A roofer in Thousand Oaks pays when someone clicks his ad after searching “roofing jobs near me,” and a dentist in Camarillo pays for a click on “free dental clinic” too. Neither would ever book. Both clicks cost real money.
Negative keywords in Google Ads tell Google to stop showing your ad on searches like those, and November is the month to set them up, before holiday hiring, gift shopping and “free” searches pick up. Here’s the plain-English version from the Google Ads team at Outreach Digital Marketing in Westlake Village.
Quick Summary: Key Takeaways
- A negative keyword is a do-not-show word: it blocks searches that contain it.
- The search terms report shows the waste: real searches, real cost.
- Plurals and synonyms need their own entries: “job” won’t block “jobs.”
- Check weekly: right through the holidays.
Negative Keywords in Google Ads Tell Google Where Not to Show You
A keyword is a word or phrase you choose so your ad can show for related searches, and a negative keyword works the other way, excluding searches that contain it. Add “apprenticeship” as a negative, and an ad for “plumber” stays off “plumber apprenticeship” searches.
The reason is cost. Most local campaigns run on keywords loose enough to match searches the owner never pictured, and you pay for each click. Nobody shows you those searches unless you go and look, so a campaign can bleed for months on “salary” or “DIY” before anyone notices the leads aren’t keeping up.
→ Google Ads management for local businesses
The Search Terms Report Shows What People Actually Typed
Your keyword is what you bid on. The search term is what a person actually typed into Google. Add the Keyword column, which Google hides by default, and the report lines the two up, so you can see that “electrician” just paid for a search about electrician salaries in California.
To open it, Google’s instructions are to click the Campaigns icon, open the Insights and reports menu, and click Search terms. Start with the expensive ones. Google leaves out some low-volume searches for privacy reasons, so the list is never complete, but it’s the best evidence you’ll get.
→ Keyword research for Google Ads campaigns
Negative Match Types Work Differently From Regular Keywords
A match type decides how closely a search must match your keyword, and for negatives Google offers three that are more literal than regular keywords, so the one you pick decides what actually gets blocked.
A broad negative, the default when you type one in yourself, blocks any search containing all of its words in any order. A phrase negative blocks searches with those words in that exact order, even with extra words around them, and an exact negative blocks only that search with nothing added.
Regular keywords stretch to cover plurals, stem words and similar meanings, but negatives don’t stretch to plurals or synonyms, so “job” won’t block “jobs” and “cheap” won’t block “budget” on its own. Add both.
The Holiday Season Brings Its Own Junk Searches
November and December add searches that look like yours but come from people who aren’t buying. Job searches are the easiest to spot. Seasonal hiring sends people to Google looking for work, and last season the National Retail Federation expected retailers alone to hire between 265,000 and 365,000 seasonal workers for the 2025 holidays.
A starter list for most service businesses includes job and jobs, hiring, career and careers, salary, apprentice and apprenticeship, training and school. Add “how to” as a phrase negative, so a broad version doesn’t also block “how much to replace a roof.” Be careful with “free,” though. If you offer free estimates, blocking it cuts off people asking for exactly that. Check every word on the list against what you sell, too, since a broad “job” would also block someone pricing a paint job.
→ Holiday marketing budget planning
Adding Negatives From the Search Terms Report Is Quick
You can add them straight from the report: in Google’s steps, you check the boxes next to unwanted search terms and click Add as negative keyword. Then you choose an ad group (a bundle of related keywords and ads inside a campaign), the whole campaign, or a negative keyword list, and save. Check the match type before you do. Google’s help page notes that negatives added from this report go in as exact match by default, so “plumber jobs near me” would block only that one search; switch it to phrase or broad when the word itself is the problem.
Lists save time. A negative keyword list is a saved set you can reuse across campaigns. Separately, Google lets you add up to 1,000 account-level negatives, entered once and applied across eligible Search and Shopping campaigns. One warning from Google’s setup guide: if a negative overlaps one of your regular keywords, that ad won’t show.
→ Google Ads basics for small businesses
Check Weekly Through November and December
New junk turns up all season, so check weekly. Mondays work well.
But don’t overdo it. Google warns that too many negatives can shrink the audience your ads reach, so block what’s clearly wrong and leave borderline terms running until the data says otherwise. Dustin Brewer, our Director of Paid Advertising, has spent more than a decade on client Google Ads accounts here, and the team adjusts campaigns continuously from live data.
→ Google Ads performance tracking
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: What are negative keywords in Google Ads?
A: Words or phrases you add so your ad doesn’t show when a search contains them, which keeps your budget on searches from likely customers.
Q: How do I find negative keywords for my campaign?
A: Open the search terms report from the Insights and reports menu and look for searches that cost money but don’t match a service you sell.
Q: Do negative keywords block misspellings?
A: Yes, according to Google’s help page, which says negative keywords automatically account for casing and misspellings, so “JOBS” in capitals needs no entry of its own. Plurals and synonyms still do.
Q: Should I add negative keywords before a campaign launches?
A: Yes, for the obvious mismatches. Google’s example is an optometrist who sells eyeglasses blocking “wine glasses” and “drinking glasses,” the kind of overlap you can spot before a single click, and the search terms report catches the rest once clicks come in.
Get a Second Opinion Before the Holiday Spend Climbs
Our marketing check-up is built for that. It starts with a 10-minute survey and ends with a complimentary 30-minute call that brings two or three recommendations. Meetings happen by appointment at 2555 Townsgate Rd. Suite 200, Westlake Village, CA 91361, though the whole check-up runs from outreachdigitalmarketing.com and a phone call.