What’s Your Intent?

Over the past several weeks, I have recorded episodes for six different podcasts. One thing I discovered is that when six different people ask you questions about what you do and how you do it, you get much clearer on how to explain it.

One topic came up on almost every podcast: How is Google Ads changing?

I’ve been working with Google Ads since 2004, and I think one of the biggest changes over those twenty-two years has been the evolution from keywords to search intent. Keywords still matter. But increasingly, they are a guide that helps Google understand who you are trying to reach.

Sometimes your keyword won’t even appear in the search someone types. For example, you might target “foundation repair,” and your ad could show when someone searches:

“Who can help with water leaking into my basement?”

They didn’t search for your keyword. But Google believes the intent behind their search may be a match for what you offer. 

That creates an interesting challenge. If Google is trying to understand intent, how do you make sure it understands the right intent?

Tell Google What You Actually Want

One of the most important ways is through your conversions. Google is happy to let you optimize for goals like “engagement” or “driving directions.” They’re easy conversions to generate. But are they really what you want to pay Google Ads prices for?

For most lead-generation businesses, you want something much closer to an actual sales opportunity, typically a completed form or a meaningful phone call. Even then, the details matter.

For phone calls, Google lets you determine how long a call needs to last before it counts as a conversion. We typically start at 60 seconds, although the right number depends on the client’s sales process.

Why does that matter? Because Google Ads is extremely goal-oriented. Tell Google that a 30-second call is a successful conversion, and it will try to find more people likely to make those calls. Tell Google that only calls lasting at least 60 seconds are successful, and you’ve given it a different signal.

We saw this recently with a client whose call conversions had been set at 30 seconds. After talking with the client, we increased the threshold to 60 seconds. The result was fewer quick-question calls and more conversations with actual sales potential.

But Aren’t We Bidding on Keywords?

Yes. But keywords are only part of the equation. Google is also trying to understand the intent behind each search. We’ve seen just how powerful that can be with Cardiac Care & Safety, a company that provides on-site CPR training for organizations.

Most people don’t search for “on-site CPR training.” They search for things like “CPR training.” The problem is that someone searching “CPR training” could be an HR manager looking to train 50 employees—or one person looking for a Saturday morning class. The keyword doesn’t tell us which one.

When we started working with Cardiac Care, about half of their leads were individuals looking for classes. Their previous agency had told them that was simply the cost of advertising on Google. We decided to give Google more information.

When someone clicks “Get a Quote” on the landing page, we ask whether they’re looking for:

A class for an individual or On-site classes for an organization

People looking for an individual class can still find information and contact Cardiac Care, but we don’t tell Google to count them as a conversion. People looking for on-site training are taken to the primary form, and completing it counts as a conversion.

We’re giving Google a very clear signal: This is the intent we’re looking for.

Before adding that step, about 50% of Cardiac Care’s leads were for on-site training. Six months later, that number has increased to 90%.

We didn’t accomplish that by finding a magical new keyword. We helped Google better understand the intent we wanted.

Is Your Intent on Target?

As Google Ads continues to move beyond precise keyword matching, choosing the right keywords is only part of building a successful campaign. You also need to teach Google what a valuable prospect looks like.

That means thinking carefully about what you count as a conversion and whether those conversions represent the people you actually want as customers. Google is very good at giving you more of what you ask for.

The question is whether you’re asking for the right thing.