I audit a lot of Google Ads accounts. Businesses come to me because their campaigns "aren't working" or because they suspect something's off but can't put their finger on it. And almost every time, the diagnosis is the same: they're not doing anything catastrophically wrong — they're just leaking money in half a dozen places because Google's default settings are quietly working against them.

This isn't a conspiracy theory. Google is an advertising company. Their revenue goes up when you spend more. So the defaults they set when you create a campaign are designed to maximise your spending, not your results. Understanding where those defaults hurt you is the single fastest way to improve your return on ad spend.

Broad match is broader than you think

When you set up a Google Ads campaign, the default keyword match type is broad match. Google will tell you this is a good thing — it helps you "reach more people" and "discover new opportunities." What it actually does is show your ads for searches that are only tangentially related to what you're selling.

I've seen a solicitor's ad appear for "how to sue someone for free." A plumber's ad triggered by "DIY pipe repair." A wedding photographer's budget drained by searches for "cheap photo prints." None of these people were potential customers. Every click cost money.

The fix isn't complicated. Start with phrase match or exact match keywords. Yes, you'll reach fewer people. But the people you do reach will actually be looking for what you offer. You can always loosen match types later once you've got conversion data to guide you. Starting broad and hoping for the best is how budgets evaporate.

Smart campaigns that aren't smart

Google pushes Smart campaigns hard, especially for small businesses. The pitch is appealing: let Google's AI handle everything, and you just watch the leads roll in. For some businesses with straightforward offerings and generous budgets, this can work acceptably. For most, it's a black box that's impossible to optimise.

The problem with Smart campaigns is that you surrender almost all control. You can't see which search terms triggered your ads. You can't exclude irrelevant searches. You can't control where your ads appear. You're trusting Google's algorithm to figure out your business, and that algorithm's primary objective is to spend your daily budget — not to spend it wisely.

Standard campaigns with manual oversight will almost always outperform Smart campaigns once you know what you're doing. The learning curve is steeper, but the control you gain is worth it. If managing Google Ads properly feels like too much, that's exactly when it makes sense to bring in someone who does this daily rather than handing the keys to an algorithm.

The negative keyword gap

Of all the wasted spend I see in Google Ads accounts, the lack of negative keywords is probably the most common culprit. Negative keywords tell Google what you don't want to appear for. Without them, your ads show up for all manner of irrelevant searches.

Every industry has a predictable set of terms that waste money. "Free" is the obvious one — if you're selling a service, someone searching for the free version isn't your customer. "Jobs" and "careers" are another. "DIY" and "how to" often signal someone looking to do it themselves rather than hire you. "Reviews" and "complaints" suggest someone researching a competitor's reputation, not looking to buy.

Building a negative keyword list isn't a one-off task. You need to check your search terms report regularly — weekly if you're spending any meaningful budget — and add new negatives as you spot them. I typically find that a proper negative keyword strategy saves 15-25% of wasted spend within the first month.

No conversion tracking, no accountability

This one genuinely baffles me, but it's frighteningly common: businesses running Google Ads without proper conversion tracking. They're spending hundreds or thousands of pounds a month and have no way of knowing which clicks actually lead to enquiries, phone calls, or sales.

Without conversion tracking, Google can't optimise your campaigns towards people who are likely to convert. Its bidding algorithms are flying blind. And you can't make informed decisions about which keywords, ads, or audiences are performing because you have no data to base those decisions on.

Setting up conversion tracking properly is the single highest-impact change you can make to an underperforming Google Ads account. Track form submissions. Track phone calls. Track whatever action means "this was a genuine lead" for your business. Once Google's algorithm knows what a successful outcome looks like, it gets dramatically better at finding more of them.

Bidding on brand terms you'd get anyway

Here's a controversial one. If someone searches for your exact business name, they're already looking for you. In most cases, you'll appear at the top of the organic results for your own brand name. So why are you paying for a click you'd have got for free?

There are legitimate reasons to bid on brand terms. If competitors are bidding on your name (which happens), a brand campaign protects your position. If you have time-sensitive promotions, brand ads let you control the message. And brand clicks are cheap — typically a fraction of the cost of non-brand clicks.

But I've seen businesses where 30-40% of their total ad spend was going to brand terms, and there were zero competitor ads appearing for those searches. That's money that could have been spent reaching new customers instead of paying for clicks from people who were already on their way to the website. Run a test: pause your brand campaign for a week and watch whether your organic traffic for those terms picks up the slack. For many businesses, it does.

What to do about it

If you've recognised any of these patterns in your own account, the good news is that fixing them isn't complicated. Switch to tighter match types. Build a negative keyword list. Set up proper conversion tracking. Review your brand spend. These aren't advanced tactics — they're the foundations that should be in place from day one.

The reason most accounts waste money isn't that Google Ads doesn't work. It works extremely well when it's set up properly. The problem is that "properly" means actively working against the platform's defaults, and most business owners don't know that until they've already burnt through a few thousand pounds.

If you're not sure where your account stands, get in touch. I'm happy to take a look and tell you straight whether there's room for improvement — and how much of your budget you might be able to reclaim.