Google Ads Quality Score: Essential Knowledge for PPC Advertising

In Google Ads, there is a diverse range of metrics for advertisers to consider. Of course, it’s not easy to keep an eye on them all, nor should you try. However, regardless of your goals or experience, there is one vital parameter that is integral to the success of your campaign — we’re talking about Quality Score.

In this article, we’ll learn all about the importance of this crucial metric, and discuss the benefits of a higher Quality Score for your pay-per-click (PPC) campaign.

Let’s get started.

What is the Google Ads Quality Score?

Quality Score is the Google rating criteria for the performance and relevance of PPC ads and keywords. This score directly impacts your Ad ranking in Google’s search engine results pages (SERPs). Furthermore, it also influences the cost-per-click (CPC) rate — which is the amount you pay for a single click on your ad.

Essentially, Quality Score is the defining metric that grades your ad’s performance. Three factors determine the Quality Score metric:

• Expected clickthrough rate
• Landing page experience
• Ad relevance

How is Quality Score Calculated?

The Google Ads Quality Score ranges from a low of 1 to a high of 10. To determine Quality Score, Google considers your ad copy, your keywords, and past interactions users have had with your ad. Also, it leverages data that helps predict the future relevance of your ad for users.

Google doesn’t rely on results from individual search terms. Instead, the platform looks at the bigger picture by considering the actions taken by the majority in relation to a specific query. Through using this concept of “perception of the majority”, the Google algorithm can assess historical data and make predictions about future interactions.

If Google determines that your content will have more relevance in the future, your ad will get a higher Quality Score.

Why Google Ads Quality Score is the Perfect Metric for PPC Success

Are you wondering why Quality Score is so important?

Google Ads has a lot of other important metrics, such as clickthrough rate (CTR), cost per acquisition (CPA), and return on advertising spend (ROAS). So, why is there such hype around Quality Score?

The answer comes down to the idea of relevance. Relevant content is a big deal nowadays, more so than before because the internet is an increasingly crowded place. Because of that, every industry, and every niche is highly competitive. That means two things:

1. It’s hard to stand out to get the attention of your target audience.
2. Consumers have plenty of options if your content is irrelevant to their specific needs or interests.

So, there’s little room for generic, vague content in modern marketing. By using Google Ads, you can create highly-relevant ads to target a very specific audience.

Google uses Quality Score to rate ad relevance, and ensure users get the most relevant results for their search queries. Google makes a lot of revenue from its advertising platform, so its keen to make sure it is optimized to deliver engaging ads that offer targeted solutions.

Imagine if there was no quality assurance on Google Ads. The platform would be flooded with substandard ads that aren’t relevant to users’ search queries. As a result, people would stop using Google to search for things. The business would slump, and Google’s profits would take a massive hit.

Quality Score protects the integrity of the advertising platform and gives advertisers a standard to aim for if they want to earn a greater ROAS.

3 Benefits of Quality Score for Advertisers

So, now that you understand its value to Google Ads let’s take a look at the advantages of Quality Score for advertisers. Here are three significant wins you can enjoy when you focus on earning a higher Quality Score:

Budget Minimization

When your keywords have a high Quality Score, you won’t have to pay as much for each click on your ads. In most cases, this is only a marginal saving. However, wasted spend can add up quickly, so fractional savings should not be dismissed.

To truly see the impact of a higher Quality Score on your budget, try improving keywords with a low Quality Score so you can watch your CPC tumble.

Better Ad Rank Position

Ads with a higher Quality Score will usually appear higher in SERPs, as Google deems these ads to be more relevant for users.

Better Return on Investment (ROI)

Whatever your PPC campaign goals are, it’s certain that investing your efforts in improving Quality Score will yield dividends. Your ads will have greater visibility, which can lead to more impressions, more clicks, and more conversions.

How to Get a Higher Quality Score

With everything there is to gain, it’s easy to see why many marketers seek to improve the Quality Score in their Google Ads campaigns.

Here are seven tips you can follow to get a higher Quality Score:

1. Understand the key factors — By learning more about the factors above that impact Quality Score, you’ll soon be able to optimize them to your advantage.
2. Improve page loading speeds — Speed is crucial, as people won’t wait around for a slow website — especially on mobile. Use Webmaster Tools or Page Speed to test your landing pages, and look for ways of increasing their speed, so your great content doesn’t go to waste.
3. Create targeted ad groups — Group ads with similar keywords, and also focus on specific keywords to generate more audience engagement.
4. Optimize ad copy — By creating ad copy around relevant keywords, and using a strong call-to-action, you can increase your clickthrough rate (CTR), which, in turn, leads to a higher Quality Score.
5. Create landing pages for each ad group — Rather than having one or two generic landing pages for your whole audience, create targeted pages for each ad group. These pages can use different keywords and target smaller subsects of your audience with relevant offers.
6. Remember relevance is king — If your ads or landing page has content that isn’t aligned with user intent, you’ll struggle to gain traction. Make sure everything is tailored to the needs and interests of your ideal customers.
7. Keep control over your budget — Some people make the mistake of spending more thinking it will automatically lead to a higher Quality Score. Although the bidding price is a ranking factor, it’s not as important as relevance. Therefore, you should be cautious about throwing down more money in an effort to boost Quality Score. Look to optimize your campaign in other ways first.

What is a Historical Quality Score?

While Quality Score relates to the present status of your ads and keywords, we can also learn a lot from the historical Quality Score. This analysis of how Quality Score has performed over a previous period offers insights into the efficacy of potential keywords. With this information, advertisers can make more educated projections about their PPC campaigns.

If you’d like to get actionable insights for your campaign, try running the Quality Score Report from PPCexpo. This reporting tool helps you understand daily trends in Quality Score with respect to other vital factors in your campaign, such as CTR.

Here, you can see a chart from the Quality Score Report, which shows the correlation between Quality Score and CTR over a month:

Our Quality Score Report also provides a detailed analysis of the other vital components of Quality Score, which helps you develop a clearer understanding of your campaign.

Data visualizations like this one are useful in PPC advertising, as they allow people to glean quick insights about performance metrics.

Learn More: The Importance of Visual Storytelling in PPC Reporting

Don’t Get Obsessed with Quality Score

With all that’s been said up to now, you may think Quality Score is the be-all and end-all in PPC advertising. There’s no doubt that it is a crucial aspect of every Google Ads campaign. Advertisers should keep Quality Score in mind, and always look for ways of improving it.

The benefits of a higher Quality Score are excellent, namely:

• You will have more relevant, targeted ads.
• Your ads will get more visibility in SERPs, making it easier to reach your audience.
• You’ll reduce wasted spend and cost-per-click rates.

All that being said, you should avoid focusing solely on Quality Score. You don’t want to lose track of your overarching goals. Ultimately, it’s more important to think about user intent, how best to serve your customers, and how to manage your spending. When you do this, you’ll soon be running an efficient and effective business.

When you do that, creating connections will come naturally, and your ads will attract the right people, as they’ll see you are offering genuine solutions for the problems they need to solve.

You can discover more about The Importance of User Intent in Digital Marketing on the PPCexpo blog.