Maintaining your Google Ad Grant account takes time and commitment!
In a bid to give back to the organisations that give so much out, Google runs an AdWords grants program where eligible charity organisations can receive up to $10,000USD per month in Ad spend. However, if you’re a Google Ad Grant Account holder, you’re probably aware that there is a long list of requirements your organisation must follow to maintain your grant. With a list like this, it can be difficult to make sure you’re not breaching any regulations and putting yourself at risk of losing your grant and all the hard work you’ve put in. At PN Digital, we specialise in helping organisations manage their Google Ads Grant account so that you can continue to do what you do best, while we do the same.
The Requirements
In January 2018, Google announced that it was adding new restrictions to their grant accounts to improve the experience for all users of google. The current requirements include:
- AdWords grant accounts must maintain a click through rate (CTR) of 5% each month for two months in a row
- Ad Grant accounts must target a specific geological location
- Ad Grant accounts must have at least two active ad groups per campaign consisting of a set of closely related keywords and two active text ads.
- Ad Grant accounts must have at least two sitelink extensions
- Ad Grant accounts must keep their quality scores above the keyword level of 3
- Ad Grant accounts must only use keywords that are specific to your organisation’s primary mission. See examples below:
- Branded keywords that you don’t own
- Single word keywords (excluding your own brand name or acronyms)
- Generic keywords (e.g. today’s news, job alert, names of places or people)
You can learn more about the full list of requirements here.
What does this mean for my organisation?
You might be wondering what all these requirements mean, and how they impact your organisation. With any set of guidelines, be it Google AdWords or not, failing to adhere to these will result in consequences. The most significant consequence will be losing your grant, which will undo all the hard work you’ve done in order to generate leads and customers. Other implications include a drop in traffic due to the increased click through threshold of 5%, which is difficult for even the best of campaigns to achieve, and lower conversion numbers.
Tips for Maintenance:
While this may seem overwhelming and difficult to navigate, there are some steps that organisations can take in order to help minimise damage and maintain their account. First and foremost, if you’re an organisation managing the account yourself, it can be useful to enlist the help of a professional. At PN Digital, we specialise in helping organisations manage their Ad Grant accounts, and even have a dedicated Google Ad professional working on our team. An Ad professional will make sure your organisation is adhering to the guidelines by implementing some of the following tips:
- Ad Copy Improvements
Making Ad Copy improvements will ensure your organisation stays on top of the 5% click through rate by using highly relevant keywords sought out from thorough research.
- Keyword Improvements
As mentioned before, many of the requirements are based around using the correct keywords, which can be difficult when trying to write effective copy. Therefore, it’s important to make keyword improvements that work with, and not against, the requirements such as:
- Adding negative keywords to prevent the ad being triggered for irrelevant searches
- Prioritise longer keywords
- Remove broad match keywords and change them to broad match modifier or phrase match
- Creating a paid ad account to support the brand
While the grant help you leverage some level of exposure, the truth is, you are very limited to what you can do with the grant account. In order to support your grant account, it can be a good idea to also create a paid account to leverage your grant account. While it seems this defeats the purpose of the grant, great results can be achieved even with a limited budget. With your paid account, you can help build the campaign using tools that aren’t accessible to a grant account and most importantly, trial keywords with a low click through rate without risking losing the grant.
Get in touch with PN Digital to learn more about how we can help you manage your Google AdWords Grant Account.
How PN Digital saved a floundering Google Ad Grant from becoming disqualified
At PN Digital, we specialise in helping organisations manage their Google Ad Grant accounts, and from time to time that sees us working with clients who have come to us seeking damage control as a result of poor management from other agencies.
Understanding the ins-and-outs of a Google Ad Grant account is a bit trickier than managing a standard Ad account. Often, we are dealing with bigger ad spend budgets ($120,000USD per year!), but with much tighter restrictions on click through rate (CTR) requirements. This requires a different strategy and campaign set-up than a standard account might use.
Therefore, it can be useful to get help from professionals who specialise in managing this specific type of account and can help your business get the most out of your spend.
In this case study, we talk about a client who came to us needing some damage control – they were using an agency to help manage their account, and while that agency had a great track record managing standard Google Ad campaigns, they were struggling with the added requirements that come with an Ad Grant account.
The Client’s Issue:
Our client had another agency managing their Google Grant account who were not fully utilising the grant budget, only spending $1,000 on average each month. While it isn’t necessary to spend the entire budget, only spending 10% of the budget will often not yield the desired results. While the previous agency was regularly making changes and optimising the account, they did not understand the unique nature of grant accounts and therefore couldn’t help appropriately.
How did PN Digital help?
As experts in managing Google Ad Grant accounts, PN Digital were able to offer a specialised approach. We have several proven strategies that we use to help grow grant accounts, using some out of the box thinking, transparent communication and unmatched dedication and effort. As part of our strategy for the client, we analysed opportunities for new keywords and new campaigns that were not currently being targeted. In our client’s situation, the most obvious keywords were already being targeted, so we needed to this laterally. This, combined with our proven conversion strategy, helped to escalate the results.
The Result:
We were happy to report that within the first 5 months of managing the account, we increased traffic by an incredible 885% and increased grant spend by 2,481%. We took an account that was only spending $1k of the budget to $7k of the budget and we expect to spend the full amount in the coming months.
What did PN Digital learn from the experience?
We learnt that working together with the client collaboratively is always the best approach. This helped us not only to identify new keyword opportunities, but to give the client real time feedback about the leads it was generating so we could measure ROI.
We also learnt that the root of a many issues clients have with other agencies is poor communication, minimal effort and lack of specialisation working with grant accounts. At PN Digital, we pride ourselves on our transparency. Grant accounts are difficult to manage and there is always a learning curve necessary when taking on new clients. We are upfront with the client every step of the way so if something is not working, we’ll be the first to let you know, and we’ll come to you with a solution. This way we can all work together to leverage the grant account in the best way possible.
Are you unhappy with how your agency is managing your Google Ad Grant account? For more information, book a no obligation consult with a PN Digital Google Ads specialist.
Related Reading:
Mel’s Top 3 Optimisation Tips for Google Ad Grant Accounts
Google Ad Grant Damage Control: Case Study
How we helped an NFP keep their Google Ad Grant
5 things you need to know before applying for the Google Ad Grant
How to set up your first Google Ads campaign
