Checklist for Google Ad Grants

In this article we briefly summarize the key steps to properly set up a Google Ad Grants account.

This is a summary of our Google Ad Grants online course. We recommend the course if you want to learn the best tactics to achieve good results and avoid common mistakes.

1. Strategy

You have to develop a strategy that aligns 2 elements:

1. Demand: What many people search for on Google 
2. Supply: The goals that your organization wants to achieve

We recommend starting by thinking about 2 things:

1. Topics that many people may be searching on Google that are related to your organization.
2. How to match those topics/searches with what you offer (specific pages on your website) and what you want to achieve (goals/conversions).

It can also be done the other way around (starting with your goals in mind), but the “problem” or “bottleneck” for Ad Grants is usually the demand (finding very relevant searches for your organization that are made by thousands of users each month in your area). So it’s usually best to start there.

2. Keywords

1. Write down all the keywords that come to mind on a spreadsheet. Divide them by general topics and within that into more specific topics (this will later help you configure the campaigns and ad groups, following these same topics).

Sources of keyword ideas:

• Google Ads Keyword Planner
• Google Search Console
• Google Analytics
• SEO/SEM tools
• Artificial Intelligence tools
• Keyword mixers

3. Landing pages

1. Prepare a list of useful pages that you already have (pages that are a good match for the topics you have decided to use in Google Ads) and another list of important topics without specific pages yet.
2. Decide which pages are you going to create now and how are you going to create them (100% manual, leveraging AI, including third-party content, creating a main template and many similar variants…)
3. Review and optimize the landing pages for conversions (at least the ones with the most potential): Improve loading speed, include trust elements, think carefully about CTAs and perhaps try different alternatives, optimize “thank you” pages…

4. Campaigns

1. Evaluate the best structure for your campaigns (divided by topics, locations, languages ​​or a combination). You can design the structure in an Excel / Google Sheets table (easier) or create the campaigns and groups directly in Google Ads if you want to save intermediate steps (perhaps using the Google Ads Editor program to do it faster).
2. Divide the campaigns into small groups (maximum 20 keywords)
3. Also create a brand campaign and a DSA campaign
4. Set up campaigns with the correct parameters. To start, we usually recommend:
   • Campaign type: Normal search (not Smart Campaign)
   • Budget: $329/day
   • Bidding strategy: Target CPA or Maximize conversions
   • Ad Rotation: Optimize

5. Ads

1. Get ideas from real ads
   • Compilations of examples
   • Google Ads Preview Tool
   • Search on Google directly
   • Ad Transparency Center
2. Write the ads
   • Include different approaches (data, emotions, trust elements, CTAs, etc.)
   • Try Artificial Intelligence (different prompts and tools)
   • Take advantage of different Assets (Sitelinks especially)

6. Goals

1. Make a complete list of goals that your organization wants to achieve (get donations, purchases, registrations, calls…)
2. Evaluate how you will measure those web actions (completed forms, clicks, downloads, visits to certain pages…)
3. Assign a value for each action/conversion
4. Set up conversions in Google Analytics and import them to Google Ads

7. Maintenance and optimization

1. Apply some key aspects on your analyses of Google Ads campaigns: Key metrics, report customization and automation.
2. Create a review calendar (in the course we include a generic calendar, but we recommend adapting it to your needs and resources, as well as to the results and main “problems” of your account)

We hope you find this checklist useful.

If you want more details on each step (explanations, examples, tools, etc.) and other useful resources to achieve good results with less work (campaign templates, dashboards to analyze results, AI tips, etc.), we recommend our Google Ad Grants course.

Or if you prefer to have an expert managing your campaigns, check out our services.