Not Getting Enough Google Ads Conversions? Here Are the 5 Moves We Make First
Not getting enough Google Ads conversions? Here are the five strategies we apply when a campaign is live, tracking properly, and still not converting.
TL;DR: When a Google Ads search campaign is live, tracking correctly, and appearing for the right searches but conversions are still flat, the fix rarely lives in the search campaign itself. Creekside Marketing’s five-move sequence (display retargeting at $10/day with CPCs as low as $0.10, lead form assets, broad match plus Maximize Conversions, keyword cannibalization fixes, and Performance Max) consistently unlocks leads the search campaign alone cannot reach.
| Metric | Value |
|---|---|
| Display retargeting minimum daily budget | $5/day |
| Recommended display retargeting daily budget | $10/day |
| Display retargeting CPC range (typical) | $0.10 to $1.00 |
| Percentage of daily Google searches that are brand new | ~20% |
| Typical keyword cannibalization pattern | 2 keywords consuming 90% of budget |
Not Getting Enough Google Ads Conversions? Here Are the 5 Moves We Make First
This post is based on a video Peterson published on the Creekside Marketing YouTube channel: Strategies to Increase Conversions in Google Ads.
You’ve Done Everything Right. Why Aren’t Google Ads Conversions Coming In?
The question Creekside Marketing hears more often than almost any other is a version of this: “I created a search campaign, I’m tracking conversions properly, and I’m showing up for the right searches. What do I do when Google Ads conversions still won’t come in?”
According to Creekside Marketing’s experience managing $20M+ in ad spend across lead gen businesses, this situation almost always points to the same diagnosis. The search campaign has done what it can. Driving meaningful Google Ads conversion volume requires layering additional tactics around it. The campaign is not broken. It is one part of a larger conversion system that has not been built yet.
Here are the five moves we make first.
Move 1: Add a Demand Gen Retargeting Campaign on Max Clicks ($10 Per Day, CPCs at $0.10 to $1.00)
A demand gen retargeting campaign on Max Clicks bidding is the first move we make when a Google Ads account is not converting. Budgeted at $10 per day and targeting past website visitors plus lookalike audiences, it generates display clicks for $0.10 to $1.00 per click, maintaining high-volume reach with warm audiences at a fraction of search CPC costs.
When someone has already visited your website, they have expressed intent. Getting back in front of them on the Google Display Network is one of the highest-ROI moves available at almost any budget level. According to Creekside Marketing’s analysis, $10 per day is the recommended starting point, with $5 per day as the minimum to get the campaign collecting data.
Based on account data reviewed for this topic, CPCs on display retargeting campaigns typically run between $0.10 and $1.00 per click. One account cited in the source video showed a CPC of $1.65, which represents the upper end of the typical range and is still far below what comparable search clicks cost in most lead gen categories.
The second audience layer we add alongside website retargeting is a lookalike audience. This targets users who behave similarly to past site visitors on Google, extending low-cost reach to a relevant audience that has not yet visited your site. This is not technically retargeting, but it amplifies the low-cost reach of the campaign significantly.
The goal of this campaign is high-volume touchpoints with warm and warm-adjacent audiences running in parallel with the search campaign.
Move 2: Set Up a Lead Form Asset on Your Search Ads
For lead generation businesses, adding a lead form asset directly to your search ads is the second move. Lead form assets let potential leads submit their contact information using autofill data Google already holds on file, eliminating the landing page step entirely and dramatically reducing the friction between seeing an ad and becoming a lead in your CRM.
According to Creekside Marketing’s analysis, the lead form asset works because it shortens the conversion path. Instead of clicking an ad, loading a landing page, reading copy, and then filling out a form, a user with Google’s autofill data available can submit their information without leaving the search results page at all.
This is one of the lower-effort, higher-impact configurations available in any Google Ads account. It does not require a landing page redesign or additional budget. It is available as an asset you add to your existing search campaigns in the Assets tab.
For any lead gen account running search campaigns without a lead form asset attached, this is an immediate opportunity worth testing before making any structural changes to bidding or match types.
Move 3: Switch to Broad Match and Maximize Conversions (The Counterintuitive One)
Switching to broad match keywords with Maximize Conversions bidding is the third move, and the most counterintuitive. Despite broad match’s long history of wasted budget, Google’s AI improvements now surface converting searches that phrase and exact match targeting would never find, including from the approximately 20% of daily Google searches that are brand new queries which cannot be anticipated in any keyword list built from scratch.
This recommendation generates the most pushback during account reviews, and the hesitation is valid. Broad match has a well-earned reputation for burning budget on irrelevant searches. For years, enabling it meant watching spend disappear on queries that had nothing to do with the campaign’s goals.
According to Creekside Marketing’s experience managing accounts across multiple lead gen industries, that has changed. Google’s AI-driven targeting within broad match has improved substantially. When paired with Maximize Conversions bidding and a well-maintained negative keyword list, broad match now finds converting searches that no keyword research tool would have surfaced.
Here is the specific first-hand insight behind why this works at a structural level: approximately 20% of all Google searches every day are brand new queries that have never been searched before. Phrase match and exact match keywords can only capture searches you anticipated when building the list. Broad match, properly controlled with negatives and good conversion data, can get in front of searches from that 20% of the search universe. In accounts where Creekside Marketing has run this approach, some of the best-converting search terms were queries we would never have targeted deliberately.
The critical requirement: this only works when conversion tracking is feeding the campaign high-quality data. If your conversion tracking is capturing incomplete or low-quality actions, do not turn on broad match until the tracking is fixed. The fastest way to verify your conversion tracking setup is covered in this walkthrough.
For context on how broad match fits into a modern Google Ads account strategy, this post covers the most common strategic misconceptions we encounter in audits: Stop Managing Google Ads Like It’s 2020: Three Costly Misconceptions We Find in Every Audit.
Move 4: Fix the Keyword Cannibalization Problem
When one or two keywords are consuming 90% of campaign budget while a dozen others collect fewer than 50 impressions combined, the fix is clear: pause the dominant keywords and give the rest of the keyword list real exposure. Keyword cannibalization is one of the most common and fixable Google Ads conversion blockers because it makes conversion data from any keyword except the budget hog essentially meaningless.
According to Creekside Marketing’s account audit experience, this pattern is far more common than it should be. One or two keywords grab the budget early in a campaign’s lifecycle. The bidding algorithm reinforces them because they are generating volume. Every other keyword in the account effectively starves.
The result: budget and keyword decisions get made based on data from two keywords while the other twelve have never been given a genuine chance to perform. The data looks conclusive. It is not. It is a sample of two.
The fix is to pause the dominant keywords temporarily. This does not mean eliminating them permanently. In mature accounts, the dominant keyword often turns out to be a genuine top performer after honest testing across the full keyword set. The goal is to give the rest of the list real data before drawing any conclusions.
Once the other keywords have meaningful impression and click volume, one of two things happens: several of them convert well and the budget strategy needs to change, or they do not convert and you now have confirmed data instead of assumptions. Either outcome is more actionable than the cannibalization state you started in.
Move 5: Add a Performance Max Campaign
Adding a Performance Max campaign alongside the existing search campaign is the fifth move. Performance Max uses Google’s AI to reach converting users across all Google inventory surfaces, and for lead gen accounts where the advertiser trusts the algorithm and wants to minimize manual keyword management, it consistently surfaces leads that a search-only account structure would not have reached.
According to Creekside Marketing’s analysis, Performance Max and broad match search share a similar underlying logic: both rely on Google’s optimization algorithm to find converting users rather than requiring the advertiser to define every possible search path upfront. The practical difference is primarily about visibility and control. A broad match search campaign gives you access to search term reports and lets you manage exclusions at the query level. Performance Max operates across more surfaces and provides less granular search term data.
Google has invested significantly in the Performance Max algorithm, and the results across lead gen accounts reflect that investment. For advertisers who want to minimize hands-on management and are comfortable with reduced search term transparency, it is worth testing alongside the search campaign rather than in place of it.
The recommendation: test one approach first rather than running both simultaneously with limited budget. For a practical guide to managing Performance Max without letting it cannibalize your search campaign’s results, this walkthrough covers the approach we use.
Why These Five Moves Work as a System
Each of the five moves addresses a different constraint on what a search-only campaign can accomplish on its own.
Display retargeting recovers visitors who expressed intent but did not convert on the first visit. Lead form assets remove the friction that stops motivated users from submitting. Broad match and Performance Max open access to converting searches the keyword list would never have reached. Fixing keyword cannibalization makes the data reliable enough to inform real decisions.
No single move transforms an account. Together, they build the infrastructure around a search campaign that allows it to perform the way it was designed to.
Frequently Asked Questions
How much budget does a display retargeting campaign need to produce results?
According to Creekside Marketing’s analysis, $10 per day is the recommended starting point, with $5 per day as the minimum for the campaign to collect useful data. At typical display CPCs of $0.10 to $1.00, a $10/day budget generates 10 to 100 clicks per day depending on audience size. That volume is enough to maintain consistent presence with a warm audience while spending a fraction of what the same reach would cost in search.
Is broad match worth using in a lead gen Google Ads account in 2026?
Based on Creekside Marketing’s experience, broad match with Maximize Conversions is a legitimate conversion strategy when three conditions are in place: conversion tracking captures high-quality signals, a well-developed negative keyword list controls irrelevant traffic, and the campaign has enough monthly conversion volume for the algorithm to optimize against. The broad match of five years ago is structurally different from what Google’s AI does with it today. The risk is running broad match without quality conversion data feeding it.
What is keyword cannibalization and how do I identify it?
Keyword cannibalization is when one or two keywords dominate a campaign’s budget so thoroughly that the rest of the keyword list never collects meaningful data. To identify it, sort your keywords by cost and look at the spend distribution. If two keywords account for 85 to 90 percent of total spend and everything else has fewer than 50 impressions, that is the cannibalization pattern. The fix is to pause the dominant keywords temporarily and let other terms collect real data.
Should I run broad match or Performance Max first?
Both use Google’s AI to find converting users, but they differ in how much visibility you maintain. Broad match search gives you access to search term reports and direct control over exclusions. Performance Max provides less search term transparency but operates across more Google inventory. If data transparency matters to your workflow, start with broad match. If you prefer lower management overhead and trust the algorithm, test Performance Max first. Both require high-quality conversion tracking to work.
What if all five of these moves are running and conversions still will not come?
At that point, the issue is almost certainly not inside the ad account. The conversion problem is upstream: landing page quality, offer strength, call handling, or sales process. The ad account can deliver intent-matched traffic. It cannot convert users when the experience after the click is broken. The diagnostic at that stage shifts from the ad account to the full conversion funnel.
Get a Free Google Ads Conversion Audit
If your Google Ads account is live, tracking properly, and appearing for the right searches but conversion volume is still not where your business needs it to be, a structured audit can identify exactly where the gaps are.
Creekside Marketing manages $20M+ in ad spend for lead generation businesses. Request your free 10K Profit Audit and we will identify the specific conversion blockers in your account.
About the Author
Peterson Rainey is the founder of Creekside Marketing, a paid advertising agency that manages $20M+ in annual Google Ads and Meta Ads spend for lead generation businesses. He writes about campaign structure, conversion systems, and the operational side of running high-performance ad accounts.
