How To Find & Apply The Best Negative Keywords To Search Campaigns

Introduction

We heard earlier this year at #GML2024 about Google’s upgraded broad match keyword match type. With advanced indicators of intent, relevance, and user insights, broad match keywords should negate the need for phrase match and exact match keywords.

However, we’re not quite there yet. And, vast numbers of PPC experts are still seeing issues, irrelevant searches, and low-quality traffic coming from broad match keywords. So, with Google’s (and Microsoft is sure to follow suit) renewed focus and emphasis on using broad match keywords in all PPC campaigns, negative keywords have never been more important than now.

With that said, let’s explore some tips and tricks to not only find, but create and apply the right negative keywords to your search campaigns.

What are negative keywords?

A negative keyword is a word or phrase that you use to tell search engine advertisers not to show your ads for, when that particular word or phrase appears within the search query.

A super-simple example of this is a Google search for ‘trainers’ (also known as sneakers in the US). If your eCommerce or brick-and-mortar store sells men’s trainers, you might be tempted to use ‘trainers’ as a broad match keyword. But, it’s important to consider all the other potential homonyms that the user might be referring to with their search query, such as:

• Personal trainer
• Cross trainer
• Virtual trainer
• Dog trainer
• Animal trainer.

These are searches that wouldn’t be relevant to your ‘trainers’ ads, and therefore you’d want to exclude terms such as “personal”, “cross”, “virtual”, “dog”, and “animal”. You can do this by adding these words as negative keywords.

As well as direct homonyms, other similar search terms may be relevant to a search for ‘trainers’, but may not be something that your store sells. For example, the following search queries:

• Kids trainers
• Women’s trainers
• Trainer repair
• How to clean trainers
• Shoelaces for trainers
• Personalized trainers
• Hiking trainers
• Design your own trainers

To keep the search terms that trigger your ads as relevant as possible, there are a few ways to avoid this mix-up. You can use all three of these methods in conjunction with one another.

1. Try to stay away from using vague, broad-match keywords such as ‘trainers’. Be more specific and try keywords such as ‘men’s running trainers’ or ‘trainers for running’. This will not only give the search engines more information on the intent of the search, it will help to reduce the volume of irrelevant search queries triggering your ads.
2. Instead of - or as well as - using broad match keywords, try also using phrase match or exact match terms in your ad groups. Phrase match (stylized as “phrase match”) keywords will tell the relevant search engine only to trigger your ads when the search query matches the full phrase. A phrase match keyword such as “men’s running trainers” would only match user queries such as ‘men’s running trainers near me’, or ‘size 12 men’s running trainers’ - only queries that match the full phrase or very close variants (such as plurals). Exact match keywords (stylized as [exact match]) perform a similar function but only match up your keywords with a user’s search query when they exactly match. For example, an exact match keyword of [men’s running trainers] will only match search terms ‘men’s running trainers’ or ‘mens running trainer’.
3. The third method of reducing wastage and irrelevant triggers is using negative keywords. In the example above, a negative keyword such as ‘animal’ or ‘cross’ would avoid matching your ads to a search for ‘animal trainers’ or ‘cross trainers’ - keeping your triggers, and traffic, far more relevant to your products and services. 

You may also want to be more specific about the colors, brands, and types of men’s trainers that are available.  Maybe your shoes aren’t suitable for men with wide feet or for those who want velcro straps. Use ‘wide’, “wide feet” or ‘velcro’ as negative keywords to avoid showing your ads for these searches, even when they also include the keywords you do want to appear for. 

As an example, a user’s search query for “men’s trainers for wide feet” should, in theory, trigger one of your ads as it includes the term “men’s trainers”. But, with the exclusion (via negative keyword) of ‘wide’, this whole search query will no longer trigger your ads.

Should I use negative keywords?

Absolutely, and it’s a must-have, even if you’re not exclusively using broad match keywords. 

If your keywords are too broad and subject to tens of thousands of impressions daily, you’ll end up with a lot of wasted impressions and low-quality or uninterested traffic. Not only is this inefficient and a waste of budget, it will also create a snowball effect. 

As landing page quality is one of the factors that will help or hinder your brand within the bidding and auction process, lots of irrelevant traffic quickly bouncing off your website will incur somewhat of a ‘penalty’ with search engines. This will make your ads continuously less competitive and more expensive to run, as you’ll need to pay more in order to outbid your competitors.

How to find the right negative keywords to use

Here are a few tips on where to find the right negative keywords for your business. Don’t forget, that you can apply negative keywords to ad groups, campaigns, and to your entire account.

1. Universal negative keyword lists

It’s a good idea to make a broad list of negative keywords to apply to all campaigns at an account-wide level. This may include universal negatives such as this list from Webmachenix.

Some of the more common must-have universal negative keywords include terms such as:

• Free
• Cheap
• Job
• Wiki
• Facebook
• Instagram
• Career
• Download
• PDF
• Sample
• Guide
• How-to
• Torrent
• Blog
• CV
• Part-time
• Salary
• “What is”

Many of these keywords are indicators for those either looking for jobs - which may or may not be relevant to your advertising efforts - for a freebie, or to find out how to do something themselves as opposed to hiring support.

2. Google it!

One of the best sources of free keyword data is Google. Microsoft/Bing is also good for this, but with such a drastic difference in global market share between the two, Google undoubtedly comes out on top in terms of data volume.

Try Googling some of your keywords, brand terms, products, or services. Before pressing ‘Search’ or clicking enter, take a look at some of the drop-down recommendations that Google suggests you might be looking for. Take note of any single keywords or phrases that would be irrelevant to your ads. 

During this search, you may also discover competitor brands. Again, take note of these. Some businesses prefer to exclude competitor terms entirely from their campaigns using negative keywords, whereas others prefer to include them to try and convert them to a customer for their business instead. The choice is yours! But a list of competitor search terms is a must-have either way.

3. Use Keyword Planning Tools

The Google Ads Keyword Planner and Microsoft Advertising Keyword Planner are two must-have tools for keyword research, and are free to use for anyone with an ads account. 

While they’re both well-known and used for their insights on the keywords you should use, they can both be used to find negative keywords too. 

Type in up to 10 search terms and your desired location (such as United Kingdom, London, United States, New York etc.) and search. You’ll end up with a list of potential keywords. While this will give you plenty of inspiration for your ad groups, take note of any irrelevant words and phrases to add to your negative keyword notes.

4. Check your Search Terms reports

If you already have a Google Ads account running and simply want to reduce the wastage, check your Search Terms reports. Note: this is different from your Search Keywords report which shows you the keywords you’re currently bidding on. 

Instead, the Search Terms report shows you the keywords and search terms that have triggered your ads over a certain period of time. Check here regularly for irrelevant words or phrases to add to your negative keyword lists.

How to apply negative keywords

1. Create a negative keyword list

Negative keyword lists are best used if you have a broad range of keywords that you wish to exclude across multiple campaigns. These may include some of the wider-reaching keywords mentioned above such as ‘free’, ‘sample’, ‘pdf’, ‘jobs’ etc. This allows you to have a central source for the majority of your negatives, instead of applying the same negative keywords to multiple campaigns or ad groups.

Both Google Ads and Microsoft Ads have negative keyword lists. To create a negative keyword list on either platform, follow the relevant steps below.

How to create a negative keyword list on Google Ads

1. Once logged into your Google Ads account, click on ‘Tools’ on the left-hand navigation bar
2. Under ‘Shared library’, click ‘Exclusion lists’ - this will then show you both negative keyword lists and placement exclusion lists
3. Click the blue ‘+’ icon
4. Paste in or manually type your negative keywords, ensuring that each word or phrase is on its own line
5. Once done, add a name to your list and click the blue ‘Save’ button
6. Once your list has been saved, click the name of your negative keyword list and scroll down to ‘Apply to campaigns’
7. Select the campaigns to apply the negative keyword list to and click ‘Done’

Congratulations! You’ve made your first negative keyword list and have applied it to the relevant campaigns on your account.

How to create a negative keyword list on Microsoft Ads

1. Once logged into your Microsoft Ads account, click ‘Tools’ on the left-hand side and then scroll down to ‘Keywords’
2. Next, click the ‘Negative Keyword List’ tab on the left-hand side
3. Click the blue ‘+ Create’ button
4. Paste in or manually type your negative keywords, ensuring that each word or phrase is on its own line
5. Once done, add a name to your list and click the blue ‘Save’ button

Note: you can only apply negative keyword lists at the campaign level on Microsoft Ads, not at the ad group level. To add negative keywords at the ad group level, you’ll need to add these individually, outside of a negative keyword list. 

To apply a negative keyword list to a campaign on Microsoft Ads…

1. Click on ‘Campaigns’ on the left-hand navigation bar
2. Next, navigate to the ‘Keywords’ tab on the left-hand navigation bar and click the ‘Negative keywords lists’ tab
3. Select the campaign to apply your negative keyword list to and click ‘Done’ - you’ll need to perform this action for each campaign you wish to apply the negative keyword list to individually. 

2. Add negative keywords to an individual campaign or ad group

As well as broader negative keyword lists, you can apply negative keywords to individual campaigns or ad groups. This works well if you want to cross-negative your campaigns and ad groups from each other. For example, you may wish to exclude brand keywords from your generic ad groups, and vice versa.

How to add negative keywords to your Google Ads campaigns

You can also add negative keywords to a single campaign or ad group, as well as to multiple campaigns or ad groups, by following these steps.

1. Log into your Google Ads account
2. Under ‘Campaigns’ on the left-hand navigation bar, you’ll see ‘Audiences, keywords, and content’. Under this, click ‘Search keywords’
3. Once the search keywords page is open, navigate to the ‘Negative search keywords’ tab
4. Click the blue ‘+’ icon
5. Select the campaign(s) or ad group you wish to add the negative keywords to and either paste or type your list of negatives in - ensuring to put each word or phrase on its own line
6. Click the blue ‘Save’ button.

How to add negative keywords to your Microsoft Ads campaigns

On Microsoft Ads, follow the below steps to add negative keywords to an individual campaign or ad group.

1. Once logged into your Microsoft Ads account, select the campaign or ad group you want to add negative keywords to
2. Click ‘Keywords’ on the left-hand navigation menu
3. Click on the ‘Negative keywords’ tab and click the blue ‘+Add’ button
4. Paste in or type your negative keywords in, ensuring that each word or phrase is on a separate line
5. Click the blue ‘Save’ button.

3. Apply negative keywords from the Search Terms report

Finally, you can add negative keywords to your campaigns or ad groups via the Search Terms report. Again, this can be used in conjunction with wider negative keyword lists.

To apply negative keywords from the Search Terms report on Google Ads, follow these steps:

1. View the Search Terms Report
2. View all search terms over a date range (such as the last 30, 60 or 90 days)
3. For any keywords that aren’t relevant to your campaign or ad groups that they appear in, click the square icon next to each. Once you’ve reviewed the report and have ticked the square button next to each keyword you want to exclude, head to the top of the reporting table and click ‘Add as negative keyword’.
4. Next, you’ll be prompted to specify whether to add this keyword or these keywords as a negative at the ad group, campaign, or negative keyword list level. Select the relevant option.
5. At this stage, you can also specify whether the keyword should be broad match negative, phrase match negative, or exact match negative. For broad match negative, leave the keyword with no punctuation either side. For phrase match negative, add “ and “ either side of your keyword or phrase. For exact match negatives, add [ and ] either side of your keyword or phrase. 
6. Click the blue ‘Save’ button.

Unfortunately, this functionality is only available on Google Ads. However, you have the option to set a recurring scheduled ‘Search term report’ on Microsoft Ads, which you can manually view and note down negative keywords from to apply to your campaigns or ad groups.

Final Thoughts

Negative keywords are a quick win when it comes to optimizing your PPC campaigns for success. Not only do they make your account more efficient - but they also reduce the volume of wasted ad spend and unqualified traffic to your website, meaning you can focus on users who are much more likely to convert!