Sep 29, 2023
Ads are approved but there have been no impressions
We have ran this campaign with the exact same keywords, targeted and similar ads on Google ads and it was a really successful campaign, so I know there's enough searches in the local area for the keywords.
I can't work out what's going on and Google support won't help either.
I've seen loads of these questions and have followed the advice and troubleshooted based on this. Can anyone help or advise please?
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2) Generally those keywords look ok. Make sure you use broad match (as well as any others).
See the list of exempted single word keywords here: https://support.google.com/grants/answer/7587473. Adoption is on it but not fostering. Fortunately, there is an option on this form to request an exemption for "fostering": https://support.google.com/grants/gethelp.
4) Norfolk should be big enough to get some traffic.
BUT what's the competition like there for fostering? Do you know what you're up against from other nonprofits, which could be using a grant account AND a paid account? It only takes a few other advertisers bidding on similar keywords to really suppress your results or prevent a campaign taking off.
Actually I think that might be a big obstacle. I just searched Google for fostering norfolk and I see many ads. Norfolk County Council are in first place, then National Fostering Group, Fostering Hearts, Little Acorns... you will struggle to compete with all that. The council will be using a paid account, so might the next couple on the list. And all grant ads get placed below all paid ads IF there is still ad space left. Another problem is that a couple of advertisers don't look local, they run ads UK-wide (and haven't tweaked their settings to prevent me seeing them in France).
In your position, I would consider using the paid account for the most important fostering keywords.
As well as targeting Norfolk itself, maybe add a radius targeting of however many miles around it.
5) Landing page looks ok.
Try Dynamic Search Ads (DSA). They can be useful on new and under-performing Ad Grants, provided the website is well built with plenty of good content. They are quick and easy to set up. See https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/2471185. DSA are useful for discovering which search terms and landing pages Google thinks can get traffic. DSA can sometimes go off-message with the ad text so longer-term try to replace them with standard ads.
It does seem that it's getting more and more difficult to launch new Ad Grant campaigns, compared to a couple of years ago more people are reporting difficulties getting impressions.
Last edited Oct 20, 2023
Original Poster Bx DM marked this as an answer
All Replies (2)
"We have ran this campaign with the exact same keywords, targeted and similar ads on Google ads and it was a really successful campaign, so I know there's enough searches in the local area for the keywords."
You ran this same campaign in a paid account? Take into account that free ads appear below all paying ads, in a separate bidding auction; and that grant campaigns typically only get <10% Impression share. You'll never get the same results in a grant account, which is why many nonprofits have both a grant and a paid account. Often they put information/awareness ads in the grant, and donation/signup asks in paid.
Local area? A limited geographical reach can be problematic in an Ad Grant, mainly because with only a tenth of the possible impressions, you'd need keywords that get a lot of traffic.
"I can't work out what's going on and Google support won't help either."
For all intents and purposes, there is no support any more. Not just for nonprofits, Google Ads has withdrawn almost all support for paid accounts too. It's a self-service product these days.
Some questions:
First, check you're viewing the correct date range!
1. Has conversion tracking been set up? What kind of actions are you tracking as goals?
2. Please give some examples of keywords you expect to get traffic.
3. Are ads approved, disapproved or approved(limited)?
4. Where is the campaign geo-targeted?
5. What's the website address?
Oct 18, 2023
Yes, this is an edited version of a campaign that ran in a paid-for ads account, the keywords and ads have been edited to comply with the grants guidelines, we were averaging over 3,000 searches per month with the keywords.
In answer to your questions:
I'm filtering to all time, so it would cover the period that I am looking for.
1) Yes - we are tracking form fills of two forms (get in touch, download a brochure), plus email and phone clicks on site. All are tracking, these are also tracked in GA4 and getting hits from other sources.
2) "Foster care" would be the top one, others are "foster parent" "foster a child" we would like to target "Fosteirng" however grants seems to ban single word keywords.
3) All are approved.
4) Norfolk, UK, where the service operates (we cannot do anything outside of Norfolk for this service, hence the targeting)
5) Ads are going to the Fostering section of the site (we offer other services/activities too.) https://www.break-charity.org/charity/our-work/fostering/
Oct 20, 2023
2) Generally those keywords look ok. Make sure you use broad match (as well as any others).
See the list of exempted single word keywords here: https://support.google.com/grants/answer/7587473. Adoption is on it but not fostering. Fortunately, there is an option on this form to request an exemption for "fostering": https://support.google.com/grants/gethelp.
4) Norfolk should be big enough to get some traffic.
BUT what's the competition like there for fostering? Do you know what you're up against from other nonprofits, which could be using a grant account AND a paid account? It only takes a few other advertisers bidding on similar keywords to really suppress your results or prevent a campaign taking off.
Actually I think that might be a big obstacle. I just searched Google for fostering norfolk and I see many ads. Norfolk County Council are in first place, then National Fostering Group, Fostering Hearts, Little Acorns... you will struggle to compete with all that. The council will be using a paid account, so might the next couple on the list. And all grant ads get placed below all paid ads IF there is still ad space left. Another problem is that a couple of advertisers don't look local, they run ads UK-wide (and haven't tweaked their settings to prevent me seeing them in France).
In your position, I would consider using the paid account for the most important fostering keywords.
As well as targeting Norfolk itself, maybe add a radius targeting of however many miles around it.
5) Landing page looks ok.
Try Dynamic Search Ads (DSA). They can be useful on new and under-performing Ad Grants, provided the website is well built with plenty of good content. They are quick and easy to set up. See https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/2471185. DSA are useful for discovering which search terms and landing pages Google thinks can get traffic. DSA can sometimes go off-message with the ad text so longer-term try to replace them with standard ads.
It does seem that it's getting more and more difficult to launch new Ad Grant campaigns, compared to a couple of years ago more people are reporting difficulties getting impressions.
Last edited Oct 20, 2023
Original Poster Bx DM marked this as an answer