Google Ads (also known as AdWords) have never been more important for a business than in today’s digital environment. With over 86% of searches done in Google, it makes sense why companies would want to invest in this powerful search engine, especially small and medium businesses in niche markets.
With the right amount of investing into relevant keywords, Google can help boost a business's organic traffic and brand awareness insurmountably. In 2013, Google and Ipsos MediaCT ran 61 studies across 12 verticals, from auto to retail. Their findings concluded that companies using Google Ads increased their top-of-mind awareness in users by an average of 6.6% compared to those who didn't.
Another reason is that Google knows a great deal about your target audience. With properly set up campaigns, it has the ability to send extremely targeted leads to your website by matching your keywords with a user's search query. This directs users to your website, increasing website traffic, and hopefully, your conversion rates.
An ad campaign without interesting content and good copy will not retain an audience. Therefore, you need to create functional ads where keywords, good messaging, and good design can blend well together to create an impression.
Google AdWords is an excellent choice for a business, but can still fail if you don't practice effective keyword management. To find keywords that resonate with your target audience, take a look at these 10 highly effective Google Ads tools.
Table of Contents
1. SEMRUSH
SEMRush's PPC Advertising Toolkit plans, analyzes, and improves your Google Ad campaigns with its multiple features. The toolkit provides deep insight into the biggest competitors within your niche, their target keywords, and their product pricing strategy.
The toolkit recommends strategic keywords for organic results, paid results, and PLA (Google Shopping) campaigns based on data and analytics. Other functions include discovering keyword gaps (keywords not used by competitors), opportunities to increase return on investment (ROI), and receiving cost-per-click (CPC) and volume reports.
SEMRush tracks your visibility in paid search and provides an analytics report from the SERP feature, making it easier to understand how well your campaign is performing. The toolkit also includes a function to optimize low-performing social media posts which is a nice added bonus!
2. Ahrefs
There are a thousand potential keywords to use, and Ahrefs understands that. Keywords Explorer runs data through 10 different search engines like Youtube, Amazon, and Bing to provide keyword ideas with accurate search volume numbers.
Advanced features filter through search volume, keyword difficulty, and the presence of SERP features to narrow down the best keywords you should use for Google AdWords.
Ahrefs Keywords Explorer is an excellent analysis tool, with a heavy emphasis on analytics. Other features Ahrefs provide include a keyword difficulty score, click rate on paid or organic results, ranking history, and much more. For people who value data, Ahrefs is a great tool to consider.
3. Google Keywords Planner
Google Keywords Planner is a feature only available within Google Ads to help find keywords for targeted audiences. Key features include keyword ideas, search volumes, Google Ads competition, and CPC data for search terms.
This tool researches keywords related to your business, it estimates the searches they receive and the cost to target them.
With Keywords Planner, you will also have the ability to create new campaigns and categorize keywords into grouped ads and targeted locations.
4. Keywordtool.io
Keyword Tool.io is a great alternative to Google Keywords. Firstly, it is free to use, so users can try this first before deciding to invest in other programs if they want.
Keyword Tool uses Google Autocomplete, the autocomplete suggestions for search queries, to generate long-tail keywords and presents them to you in an easy-to-understand interface. By using Google Autocomplete, the Keyword Tool generates keywords with low difficulty, showing relevant keywords to search users.
SEO and content creation benefit from using popular keywords to attract a potential audience looking for similar content, products, or services online. Use Keyword Tool to help get you started in looking for the popular key terms in Google Ads.
5. Google Ads Performance Grader
Google Ads Performance Grader is another free tool you can access when you sign up for Google Ads. The performance grader provides clarity in how well your campaigning efforts are going compared to pay-per-click (PPC) best practices. The data is conducted by an algorithm that draws from 60 different factors, including ad spend data, Quality Score, and ranking, among others.
Performance Grader will give out a report on 10 areas of PPC management, including wasted spend, account activity, mobile advertising, and impression share. This tool gives insight into areas you are exceeding in, as well as areas for improvement, to become more efficient while lowering costs.
6. AI Google Ads Negative Keyword Generator
The AI Google Ads Negative Keyword Generator is a powerful tool designed to optimize your Google Ads campaigns. It helps in generating negative keyword ideas, which are crucial for campaign planning. By identifying and excluding irrelevant search terms, this tool ensures that your ads are not shown to uninterested audiences, thereby improving the efficiency of your ad spend.
This tool is particularly useful for those looking to enhance the effectiveness of their Google Ads campaigns by filtering out unproductive search terms.
Campaign Enhancement: Helps in refining your ad targeting, ensuring that your ads reach the most relevant audience.
Easy to Use: No complex setups; just click on the 'Generate Negative Keywords' button for instant suggestions.
7. AI RegEx Generator Tool
This tool is ideal for marketers and data analysts who require the functionality of Regular Expressions but do not have the time or expertise to write complex RegEx codes.Key Features:User-Friendly Interface: Designed for users without prior knowledge of RegEx.
AI Assistance: The AI interprets your requirements and generates the RegEx code.
Versatile Applications: Useful for extracting specific parts of text strings, which can be particularly beneficial in data analysis and digital marketing strategies.
8. ÜberSuggest
Ubersuggest is a tool that reverse engineers your competitor's SEO strategy, giving you an advantage over them. By entering a domain or keyword, Ubersuggest reveals statistical data including hits, backlinks, competitor's content marketing, and social media strategies.
With Ubersuggest, you are shown the top rankings for your keywords, so can you figure out what users are searching for and which ones are most liked on popular social media platforms like Facebook. Ubersuggest is great at revealing content that people actively search for, so you know what content ideas to generate around.
9. A/B Test Significance Calculator
A/B Testing is a part of the user experience; split testing compares two versions of a website, email, or other interface and measuring the difference in performance.
A/B Testing is a great indicator of customer behavior. By testing two versions of the same page, it will indicate which metrics such as traffic, clicks, or conversions performed better.
Use the Significance Calculator to test out different keywords on your sites to see which ones perform better. Improved headers and call-to-actions can lead to higher conversion rates, lower bounce rates, and higher sales.
10. Google Ads Editor
Google Ads Editor is a free application from Google that allows you to edit multiple ad campaigns in bulk. Google Ads Editor can be used offline and removes the hassle of editing campaigns directly on the online UI.
Google Ads Editor lets you review your work before you post, so you can make quick adjustments. After, it tracks metrics like click-through rate, cost, position, and conversion information.
Editor saves time for people who manage multiple campaigns and can make cleaning up Google Ads easier.
11. Answer the Public
Answer the Public is a keyword tool that visualizes search queries and autocomplete suggestions so you can see the most asked questions for your keyword. The tool branches the questions into the 5 W's: Who, what, when, where, and why for further insights into the search user's inquiries.
You can also access the data tab to see the values, such as how many questions are related to the keyword. By going through the numerous questions, the site reveals content users are looking for, that you can provide.
12. AdWords Wrapper
AdWords Wrapper is a free tool that wraps keyword phrases 'quotation marks' and [square brackets] to reveal broad and exact matches, respectively. There is a negative keyword feature too to avoid keywords you don't want yours to be associated with.
AdWords Wrapper helps you define your keywords and your target audience when you are setting up your AdWords campaign. You can extract results from a broad match for general audiences, phrase match for something specific, and exact match for ads that have the same meaning or intent.
Conclusion
Google Ads is a powerful tool that can help propel your business to new heights if used properly. It is incredibly useful for small and medium businesses who want to get noticed, increase brand awareness, and gain higher conversion rates, however, it will take more than just knowing the right keywords.
By using the tools in this article, they will help increase the chances that your campaigns will succeed and that is priority number one. Keep a close eye on your results and make changes where you see fit. These tools can help you every step of the way, making sure that you make the right decisions for your campaigns and ultimately, your business.
If you're looking for some help with the Google Ads process, consider working with an experienced agency like Sabino. They'll be able to get you on the right track with the ad setup and management.