If you gave an employee a company credit card and they spent $1,000 a month on items you didn’t need, you would fire them immediately. Yet, thousands of business owners let Google Ads do exactly this every single month.
Google Ads (PPC) is a powerful tool, but it is not a charity. It is an auction house designed to extract the maximum bid for every click. If you do not actively manage your campaigns, Google’s default settings will happily spend your budget on people who have zero intention of buying from you.
Is your campaign bleeding cash? Here is the 5-point diagnostic checklist to find out.
The Cost of Neglect
Sign #1: You Are Using "Broad Match" Keywords
When you set up a campaign, Google encourages you to use "Broad Match" keywords. They say it helps you "reach more people."
Do not believe them.
If you bid on the broad match keyword luxury renovation, Google might show your ad to someone searching for cheap DIY renovation ideas. You pay for the click, but that person has no money and no intent to hire you.
The Fix: Switch your high-value keywords to "Phrase Match" (using quotes, e.g., "luxury renovation") or "Exact Match" (using brackets, e.g., [luxury renovation]). This forces Google to only show your ad when the search query matches your intent.
Sign #2: You Are Ignoring Negative Keywords
A "Negative Keyword" is a word that prevents your ad from showing. This is the single most effective way to save money, yet most accounts have empty negative lists.
🚫 The "Money Saver" List
Add these words to your negative list immediately to stop paying for junk clicks:
- "Free" / "Cheap" (Unless you are a discount brand)
- "Jobs" / "Hiring" / "Salary" (People looking for work, not services)
- "DIY" / "How to" (People looking for tutorials, not solutions)
- "Definition" / "Meaning" (Students doing research)
Sign #3: You Are Sending Traffic to Your Homepage
Your homepage is a maze. It has navigation bars, about pages, blog links, and social icons. If you pay $5 for a click and drop a user on your homepage, they will get lost and bounce.
The Fix: Every ad group must have a dedicated Landing Page. A landing page has one job: convert the visitor. No navigation bar, no distractions—just the offer and the form.
Sign #4: Geographic Leakage
We recently audited a local plumber in San Diego whose ads were being shown in New York. Why? Because his location settings were set to "People interested in my location" rather than "People IN my location."
Google’s default setting often includes people interested in a city. This means a tourist in London researching a trip to San Diego might see your plumbing ad. That is 100% wasted money.
Sign #5: You Are Obsessed with CTR, Not CPA
Click-Through Rate (CTR) is a vanity metric. You can have a 20% CTR by offering "Free Gold," but you will go bankrupt.
The only metric that matters is Cost Per Acquisition (CPA). How much does it cost to get a paying customer? If you don't know this number, you are not investing; you are gambling.
| Strategy | The "Burning Money" Approach | The "Smart Scale" Approach |
|---|---|---|
| Keyword Type | Broad Match (Wide net) | Exact/Phrase Match (Sniper) |
| Negative List | Empty or ignored | Updated Weekly |
| Destination | Homepage | Dedicated Landing Page |
| Location | "Interested in" location | "Presence in" location |
Summary: Inspect What You Expect
PPC is not a "set it and forget it" channel. It is a garden that needs constant weeding. If you aren't checking your "Search Terms" report once a week to block irrelevant keywords, you are voluntarily giving Google money for nothing.
Stop feeding the machine. Start auditing your account today.
Stop the Bleeding Today
Suspect your ad account is wasting money? We offer a comprehensive 50-Point PPC Audit. We'll look under the hood and tell you exactly where your budget is leaking.
Audit My Ad Account
