Search Optimizer
The Search Optimizer is a workspace for 1 Search campaign. It gives you a to-do list and lets you fix ads, keywords, search terms, bids and settings in one place.
How to open it
Go to the Overview. Click the sparkle next to a Search campaign.
The date chip at the top sets the period for the numbers in the tabs.
The 7 tabs
| Tab | What you do there |
|---|---|
| Recommendations | Your to-do list for this campaign. |
| Ads | Check and edit your ads and extensions. |
| Keywords | See every keyword and how it performs. |
| Search terms | See what people really typed, and act on it. |
| Bid adjustments | Raise or lower bids by device, location and time of day. |
| Settings | Status, budget, bidding, locations and languages. |
| History | Every change made here, with undo. |
Recommendations
1 list of everything worth doing on this campaign. Items come from your audit, from PerfoAds' daily checks and from the AI analysis. Each item shows where it came from.
- Pick an item on the left to read the details on the right.
- Click Analyze to run a full AI check of the campaign. It uses 1 Search Optimizer run from your monthly allowance. Running it again is free while the campaign data has not changed.
- Click Apply to turn an item into a change. You see a preview and confirm before anything is sent to Google Ads.
What the AI adds
The AI reads your audit's results for this campaign first. It only adds what the audit did not already cover, and it never argues with it. When the AI has a note on something the audit already found, the note shows on the audit item instead of as a second item.
- Money figures from the AI are marked estimate. The list shows the audit's own figures first.
- Each AI item says what it is based on: how many clicks or conversions, over which days.
Safety checks
Before an AI item reaches your list, PerfoAds checks it. Items that fail are left out, and a line tells you how many were held back.
- It never suggests blocking your own brand name, or pausing, cutting or re-bidding a brand campaign.
- It never suggests blocking a search that brought sales.
- It never suggests a negative keyword you already have.
- It never suggests a target below break-even, when you told us your margin.
- It keeps budget changes small, at most 20% a week.
- Right after a bidding, target or budget change, Google needs about 2 weeks to learn. Items that would change these again are marked Too early to judge and cannot be applied yet. The same goes for campaigns with too little data.
The same checks run again when you click Apply.
Approve, Not now, Never
Tell PerfoAds what you think of each AI item:
- Approve: you agree. Then use Apply to make the change.
- Not now: hides it for 30 days. After that it can come back.
- Never: hides it for good.
You can add a reason. A line under the list shows how many items you hid. A new analysis does not bring hidden items back.
Ads
Ad groups are on the left, the ad editor on the right.
- Read each ad's headlines and descriptions.
- Pause or turn on an ad.
- Let the AI write a new ad for a group. New ads stay as a draft until you send them.
Below the ad groups you find your extensions. The AI can write and add sitelinks, callouts and structured snippets. Call, promotion, price and lead form extensions are shown so you see the full picture, but you cannot edit them here.
Keywords
Every keyword with its match type, status and results. You also see Google's estimate of the bid needed to reach the first page, so you can spot keywords that are priced out.
- Pause or turn on a keyword.
- Change a bid or a match type, from the row menu.
Search terms
The real searches that showed your ads, sorted into 3 groups:
- Promotable: searches that bring conversions but are not keywords yet.
- Watching: searches with clicks but no conversions yet.
- Wasters: searches that cost money and bring nothing.
What you can do:
- Tick good searches and add them as exact match keywords in 1 go.
- Add bad searches as negative keywords, so your ads stop showing for them.
- With 3 or more searches, click Cluster by theme to see them grouped by topic.
Bid adjustments
Raise or lower your bids for devices (phone, computer, tablet) and for locations. You can also add ad schedule windows, so ads run only at certain times.
If the campaign uses automatic (Smart) bidding, Google ignores these adjustments. PerfoAds switches the controls off in that case.
Settings
- Pause or turn on the campaign.
- Change the daily budget.
- Change the bidding strategy.
- Add or remove locations and languages.
History
Every change made to this campaign through PerfoAds. Most changes can be undone for 30 days. See Changes and undo.
14 and 28 days after a change, PerfoAds checks whether it worked. The result shows as a label on the change: Worked, Didn't work, Too early to tell or Can't tell. Hover over it to see the numbers. See Did it work?.
Monthly allowance
Your plan includes 5 Search Optimizer runs and 20 AI ad suggestions per account each month. See Billing.