Google and Microsoft paid search planning: structure, keywords, match types, negatives, RSAs, bidding lens, and landing-page alignment for conversion-focused spend.
Paid Search Ads Playbook delivers strategic planning and SOPs for Google Ads and Microsoft Advertising search campaigns when building programs from scratch or documenting standards before account access. It covers campaign taxonomy, match type philosophy, budget sizing, KPI setting, ad copy frameworks, extension strategy, landing page requirements, and optimization cadences for search-specific funnel stages.
Bridges business goals to executable search plans including brand protection, non-brand acquisition, competitor conquest, and remarketing lists for search ads where applicable.
Strategists writing search portions of media plans, agencies pitching search management, trainers onboarding junior PPC hires, and marketing leaders scoping search investment. Complements live skills like Keyword Engine and Optimizer once campaigns exist.
Document offer economics, geo, languages, and competitive landscape. Playbook proposes account structure, initial keyword themes, match type approach paired with Smart Bidding prerequisites, ad copy messaging pillars, and launch budget ramp.
Include Microsoft Ads parity notes where Bing/Yahoo audience differs. Define weekly/monthly optimization rituals, search term review SOP, and escalation triggers for tracking or landing page issues.
Planners ask Google-only versus Microsoft budget split—heuristics by industry search share with test thresholds. Another topic is lead gen versus ecommerce playbook differences in conversion value setup.
Without historical data, CPA targets use category benchmarks with explicit validation milestones week two and four.
Describe business, markets, and goals without requiring exports. Request proposal search plan or internal SOP library. After launch, transition to Google Ads Campaign Builder, Keyword Engine, and Account Audit for account-specific refinement.
Playbook modules cover account takeover hygiene—access, billing, conversion baseline—and emergency runbooks for sudden disapproval or tracking outage scenarios. Ad copy frameworks include RSA pinning strategy, callout and snippet libraries, and compliance notes for regulated terms. Landing page SLA checklist ties message match to Quality Score and conversion rate expectations before spend scales. Microsoft Ads import considerations note audience and match type differences rather than blind Google duplication.
Quality Score education modules explain expected timeline for relevance improvements after landing page overhauls—managing client expectations on CPA impact lag. Account structure decision trees help choose between SKAG legacy patterns and modern theme-based ad groups compatible with Smart Bidding at current conversion volumes.
Call tracking and form attribution setup prerequisites are listed before search launch so offline lead gen accounts do not optimize on incomplete conversion pictures week one.
Negative keyword philosophy at launch includes account-level protected terms and shared lists for irrelevant themes discovered in category research before first impression serves.
For broader context, see our roundup of marketing skills claude, and read Claude Code for paid ads for related setup guidance.