SOP 138: Set up a Google Search Campaign

Set up a Google Search Campaign

Last Updated / Reviewed: Jan 10th, 2023

Execution Time: ~15 - 30 Mins

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Goal: Successfully set up a Google Search campaign for your website.

Ideal Outcome: An up and running Google search ad campaign to drive traffic to your website.

Prerequisites or requirements: You need a Google Ads account. If you don’t have one please follow SOP 014: Create a Google Ads account.

Ideally, you will have done the keyword research necessary to launch the search campaign. If you have not, follow SOP 147: Perform Keyword research for Google Ads.

Why this is important: Google Search ads allows you to focus on the people who are searching for what your business offers and convert them into visitors, leads, or customers.

Where this is done: Google Ads manager.

When this is done: When you wish to acquire customers and get them to find your products and services through Google search.

Who does this: Marketing manager or person responsible for media buying.

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Set up Google Search Campaign

1. Head to https://ads.google.com/ and log in to your account.
2. Select an account that you want to create the search campaign.
   
3. Click “New campaign”.
   1. The Google ads manager interface if you have NEVER created a campaign before:
   2. The Google ads manager interface if you have EXISTING campaigns:
      
4. Select “Website traffic” since the purpose of this campaign is to drive traffic to your website.
   
   Note that there are 7 goals to choose from. For a search campaign you’re only able to choose sales, lead, website traffic, or “Create a campaign without a goal’s guidance” as your campaign goal. You should choose a goal that best fits your primary objective.
   1. Sales — Drive sales via app, phone or online store.
   2. Leads — Collect leads and encourage them to take action.
   3. Website traffic — Increase visitors to your website.
   4. Product and brand consideration — Encourage people to explore your product or services.
   5. Brand awareness — Reach a broad audience and build awareness for your business.
   6. App promotion — Get more installs and interaction for your app.
   7. Local store visits and promotion — Drive visits to local stores. For example: restaurants or dealerships.
   8. Create a campaign without a goal — Create a campaign without seeing a goal's recommendations.
5. From the list of campaign types, select “Search”.
   
6. Next, select “Website visits” from the list and type your website URL.
   
7. Add your website URL:
   
8. You will see a section to set up conversion tracking. Skip this for now as you can set it up later following: SOP 25: Adding Google Ads conversion tracking to a site
   
9. Click “Continue”.
10. Google Ads will automatically fill in a default campaign name based on your previous selections. However, you can edit this and give it a name that helps you identify the campaign. For example “Search - Increase Web Traffic”.
    
11. In “Networks”. This is an optional setting. However, since we’re running a search campaign, it’s recommended to select “Search Network” so your ads can appear on other Google owned networks/websites.
    
    Note: If you want your ads to show on Display network, create a separate campaign for it.
12. Select the users’ location/countries you want your ads to show to.
    
13. Select the users’ language you want your ads to show to.
    
14. In the Budget and bidding tab. Set a daily budget and bidding option for your campaign.
    
    1. Set a daily ad budget.
       1. Note: Take into consideration that there might be a slight fluctuation on your daily spend and it is possible that in some days your campaign might overspend a little bit more than the daily budget you have selected.
       2. Note 2: The daily budget you set should be based on the number of users on the remarketing list. The larger the list, the higher the budget you should set.
       3. Note 3: If you’re just getting started you can select a budget between $20-50/day, you can edit and adjust this later on.
    2. Set the bidding focus to Clicks (recommended).
       Important: Campaigns focusing on clicks are highly recommended when setting up a new campaign since Google doesn’t have any conversion data yet. Once you have some traffic and campaign data in your account, only then it’s recommended to run conversion or conversion value based campaigns.
    3. Set a Maximum Cost Per Click (CPC) Limit to control the maximum amount to spend for each click. You can estimate the maximum CPC limit for search campaigns by following the “Bid Strategy for Increasing Website Traffic” section of SOP 145.
    4. To learn more about bid strategies for ad campaigns in general, refer to SOP 145: Determine a bid strategy for new Google Ads Campaign.
15. Add sitelink extensions for your ad.
    
    Sitelink extensions are additional links and ad copy that show up below your main ad. They take up larger real estates and allow you to direct people to specific pages on your site.
    
16. Fill in the ad copy details for your sitelink extensions. Then click “Save”.
    
17. Once you’ve completed the sitelink extension, click “Save and Continue”.
18. You’re now about to set up the ad group. First, fill in an appropriate ad group name.
    
    If you’re not sure how to name an ad group. Follow SOP 148: Define naming convention for Google Ad campaigns.
19. Then, add a list of keywords you want this ad group to target. If you haven’t done keyword research, follow SOP 147: Perform Keyword research for Google ads.
    Simply copy and paste your keyword(s) into the text field.
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20. You can create another ad group, or if you’re done, click “Save and Continue”.
21. You will now create the ad for the search campaign. Scroll down and fill in the ad copy details.
    
    1. Final URL — Make sure the URL is correct and loads as intended.
    2. Display path — Customize the URL being shown in the ad. Note: This doesn’t have to be an actual URL.
    3. Headlines — Write headlines within 30 characters. You can write up to 15 headlines. Note: All your headlines won’t show at the same time, rather, Google will rotate your headlines based on the user’s device or search query.
    4. Description — Write a description within 90 characters. You can write up to 4 descriptions.
    5. Ad URL Option — Add UTM parameters to your ad URL for refined tracking. To create UTM campaign links follow SOP 006: Creating UTM URLs to Track Your Campaigns.
       1. Note: If you have linked both your Google Analytics and Google Ads account, and have enabled auto tagging, there’s no need to add UTM parameters as autotagging will do this for you.
22. Once completed click “Done”.
23. You can now set up another ad group or click “Save and Continue”.
24. Review the search campaign that you’ve set up. Make sure the budget, campaign settings, and keywords are correct. Once you’ve reviewed the campaign, click “Publish Campaign”.
    t’s the same logic but this looks different now too:
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25. You have now published your Google search campaign! Google will review all your ads automatically. Once your campaign passes Google’s ad review process (takes up to 1 business day), the status of your ad campaign will turn eligible and your ad will start running.

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Note: If your ad is still under review after 2 business days contact Google to

resolve the issue.