Google will shuffle them to show the ones most likely to convert, each separated by a hyphen.
2. Test and experiment
Even your most successful ads can be improved by testing new variations. Conduct A/B testing frequently and don’t be afraid to experiment with new ad copy, visuals, and more.
3. Have a clear CTA
For pay-per-click (PPC) conversion campaigns, keep your call-to-action simple and descriptive about what you want the viewer to do.
4. Make use of all the available ad attributes
Although optional, including additional fields such as “callouts” and “sitelinks” can make your ad stand out from the crowd. This ad grabs attention by adding a “callout” about financing
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