Google Ads negative keywords
The average Google Ads account wastes 20-30% of its budget on irrelevant clicks. Negative keywords are how you stop it.
The 20-30% tax you're probably paying
Run a search terms report on any Google Ads account that hasn't been actively managed and you'll find the same thing: 20-30% of clicks come from searches that have zero chance of converting. Job seekers, students, people looking for free alternatives, and completely unrelated queries that happen to share a word with your keywords.
A negative keyword tells Google "do not show my ad when someone searches for this." Add "free" as a negative, and your ad stops appearing for "free coffee samples" when you sell $2,000 espresso machines. Simple concept, massive impact.
Real examples by industry
A personal injury lawyer bidding on "car accident lawyer" without negatives will pay $80-150 per click from people searching "car accident lawyer salary" and "how to become a car accident lawyer." Those clicks convert at 0%.
A SaaS company bidding on "project management software" will burn budget on "free project management software" and "project management software open source." At a $12 average CPC, ten of those clicks a day is $120 wasted daily — $3,600/month.
A plumber bidding on "pipe repair" gets matched to "pipe repair DIY" and "how to repair a pipe yourself." People searching those terms are explicitly trying to avoid hiring a plumber.
Universal negative keywords to add right now
These terms are irrelevant for almost every business running Google Ads. Add them as a shared negative keyword list at the account level before you spend another dollar:
| Category | Negative keywords |
|---|---|
| Job seekers | jobs, careers, salary, hiring, how to become, resume, interview |
| Freebie hunters | free, cheap, discount, coupon, promo code |
| DIY / education | DIY, how to, tutorial, course, training, certification, class |
| Research / social | reddit, youtube, quora, wiki, what is, definition |
| Wrong intent | template, example, sample, PDF, download |
One caveat: if you sell training courses, don't negate "training." If you run a job board, don't negate "jobs." Use the list as a starting point and tailor it to your business.
How to find irrelevant search terms
Go to Keywords > Search terms in Google Ads. Sort by cost descending. The most expensive irrelevant terms are at the top — that's where your money is going. Look for patterns: job-related searches, educational queries, competitor brand names you can't compete on, and terms with a completely different meaning than you intended.
Before launching a new campaign, spend 15 minutes brainstorming ambiguities. A "mercury" campaign for the car brand needs negatives for the planet, the element, and the record label. A "pool service" campaign needs negatives for "pool table" and "car pool." That 15 minutes can save hundreds in the first week.
Negative keyword match types
Negative match types work differently from regular match types. Here's the breakdown:
| Match type | Syntax | Blocks | Does NOT block |
|---|---|---|---|
| Broad negative | running shoes | "cheap running shoes," "shoes for running" | "running" alone, "trail shoes" |
| Phrase negative | "running shoes" | "buy running shoes," "running shoes sale" | "shoes for running," "running sneakers" |
| Exact negative | [running shoes] | "running shoes" only | "best running shoes," "running shoes sale" |
The critical gotcha: unlike regular broad match, negative broad match does NOT include synonyms, misspellings, or close variants. If you add "shoes" as a negative, your ad still shows for "shoe." You need to add both forms manually.
We recommend using negative broad match for most negatives. It gives you the widest coverage. Use phrase or exact negatives only when you need surgical precision — like blocking "free trial" without blocking "trial lawyer" in a legal campaign.
Campaign-level vs. account-level negatives
Account-level negative keyword lists apply to all campaigns. Use these for universally irrelevant terms — jobs, free, DIY. You update them in one place instead of adding the same word to every campaign.
Campaign-level negatives only affect one campaign. Use these when a term is bad for one campaign but good for another. "Used" is a negative in your new car campaign but the whole point of your pre-owned campaign.
Pro tip: use campaign-level negatives to prevent your own ad groups from cannibalizing each other. If you have separate ad groups for "divorce lawyer" and "family lawyer," add "divorce" as a negative to the family lawyer group and "family" as a negative to the divorce lawyer group. This forces the right ad to show for the right query.
How often should you add negatives?
Weekly minimum. Daily is better. Every day you don't check your search terms report is a day you're paying for clicks that will never convert.
In the first 60 days of a new campaign, check daily. Google's broad match is aggressive about matching your keywords to loosely related searches, and you need to train it quickly on what's irrelevant. After the first couple months, once wasted spend drops below 5% of total budget, weekly is enough.
This is exactly why we built Fullrun. Our AI agent monitors your search terms report every day, flags wasteful queries, and adds negatives before the spend piles up. It also maintains cross-negative lists between your ad groups to prevent cannibalization — the kind of tedious maintenance that humans skip but that costs real money. Your Quality Score improves too, because fewer irrelevant clicks means a higher click-through rate.
Frequently asked questions
- How many negative keywords should I add?
- Start with 30-50 universal negatives before you launch a single campaign. A mature account typically has 100-300. But one well-chosen negative on a high-spend keyword saves more money than 50 marginal ones, so prioritize by spend, not by list length.
- How often should I review my search terms report?
- Weekly at minimum. Daily is better, especially in the first 60 days of a new campaign when you're still discovering what garbage queries Google is matching you to. Once your wasted spend drops below 5% of total budget, biweekly is fine. This is exactly why we built Fullrun — it checks every day so you don't have to.
- What negative keywords does every account need?
- Free, jobs, careers, salary, how to become, training, certification, DIY, reddit, youtube, and tutorial. These attract job seekers, students, and freebie hunters — not buyers. One caveat: if you actually sell training or courses, obviously don't negate those terms.
- What is the difference between negative match types?
- Negative broad match blocks any search containing all the negative words in any order. Negative phrase match blocks searches containing the exact phrase in order. Negative exact match only blocks that precise query. The critical difference from regular keywords: negative broad match does NOT include synonyms or close variants. If you negate 'shoes,' Google will still show your ad for 'shoe.' You need to add both.
- How does Fullrun find negative keywords?
- Fullrun scans your search terms report daily and flags queries that are spending money without converting. When a term hits 10+ clicks with zero conversions, it gets recommended as a negative. You can set it to auto-add negatives or require your approval first. It also maintains cross-negative lists between ad groups to prevent your own campaigns from competing against each other.
Continue learning
The complete guide to Google Ads
Start from the beginning with how Google Ads works and what it costs.
Campaign structure
How to organize campaigns and ad groups so negatives stay clean.
Quality Score
Better negatives mean higher CTR, which directly boosts Quality Score.
AI ads management vs. agencies
Why daily negative keyword management is where AI beats agencies.