There’s a conversation I’ve been having more and more frequently at Faceted Media. A business owner reaches out—exhausted, frustrated, and genuinely confused about why their Google Ads aren’t delivering results. They’ve been working with an agency for months, sometimes years, watching their ad spend disappear with little to show for it. When we finally pop the hood and look at their account, the problems are almost always the same.
And here’s the thing: these aren’t complicated, obscure issues. They’re fundamental misunderstandings about how Google Ads actually works—misunderstandings that cost businesses thousands of dollars every single month.
If you’re running Google Ads and feeling like something’s off, or if you’re considering hiring someone to manage your campaigns, this article will walk you through the most common (and costly) mistakes I see repeatedly. More importantly, I’ll show you exactly what to look for so you can protect your marketing budget and actually get the results you deserve.
The Hidden Search Terms Problem: What Your Ads Are Really Showing For
Let me start with the biggest issue I encounter: business owners have absolutely no idea what search terms are actually triggering their ads.
Wait—didn’t they choose keywords? Yes, they did. But here’s where it gets tricky, and this is something that sounds like it should be the same but is actually the complete opposite.
Keywords are what you bid on. Search terms are what people actually type into Google.
Your keywords trigger search terms, but they don’t limit them nearly as much as you’d think. And here’s the kicker: the search terms column is hidden by default in Google Ads. That means unless you specifically know to add that column to your reports, you have no visibility into what searches are actually spending your money.
When I audit a new client’s account, one of the first things I do is pull up their search terms report. The results are often shocking. I’ve seen divorce attorneys showing up for “free divorce advice,” personal injury lawyers appearing when someone searches for a specific competitor’s name, and healthcare providers burning through budget on searches for individual doctors’ names at other practices.
The business owner thinks their ad is showing for “divorce attorney near me” because that’s the keyword they selected. But in reality, Google’s match types are pulling in all sorts of searches they never intended.
Match Types: The Difference Between Control and Chaos
This brings us to match types, which most people fundamentally misunderstand.
There are essentially three match types in Google Ads today:
- Broad match – Google has wide discretion to show your ad for related searches
- Phrase match – Your keyword phrase must be present in the search, but Google can add words before or after
- Exact match – The closest to precise matching, but even this allows for close variations
Many business owners I work with have everything set to broad match without realizing it. They think they’re being smart by keeping it “open” to capture more traffic. What they’re actually doing is giving Google a blank check to interpret their intent.
But here’s an even more insidious problem I see constantly: keyword choice mistakes that come from not understanding how Google interprets language.
Things vs. Services: Why Your Keywords Matter More Than You Think
Let me give you a real example. A counselor comes to me and says their ads aren’t working. I look at their keywords and see things like:
- counselor
- therapist
- psychologist
- doctor
They think these keywords will pull in searches from people looking for counseling services. That makes logical sense, right?
Wrong.
When you use a “thing” (a noun referring to a person or role) instead of a “service” (an action or offering), Google interprets this very differently. The keyword “counselor” doesn’t just pull searches like “find a counselor near me.” It pulls searches for:
- Specific counselors’ names
- Counselor training programs
- Counselor licensing requirements
- Other businesses with “counselor” in the name
The same goes for “lawyer,” “doctor,” “mediator,” and countless other professional titles.
What you actually want are service-based keywords:
- counseling services
- therapy near me
- legal consultation
- mediation services
This subtle shift changes everything. It moves you from competing with individual names and informational searches to actually reaching people looking for the service you provide.
When I make this switch for clients, we often see their cost-per-click drop and their conversion rate increase immediately—simply because we’re finally reaching the right people.
The Auto-Recommendation Trap
Google Ads has a feature that sounds helpful: automated recommendations. The platform analyzes your account and suggests changes you can apply with a single click.
I cannot tell you how many accounts I’ve inherited that have been absolutely destroyed by blindly applying these recommendations.
Here’s what you need to understand: Google’s primary goal is not to make your campaigns more efficient. It’s to increase your ad spend. Many of these “recommendations” do exactly that by:
- Switching your keywords to broad match
- Adding new keyword themes that may not be relevant
- Increasing your budget
- Expanding your targeting beyond what makes sense for your business
I recently worked with a client who had dutifully applied every recommendation Google suggested for six months. Their monthly ad spend had tripled, but their leads hadn’t increased at all. When we dug into the search terms, we found they were showing ads for completely unrelated searches because Google had broadened everything.
Auto-recommendations aren’t inherently evil, but they need to be evaluated carefully by someone who understands your business goals, not applied automatically.
Max Conversions Without Conversion Tracking: The Ultimate Irony
One of the most common—and most frustrating—issues I encounter is accounts set to “Max Conversions” bidding strategy with absolutely no conversion tracking in place.
Let me explain why this is such a problem.
“Max Conversions” tells Google: “I want you to automatically bid to get me the maximum number of conversions possible within my budget.” It’s an automated bidding strategy that relies on Google’s machine learning to optimize your campaigns.
But here’s the thing: if you don’t have conversion tracking properly set up, Google has no idea what a conversion actually is for your business.
Many times, I find that clients have no Google Tag Manager (GTM) implementation, no conversion events configured, or—even worse—they’re tracking completely meaningless actions as conversions (like someone visiting their homepage).
Running Max Conversions without proper tracking is like telling a driver “get there as fast as possible” without telling them where “there” is. You’ll definitely go somewhere, and you might go fast, but it probably won’t be where you wanted to end up.
The fix requires proper GTM setup and clearly defined conversion events—actual business goals like form submissions, phone calls, appointment bookings, or purchases.
Demographics: Why You’re Showing Divorce Ads to 18-Year-Olds
Here’s a recent example that perfectly illustrates another common oversight: I took on a client who provides divorce mediation services. Their ads were burning through budget with very few qualified leads.
When I looked at the demographics report, I saw the problem immediately: they were showing ads to 18-24 year olds.
Now, are there 18-24 year olds getting divorced? Statistically, yes. Is that your primary market? Almost certainly not.
But because the campaign had no demographic targeting set up, Google was showing their ads to everyone, regardless of age, gender, household income, or parenting status.
This is default behavior in Google Ads, and it’s costing businesses a fortune.
For this particular client, we adjusted the targeting to focus on:
- Ages 30-64 (where divorce rates are actually highest for their market)
- Household income thresholds that matched their service pricing
- Geographic areas within their service region
The results were immediate: cost per lead dropped by 43% in the first month, and the quality of leads improved dramatically.
Another demographic issue I see constantly: no income targeting. If you’re offering premium services or products with a significant price tag, showing ads to every income level means you’re inevitably reaching people searching for “free” or “cheap” versions of what you offer.
These clicks cost you money but have zero chance of converting.
Ad Scheduling: The 24/7 Money Drain
Another default setting that wastes money: running ads 24/7.
Unless you’re an e-commerce business or you have 24-hour service availability, there’s absolutely no reason your ads should be running at 3 AM.
I recently reviewed an account for a B2B service provider whose ads were running around the clock. When we pulled the conversion data by hour, we found that:
- 100% of their conversions happened between 8 AM and 6 PM on weekdays
- Zero conversions ever happened after 8 PM or on weekends
- Yet they were spending 30% of their budget during these non-converting hours
We adjusted their ad schedule to match business hours, and that alone freed up 30% of their budget to reinvest in the times when people actually convert.
This seems obvious, but it requires someone to actually look at the data and make the adjustment. The default is to serve ads 24/7, and many agencies never bother to optimize this.
The Impatience Problem: Changing Everything Before You Know What Works
I need to address something that makes effective campaign management nearly impossible: impatience.
Google Ads requires data to optimize. When you make a change, you need to wait long enough to collect meaningful data before you make another change. Otherwise, you have no idea what’s actually working.
The problem is, many business owners and agencies panic at the first sign of non-performance and start changing everything:
- They adjust bids daily
- They rewrite ads every few days
- They add and remove keywords constantly
- They switch bidding strategies weekly
This creates a chaotic environment where nothing can be properly tested or evaluated.
Here’s the reality: depending on your industry and budget, you might need anywhere from 2-4 weeks to gather enough data to make informed decisions about what’s working. If your budget is smaller, you need even more time because the data comes in more slowly.
When I onboard a new client, I often spend the first month simply observing and making minor adjustments, not wholesale changes. This gives us a baseline to understand what’s happening before we implement major optimizations.
The agencies that change everything every few days aren’t being responsive—they’re being reckless. And it costs you money.
The Missing Piece: Heatmaps and Understanding User Behavior
Here’s something most businesses don’t think about when running Google Ads: you need to know what’s happening on your website after someone clicks your ad.
Google Analytics tells you:
- Which pages people visited
- How long they stayed
- Where they came from
- Where they exited
That’s useful, but it doesn’t tell you the full story.
Heatmap tools show you:
- Where people are actually clicking (or trying to click)
- How far down the page they scroll
- Which elements they interact with
- Where they get confused or stuck
I cannot count the number of times I’ve used a heatmap to discover that:
- A critical call-to-action button isn’t being clicked because it doesn’t look clickable
- Users are trying to click on an image that isn’t linked to anything
- People are abandoning a page because the most important information is below the fold
- A form is too long or has a confusing field that causes drop-offs
Without this insight, you might spend months optimizing your Google Ads when the real problem is your landing page experience.
Tools like Hotjar, Crazy Egg, or Microsoft Clarity (which is free) can provide this data. If you’re spending money on ads and you don’t have heatmap tracking, you’re flying blind.
Quality Score, Ad Relevance, and Landing Page Experience: The Hidden Ranking Factors
Most people know that Google Ads works on an auction system—you bid for keywords, and the highest bidder wins, right?
Not quite.
Google doesn’t just give ad placement to whoever pays the most. They use a metric called Quality Score, which combines three major factors:
1. Expected Click-Through Rate (CTR)
Google predicts how likely your ad is to be clicked based on your keyword and ad copy. If your ad is relevant and compelling, it will have a higher expected CTR, which improves your Quality Score.
2. Ad Relevance
How closely does your ad copy match the search intent of your keyword? If someone searches for “emergency plumber” and your ad talks about “affordable home services,” that’s not very relevant. But if your ad specifically addresses emergency plumbing, your Ad Relevance score improves.
3. Landing Page Experience
When someone clicks your ad, do they land on a page that:
- Is relevant to their search and the ad they clicked?
- Loads quickly?
- Is easy to navigate on mobile?
- Provides clear information and a path to convert?
These three factors combine to create your Quality Score (rated 1-10 for each keyword). A higher Quality Score means:
- Lower cost per click
- Better ad positions
- More efficient use of your budget
I regularly see accounts where every keyword has a Quality Score of 3-5 out of 10. This means they’re paying premium prices for poor ad positions, all because no one optimized for these factors.
The fix involves:
- Writing specific, relevant ad copy for each ad group
- Creating tightly themed keyword groups
- Building dedicated landing pages that match the search intent
- Improving site speed (more on this next)
Site Speed: The Conversion Killer No One Talks About
Here’s a statistic that should terrify anyone running paid ads: 53% of mobile users abandon a site that takes longer than 3 seconds to load.
You can have perfect keyword targeting, brilliant ad copy, and a generous budget, but if your landing page takes 6 seconds to load, you’ve already lost half your visitors before they see anything.
Site speed affects:
- Landing Page Experience score (part of Quality Score)
- Conversion rate (slow sites convert significantly worse)
- Your cost per conversion (fewer conversions means higher cost per conversion)
- Mobile performance (increasingly important as mobile search grows)
I use tools like Google PageSpeed Insights, GTmetrix, and Pingdom to audit site speed for clients. Common issues include:
- Unoptimized images (the #1 culprit)
- Too many plugins or scripts
- Poor hosting infrastructure
- No caching enabled
- Render-blocking resources
Sometimes we can resolve these issues quickly; other times, it requires a more significant technical overhaul. But the ROI on site speed improvements is enormous when you’re paying for every click.
Think about it this way: if you’re spending $3,000/month on Google Ads and getting 1,000 clicks, but 40% of those visitors leave because your site loads too slowly, you’re wasting $1,200 every month before anyone even sees your offer.
What This All Means For You
If you’re currently running Google Ads and you’re not seeing results, I hope this article has given you some concrete places to look. The issues I’ve outlined here are not edge cases—they’re the norm for most accounts I audit.
The truth is, Google Ads is powerful, but it’s also complex. The platform is designed to make it easy to spend money, not easy to spend money efficiently. The defaults are set to maximize Google’s revenue, not your return on investment.
A good agency or consultant should:
- Regularly review your search terms and add negative keywords
- Understand match types and use them strategically
- Set up proper conversion tracking before implementing automated bidding
- Configure demographic and geographic targeting based on your actual customers
- Optimize ad scheduling to match when your conversions happen
- Make data-driven changes, not panic-driven changes
- Implement heatmap tracking to understand user behavior
- Focus on Quality Score components to lower your costs
- Ensure your site loads quickly and provides a good user experience
If your current agency isn’t doing these things—or if you’re managing your own campaigns and you’ve never looked at some of these elements—you now have a roadmap for improvement.
The Bottom Line
Google Ads can be incredibly effective for generating leads and growing your business, but only when it’s done correctly. The difference between a well-managed campaign and a poorly managed one isn’t just a few percentage points—it’s often the difference between profitability and just burning money.
At Faceted Media, we see businesses come to us burned out, frustrated, and convinced that Google Ads “just doesn’t work” for their industry. In almost every case, it’s not that the platform doesn’t work—it’s that it wasn’t being used correctly.
If you’re in that position right now, don’t give up on Google Ads entirely. Instead, take a hard look at what’s actually happening in your account. Pull that search terms report. Check your Quality Scores. Look at your demographic data. Review your conversion tracking.
The insights you gain from that audit might be frustrating, but they’re also empowering. Because once you know what’s wrong, you can fix it—and that’s when Google Ads transforms from a money drain into a genuine growth engine for your business.
And if you need help making sense of what you find, that’s exactly what we’re here for.