Negative keyword list

The same unwanted searches show up in every campaign: jobs, free, training, a competitor you never want. A shared list keeps them in one place and applies them everywhere it is attached.

New campaigns, especially Performance Max, often launch without the list attached, so they pay again for searches the account learned to refuse years ago.

1. Open Tools, then Shared library, then Exclusion lists.
2. Create a negative keyword list and add one negative per line.
3. Apply it to campaigns, including Performance Max.
4. Check which campaigns each list is attached to.

A software company keeps one list for job searches, one for free and pirated versions, and one for students. Each new campaign, Performance Max included, gets all three on its first day.

• Keeping lists but never attaching them to new campaigns.
• Putting brand terms on a list attached to the brand campaign.
• Building one huge list that nobody can read.

The audit checks Oppy runs on this, each with its own page.

• Performance Max with no negative keyword list
• Broad match running with nothing to stop it
• A negative keyword switching off one you chose

• Negative keyword: A word or phrase that stops ads from showing on searches containing it.
• Account-level negative keywords: A list of negative keywords applied to the whole account at once, for searches that are wrong for the business everywhere, such as jobs or free.
• Performance Max: A campaign type that runs on Search, Shopping, YouTube, Display, Discover, Gmail and Maps from one budget, with Google deciding where each ad shows.