Google Adwords: Why Isn’t My Ad Showing?

As an Adwords Management agency, a question we sometimes get asked by clients is ‘why isn’t my ad showing?’ There are plenty of good reasons why this might happen and its important to know what they are so you can rule them out.  These reasons include:

1. Your ads are set to rotate evenly throughout the day.
2. They keyword has performed badly and has therefore been paused

However, there might be a more concerning reason, such as :

1. Your daily budget has run out too early
2. An incorrect negative keyword is blocking good quality traffic
3. A good keyword has been paused
4. Low quality score

How To See Why Your Ad Isn’t Showing

Your first port of call should be the ‘Ad Preview & Diagnosis Tool’ that you can find in the ‘Tools’ tab in the Adwords interface. Here, you can search for any keyword and Google will either show your ad highlighed or tell you why it’s not showing.

The other way is to find the keyword in the campaign and hover over the speech bubble – here you’ll see if your ad is showing, why it isn’t showing and what that keyword’s quality score is. Much easier than calling up your Adwords management agency!