How To Use Keyword Match Types

There are basically three different keyword match types: broad, phrase, and exact match. You can select all of these options for one and the same keyword, or not choose a match type at all and the keyword will have the default match type broad. Keyword match types determine when your ad is shown to a user searching online. Therefore, learning more about the different matching options and how to use them can be worthwhile to improve your campaign performance.

1. Broad Match

Broad match allows you to reach a wide audience. Therefore, your ad can appear for searches that are not necessarily relevant to your business. With broad match your ad can show up for synonyms, misspellings, variations and singular and plural forms of your keyword. Let’s say your keyword is women’s shoes and a user searches for buy ladies shoes, with broad match your ad would be displayed.

2. Phrase Match

Phrase match is a more refined targeting option than broad match. With phrase match your ad can show up for searches that contain a phrase or close variations of it with words before and after the phrase. For example, if someone searches for buy women’s shoes (keyword: “women’s shoes”), your ad would be among the search results. However, your ad would not be displayed for buy women’s winter shoes.

3. Exact Match

Exact match is the most exclusive match type of the three. It allows you to target a specific group of people. With exact match your ad shows up for searches that contain a phrase or close variations of it and no other words. If a user types in women’s shoes (keyword: [women’s shoes]), your ad would be displayed. If he types in buy women’s shoes, your ad would not be shown.

If you are uncertain which keyword match type to use, start with broad match first. You can run a search query report after you’ve collected enough traffic and analyze which keywords triggered your ads. You can then adjust the match type to improve your campaign performance.

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