Five Reasons Your Search Ads Are Not Getting Clicks, and What to Do

You take on search advertising, work hard on the settings, go live, and then get no clicks at all.
Some of you will have been through exactly that.

Without clicks there is no point to the advertising, so this needs fixing quickly.

This article sets out five causes of search ads getting no clicks, and what to do about each.

1. The daily budget is set too low

The first thing to check when search ads get no clicks is the daily budget cap.
Google Ads lets you set a daily budget.

If you treat the start as a ‘test’ and set the budget far too low to keep daily spend inside your figure, impressions are held back and the ads get no clicks as a result.
With the daily cap set too low, the demand is there but the budget holds back impressions and clicks, and you lose a great deal of opportunity.

▼How to fix it

・Set a sensible figure
A low budget is not a virtue in itself,
so leave some headroom and set a figure that makes sense for the return.

Even for a test, rather than fixing on a monthly figure,
an approach like ‘no budget cap, just spend 10,000 yen first’ may be more realistic.
With nothing holding delivery back, the test may tell you more.

How much does search advertising cost? Four ways to decide your budget and how to keep costs down

2. The bid is too low

Search advertising works as an auction,
so if your bid on a keyword is too low you lose out to competitors’ bids,
your ad position falls, and in the end the ad stops showing at all.
That is one way ads end up getting no clicks.

▼How to fix it

・Raise the bid
When setting bids, use the First Page Bid as your guide.

The First Page Bid is an automatic estimate of the bid needed to place a search ad on the first page of results.
First page means the bottom of the page as well as the top.

The First Page Bid is
determined by factors such as ad quality and how competitors are bidding.
A common reason ads get no clicks is that the keyword bid is below this First Page Bid.
When that happens, the admin screen shows ‘Below first page bid’, as in the image below.

The fix is to raise the bid above the First Page Bid.

3. The keyword has low search volume

You deliberately register keywords with little competition in the hope of results,
and that itself can leave you with no clicks.
If the search term is one people rarely use,
the account shows a ‘Low search volume’ alert on the keyword,
and while that alert is showing, the ad will not appear even if someone does search for it.
So there are no clicks either.

This state is called a keyword suspend,
and you can check for it in the status column of the keyword admin screen below.

▼How to fix it

・Register a different search term
Even if it is not showing now, the ad will start to appear once searches for that keyword pick up.
But if there is no prospect of searches for that keyword growing,
you need to register search terms people are more likely to care about.

・Change the match type
Widening the keyword’s match type may also solve it.
For example, moving a keyword from exact match to broad match can bring in more searches, and clicks may pick up again.

How much does search advertising cost? Four ways to decide your budget and how to keep costs down

4. The keyword match type is restricting delivery

There are three keyword match types, broad, phrase and exact,
and with them you can choose between running ads widely or narrowing them right down,
adjusting how far the advertising reaches.

Search advertising match types: the types and how to use them

Each needs to be set to suit your target audience, but
with ‘exact match’ the range of searches a keyword responds to is narrow, so
naturally impressions fall too.

The result can be an ad that gets no clicks.

▼How to fix it

・Change the match type to broad match

As a fix, try switching to broad match.
Broad match is the type where the ad shows whenever the system judges the search term to be related to your keyword.
That includes searches which do not contain the registered keyword itself.
It gives the most chances to be shown of any match type, and
lets you make your case to people searching on keywords you never anticipated, which also means
the ad will show on a fair number of searches from people who are not your target.
So check the search terms your ads appeared on regularly,
make use of negative keywords to stop the ad showing when certain words are present,
and make sure the ad copy makes clear what service or product you are selling.

5. The ad rank is low

If the run dates are not right, for instance if the campaign end date is in the past, the ad will not show. The start date and

A low ad rank also stops the ad showing, which again leaves you with no clicks. Ad rank is the measure that decides where a search ad is placed.

Where your ad appears in search results is decided by this ad rank.
Ad rank is worked out as [quality score × maximum cost per click + ad extensions].

In other words, poor ad quality leads to the ad not showing, and so to no clicks.
The ‘quality score’ is set per keyword on a 10-point scale.

A quality score of 1 or 2, for example, clearly points to a problem with the ad copy or the page the ad leads to, so you need to work on the consistency between the keyword, the ad copy and that page.

▼How to fix it

・Raise the quality score
Keeping the quality score high raises the ad rank.
That lifts your position, which in turn makes clicks more likely.
And as the formula [quality score × maximum cost per click + ad extensions] shows, raising the maximum cost per click also raises the ad rank, which can bring in clicks.

6. In closing

This article has explained five reasons search advertising fails to pick up clicks, and what to do about each.

Clicks that fail to grow often mean the ad is not being shown at all,
and missing the people you are targeting is a serious loss of opportunity.
If clicks feel flat, work through this article and fix one thing at a time.

That said, fixating on clicks alone brings wasted clicks from people who are not your target, and no meaningful result.

And even with clicks rising, there is no point unless the page the ad leads to is appealing and matches what people want. Keep the whole picture in balance, budget and quality alike, as you make adjustments.