Make every ad lead to the page about the exact service it promotes, with the ad's words, price and offer repeated near the top. An ad that looks like a result is expected to answer like one.

The shading is gone

A week ago today, Google changed how its results look on computers. Titles are bigger, the underlines are gone, and the ads at the top changed with them.

Those ads used to sit together on a pale shaded block, set apart from everything else. Now they sit on the same white background, each with a small yellow label reading "Ad" beside its web address.

For anyone paying for those ads, the change matters more than it looks.

Ads that look like results

Without the shading, the top ads read much like the free results below them: the same title size, the same colours, a short description and an address.

The label is honest, but it is small. Some searchers will notice it; others will click the first title that matches their search and treat the page as a result.

Either way, they arrive expecting the page to answer their search as directly as a good result would.

What a searcher expects after the click

Someone who clicks an ad that looks like a result expects the page to deliver, at a glance:

When the page meets those expectations, the visitor stays to read. When it does not, the back button is one tap away, and the click is already paid for.

The ad text and the page must agree

Each group of ads should lead to the page about that exact service, not to a general page. The words in the ad's headline belong in the page's heading too.

Any price, date or offer in the ad must appear on the page, in the same words. An ad promising a weekend course that leads to a page about evening classes reads like a trick.

AdWords measures this too. Its Quality Score weighs how relevant the ad is to the search and how well the page serves the visitor, and that score affects what each click costs.

Why the home page is rarely the destination

Sending every ad to the home page saves setting up pages, but it hands the visitor a second search. They have to find the service again, on a site they do not know.

A page for each service the ads promote, with its own heading, details and next step, does that work for them before they decide to leave.

What an ad dressed as a result has to live up to

An ad that looks like a result borrows some of the trust people give to results. The page behind it has to earn that trust as quickly as a result would.

Keep claims in the ad that the page can show: real prices, real dates, an offer that is still running. Remove words such as "free" or "best" unless the page makes them true.

Make the address shown in the ad your own domain, and keep it consistent with the page the visitor lands on. Surprises after a click are what people remember.

A worked example

A bartending school in Vancouver runs evening and weekend courses for people who want to work behind a bar, and advertises them with a small AdWords campaign.

Its ads were written for specific searches: weekend bartending course, evening classes, cocktail workshops. Every ad led to the home page, which opened with a slideshow and a welcome.

A visitor searching for a weekend course had to find the course menu, choose the right course and scroll to the dates. Plenty left before they got there, and each of those clicks had been paid for.

Each ad group now leads to the page for its own course. The page heading repeats the words of the ad, and the next start date and the price sit just below it.

An ad mentioning a weekend course no longer appears for searches about evening classes, and the cocktail workshop has its own ad and its own page.

The click now lands where the ad said it would. A searcher who barely noticed the label still finds exactly what the words promised.

Checking your own ads

Searching for your own ads over and over adds impressions without clicks. AdWords includes a preview tool that shows an ad the way searchers see it, without registering an impression.

Read each ad beside the page it leads to, as a stranger would. If the page's first screen does not repeat the ad's promise, rewrite one or the other.

Check on a phone as well. Ads on phones lead to the same pages, and a page that works on a desktop can bury the offer below a large header on a small screen.

Reading the figures after the change

Clicks and costs may move in the weeks after a change like this. A single week says little, especially in a season when demand shifts anyway.

Compare a full month with the same month last year, and note the date of the redesign in your reports so later readers know why the pattern changed.

The counter-case

For an ad shown on searches for your own business name, most clickers want the home page anyway, and sending them there is reasonable.

And a campaign whose ads already lead to matching pages may see little difference. The label changed; the advice was always the same.

But an ad that leads somewhere generic now looks even more like a result, and people who think they clicked a result leave fastest when the page does not answer them.

Pairing each ad with its page

  1. List every ad and the page it leads to.
  2. Match each ad group to the page for that service.
  3. Repeat the headline's words in the page heading.
  4. Show the ad's price or offer on the page.
  5. Remove claims the page cannot support.
  6. Check each ad with the preview tool.
  7. Compare a full month before judging the change.

Step two answers the search behind every click. Once every ad leads to the page about its own service, the visitor finds what the ad promised, whether or not they noticed the label.

The same redesign also cut the free results' titles shorter, and rewriting them so the service shows first is covered in page titles cut shorter in the new search results.

Frequently asked questions

What changed in how Google shows ads?

On computers, the ads above the results no longer sit on a shaded block. Each ad now has a small yellow Ad label beside its address, with larger titles.

Why does that matter to advertisers?

The ads now look much like the free results, so some searchers click without noticing the label and expect the page to answer their search like a result.

Where should each ad lead?

To the page about the exact service or product it promotes, with the ad's headline words in the page heading and any price or offer shown near the top.

Does the landing page affect what I pay?

It can. The AdWords Quality Score weighs how relevant the ad is and how well the page serves visitors, and that score affects ad position and the cost of each click.

How can I check my ads without searching repeatedly?

Use AdWords' own Ad Preview and Diagnosis tool. It shows how ads appear for a search without counting impressions, which repeated searches of your own would do.

Should I judge the change from one week of figures?

No. A week says little, especially when demand shifts with the season. Compare a full month with the same month last year and note the redesign date.

West Coast Media Solutions Inc. provides web design, web development, hosting, digital marketing, and business consulting to organisations across Canada, drawing on more than twenty-five years in the field.

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