Low conversions in Google Ads: Reasons and Solutions
When launching advertising campaigns in Google Ads, not only business owners, but also experienced contextual advertising specialists, as well as arbitrators, often face low conversion with a large total number of clicks on ads.
What should be considered when evaluating statistics in Google Ads if there are few clicks
To avoid wasting time on reconfiguring advertising campaigns, the webmaster should remember that advertising in Google Ads has only an indirect effect on the final conversion of an advertising campaign. The main influence on conversion is exerted by factors such as prelanding / landing or another landing page that the user gets to after clicking on the ad, as well as the demand for the offer. It is important to keep in mind that depending on the vertical, the target actions may vary.
It is often common for newcomers to work with traffic from Google Ads to incorrectly interpret data on the number of clicks, sessions and conversions. For example, the number of clicks can be tracked in the Google Ads advertising account, while the user's interaction time with the landing page and other activities should be estimated based on data collected by Google Analytics.
Important points for webmasters:
The difference in tracking clicks and sessions:
It is important to understand that one user can click on an ad, go to the site, then close the page or go back and click on the ad again. In Google Ads statistics, such actions will be counted as two clicks, whereas in Google Analytics it will be registered as one session if less than 30 minutes have passed between clicks and the user has not closed the browser. This difference in performance can be misleading even for an experienced webmaster.
Key aspects of working with data:
- Clicks: The number of clicks is tracked in the Google Ads advertising account and shows how many times users clicked on your ads.
- Sessions: In Google Analytics, a session is defined as the period of user activity on your site. If a user clicks on your ad twice within 30 minutes without closing the browser, it will be counted as one session.
- Conversions: Track conversions in both Google Ads and Google Analytics to understand how many users perform targeted actions after clicking on an ad.
Optimization of landing pages:
- Relevance and quality of the landing page: The landing page must exactly match the user's expectations generated by the ad.
- Improve the user experience: Make the landing page easy to navigate, with clear calls to action and fast loading to maximize conversions.
For successful work with advertising in Google Ads, it is important to take a comprehensive approach to data analysis and take into account the difference between click-through rates in the advertising cabinet and sessions in Google Analytics. This will help to avoid incorrect conclusions and focus on optimizing those elements that really affect conversion, such as the quality of landing pages and the relevance of the offer.
The reasons for low CR in Google Ads and ways to solve them
The form of communication
If there are a lot of clicks and transitions to the landing page, but there are no orders, deposits or registrations, then first of all it is necessary to check the correctness of the communication form on the landing page. The webmaster should fill out the form himself to make sure that the entered data is successfully sent and saved in the database.
In addition, it is important to keep in mind that in some niches it may be more convenient for potential customers to contact the advertiser by phone without leaving their data on the site. In this case, it is advisable to use dynamic call tracking, which will allow you to track calls initiated by advertising campaigns.
Offer and vertical
If a lot of traffic comes to the landing page, but there are no conversions, it is worth reviewing the relevance of the offer for the selected target audience, as well as the expediency of using contextual advertising in this vertical. In order not to waste the budget, a PPC specialist or an arbitrageur needs to understand who is the main audience of the offer and what problems it solves. Based on this information, the semantics of the advertising campaign should be clustered and ad groups with unique sales offers (USPS) should be created for each need.
Key steps:
Evaluation of the offer and the target audience:
- Understanding the audience: Determine who your target audience is and what problems your offer can solve for them.
- Relevance of the offer: Make sure that your offer is really interesting and relevant for the selected audience. The proposal may need to be finalized or adjusted.
Clustering semantics and creating ad groups:
- Clustering: Divide keywords into clusters depending on the needs and interests of the audience.
- Unique Trading Offers (USP): Create ad groups with USPS tailored to the specific needs of each cluster.
Vertical analysis:
- Competition and Average check: Explore the number of competitors and the level of average check in your niche. This will help you evaluate the profitability of advertising.
- High competition and marginality: If your niche has high competition and low marginality, contextual advertising may be ineffective.
- Gray category: If your niche belongs to the gray category, consider the cost of Google accounts. Using trust agency advertising accounts will help reduce the number of blockages and speed up moderation.
To summarize, it is important to keep in mind that low conversion may be the norm for individual niches. However, understanding the audience, adjusting the offer and setting up the advertising campaign correctly will help improve the results and optimize the advertising budget.
Competition and deferred demand
When a webmaster and his competitors promote the same offer in the same geo, users are more likely to choose the option where the offer is presented in a more favorable light. For example, in gambling, it can be a bonus in the form of free spins of slots for making the first deposit. In order to increase conversion in such conditions, it is necessary to create additional value for a product or service not only in ads, but also on the landing page. This may include unique offers, promotions and bonuses that make the offer more attractive to users.
Daily monitoring of competitors and tracking the headlines and descriptions in their ads will help you quickly respond to changes in their strategy and adapt your ads. In addition, when launching advertising campaigns in Google Ads, it is important to take into account the likelihood of delayed demand and seasonality. Data about users who returned to the landing page after a while and performed a targeted action can be tracked using the Associated Conversions report in Google Analytics. This report allows you to understand how different advertising channels interact with each other and affect the final conversion, providing a more complete picture of the effectiveness of your marketing efforts.
What else can negatively affect the number of clicks and requests
Let's look at several reasons that can affect not only the number of clicks and conversions, but also ad impressions. And the fewer impressions, the fewer clicks.
Semantics
A small number of clicks may be caused by irrelevant search queries and keywords. To improve the semantic core, increase the frequency and relevance of queries, as well as to organically embed keywords in each ad, you need to activate the "Mark the URL that people click from my ad" function in your account settings. Next, go to the "Traffic Sources" tab — "Search queries" and adjust the semantics and text of the ads based on this data. Ads shown for non-targeted queries not only consume the budget, but also reduce CTR, which lowers the rating of the ad. Therefore, it is important for the webmaster to regularly make a list of negative keywords and delete inappropriate queries.
The promise in the ads
If clicks on landing pages for target queries occur, but conversions remain low or absent, the reason may be a discrepancy between the ad text and its relevance. A common mistake is to create multiple ads with different queries using a common template, with each ad leading to the same page. This problem can be solved by analyzing the performance reports and the number of failures. For large ad groups with similar queries, it is better to create unique landing pages or separate pages. You can also use multi-landing to adjust the content depending on the request. If the bounce rate exceeds 70%, it is likely that the information on the site does not meet the expectations created by the ad. It is also possible to incorrectly configure the landing page, for example, the link leads to the main page, and not to the landing page with the offered product or service.
Poorly designed landing page and website
Even if the advertising campaign is carefully thought out, if the user gets to a landing page with an uninteresting title, outdated design and inconvenient navigation, the probability that he will perform the target action is extremely low — most likely, he will close the tab. This also applies to old URLs and pages that do not contain keywords from ads. Before launching an advertisement, the webmaster should carefully study every aspect of the landing page: the title, SEO text, graphic content, application form, CTA buttons and navigation. Experienced media buyers recommend paying attention to heatmaps with screen viewing patterns, for this you can use the Page Analytics extension for the Chrome browser. It is also important to check the adaptability of the landing page for different models of mobile devices.
Geo with an unprofitable lead price
If the number of clicks is low and the conversion rate remains low, one of the reasons may be the display of ads to an audience from non-target regions. For example, if the product is not delivered to a certain region, but the ads are still displayed to this audience. To solve this problem, it is necessary to exclude such inefficient locations from the advertising campaign based on the data from the "Efficiency based on geographical Data" report.
In addition to the standard Google Ads report, it is also useful to use data from a CRM or tracker to get additional information about audience behavior and identify non-target regions. This will allow you to set up targeting more precisely and increase the effectiveness of your advertising campaign.
Display time and device
It is important to adapt the display of ads according to the time intervals when the largest number of requests is received. This will help reduce costs during periods of low conversion. In addition, it is necessary to regularly adjust the bids in the advertising campaign, taking into account the profitability of each type of device. Devices that attract a lot of traffic but do not bring conversions should be excluded from the display.
It is important to remember that as the number of conversions increases, so does the cost per click to reach the top positions. If the low conversion rate is not explained by problems in the advertising campaign, it is worth checking the quality of the call center when communicating with potential customers. This can be done by requesting phone records from partners or advertisers and comparing the number of requests with the number of orders placed.
Conclusion
For effective advertising management in Google Ads, it is necessary to carry out detailed configuration of web analytics, select relevant queries, analyze the actions of competitors, optimize budgets and improve the usability of the landing page. Specialists in the field of webmasters or PPC campaign management need to analyze each stage of the marketing funnel and assess how much they can cause difficulties for users. It is important to optimize and improve each of these steps to achieve better results.
