Google Is Limiting Search Term Reports: How Will This Affect Your Performance?

In September 2020, Google decided to limit the search terms report for advertisers on Google Ads. What impact will this decision have on the management of your campaigns and budget? Does it mean less visibility and less control?

The Search Terms Report: How It Works and Why It Matters

The Google Ads search terms report allows you to view the user queries that triggered your ads. The report therefore shows the performance recorded by your ads based on these search terms: cost, clicks, CPC, sales, ROI, etc. It offers two main advantages: the first is identifying high-potential search terms for your business, with the option to add them as keywords and bid on them. The other advantage is that it allows you to identify search terms that are irrelevant or not profitable enough according to your objectives, with the option to exclude them so that your ads no longer appear for those terms.

Limiting Search Terms: Less Control and Visibility for Advertisers

A warning appeared across all Google Ads accounts: “Since September 2020, the search terms report only includes terms used by a significant number of users. Your report may now show fewer terms.”

In other words, the data usually provided to advertisers is now restricted, suggesting reduced visibility and less precision regarding search terms. Advertisers will therefore no longer be able to analyze their performance in as much detail and identify ineffective terms or keywords to which a more or less significant portion of the budget has been allocated.

This decision makes advertisers more dependent on Google’s “smart” tools for building campaigns. Many of them believe they no longer have as much control over their accounts as before.

In addition, Google has so far provided no information about the query threshold below which a search term no longer appears in the report. Some advertisers and SEA experts have made their own estimates and expressed concern. Some estimates indicate that the search terms removed by Google account for nearly one-third of their budget.

More Privacy for Users

With this new announcement, Google continues to demonstrate its intention to improve user privacy throughout their journey.

The search terms report previously allowed advertisers, among other things, to better understand users’ intentions. By increasing its privacy threshold, Google therefore offers individuals better data protection.

A Warning That Needs Some Perspective

As experts, we recommend not confusing the advertiser account perspective with the market perspective.

Amélie from Feed Manager explains: “According to Google, for a search term to be visible in the dedicated report, it must have been searched by a significant number of users. But for example, if the term ‘sofa’ was searched 50 times on Google in France and there were only two impressions in your account (advertiser), the term will still appear. This is because, from a market perspective, the term was searched often enough. In reality, Google is increasing its threshold from a market perspective, not from the advertiser account perspective.”

This growing difficulty in accessing certain data from Google demonstrates a twofold intention:

• on the one hand, to better respect the privacy of user data;
• on the other hand, to encourage advertisers to make greater use of automated tools such as machine learning and steer them toward smart bidding campaign strategies.