Whether you’re a veteran digital marketer or you’re fairly new to the game, you (I hope!) already know that the importance of keywords can’t be overstated when it comes to your ad campaigns. But there’s another, equally important component that a vast number of marketers -- including some of the most seasoned ones -- are full-on neglecting: negative keywords. In fact, research conducted by WordStream has found that, over the course of one month, nearly 50% of digital marketers fail to add a single negative keyword to their AdWords accounts. And the reality is that if you’re one of those who aren’t incorporating negative keywords into your PPC and search strategies, you’re almost certainly tossing boku marketing bucks straight into the trash can. As the folks over at Google have summed it up, “One key to a highly targeted campaign is choosing what not to target.”

What Are Negative Keywords?  As we know, Google functions like a type of auction, where you bid on keywords you’ve deemed most relevant to your dealership’s website and marketing objectives. But what you may not know is that you can also tell Google the search terms for which you don’t want your ads to appear. These are called “negative keywords” (they may also be called “negative matches”). Here’s how Google defines negative keywords:

When you run a PPC campaign, you fork over money every time someone clicks on your ad -- even if that person isn’t a member of your target audience and doesn’t give two hoots about the product or service you’re offering. When this happens, you’re paying good money for a totally useless click: not exactly an ideal way to distribute your ad spend. To illustrate, here’s an example:

Let’s say you’re in charge of digital marketing for a Ford dealership. A classic cars enthusiast -- we’ll call him Sam -- wants to find parts for his Ford Edsal, a model that was in production from 1958 until 1960. He performs a search query for Ford Edsal car parts, and an advertisement for your dealership appears in the search results. Sam’s not in the market for a new car and he’s not looking to have his current vehicle serviced, but he accidentally clicks on your ad (or maybe he clicks it on purpose, thinking that a Ford dealership would sell the parts he needs). Boom. You just spent precious marketing dollars on a useless click. Or maybe you’re paying per impression, and your ad shows up on Sam’s blog, which is a forum for people who are obsessed with restoring vintage cars. The result is the same: wasted money. Enter negative keywords, which “offer an opportunity to strategically restrict your PPC advertisements so they only reach your best potential audience.”

Benefits of Using Negative Keywords.  As I’ve just illustrated above, using negative keywords can save you money and increase your ROI. But implementing them into your digital marketing strategy also has some other, less obvious benefits.

For one thing, it can help you create more relevant ad groups: “By weeding out keywords that aren’t related to your business, you tighten the relevance of your ad groups. Small, closely-related ad groups allow you to craft a single message that speaks to your entire group of keywords.”

Using negative keywords can drastically impact your click-through rate (CTR), as well. By eliminating uninterested users from your audience, you automatically increase the likelihood that those who do see your ads will click on them -- and eventually make a purchase.

Choosing Negative Keywords.  Not sure how to decide which keywords should make your negative keywords list? Google suggests looking for “search terms that are similar to your keywords but might cater to customers searching for a different product.”

You can use the same discovery methods for negative keywords that you already use to find regular (“positive”) keywords. For example, you can search for a term in Google’s AdWords Keyword Planner tool, just as you’d search for a positive keyword. As you browse the list of related keyword searches, look for items in the list that you know are irrelevant to your dealership and marketing objectives. Likewise, you can use the Search Terms Report tool within AdWords. Because this tool shows you the actual search queries that have triggered your ads, you can use it to eliminate those that are irrelevant by adding them to your negative keywords list.

How to Add Negative Keywords to a Campaign or Ad Group.  Google provides the following instructions for adding negative keywords to your campaign or ad group:

• Sign into your AdWords account and click Keywords from the left-hand page menu.

• Click Negative Keywords, and then click the blue ⨁ button.

• From here, you can apply new keywords, add a new negative keyword list, or add an existing negative keyword list to your campaigns or ad groups:

  • Apply new keywords or add a new negative keywords list:

    • Select Add Negative Keywords or Create New List.

    • Choose whether to add negative keywords to a campaign or ad group, and then select the specific campaign or ad group.

    • Add your keywords, one per line, making sure your negative keywords don’t overlap with your positive keywords.

    • Click Save.

  • Use an existing negative keywords list:

    • Select Use Negative Keyword List.

    • Choose the campaign to which you’d like to apply negative keyword lists.

    • Check the boxes of the negative keywords lists you’d like to use.

    • Click Save.

A Note of Caution.  It’s important to remember that negative keywords don’t work for Display and Video Ad campaigns the same way they do for search campaigns. According to Google, “[d]epending on the other keywords or targeting methods in your ad group, some places where your ad appears may occasionally contain excluded terms. For Display and Video ads, a maximum of 5,000 negative keywords is considered. You can also avoid targeting unrelated sites or videos by implementing site category options and content exclusions.”