How to choose and research Google Ads keywords in 2026

Keyword research for Google Ads starts with the services you want enquiries for, not with a tool. List the terms a buyer would type when they are ready to contact someone, check the volume and cost of each in Keyword Planner, group them by intent into small ad groups, choose a match type for each, and build a negative keyword list before the campaign goes live. Then let the search terms report refine the list every week. This guide covers each step as Google defines the mechanics in 2026, and folds in our older articles on choosing keywords and on long-tail keywords.

If you arrived here looking for internal linking with long-tail keywords in mind, that is an SEO question rather than a Google Ads one, and our internal linking for SEO guide answers it.

What Google Ads keywords are and how they trigger ads

A keyword is a word or phrase you add to an ad group to tell Google which searches your ad can enter the auction for. A search term is what the person typed. The two are rarely identical. Bid on “accountant Perth” and your ad can show for “small business accountant Perth”, “Perth accountants near me” and, depending on match type, searches that share the meaning without sharing the words.

That gap between keyword and search term is where most Google Ads budgets are won or lost. Good keyword research picks keywords that reach the searches you want, uses match types to control how far the reach extends, and uses negatives to cut the searches you do not want.

How to choose the right keywords for Google Ads

Choose keywords by intent first and volume second. A keyword is worth bidding on when the person typing it is likely to become an enquiry and the enquiry is worth more than the clicks it took to get it. Sort your candidates into four groups.

• Brand keywords: your business name and product names. These convert best because the searcher already knows you, and they are cheap to defend.
• Service keywords: the plain description of what you sell, such as “bathroom renovations Perth” or “commercial cleaning Brisbane”. This is where most of the budget goes.
• Related keywords: terms adjacent to your service that catch people earlier in the decision, such as “bathroom renovation cost”. Lower intent, lower cost, worth testing once the core is running.
• Competitor keywords: other businesses’ names. Allowed as keywords, restricted in ad text by Google’s trademark rules, and usually expensive because the searcher wanted someone else.

Within each group, prefer the specific term over the generic one. “Web design Perth” beats “web design” for a Perth agency because it carries the location and the intent in the query. Our guide to keyword intent explains how to read the difference between research queries and buying queries, and local keyword research covers suburb and region modifiers.

Do not build lists of misspellings and plurals. Google’s match types now work on the meaning of the keyword rather than its spelling, so a separate list of typos adds management without adding reach.

How to research keywords for Google Ads with Keyword Planner

Keyword Planner is the tool Google provides for this, and it is the one source that reports Google’s own numbers. Google describes it as showing estimates of the number of searches a keyword gets each month, the average cost for your ad to show, and forecasts of clicks and conversions based on your spend. You need billing details entered on the account before the keyword ideas feature works.

Use it in three passes. First, enter your service keywords and your website to get the seed list and its volume. Second, filter the ideas by the locations you target, because a national volume figure is meaningless for a Perth trades business. Third, export the list with the cost estimates, because those numbers set your expectations for the budget conversation.

Then add the sources that Keyword Planner does not have. Google Search Console shows the queries your site already appears for organically, and the ones with impressions but no clicks are often good paid targets. If you already run Google Ads, the search terms report is the richest source you own. Your enquiry forms, call recordings and sales team tell you the words customers use, which are not always the words the industry uses. Our list of free keyword research tools covers the rest.

Match types as Google defines them in 2026

Google offers three keyword match types, and its current keyword matching options page defines them as follows.

• Broad match (no punctuation): ads may show on searches related to your keyword, including searches that do not contain the direct meaning of the keyword. Broad match is the default, and Google states that using Smart Bidding with it is critical because bids need to reflect the context of each search.
• Phrase match (“in quotes”): ads may show on searches that include the meaning of your keyword, where the meaning can be implied and the search can be a more specific form of it.
• Exact match ([in square brackets]): ads may show on searches that have the same meaning or intent as the keyword. It gives the most control and reaches the fewest searches.

Broad match modifier, which older guides including our own recommended, is no longer in Google’s list. The broader types include the narrower ones, so a broad match keyword can enter every auction its phrase and exact versions could.

PWD’s practice on new accounts is to launch service keywords in phrase and exact match, build the negative list from the first weeks of search terms, and only then test broad match on the keywords that convert, with Smart Bidding on and a conversion goal it can learn from. Broad match on day one with no negatives and no conversion history is how new accounts spend a month’s budget on the wrong searches.

Negative keywords: the list you build before launch

Negative keywords are the terms you do not want your ads to show for. Google’s negative keywords page describes them as a way to exclude search terms so you can focus on the keywords that matter to your customers, and it makes one point that catches people out: negative keywords do not match close variants. If you add “free” as a negative, searches for “for free” and “freebies” can still show your ad, so add the plural, singular and synonym forms yourself.

Negative match types also behave differently from positive ones. Negative broad match blocks a search that contains all the words in any order. Negative phrase match blocks a search that contains the words in that order. Negative exact match blocks only that exact search.

Start with the obvious exclusions: “free”, “jobs”, “course”, “DIY”, “salary”, and any products or services you do not offer. Add competitor names if you are not bidding on them. Put the list at account level so every campaign inherits it, then review the search terms report weekly for the first month and monthly after that. Google’s search terms report sits under Campaigns, then Insights and reports, and shows the actual searches that triggered your ads alongside the keyword that matched them.

Long-tail keywords in Google Ads: the benefit and the limits

The benefit of a long-tail keyword in a Google Ads campaign is a higher conversion rate, not higher search volume, not a lower Quality Score and not a higher cost per click. Someone typing “emergency plumber Joondalup after hours” has told you exactly what they need, and an ad that answers it converts well.

The limits are volume and data. Most searches are short, and a campaign built only on long phrases produces too few impressions to learn from. Google will mark very specific keywords as low search volume and hold them back from the auction until people actually search for them. Bidding decisions need data, and a keyword with a handful of impressions a month never produces enough.

Use long-tail keywords this way:

• Keep your core service keywords in the campaign. They carry the volume and the data.
• Find long-tail additions in the search terms report rather than guessing them. The report shows the specific phrases real searchers used and whether they converted.
• Promote a long-tail search term to its own keyword only when it has converted more than once. Give it its own ad group and ad copy if it is different enough in intent.
• Stay around three to five words. Beyond that, phrase and broad match on a shorter keyword already reach the search.
• Send the very specific queries with no paid volume to your content plan. They are SEO opportunities, and our SEO services pick them up where Google Ads cannot.

How many keywords should you use in Google Ads?

Fewer than most accounts have. An ad group should cover one intent, with a set of keywords that could all sensibly share the same ad and the same landing page. In practice that is usually under twenty keywords and often under ten, across the match types you are running. Once the keywords in a group need different ads, split the group.

The old advice of single keyword ad groups, one keyword per group with its own ad, still works for high-value terms where the extra management pays for itself. For most Perth businesses a themed group is the right size. Our guide to Google Ads ad groups covers the structure.

Across the account, the total matters less than the coverage. Twenty well-chosen keywords across three tight ad groups will outperform two hundred spread across one, because the ads and landing pages can match each search.

Keywords for YouTube, remarketing and Performance Max

Keywords do a different job outside Search. In YouTube campaigns they are one of several audience signals rather than the trigger for the ad, and our guide to setting up YouTube ads in Google Ads covers the setup. Remarketing campaigns target people who have already visited your site, so the audience list does the work that keywords do in Search, as explained in our remarketing getting started guide. Performance Max uses search themes as signals rather than keywords you bid on. Research the keywords for Search first, because the search terms report from a Search campaign is the best input to every other campaign type.

Reviewing keyword performance after launch

Keyword research does not finish at launch. Add the conversions, cost per conversion and search impression share columns to the Keywords table and review them on a fixed schedule. At PWD, conversion tracking is live and tested before the first dollar is spent, because a keyword review without conversion data is a review of clicks, and clicks are not the goal.

Each month, do four things. Pause keywords that spend without converting after a fair test. Move converting search terms into keywords. Add new negatives from the search terms report. Check that the ad and landing page for each group still match the searches coming in. Seasonality, new competitors and changes in how people phrase their searches all shift the list over time.

When to hand this to an agency

Do it yourself when you have one service, one location, a small budget and the time to check the search terms report every week. The tools are free and the method above works.

Hand it to an agency when you have several services or locations that need separate campaigns, when a month’s wasted budget costs more than a month’s management fee, or when you have run the account for three months and cannot say which keywords produced enquiries. An agency brings search terms data from other accounts in your market, which shortens the learning period, and takes on the weekly negatives work that most business owners drop by month two.

PWD manages Google Ads for Perth and WA businesses in-house from West Leederville. The account is in your name, Google bills you directly, and the monthly report lists the search terms we added and excluded and why.

Get a free Google Ads account audit

Send us your account and we will review the keywords, match types, negatives and search terms, and tell you in writing where the budget is going and what we would change. No obligation and no lock-in contract.

Request a free Google Ads account audit or call 08 6146 0195.