How to Rank on Google’s First Page and Top Positions

Just like with organic results, Google has an algorithm to rank the ads. And it’s not about having the largest budget to get in top. When done right, you can win higher positions while paying less than your competitors, and lower your CPC too! Digital ad spending worldwide is reaching nearly $400 billion by 2021 (eMarketer), with the largest market segment being Search Advertising (Statista). Logically, this means that when we are talking about Google Ads to get your business in search results, you are not alone. So your ranking is a definitive factor.

More visibility, more engagement

These are no news at all, but the majority of people never scroll past the first page on a Google search. And the higher the position of an ad, the higher engagement and clickthrough rates. So remember that even though your ad may be showing, it doesn’t mean that people actually see it. 

That’s why winning the top positions only will be to your advantage. More visibility simply proves to drive more engagement. 94% of all clicks happen on the first page of search engine results. The top two paid ads get around double the traffic than ads just one position lower (Powertraffic). On mobile devices where most searches are from, only paid ads results are showing before scrolling all the way down. With two results at a time. So imagine the attention to be number one or two.

Win the auction

To have the best ad positions and improve your ad rank, you first need to understand how Google’s algorithm works. The ads ranking is based on an auction, which starts when someone makes a search on Google. The Google Ads algorithm finds all eligible ads from the different advertisers and determines which ads to show and their final position on the page. It includes over 200 factors, but the three main factors are the following; your bidding, ad relevance, and landing page quality. 

Set a bidding 

Google Ads is also known as PPC advertising (pay per click), which means that you only pay when someone clicks your ad. Your bid is what you are willing to pay for a click on your ad.  

Your maximum bid

You can choose to set a limit for your maximum bid. It should be set to a fair amount, depending on the competition. If your bid is way below average, your ad might not even show. What you will end up paying per click, however, also depends on your quality score. The higher the quality score you have, the lower the cost per click you can get. Two important factors here is the relevance of your ad and your landing page quality.

Make your ad relevant

The algorithm determines how relevant your ad is to what a person is searching for, by the content of your ad and expected interaction with the ad.

Ad copy

Relevant ad copy is based on how it matches the keywords you have selected and how often they appear in the ad. Make sure to include keywords from your ad group in the description text and title. Write it in an appealing way too, and in a way that makes sense. It’s people who will read it and their interest you need to catch. Don’t exaggerate with too many keywords or repetitively writing them after one another.