Main Differences Between Phrase Match Vs Broad Match

It is no secret that PPC campaigns for Google Ads provide an excellent opportunity to grow your business. But how do you use them to your advantage and generate that growth? Start by making sure you understand the differences between phrase match and broad match. Once you understand those keyword match types, you can confidently combine them with Smart Bidding and watch your business grow.

PPCexpo Keyword Planner is a growing tool used by many digital marketing experts to search high intent keywords for their campaigns.

Phrase Match Vs Broad Match: Defining Keyword Match Types

To start, take a closer look at phrase match vs broad match, and the other keyword match types.

Broad Match:

Broad match is Google’s default match type. If you do not change your match type, this is what it will be. Broad match keywords will display your ad for a long list of related keywords, including related searches, variations, synonyms, and misspellings.

As an example of broad match, consider the keyword “women’s scarves.” If this is your keyword, your ad would also appear for searches for “women’s hats” and “buy ladies scarves.”

Phrase Match:

Phrase matches will let your ads appear if someone searches for the exact phrase or a close variation. That variation can include words before or after, but not in the middle. The words within your phrase can also appear out of sequence in the search term, as long as the phrase has the same meaning. You indicate a phrase match using quotation marks. E.g. if you enter keyword as “Ladies scarves” it may appear for if user search for Ladies scarves on sale or winter sale on ladies scarves.

Exact Match:

Exact matches will only show up if someone searches for a keyword that exactly matches the terms or is a close variation. Importantly, exact matches will not appear if there are extra descriptive words in the search, such as “blue.” When you write exact match keywords, you do so with square brackets around them, such as [women’s scarves].

Those close variants can be keyword searches that share the meaning, even if the grammar or spelling is different.

Negative Match:

In addition to positive match types, Google also offers negative keywords that have a negative match. These are exclusions for your ad. For example, if you sell women’s hats but do not sell baseball hats, you would include “- baseball hats.” The “-” is important as it indicates the negative keyword.

Understanding Close Variants:

Since close variants are a part of all the keyword match types, they are worth clarification. Close variants can include all of the following:

• Plural or singular forms
• Abbreviations
• Accents
• Misspellings
• Stemmings (e.g., flooring vs floor)
• Paraphrases and synonyms
• Words that are reordered but retain their meaning
• Implied words (e.g., [daydream vr headset] could still appear for “daydream headset” as it implies VR
• Changes in function words (Function words include prepositions like to and in, articles like the or a, conjunctions like but or for, and other terms that will not affect search intent
• Same search intent (e.g., free copyright images vs royalty free images)

Keep in mind that not all of the close variants are possible for all languages. If you are using a phrase match, close variants only include all languages for words that have closely related syntax, such as plurals, misspellings, and accents. Otherwise, the close variants are only available in English, Spanish, German, French, Dutch, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, and Japanese.

For exact matches, close variants work in all languages for words that have closely related syntax, changes to functioning words, and reordered words that maintain the meaning. Otherwise, they are only available in the same list of languages plus Swedish, Hungarian, Chinese (Traditional and Simplified), Polish, Turkish, Hebrew, Finnish, Arabic, Greek, Swedish, Danish, Thai, Indonesian, Korean, and Vietnamese.

Understanding Match Types Via Examples

To make sure that you understand the differences in phrase match vs broad match and other match types, consider the following examples.

If you use broad match for the keyword women’s scarves, it would appear for the following example searches, among others:

• Buy ladies scarves
• Women’s clothing
• Women’s hats
• Winter neckwear for women

If you opted for a phrase match for “women’s scarves”, it would only appear if the search term includes that phrase or a close variation, such as in:

• Ladies scarves on sale
• Buy scarves for women
• Purple women’s scarves

If you opted for an exact match for [women’s scarves], it would only appear for search terms with that phrase or a close variant and nothing else. Examples could include:

• Scarves women
• Scarves for women
• Women’s scarves
• Ladies scarves

Start With Broad Matches and When Else to Use Them

When you first create your ad campaign, it is best to start with a broad match if budget is not low or restricted. This will offer you an expanded reach and help you gather more data that you can later use to adjust your keywords or exclusions. You may also want to add some negative keywords if you feel it is necessary.

Once you are more confident in your search terms and have more data, you should consider changing match types. Ideally, you will start with just broad match keywords and monitor their performance. If you have many irrelevant searches, you can add negative keywords that target the most common situations. Or, you could transition to a narrower match type.

Remember that starting with broad match keywords lets you gather data that can help you with future keywords. It will help you find which terms to include on your negative keywords. It will also help you identify which terms you can safely set up as phrase matches or exact matches.

When Else to Use Broad Matches

Overall, you will want to use broad matches whenever you want to expand your audience.

When to Use Phrase Matches?

In a comparison of phrase match vs broad match, you should consider using phrase match if you want to increase your CTR or create ads that feature keywords customers use to search with.

In terms of clickthrough rate (CTR), phrase match is helpful due to the high relevance factor. Remember that phrase match results will only show up if your phrase is a close variant or identical to the search term entered. This means that it is much more likely that your ad is relevant to the search, increasing the chances of a click. As a bonus, a phrase match will also reduce impressions that don’t lead to conversions or clicks because they aren’t closely related to your ad.

The second situation entails using the phrase customers search within your ad. This lets you directly appeal to searchers. It increases the chances of them clicking on your ad as it will be highly relevant.

If you aren’t sure what phrase match keywords to use, look at your data from when you had a broad match keyword. See what terms most commonly led to someone clicking on the ad. Then, use these phrases and words.

When to Use Exact Match?

You should consider using exact match if you are confident that you can reach your intended target audience with your keyword or phrase. You should also be confident that you will get enough results without having to broaden your match criteria.

Keep in mind that if you opt for exact match keywords, you are likely to get fewer impressions. However, the engagement you get will have a higher chance of conversion and will be more interested.

Keywords That Are Too Restrictive Can Limit Traffic

You should be careful when using exact match or negative keywords, or any other restrictive type of keywords. You don’t want to make your keywords too restrictive as this can result in your ad rarely getting the chance to appear. While you will save on your budget, you will also drive less traffic, making it unlikely to meet your goals.

You want to find the perfect balance between making your keywords general enough to attract traffic but specific enough to only attract relevant traffic that is likely to convert.

Using broad match keywords will be the least restrictive option, while exact matches are the most restrictive. From least to most restrictive, the match types are:

• broad
• phrase
• exact

The Solution: Combining Broad Keywords and Smart Bidding

The best solution to striking that delicate balance between attracting more traffic but still mostly only displaying ads for your relevant audience is to start with broader keywords and use Smart Bidding to narrow them down. Think of this as an extension of the broad-to-narrow strategy that comes from starting with broad keyword matches and potentially changing to other match types in the future.

This strategy will let you take advantage of the machine learning technology in Smart Bidding. That technology will automatically prioritize the keywords that will perform the best, no matter their match type.

What Is Smart Bidding?

To understand this strategy related to phrase match vs broad match, you must also understand Smart Bidding. Smart Bidding is a type of automated bidding from Google. It relies on machine learning to maximize conversion value or conversions via auction-time bidding, which means in every auction. With Smart Bidding, Google automatically evaluates which keywords are performing the best and prioritizes those to help you reach your goals.

Benefits of Using Smart Bidding, Regardless of Keyword Match Type

No matter the keyword match type that you choose, you will notice several benefits to using Smart Bidding. To start, the use of advanced machine learning helps improve the accuracy of your bids in a way that would not be possible for an individual or even a team. You also get extensive, transparent reporting. This lets you get insight if you choose to bid manually in the future and lets you more easily troubleshoot problems.

Additionally, auction-time bidding lets you account for various signals when adjusting the bid. The potential automated bidding signals include weekday and time of day, location intent, physical location, device, remarketing list, ad characteristics, browser, operating system, interface language, site behavior, search network partner, actual search query, and others that are specific to other ad types.

There is also the fact that although it is automated, Smart Bidding gives you more than enough control by letting you customize settings and choose performance targets. For example, you can choose an attribution model and device-specific targets for performance.

Why Broad Keywords With Smart Bidding Are the Perfect Combination?

It is widely accepted that combining broad keywords and Smart Bidding is the perfect combination to grow your business. Google suggests this strategy and other experts confirm that it works well.

The idea is that you set up broad match keywords to help attract a wider audience. This lets you reach audiences that you would not with exact matches or even phrase matches. The Smart Bidding provides an alternative method of narrowing down when your ad appears to reduce the impressions and clicks that won’t convert.

By combining broad matches with Smart Bidding, you don’t have to segment your keywords based on match type. Instead, the system automatically creates a bid for each search query. Then, it adjusts the bid based on how the machine learning program predicts the query will perform.

Broad Match Keywords Provide Smart Bidding With More Data

While the Smart Bidding benefits the broad match keyword strategy by narrowing down your ad’s appearances to more relevant situations, the broad match also helps your Smart Bidding strategy. It does so by giving the Smart Bidding algorithms even more data, thanks to the increase in matching queries. The result is that the Smart Bidding algorithms can learn more quickly and better find more auctions that could benefit you.

The Combination Saves You Time While Providing that Data and Reaching a Wider Audience

There is also the fact that broad match keywords help you appear for more searches without having to think about each potential query. That is particularly important as you would not only have to think of the queries but then create and manage ads for each. Broad match keywords let you get similar results with significantly less effort and time.

Smart Bidding Can Identify Good Broad Match Keywords

Google also set up Smart Bidding so that it can identify keywords that you are already using that you should switch to broad match. It will suggest keywords based on whether they are likely to experience better performance as a broad match. You will then find these suggestions on your Google Ads Recommendations page.

Google already has some data to back up the usefulness of these predictions. It analyzed the data from advertisers who had modified broad keywords or phrase keywords and switched them to broad matches based on the suggestion of the algorithm. The data showed that those with Target CPA campaigns experienced a 25% boost in conversions. Those in Target ROAS campaigns saw a 12% increase in conversion value.

Other Advice for Phrase Vs Broad Match and Smart Bidding

Take your knowledge of phrase match vs broad match keywords to the next level with the following suggestions.

Bid Strategies for Broad Match Vs Modified Broad Match

When switching from broad match keywords to modified broad match ones, consider increasing your CPC bid slightly. This can increase your volume of clicks and conversions. Remember, a slightly higher CPC bid in this case would still work with the same budget as your keyword will appear for fewer situations.

Combine Keyword Match Types in a Campaign

In addition to starting with broader keywords and using Smart Bidding to narrow them, you can benefit from using at least two keyword match types within a campaign. This lets you get similar benefits. You still target a wide audience for some terms yet get less traffic that’s unlikely to convert with the other.

When you follow this strategy, you will want to create long-tail keywords that use broad matching and more specific terms that use exact match. For example, you could combine an exact match keyword of “Black short-sleeve Adidas shirt” with a broad search match of “where to find a short-sleeve Adidas shirt” or “short-sleeve Adidas shirt.”

Know When to Narrow or Broaden Your Match Type

As you choose which match type to use for various keywords, focus on leaving phrase match or exact matches to high-volume and high-control queries. These are the situations where you want to have more control over bids and narrower matching requirements allow for that.

On the other hand, if you have a high-value keyword, consider broadening the match type. If you look at your performance data and notice that a term performs well but only has an exact or phrase match, you may want to modify it and add that modification as a broad match. This will increase your reach. Just remember to use another method to prevent getting too many irrelevant impressions that hurt your performance levels. Use negative keywords or Smart Bidding to prevent that.

Use the Search Terms Report to Determine the Best Match Type

After running your campaign for a little bit, you will have gathered data in your search terms report. Take a look at this and pay attention to the column for match type. This column will let you know the type of match that resulted in your ad showing.

You can then use this information to adjust the type of match you choose for keywords. For example, if you notice you have mostly exact matches, you may want to switch to an exact match to avoid unrelated or non-converting matches.

Get Keyword Inspiration From the Search Terms Report

The search terms report is also a great source for coming up with new keywords and creating negative keywords. The report includes all search terms that people used to find your ad, so it may include some that you did not think of. It may also include some terms that you thought of including but chose not to.

As you review, you also want to check search terms that are not relevant to your ads but still showed up in the report. You may want to consider adding those as negative keywords. Or, you may want to narrow the match type of related keywords to prevent them from triggering your ad. Generally, using negative keywords will be the best first step to exclude them.

FAQs:

What is keyword research?

Keyword research is a process to find best suited keywords related to search terms which users are typing on Google to find the search results.

What is the default keyword type in Google Ads?

If you don’t provide any match type while creating campaign in Google Ads then by default broad match type is used.

Does Google Ads support broad match modifier?

No, broad match modifier is no more supported in Google Ads.

Wrap Up

There is no single answer to whether you should use phrase match vs broad match. It is best to start with a broad match to gather data. But once you have that data, you will do well to combine phrase match with broad match. An incredibly useful strategy is to combine a broad match keyword with Smart Bidding. The broad match provides the Smart Bidding algorithms with more data, while the Smart Bidding weeds out the unwanted queries that would otherwise appear from a broad match.

The most important thing to remember is that your keyword match strategy should evolve regularly. Use data from Smart Bidding and past search matches to adjust keywords and Smart Bidding goals, and you should find yourself on your way to business growth.