AI is changing digital marketing. For most companies that means embracing tools like Google Gemini to simplify day to day tasks and improve efficiencies.
If you aren’t using AI in the PPC space, then you could be missing out on the opportunity to drive efficiencies, get a whole bunch of keyword, campaign and copy inspiration, and claim some valuable time back from your day.
If you’re looking to get started here are five ways that you can integrate Google Gemini into your Google Ads campaigns in order to maximise efficiency and drive growth:
1. Ad Copy Inspiration
Ad copy is probably the most common reason PPC execs use Google Gemini. This is for its ability to generate significant variations on ad copy quickly, making it a valuable tool for A/B ad testing and taking that ad copy to the next level.
Re-writing, updating and coming up with inspiration for new ad copy used to be quite a laborious task – but not with Gemini. With the right guidance and input it can provide you with ad copy variations in next to no time.
There are a number of different ways you can use Gemini to support your ad copy creation – from the AI-integrated options within the Google Ads interface, through to asking it directly from the main Gemini platform. Both of these are effective and can save substantial time and also provide you with ad copy ideas.
To get the most out of it, make sure that you clearly input any restrictions (e.g. the 30 character headline limit) and target the focus keywords that you want to generate ideas around. In this example we are researching for our own Google Ads campaigns:
You can even specify the “type” and “approach” of ad copy you are looking for to ensure that you’re meeting your audience’s needs effectively. In the next example, we were doing research for our own Google Ads campaigns, where we are focusing on an emotion-driven “curiosity-inducing” approach, designed to improve CTR:
We know humans thrive on emotional triggers and Google Gemini can be great at approaching ad copy from this angle, which can encourage users to take action. While I wouldn’t directly probably use any of the above, what it does is give me inspiration for my own ad copy – invaluable if you’re looking to try something new for a client you’ve worked on for a while.
As a Large Language Model (LLM), Gemini can also help to strengthen existing ad copy and perform clarity checks – ensuring that content is clear and concise, or identifying areas where we can make our ads more compelling, or strengthen them for better impact. Even if you have existing ad copy it’s always worth asking Gemini for advice on how this could be strengthened or clarified.
2. Keyword research
Keyword research is one of the main areas you can use Google Gemini to save time, but the main benefit is its ability to create new paths of thinking, rather than just deploying the standard keyword build.
If I am looking to expand my targeting on the “seo agency” campaign I’m not just looking for a few words either side, I’m looking for new cluster topic ideas. Gemini is great for this as it can break the research down into keyword clusters.
From the outset, we can use Gemini to identify cluster-based themes for our keyword research, in the first instance focusing on high-intent keywords:
We can break these out further by looking at different clusters, including keywords which are industry-specific, location-based or service-based:
We can build these out further still by honing in on a specific vertical, which is great if you focus on a specific industry and can allow for further expansion of targeting within this area. In this instance we asked Gemini to focus on industry specificity:
Gemini can be invaluable for building keyword lists out, but more than that it can be used as a tool for inspiration to get into very granular targeting of areas you might not otherwise have identified. This helps to build depth and increases focus on high-intent, low competition keywords.
3. Audience Personas
One thing Gemini does really well is bring data together in a quick and effective manner. If you are looking to undertake research this is one area it can really save you time.
Often at the start of a campaign you will be looking to build out audience personas. While in some instances you’ll be fortunate enough to work with brands who have this data to hand, if you aren’t in that boat then being able to dig out different persona data can be a time-consuming task.
With a few of the right prompts, Google Gemini can do that for us. In this instance, we asked Gemini to create some user personas for the watch brand, Watches2U. What came back was in-depth insights that got us thinking about the potential audience:
These are only two, of the six different personas Gemini offered, and which helped to define our audiences. When combined with our own internal data they gave us a thorough picture of what the watch marketplace looked like, helping to focus our ads.
It’s not just audience personas that Gemini can help with when it comes to audience research data. You can also use the data to understand some of the challenges your audience is facing, so that you solve their problems and answer their questions accordingly.
In this example, we asked Gemini to list the struggles of an audience who might be looking for an SEO agency:
By understanding this data we can start to tailor our approach to ad copy, targeting and the landing page experience, ensuring we’re answering queries and addressing pain points from the outset.
You can also have Gemini evaluate your landing pages to identify potential opportunities for improvement, identifying areas that might resonate well with an audience, and also those which could take some improvement. In this instance, we asked Gemini to analyse our SEO landing page to see if it was appropriate for the audience we were targeting:
4. Negative Keywords
In addition to helping us to find keywords to target, Gemini can also help us to pre-emptively build negative keyword lists which can save us money from the outset.
Using a similar structure to the keyword research we can ask Gemini to group these into themes:
By understanding the intents we can build out targeted negative keyword lists to ensure we aren’t showing our ads to irrelevant close variants or phrase matches, which could burn through our budget.
As with the keyword lists we can expand on these individual intents to get more comprehensive keyword lists. In this instance by building out the “educational” list we can identify even more negative keywords and build out comprehensive lists in next to no time.
Many agencies have to start running campaigns with limited negative keyword lists due to time and budget constraints, leaving brands spending budget to simply find out what those keywords are before removing them from the campaign. By using Gemini in this way it enables you to build out a much bigger negative keyword list from the start, saving budget and time.
5. Troubleshooting Google Ads Scripts
If you’re a Google Ads Script user then chances are you understand the value of using scripts both to drive efficiency and save time.
There are a number of ways that you can use Gemini to help with scripts. While it can’t actually write the script itself it can help to troubleshoot potential issues and explain the different functionalities within Google Ads to support with script creation.
In the following example, we asked it to evaluate a script we use frequently called the “Exact Match Variant” script, designed to implement negative keywords across any search query that doesn’t exactly match the term.
By querying the script, we can ensure that it does exactly what we would expect it to. If we find an issue we can adjust the script accordingly.
We can then ask Gemini to identify what the best practice use of the script would be and see that in accordance with our current usage it’s doing exactly what it should be:
This can be invaluable if you want to try out a new script on a client’s account but want to ensure it’s working correctly before launching, if you simply want to better understand the functionality or make improvements to your existing scripts.
The above is not an exhaustive list, but provides a couple of ideas around how you can employ Google Gemini to improve efficiencies and depth across your Google Ads campaign. As AI continues to develop and expand, so will the opportunities to use it as an effective support tool across our marketing activities.
Amanda Walls is the Director of Cedarwood Digital – a performance marketing agency based in Manchester.
