Top Conversion Optimisation Company Australia 2023

Google Ads Campaign Quality Score and how to track it as a KPI?

Paid search using Google Ads is often an essential marketing activity for many businesses optimising digital advertising. That said, it is surprising that a lot of businesses don’t know how to measure a successful PPC campaign.

If you want to master a successful PPC campaign, there is no doubt that you need a solid understanding of Google Ad’s ‘Quality Score’.

But, why?

The Google Ads quality score is a digital marketing KPI with an enormous influence on the cost and effectiveness of your paid search campaigns. And, a high Google Ads ‘Quality Score’ is exactly what you should be aiming for.

In this blog post, we’ll cover the factors that influence a Quality Score, the importance of a high Quality Score as a digital marketing KPI, how to improve your Quality Score to be competitive and how to use it to keep costs low.

What is Google Ads’ Quality Score?

Google Ads’ Quality score is their unique way of rating the relevance and overall user experience that your ads and landing page/s provide when users search your applicable keyword(s).

It is a piece of diagnostic data that can give you a sense of how well your advert performs compared to other advertisers.

The score is measured on a scale from 1-10 and is available at the keyword level.

Your Google Ads’ Quality score is updated every time a user searches for something that triggers your ad. Regular updates mean any changes to your site are taken into account as are ad copy and ads performance.

A higher Google Ads’ Quality Score indicates that your PPC ads and landing pages are more relevant and applicable to individuals searching for your paid keyword, compared to other advertisers paying for the same keyword/s. Once you understand how the Quality Score works you can use it to identify where it might be beneficial to improve your ads, keyword selection or landing pages.

The example below depicts keywords with a low quality score. As a result, it is likely that these keywords are raising costs and are lacking in any significant amount of relevance to both your audience and other advertising assets.

Your Google Ads’ Quality Score rating depends on multiple factors including:

  • Expected Click-through rate (CTR): How often are users clicking on your ads? This stat provides the percentage of clicks from your ad impressions (views) and is a strong indication to Google that the content in your ads is relevant and applicable.
  • Ad Relevance: Is the ad relevant to your keywords? Does it make sense for the ad to appear when someone searches for a particular keyword? For example, if you bid on the keyword ‘personal loan’ and your ad content doesn’t include information about a personal loan Google Ads will use this to penalise your ad relevance.
  • Landing Page Experience: Does the information presented on the landing page correspond to what the ad is offering, and vice versa? Just like the above example with the personal loan, if your landing page doesn’t contain information about a personal loan, Google is likely to assume it’s not relevant to that keyword and penalise you for it.

Google Ads weighs these factors when evaluating your campaigns and this is how your Quality Score is measured.

Why is a high Google Ads Quality Score Important in Digital Marketing?

Google Ads aims to match users to the most relevant and quality ads because they make money from engagement. A Google Ads auction is based on a cost-per-click model and high-quality ads will almost always receive preference over those with a low Quality Score, to ensure maximum clicks and earnings.

But, don’t confuse the point of the Quality Score as a ranking factor that’s only helpful to Google’s bottom line. It’s beneficial for improving the quality and performance of your campaigns. If you leverage your Quality Score to create more relevant and useful ads for your target audience, the better your return will be. So, a high Google Ads Quality Score is better for your bottom line too.

Is there a difference between Quality Score and Ad Rank?

Short answer – yes!

Both Quality Score and Ad Rank are used by Google to evaluate your campaigns, and although related, they are not the same.

Quality Score is Google’s way of informing an advertiser like you how to adjust your campaigns, by

  • evaluating keywords,
  • ads, and
  • landing pages.

Ad Rank, on the other hand, takes into account much more campaign information to determine where your ad will show up on search engine results pages (SERPs). Ad Rank is calculated by various factors including

  • your bid amount,
  • your auction-time,
  • ad quality,
  • competitiveness of an auction
  • and more.

Google is determining where, if at all, to show your ad in relation to other ads on SERPs, without directly considering Quality Score. Just because you have a high Quality Score, does not mean your campaign will have a high Ad Rank. While Ad Rank does take into account the same factors as Quality Score, it is all about improving your Ad Ranking position.

How do I check my Google Ads Quality Score?

To check your Google Ads Quality Score, sign into your Google Ads account. Navigate to the Keywords report. If you don’t see a Quality Score column, under “modify columns for keywords” open the Quality Score section. Here you’ll be able to add any of the following to your statistics table:

  • Quality Score
  • Landing page exp.
  • Exp. CTR
  • Ad Relevance

Why is a Google Ads Quality Score important?

Advertisers should recognise the big incentive that comes with achieving a high Quality Score – that is, the higher your Quality Score, the less you will pay per click. Even if there is low competition for your keywords, you may still end up paying close to your maximum CPC if your ad quality is low.

Further, a high Quality Score not only lowers your cost per click but your cost per conversion too.

Cost per conversion is different from cost per click as it reflects how much you pay when a user takes the action you want. Since not every click results in a conversion, cost per conversion is generally higher than cost per click.

So, remember, the better you are at meeting your prospect’s needs through relevant content, the less Google will charge you for the ad click and/or conversion.

And, unless you already have a Quality Score rating of 10/10, you should always improve your ads/content/landing page to increase your Quality Score, reduce costs and generate a greater return.

What Quality Score should you aim for in Google Ads?

Like any performance metric, a good Quality Score depends on what kind of keyword you are bidding on. Typically, a strong Quality Score is considered from 8-10/10, but may not be applicable to every keyword.

For example, Quality Score may vary from low commercial intent keywords to high commercial intent keywords. Commercial intent is an evaluation of the likelihood that someone searching for a keyword becomes a lead or customer.

Keyword research is fundamental to digital marketing. Identifying and applying highly relevant keywords related to your niche, allows you to achieve a higher Quality Score with less effort and budget.

We have information on how to research keywords for your niche here.

How to interpret your Google Ads Quality Score results

In digital marketing, a high Google Ads Quality Score is beneficial as a marketing KPI, as it indicates a strong alignment between consumers and marketers.

A high Quality Score represents thorough research has been completed to identify who it is you want to reach and talk to and that you’re engaging with them through highly targeted and relevant messaging within Google Ads.

Ultimately, the higher your Quality Score, the more effective your marketing efforts are.

How can I improve my Quality Score?

Has your quality score tanked?

While there are various potential culprits that can lead to a low Quality Score, here are the most likely culprits that will lead to a low Quality Score and how to fix them:

1. Ad Relevance If you recall, ad relevance is one of the key factors used to measure your Quality Score. So, here are some top tips for improving your ad relevance:

a) Conduct Keyword Research: By conducting keyword research, you’ll help find the right words and phrases to use in your ad content, that are likely to resonate with your target audience. Focus on keywords most likely to drive qualified traffic. For example, the use of long-tail keywords will help to drive niche, interested, and qualified leads.

b) Organise your Ad Groups: The keywords in your ad group should all be relevant and follow the same intent. Ad groups that combine both broader and more specific keywords will affect their relevance. More specific and related keywords keep the ad group focused with similar, if not identical, search intent.

c) Refine the Ad Copy: If you have done your keyword research, the next thing you should focus on is your ad text. Your ad copy should always be relevant to your keyword selection. Google overlooks your ad copy to ensure you are providing users with useful and relevant information. This is because you want your ad copy to directly match user search intent.

d) Add Negative Keywords: Incorporating negative keywords prevents your ads from appearing in search results that aren’t relevant to your business. This way you can save money on leads or clicks that aren’t interested in your offering or match their initial search intent, and therefore will not convert.

2. Landing Page Experience:

You might’ve guessed this one was coming.

To improve your Quality Score you’ll also want to look at your landing page experience. This is another key factor for Google to measure your Quality Score.

Some recommendations for strengthening a landing page experience are:

a) Align the ad and landing page: The landing page should always deliver what is offered in your ad. It is important that the content of your landing page does not fall short of the content of your ads. The landing page should offer your audience an extension to what they have already seen, and if they have clicked your ad to your landing page, you’re one step closer to generating a conversion. Thus, you want to ensure your landing page has the relevant information your prospect is looking for.

b) Optimise for Mobile Experience: More than half of website traffic now comes from mobile devices. So, there is a very large chance most users are viewing your ads on their mobile device. Therefore, you should prioritise designing your landing page to be responsive to all devices, not just desktops. You want the entire experience to be frictionless from the ad to the very last conversion action.

c) Design your landing page with the visitor’s goal in mind: In essence, the goal for your landing page and your visitor’s goal should overlap. They want to claim an offer, and you want them to claim it. So, when designing your landing page, guide them to the most important or core elements of the page, for example, the CTA or lead form. Moreover, you should ensure the value proposition is clearly articulated and resonates with visitors at first glance. The clearer you can articulate the value of the offer, the better chance you have of converting your users.

d) Check Page Speed: Site or loading speed can greatly affect user experience. Users are highly time-sensitive and want answers fast. A landing page that takes longer than a few seconds to load will likely result in the user bouncing from your website, with a poor user experience. If you have paid for a user to get to your landing page, the last thing you want is to steer them away with a slow-loading page. Evidence shows that pages that take longer than 3 seconds to load, will result in a higher bounce rate.

 

Summary: By now you will have realised why a Google Ads high Quality Score is essential to measuring the success of a Google Ads campaign.As marketers, we want high returns, in less time and with less ad spend. Quality Score is the indicator that will help achieve this, provided you use Quality Score as a measure of the relevance and usefulness, to your target audience, of your keywords, ads and landing pages.

Use this guide to better understand the status of your Google ads to achieve the best possible return when advertising on Google.

What is Google Ads’ Quality Score?

Google Ads’ Quality score is their unique way of rating the relevance and overall user experience that your ads and landing page/s provide when users search your applicable keyword(s).

Why is a Google Ads Quality Score important?

Google Ads Quality Score is important because the higher your Quality Score, the less you will pay per click. Even if there is low competition for your keywords, you may still end up paying close to your maximum CPC if your ad quality is low.

What Quality Score should you aim for in Google Ads?

Like any performance metric, a good Quality Score depends on what kind of keyword you are bidding on. Typically, a strong Quality Score is considered from 8-10/10, but may not be applicable to every keyword.

Share this:

Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn

Free 25 Page eBook

Download the Influencing Your Digital Marketing Metrics ebook

Growth in numbers translates to growth in business, learn about the digital marketing KPI’s that can dramatically boost your business trajectory.

Free 25 Page eBook

Download the Influencing Your Digital Marketing Metrics ebook

Growth in numbers translates to growth in business, learn about the digital marketing KPI’s that can dramatically boost your business trajectory.

Where to from here?

Related Blog Posts

There’s always more to learn when it comes to digital marketing, continue learning about it by clicking on one of our blogs here

Here's what our clients say

Book Your Digital Strategy Session

Free 45 Minute Digital Strategy Session

We’ll get in touch with you to arrange a time for your session and gain some initial background on your business needs

What you'll get

Website Audit

A strategic look at your website from the inside and out conducted by one of our senior digital strategist’s

Industry Strategies

An insiders view of what unique strategies work for similar businesses in your industry and how you can capitalise on these learnings

Spy on your competitor’s

A sneak-peak at what your competitors are doing online

Success framework

A digital marketing success framework tailored to your business

Niki Patterson

Business Assist help us with the growth of our business, which is what every business wants, and also it really feels like everyone on the team understands and knows your business well. It’s not just one person, everyone is somehow involved and I appreciate that. Thank you so much for all your hard work in fixing our campaigns. We are all incredibly appreciative.

Jo McMillan

Business Assist were a pleasure to work with as we developed our new website. They were responsive, considered and always sought to provide us with the best possible product at a competitive price. We are very happy with the website they produced for us and have had a lot of positive comments on it. Business Assist is also great with follow up and ongoing support, should we need it.

Dean Burns

We only launched Rent Busters Perth in November 2018, so it is incredible that Business Assist generated over 500 leads for us in June 2020!  They helped us with our branding, market positioning and have since worked very closely with us on developing new offers, headings and campaigns every month. And most importantly we are signing a record number of deals every month!

Business Assist are more like our business partner than supplier and we heavily rely on their expertise and the results they deliver are extraordinary – I can’t recommend them more highly.

Lisa Bywaters

We’ve been working with Steve and the team at Business Assist since 2010.  With an information dense website it’s vital for us that our visitors find the information they need, when they need it. The BA team understand that people search for information in an organic way, that it’s not a linear process. By using their expertise, we now have a friendly, welcoming website that allows visitors to find the information they need quickly and easily. They were also extremely helpful when we transitioned to our new name and new website – with everything from developing a new website that incorporated consumer and staff feedback, to developing an SEO strategy and Google Ads campaigns that helped us retain our past users and attract new ones. They’re a professional, friendly team that takes the time to get to know the needs of your organisation and your website users.

Tony Raunic

A few years ago Hunt & Hunt Lawyers decided to put more resources into our SEO.  We interviewed a number of contractors who all promised their services would be superior.  We were struck by Steve Foura and his team’s preparedness to invest time in learning about what was distinctive about our business and what we particularly wanted to achieve.

We appointed Business Assist to focus on SEO improvements for aspects of our property team marketing including our compulsory acquisition advisory services.

The results have been outstanding with web-based enquiries growing exponentially and, critically, the right prospective clients contacting us and invariably converting into fee paying clients.

We certainly recommend Business Assist highly for any professional services business looking to better leverage its internet presence.

Ultimately, Hunt & Hunt asked Business Assist to develop a new website for our national legal group and we are very pleased with the results.

We continue to work with Business Assist today across various teams as we derive great value from Steve’s practical layman’s advice on SEO.  Business Assist also understand our business and genuinely seem to go the extra mile to add value.

Robert Thorpe

It felt that our previous digital agency was not very engaged with our business – there was a real disconnect.  With Business Assist we feel like we’re talking to the people who are actually implementing the campaign, or at least have a very good understanding of it.  We believe this is one of the main  reasons we saw results happen straightaway – increased new customer inquiries from Australia and overseas. But the other thing we get is great advice from Business Assist about things we can and can’t do from a Digital Marketing perspective. We trust really these guys. The other thing we’re getting is the changes we’re asking to make or services we’re changing, it happens really fast – there’s nothing like a 2 week period of waiting.

Amanda Greer

We’re a small business but we try and behave like a bigger company and Business Assist help us lift that bar. They have helped us get ahead of our competitors. We have a strategy meeting soon where we will develop a 5 year plan and we look forward to Business Assist’s input and planning what we should be working with them on for the next 5 years.  Business Assist have a  really good personable team and they tailor to us – we really like the flexibility. We’re very strategic in what we do and Business Assist helps us enhance our competitive advantage by reacting to opportunities quickly. Our position, interests and needs are well aligned.

Dave Porter

Business Assist are responsible for our new leads coming in. Increasingly, we are becoming more and more reliant on digital marketing as the other avenues are either too expensive or deliver little or no return. So we are extremely reliant on Business Assist.  And they have delivered for us for many years and continue to do so in 2020 where we keep having all-time record revenue weeks! We also really appreciate the team at Business Assist and I’ve always enjoyed working with a company that we feel as though they are really part of our team. We have a very healthy working relationship.

Karl Zimmerman

Since hiring Business Assist to take over our in-house Digital Marketing management, our Google Adwords spend has gone down by 75-80% and our traffic has increased by over 150%. To see such a massive drop in spend and yet an increase in traffic has to be one of the biggest and most impressive things I have ever seen.

Also, compared to what we were getting before, we see Business Assist basically as a free investment with the high returns and the increase in traffic we are getting. Not only that, each time we face any problems, the team gives us much valued solutions, not just ‘yes, we can fix that’ but also different options to choose from.

Business Assist gave us the ability to trust them with our money compared to the other 3-4 companies we had before them. We now can see where our money is going and the returns for it. They also take the time to explain details to us and make sure we are given regular updates. As we grow as a business, we see us growing with Business Assist.

Brayden Cameron

We have been using the Business Assist team since 2013. Coming from a trade background in Roofing & Roofing maintenance and jumping into Digital for all that is involved is a daunting task. We know everything worth knowing about our own trade and Digital is such an unknown area. In turn we were so hesitant because we felt like we were getting ripped off from previous attempts with other agencies and any requests for information or advice would have an extra charge or a feel like such an up-sell. Upon working with the Business Assist team we have COMPLETE clarity around the following:

  • Cost Vs Conversion (analytics)
  • Competitor analysis
  • Our target market and how to attract them
  • Brand Strategy Marketing
  • Social Media
  • SEO & so much more.

Providing these services should be a given for any Digital company – however we have found that it is not. Providing this whilst maintaining honesty and transparency even educating us along the way, whilst not making us feel like idiots because we didn’t know certain terms throughout the process is the real benefit working with Business Assist. We have meetings every week / fortnight with the team to report on every aspect of the business on a digital front. We feel the Business Assist team is an extension of our 40 + family. I think we are really fortunate we found a company that propelled us to grow from 2 staff to 40+ in 7 years – they know our company as if it was their own!