Set up a Google Dynamic Search Ad Campaign

Last Updated / Reviewed: Jan 10th, 2023

Execution Time: ~15 - 30 Mins

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

Ideal Outcome: An up and running Dynamic ad campaign that can help you find customers without relying on keywords.

Prerequisites or requirements: You need a Google Ads account. If you don’t have one please follow SOP 014: Create a Google Ads account. You will also need to set up tracking prior to launching this campaign, if you have not, then please follow SOP 025: Adding Google Ads conversion tracking to a site.

Why this is important: Dynamic ad campaigns are great supplements and can fill in the gaps of your keyword based campaigns. There’s no need to map keywords and headlines are dynamically generated so you save a lot of time in this process.

Where this is done: Google Ads manager.

When this is done: When you have existing keyword-based search campaigns and want to maximize the number of keywords to target.

Who does this: The person responsible for media buying.

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How to set up a Google Dynamic Search Ad Campaign

Head to https://ads.google.com/ and log in to your account.
Select an account that you want to create the search campaign.
Click “New campaign” from the top left corner.
Select one of the campaign goals.
Important: 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.
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.
From the list of campaign types, select “Search”, since we’re setting up a dynamic search campaign.
Add your website URL:
Give an appropriate name to your campaign and click “Continue”.
On the Budget and bidding tab, set a daily budget and bidding option for your campaign.
1. Set a daily ad budget.
2. Set the bidding focus to Conversions (recommended).
3. Optionally set a target cost per action (CPA). When selected Google Ads uses your target CPA to set a bid for your campaign so the average cost to convert is below the target CPA.
4. Once done click “Next”.
Next in campaign settings, leave only the “Search Network” checked. Since this is a search campaign you won’t need to show your ads on Google’s display network.
Select the users’ location/countries you want your ads to show to.
Select the users’ language you want your ads to show to.
Expand the Dynamic Search Ads setting.

Note: If you don’t see the Dynamic Search Ads setting, click “More Settings” instead and you will find the Dynamic Search Ads setting in here.
Add your website URL in the Dynamic search ads setting. Here you’re informing Google to serve dynamic ads based on the content of your website.
1. Enter Domain — The URL of your website.
2. Targeting Source — By default Google will create the dynamic ads based on all of the your web pages that are currently indexed on Google. Leave this option as is unless you want Google to specifically use a subset of pages on your website, which you then have to select “Use URLs from my page feed only” and upload a Google Sheet or excel file.
Once done click “Next”.
You’re now about to set up the ad group(s). Dynamic Search Ads will match people’s searches on Google with specific pages on your site. Here you will select which type of pages you want the Dynamic Search Ads to target.
Note: It’s recommended to create ad groups for different theme/category of pages for your website. For example, if you’re running an electronics ecommerce store, you want to create one ad group for your home page and one ad group for each of your product category pages such as TVs (/televisions) or Digital Cameras (/digital-cameras).
1. Rename the ad group
2. Select “Use exact URLs”
3. Enter the URL of your category pages.

   **Important**: Make sure you click “ADD” and verify the page is selected.

   ![2SjBx3Kjnf7VWJduX\_Q5j4HfmuLSSHm3qPd4TxatZAufmiSb9efa0qlLCD4jf9ha2hL3hnSJ5BoaXf2gRXWO03iQJK7Z4e5zSwi1Wf8CtmD-Gr6k7OuM6dvC\_3pxuIbClPAMqaV1oM4f9RQ](https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/2SjBx3Kjnf7VWJduX_Q5j4HfmuLSSHm3qPd4TxatZAufmiSb9efa0qlLCD4jf9ha2hL3hnSJ5BoaXf2gRXWO03iQJK7Z4e5zSwi1Wf8CtmD-Gr6k7OuM6dvC_3pxuIbClPAMqaV1oM4f9RQ "‌")
   Enter the URL of your category pages.

   ![5Ku7u9kP7vw9ha8XT2SlgmAtF0n6JtBAO-NKCza3ptjKyD5rhY637G9CNZzYwugGApTEoooXHp6MSaxUVP4J8opwtl-aB8J2PybdwgKCJxyrI9GRDT4VbVP19AM8p0YWa5TkEhTbzicgcz0](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/5Ku7u9kP7vw9ha8XT2SlgmAtF0n6JtBAO-NKCza3ptjKyD5rhY637G9CNZzYwugGApTEoooXHp6MSaxUVP4J8opwtl-aB8J2PybdwgKCJxyrI9GRDT4VbVP19AM8p0YWa5TkEhTbzicgcz0 "‌")

   **Important**: Make sure you click “ADD” and verify the page is selected.

   ![2SjBx3Kjnf7VWJduX\_Q5j4HfmuLSSHm3qPd4TxatZAufmiSb9efa0qlLCD4jf9ha2hL3hnSJ5BoaXf2gRXWO03iQJK7Z4e5zSwi1Wf8CtmD-Gr6k7OuM6dvC\_3pxuIbClPAMqaV1oM4f9RQ](https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/2SjBx3Kjnf7VWJduX_Q5j4HfmuLSSHm3qPd4TxatZAufmiSb9efa0qlLCD4jf9ha2hL3hnSJ5BoaXf2gRXWO03iQJK7Z4e5zSwi1Wf8CtmD-Gr6k7OuM6dvC_3pxuIbClPAMqaV1oM4f9RQ)

Next you will create the dynamic search ad. Here, the URL, headline and display URL will automatically be generated. All you have to write is the description that will show when Google presents this dynamic search ad to the user.
Note: The description should describe the the URL(s) you added in step #15.
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Once you’re done with the first ad group, go ahead and create the next ad group for the other category pages on your site.

Important: Make sure you select the “Dynamic ad group” and repeat steps 15-16 for each category of page(s) you plan to run Dynamic Search Ads for.
Once you have created all the ad groups, click “Next”.
Next, Add Ad extensions to increase the click through rate of your ads.
1. Add sitelink extensions. Click the down arrow next to “Sitelink Extensions”.
  1. Sitelink extensions are additional links and ad copy that show up below your main ad. They take up more real estate and allow you to direct people to specific pages on your site.
  2. Fill in the ad copy details for your sitelink extensions. Then click “Save”.
2. Add Callout extensions. Click the down arrow next to “Callout Extensions”.
  1. Callout extensions are snippets of text below your ad where you can promote unique offers to shoppers, like free shipping or 24-hour customer service.
  2. Add at least 2 benefits or offers to promote your products or services then click “Save”.
3. Add Call extensions. Click the down arrow next to “Call Extensions”.
  1. (Optional) Call extensions let you add phone numbers to your ads. Recommended if you have a contact number dedicated to customer support or sales.
  2. Add your phone number along with the country and click “Save”.
  3. (Optional) You can set a schedule to show your call extension. This is useful if the phone is operational during certain hours (e.g. 9-5 during the weekdays).
  4. Once done, click “Save”.
Once you’ve completed the extensions, click “Next”.
In the last stage, review the search campaign that you’ve set up. Make sure the budget, campaign and ad settings are correct. Once you’ve reviewed the campaign, click “Publish Campaign”.
That’s it! You have now set up and published your dynamic search ad campaign.
You can then head to your campaign dashboard and check the status of the campaign you just set up.
At this point the campaign and ads are not live yet. 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.