Using Negative Keywords to Save Ad Spend
How Negative Keywords Work
When you add a negative keyword to your campaign or ad group, Google blocks your ads from showing for any search that matches that negative term. If you sell premium leather bags and add "free" as a negative keyword, your ads will not appear when someone searches "free leather bag pattern" or "leather bag free download." The searcher never sees your ad, you never pay for the click, and your budget is preserved for searches from people who actually want to buy leather bags.
Without negative keywords, your ads will inevitably show for searches that look related to your keywords but have completely different intent. A store selling yoga mats might find their ads appearing for "yoga mat DIY," "yoga mat repair," "yoga mat exercises," "yoga mat recycling," or "yoga instructor jobs" because Google's match type algorithms interpret these as related to "yoga mat." Each of those clicks costs money and produces zero sales.
Negative keywords have their own match types that work differently from regular keyword match types. Negative broad match (the default) blocks your ad when all the negative keyword words appear in the search, in any order. Negative phrase match blocks when the negative phrase appears in order within the search. Negative exact match blocks only the exact search query. Unlike regular match types, negative keywords do not include close variants, misspellings, or synonyms, so you need to add each variation separately.
Step-by-Step Implementation
Before your first campaign goes live, create a list of terms that clearly indicate non-buying intent. Start with these universal ecommerce negatives: "free," "cheap" (if you sell premium products), "DIY," "how to make," "pattern," "template," "tutorial," "class," "course," "job," "jobs," "career," "salary," "hiring," "intern," "review" (if you sell products, not review content), "reddit," "forum," "wiki," "pdf," "download," "used," "refurbished" (if you only sell new), "repair," "fix," and "return policy" (you want shoppers, not people looking to return something). Add industry-specific negatives based on your products. A store selling new furniture should add "used furniture," "furniture repair," "furniture disposal," and "free furniture."
The search terms report is your primary tool for finding negative keyword opportunities. In Google Ads, go to Keywords, then Search Terms. This report shows every actual search query that triggered your ads, along with clicks, cost, and conversions. Review this report twice per week for the first month and at least weekly after that. Look for three types of irrelevant traffic: completely unrelated searches (someone searching for a different product entirely), informational searches (people researching rather than buying), and searches that indicate the wrong customer segment (businesses looking for wholesale when you only sell retail, or consumers when you only sell B2B). Add each irrelevant query as a negative keyword. For recurring patterns, add the root term rather than every variation. If you see "yoga mat exercises," "yoga mat stretches," and "yoga mat workout," adding "exercises," "stretches," and "workout" as negatives covers all three and future variations.
Apply negative keywords at the right level. Campaign-level negatives block searches across all ad groups in that campaign, ideal for terms that should never trigger any of your ads within that campaign. Ad group-level negatives block searches only within a specific ad group, useful for preventing overlap between ad groups. For example, if you have separate ad groups for "men's running shoes" and "women's running shoes," add "women" as a negative in the men's ad group and "men" as a negative in the women's ad group to keep each ad group focused. Choose the right negative match type. Use negative exact match when you want to block only a specific search query without affecting related searches. Use negative phrase match when you want to block any search containing a specific phrase. Use negative broad match when you want to block any search containing all the words in your negative keyword, regardless of order.
In Google Ads, go to Tools and Settings, then Shared Library, then Negative Keyword Lists. Create reusable lists that you can apply across multiple campaigns. A "Universal Ecommerce Negatives" list containing your starter terms from Step 1 should be applied to every campaign in your account. Create additional lists for specific exclusion categories like "Competitor Brands" (if you want to block competitor name searches in certain campaigns), "B2B Terms" (if you sell direct to consumer), or "Geographic Negatives" (locations you do not ship to). Shared lists save management time because updating the list once updates the exclusion across all campaigns it is applied to.
Negative keyword lists need maintenance just like your regular keyword lists. Set a monthly calendar reminder to audit your negatives. Check for terms you blocked that might now be relevant because your product line expanded. Check for new search patterns that need blocking based on recent search terms reports. Check for negative keywords that might be blocking valuable traffic, look for keywords where impressions dropped unexpectedly, which could indicate an overly aggressive negative keyword is filtering out good searches. If a negative keyword uses broad match, verify it is not accidentally blocking relevant terms by checking impression trends for related keywords.
Negative Keyword Categories for Ecommerce
Non-Purchasing Intent
These terms signal the searcher has no intention of buying: "free," "DIY," "how to make," "how to build," "tutorial," "pattern," "template," "class," "course." These people want to create the product themselves or learn about the topic, not buy from your store. Block these across all campaigns unless your store sells instructional content alongside products.
Job and Career Searches
Terms like "job," "jobs," "career," "salary," "hiring," "intern," "work at," and "employment" attract people looking for employment rather than products. These are especially problematic for brand-name keywords because "[Your Brand] jobs" searches are common and the clicks are expensive with zero conversion potential.
Informational and Research
Terms like "wiki," "wikipedia," "reddit," "forum," "meaning of," "what is," "definition," "history of," and "vs" (in some contexts) indicate someone in the research phase rather than the buying phase. Be selective here because some research terms do convert, "best running shoes 2026" is research-intent but often precedes a purchase. Block the pure information terms but keep research terms that commonly lead to transactions.
Wrong Product Condition
If you sell new products only, add "used," "refurbished," "secondhand," "pre-owned," "vintage" (unless you sell vintage), "reconditioned," and "renewed." If you sell new products at full price, consider adding "cheap," "budget," "discount," "clearance," and "outlet" unless you actually offer those options.
Wrong Customer Type
If you sell to consumers, add B2B terms like "wholesale," "bulk order," "distributor," "manufacturer," "supplier," "OEM," and "white label." If you sell to businesses, add consumer-oriented terms like "personal use," "for home," and specific consumer phrases that indicate individual rather than business purchasing.
Competitor Brand Names (Selective)
Decide whether you want your ads to show for competitor brand name searches. Some stores intentionally bid on competitor names to capture comparison traffic. Others block competitor names to avoid expensive, low-converting clicks from people looking for a specific brand. If you choose to block, add competitor brand names as negative exact match so you only block the brand name itself without blocking searches that contain the brand name alongside your product terms.
Measuring the Impact of Negative Keywords
Track the impact of your negative keyword strategy by monitoring three metrics over time. Click-through rate (CTR) should increase as you remove irrelevant impressions that were generating views but not clicks. Conversion rate should increase as you filter out clicks from non-buyers. Cost per conversion should decrease as wasted spend on non-converting clicks is eliminated.
Compare your metrics before and after adding significant negative keyword batches. If you added 50 negative keywords this week, compare this week's cost per conversion to the previous two weeks. Most stores see a 10% to 25% improvement in cost per conversion within the first month of implementing a serious negative keyword strategy, with the biggest gains coming from the initial list of universal negatives applied before the campaign even launches.
Be cautious about over-blocking. If you add too many negative keywords or use broad match negatives too aggressively, you might accidentally block profitable searches. Watch your impression and click volume after adding negatives. If volume drops sharply without a corresponding improvement in conversion rate, review your recent negatives for terms that might be blocking good traffic. Remove any that are questionable and use a more specific match type if needed.