Google Ads unveils major updates to search query matching

Google today announced four significant updates to its Ads platform, enhancing query matching and brand controls for advertisers.

Why it matters. These changes aim to improve ad performance and give advertisers more control over their brand-related traffic.

Key updates.

1. New recommendation for brand inclusions in broad match.
2. Brand exclusions across all match types and Dynamic Search Ads.
3. Improved visibility in search term reports. Misspelled search queries are now reported with the correctly spelled search query. This means that, on average, 9% of search terms previously under “Other” due to misspellings in the search terms report are now visible.
4. Easier blocking of misspelled searches. All the misspellings of one word will be included in an exclusion when just that one word is added as negative.

Why we care. These updates essentially provide advertisers with more powerful tools to gain more control over how their ads show. Advertisers will be happy that they get more visibility of misspellings in their search term report, there is less heavy lifting in excluding negative terms.

Update July 3rd. – Brand exclusions. Google Ads Liaison, Ginny Marvin confirmed on X that for the Brand Exclusions update you will need to know the names of the brands you want to exclude. Your ads could still show against brand names that you haven’t specifically added to the brand exclusion list:

What to watch. How advertisers adapt their strategies to take advantage of these new features, particularly in managing brand-related traffic and misspellings.