By adding negative keywords to your Performance Max campaigns or account, you can avoid your campaigns showing for queries that contain those terms on the Search and Shopping inventory.
Negative keywords prevent your ads from appearing for irrelevant searches. For example, if you sell luxury watches, adding “cheap” as a negative keyword ensures your ads won’t show for searches like “cheap watches.”
Key details for Performance Max campaigns:
- Scope: Applies only to Search and Shopping inventory.
- Limitations: Negative keyword lists are not supported; keywords must be added individually.
How to add negative keywords:
- Log in to Google Ads and go to Campaigns.
- Click Audiences, keywords, and content, then Keywords > Negative keywords.
- Click the plus (+) button and select your campaign.
- Add keywords (one per line) and click Save.
Account-level negative keywords
For broader control, add negative keywords at the account level to filter terms across all Search and Shopping inventory, including Performance Max campaigns.
Why use negative keywords?
- Improve campaign relevance.
- Reduce wasted ad spend.
- Attract high-intent traffic.
Negative keywords refine your Performance Max campaigns, ensuring better relevance and higher ROI.
Find all the details about negative keywords in Google’s official guide.
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