Your Google Ads report says you got 180 clicks last month.
Okay. What were those people looking for?
If nobody can answer that, you’re missing one of the most useful pieces of information in your account. Clicks don’t tell you whether somebody needed your service, wanted a job, or was looking for instructions to do the work themselves.
I’ve spent more than 20 years working on websites, SEO, Google Ads, and the problems that keep business owners from getting customers. One thing I keep coming back to: traffic isn’t the same as opportunity.
For Alabama businesses, Google Ads search terms deserve more attention than another chart showing impressions going up. This report helps you see what people actually searched before your ad appeared—and whether those searches belonged in your budget.
Keywords Are What You Target. Search Terms Are What People Type.
These aren’t the same thing.
A keyword is something you add to a campaign, such as water heater repair. A search term is the actual query someone enters into Google.
Depending on your targeting and match types, that keyword could connect with searches like:
water heater repair near me
emergency water heater repair Florence AL
how to repair a water heater
water heater repair technician jobs
The first two sound promising for a local plumber. The others probably don’t.
Even exact match doesn’t mean Google only shows your ad for the identical words you entered. Matching can include close variants and searches with the same meaning or intent. Phrase match also goes beyond matching a literal phrase.
That’s why reviewing your keyword list alone won’t tell you where all the money went.
Where to Find the Search Terms Report in 2026
For Search campaigns, open your Google Ads account and look for Search terms, generally under the Campaigns area within Insights and reports. Google moves navigation around, so use the account’s search function if the menu looks different.
Start with the last 30 days. Lower-volume accounts may need 60 to 90 days to show useful patterns. Don’t mix years of old activity into a review of what’s happening now.
Include these columns where available:
Search term
Campaign and ad group
Matched keyword and match type
Clicks and cost
Conversions and cost per conversion
Sort by cost first. That puts the expensive questions at the top.
One catch: the report doesn’t reveal every search. Google withholds some query details because of privacy and reporting thresholds. Visible rows may not account for all campaign traffic or spending. Search terms insights can provide broader themes, but they aren’t a complete query-by-query record either.
Read for Intent, Not Just Familiar Words
A search can mention your service and still be a poor fit.
“Commercial roofing jobs Birmingham” contains a valuable service phrase. But the person likely wants employment, not a roof.
I’d separate searches into three groups.
Clearly Relevant
These describe something you sell, in an area you serve, with a reasonable chance of becoming business. “AC repair Muscle Shoals” is a good example for an HVAC company serving Muscle Shoals, Alabama.
Clearly Irrelevant
These involve services you don’t provide, job searches, school assignments, unrelated products, or locations outside your market.
They’re usually the easiest waste to address.
Needs a Closer Look
“Heat pump replacement cost” could come from a serious buyer doing homework. “Best plumber in The Shoals” could be somebody ready to call.
Don’t block research-related searches automatically. Look at spending, actual leads, and whether your landing page answers the question.
Not every customer types “buy now.”
A Realistic Example From The Shoals
Here’s a hypothetical example—not a client result.
Say a plumbing company serves Florence, Sheffield, Tuscumbia, and Muscle Shoals, Alabama. It spends $1,500 a month advertising drain cleaning and water heater services.
A search terms review finds:
$145 on plumbing job and apprenticeship searches
$110 on DIY drain-cleaning instructions
$95 on RV plumbing repairs, which the company doesn’t offer
That’s $350, or about 23% of the monthly budget, going toward searches that don’t fit this business.
The answer isn’t automatically “spend more.” First, address those mismatches with appropriate negatives and review the keywords attracting them.
Then check the good traffic. If “emergency plumber Sheffield AL” generates clicks but no calls, the problem might be elsewhere. Does the company answer after hours? Does the landing page show emergency service? Is the phone number easy to tap?
Cleaner traffic helps. It won’t fix a broken customer experience.
Use Negative Keywords Carefully
Negative keywords tell Google which searches you don’t want your ads to show for.
Common candidates include employment terms, services you don’t offer, and clearly unrelated meanings. But there’s no universal negative keyword list that fits every company.
A contractor might exclude “training.” A training company wouldn’t.
Before adding a negative, ask:
Is this irrelevant across the account, or only in one campaign?
Should I exclude this exact query or a broader phrase?
Could the exclusion block a service I actually want to sell?
Negative match types behave differently. A negative exact match blocks the specified search without extra words. A negative phrase match blocks searches containing that phrase in that order. A negative broad match blocks searches containing all its terms, even in a different order.
Negatives also don’t expand to close variants the way positive keywords do. You may need separate exclusions for relevant variations.
Be especially careful with one-word negatives. Blocking “free” could also block “free estimate roof replacement,” which might be a perfectly good lead.
Don’t Blame Broad Match for Everything
Broad match can pull in searches you wouldn’t have chosen yourself. Some are useful. Some aren’t.
Whether it belongs in your account depends on your budget, bidding approach, conversion tracking, and lead quality. A small local campaign with weak tracking has less room for expensive experimentation.
If a keyword repeatedly attracts poor-fit searches, review its match type, ad group, landing page, and bidding setup. Adding negatives forever isn’t always the right repair.
In 2026, with automated matching and bidding doing more of the work, business feedback still matters. Google can’t reliably distinguish a valuable customer from a wrong-number call unless your measurement gives it useful signals.
Review auto-applied recommendations too. Know whether settings allow changes that expand your reach.
A Reported Conversion Isn’t Always a Customer
This is where a good-looking report can fool you.
A phone-button click isn’t necessarily a completed call. A form submission might be spam. A long call could be somebody asking about employment.
Check what your account counts as a conversion before judging search terms by conversion totals.
Where practical, connect qualified leads or booked work back to your advertising. Ask whoever answers the phone what callers actually wanted.
And check the website. An outdated page, slow mobile loading, or a buried contact form can waste a perfectly relevant click. Businesses getting traffic but no phone calls don’t always have a traffic problem.
A Simple Review Routine for Busy Owners
You don’t need to live inside Google Ads. Start with a short weekly review, especially after launching a campaign or changing targeting.
Sort search terms by cost. Read the highest-spending queries first.
Flag obvious mismatches. Add carefully scoped negatives.
Investigate relevant searches without leads. Check the page, tracking, and phone response.
Look for useful patterns. Repeated service-specific searches may deserve a more relevant ad and page.
Record changes. Review results after enough time has passed for leads to arrive.
Don’t condemn a relevant search after one click. But you don’t need weeks of evidence to decide that a service you don’t offer is irrelevant.
Bottom Line
The search terms report won’t explain every problem in your Google Ads account. It will answer a question too many reports skip: What are we paying to show up for?
Start there before raising the budget.
If you’d like a Google Ads review, contact me at Lime Group, LLC. We can look at search terms, negative keywords, conversion tracking, and the pages receiving your traffic. The goal is straightforward: find where the money is going and whether it’s bringing the right people to your business.
Brian "JR" Williamson
Founder & Marketing Director
Lime Group, LLC
Web Design • SEO • Content Strategy • Online Marketing
(256) 443-2714
(731) 215-5449
Serving Florence, AL • The Shoals • Jackson, TN
