Top 5 Google Ads opportunities you might be missing

I’ve been auditing Google Ads accounts for over 10 years. I can confidently say that the same issues appear in most accounts.

The good news? These issues are easy to fix and can quickly improve performance.

The five key areas where I consistently find missed opportunities include:

• Location targeting: A default Google Ads setting can cause your ads to reach users outside your intended area. This is easy to fix and can save you measurable amounts of money.
• Auto-applied recommendations: Allowing Google to auto-apply changes can lead to costly mistakes. It’s better to review and apply these manually, except in specific cases.
• Campaign structure: Different structures work best in different situations.
• Campaign experiments: This underused feature allows you to test and apply changes with minimal risk – yet 90% of accounts overlook it.
• Performance Max for lead gen: While PMax can drive lead volume, the quality is often low. It works best for ecommerce and is rarely ideal for lead generation.

We’ll explore each of these areas in more detail to show you how to unlock better results from your Google Ads campaigns.

1. Optimizing location targeting settings

This is the first item I check when auditing an account, and it’s usually set up incorrectly. 

Under the campaign settings, you can enter the target location, but it’s important not to overlook the details. 

Beneath the target location, there are two additional options: 

• Presence or interest.
• Presence.

By default, Presence or interest is selected. 

This means your ads will reach people located in your target area and people who have shown interest in it – even if they’re far away. 

In most cases, it’s better to choose Presence to limit targeting to users physically in your specified location.

To check how much you’ve spent on users outside your target location, build a custom dashboard:

• Navigate to Campaigns > Dashboards.
• Add Country/Territory (User location) as a row.
• Include metrics like Cost, Clicks, or Impressions.

Be sure to select User location rather than Matched location. This shows where users were actually located when they saw your ads.

For example, a client targeting people in Australia discovered that, while most ad spend was correctly allocated, a significant amount still went to users outside Australia. 

This happened because the default Presence or interest setting was left unchanged – benefiting Google but wasting the advertiser’s budget.

This simple report helps you identify how much money you can save by adjusting your location settings.

Dig deeper: Improve your Google Ads performance: 3 simple setting changes

2. Taking control of auto-applied recommendations

Google serves millions of advertisers with varying experience levels. 

While Google Ads provides useful tools for low-touch advertisers, they are not always ideal for active managers focused on optimizing performance. 

If you want to manage your ad account effectively – which I highly recommend – this is another area where you can save money and improve results.

Some Google Ads recommendations are valuable, while others are not. 

Leaving decisions to the system is poor practice for active managers. 

Auto-applied recommendations should be turned off. Instead, review and apply them manually weekly.

You can find auto-applied recommendations in the Recommendations tab:

Some auto-applied recommendations can be harmful if left unchecked:

• “Add responsive search ads”: This allows the system to create new ad headlines and descriptions using content from your website. I recommend reviewing all ads before deployment. Leaving it to Google can result in awkward ad copy that may harm your brand and create compliance or legal risks.
• “Add new keywords”: This applies new keyword targeting, which may include irrelevant or broad match keywords. While some suggestions are useful, it’s best to review them manually.

However, some auto-applied recommendations are generally harmless and can be enabled without manual oversight:

• “Use optimized ad rotation”: This shows higher-performing ads more frequently instead of splitting impressions evenly. If you’re comfortable letting Google decide which ads to prioritize, this can be useful.
• “Remove non-serving keywords”: This helps reduce account clutter by removing keywords that do not receive impressions, which is usually beneficial.

Each account is unique, so evaluate these options based on your specific needs.

Dig deeper: Top Google Ads recommendations you should always ignore, use, or evaluate

3. Simplifying and aligning your campaign structure

There are many ways to structure Google Ads campaigns. While no single approach fits every business, some structures are less effective today.

Common campaign structures include:

• Keyword match types: Separate campaigns for exact match and broad match keywords, where the same keyword appears in different campaigns with different match types.
• SKAGs (single keyword ad groups): Each ad group targets a single keyword, allowing highly specific ad experiences. This approach requires many campaigns and ad groups.
• Locations: One campaign per geographic region, such as a city, state, or suburb.

The best structure depends on your business context. For instance, a hyper-local service like a locksmith or dentist benefits from location-based campaigns.

Why automated bidding changed campaign structure

Campaigns built around keyword match types are becoming less relevant due to automated bidding. 

This system lets Google’s AI adjust bids across keywords, reducing the need for manual bidding.

• Automated bidding works best when keywords are grouped together, giving the system more data to optimize performance.
• Manual bidding is still useful in specific cases, like new service launches or managing high-performing (hero) keywords.

Focus on customer search intent

The most effective campaign structures mirror how customers search and engage with your product. Start by understanding their search behavior and align your campaigns accordingly.

For example:

• A dentist may offer emergency, general, and root canal services. However, customers often search for “cheap dentist,” “dentist near me,” or “best-reviewed dentist.” Campaigns should reflect these search patterns, not just the business’s internal service categories.
• A mortgage restructuring company might label its service technically, but people are more likely to search for terms like “change my loan” or “update mortgage rate.” Targeting these common phrases improves results.

Capture sub-niches for better performance

Successful campaigns target sub-niches with enough search volume to drive results.

For instance:

• A bank offering multiple products – loans, bank accounts, and credit cards – can improve performance by drilling down into specific categories like rewards cards or low annual fee cards. 
• Users searching for “rewards cards” show a clearer intent than those searching for “credit cards.”

By matching your campaign structure to user intent, you create a seamless path from search keyword → ad copy → landing page – improving both relevance and performance.

It’s critical to avoid key mistakes when building your Google Ads account structure.  

• Do build campaigns that reflect customer search intent and are as simple as possible.
• Don’t rely on outdated, complex structures that hinder automated bidding.

Dig deeper: PPC keyword strategy: How to align search intent with funnel stages

4. Leveraging Google Ads Experiments

If your Google Ads account is running smoothly, the next step is to unlock additional performance – this is where Google Ads Experiments come in.

Surprisingly, many account managers overlook this powerful tool, which allows you to test changes with minimal risk and confidently improve your campaigns.

Here’s how to effectively use them:

• Define your test: Identify a specific change you want to evaluate – such as increasing bids by a percentage, adding new keywords, or adjusting keyword match types.
• Apply the change: Implement the change to a portion of the traffic (50% is a common starting point) while keeping the other half as a control group.
• Measure the results: Monitor key metrics (CTR, CPA, ROAS) in real time. The platform provides statistical significance to help you evaluate performance.
• Act on the outcome: If the change improves performance, apply it to the entire campaign with a single click. If results decline, you can easily revert the campaign to its previous state.

Without experiments, you’re either making changes blindly or hesitating to implement major updates due to uncertainty. 

Google Ads Experiments offer a safe and reliable way to test, refine, and optimize your account – helping you stay agile while minimizing risk.

Dig deeper: What 54 Google Ads experiments taught me about lead gen

5. Refining Perfomance Max for lead generation

Performance Max was originally designed for ecommerce and tends to deliver solid results in that context. 

However, for non-ecommerce businesses – such as lead generation or SaaS signups – its performance is often underwhelming.

Here’s why PMax may fall short for lead generation and what to do instead:

• Lead quality issues
  • While PMax can generate a high volume of leads, these leads often lack quality. 
  • Many lead generation businesses initially see promising results but are disappointed upon closer inspection.
• Why it works for ecommerce
  • PMax performs better when paired with a product feed, allowing for more precise targeting. 
  • You can further refine performance by segmenting your product feed by categories or by top and bottom performers.
• Challenges for lead generation
  • Without a product feed, Google heavily favors Google Display Network (GDN) inventory. This often results in a flood of low-cost but low-quality leads – many of which may be spam.

A better approach for lead generation is to separate Search and Display campaigns:

• Create dedicated Search and Display campaigns to control your budget and targeting on each network.
• Use a dedicated GDN campaign for remarketing and custom search intent to maintain better oversight.

While setting up separate campaigns requires more effort than using a PMax campaign, it usually yields higher-quality leads and better long-term results. 

For lead generation businesses, relying on PMax without close monitoring and segmentation is unlikely to produce sustainable success.

Dig deeper: How to use Performance Max for any type of business

Fine-tune your Google Ads campaigns with these optimizations

Small changes can make a big difference in Google Ads. 

By refining targeting, controlling automation, structuring campaigns effectively, testing with experiments, and using PMax wisely, you’ll drive better results and reduce wasted spend.