How to advertise on Google, step by step: account, campaign, budget and tracking

What do you need to advertise on Google?

To advertise on Google, you need a Google Ads account, a web page for the ad to send people to, a payment method and a clear definition of what you expect from the ad. Opening the account takes a few steps. The real work is making sure the campaign shows up on the right searches and measuring the inquiries it brings.

The steps in this article are based on the official pages of the Google Ads Help Center, as they read in November 2026. Google changes its interface and menu names from time to time. If a setting looks different from what is described here, check the current page in the sources at the end of the article.

If you do not want to handle the setup and weekly management yourself, our Google Ads management service opens the account in your business's name, sets up measurement before the campaign starts, and leaves you paying the ad budget directly to Google.

1. Open a Google Ads account

According to the Google Ads Help Center, opening an account takes three steps: adding your business information (name and website address), choosing a campaign goal and budget, and entering payment details. Google recommends creating the account before you create a campaign, and also offers an option to create an account without a campaign during sign-up. You can use that option to set up the campaign without rushing, once measurement is ready.

Three billing settings need attention. The country of your billing address determines which payment options you can use. The time zone affects your reports, statistics and billing. The account type defaults to Organization, and according to a note on Google's conversion measurement page, it cannot be changed after the account is created. If you are advertising on behalf of a company, fill in these fields with the company's official details.

As a payment method you add a credit card, a debit card or, where available in your country, other methods. When a card is used, a temporary authorization may appear, and Google may ask for a small prepayment for verification. The account should be opened with the business's own email address, and an agency or specialist should be added as a user. Why this matters is explained in detail in our article on choosing a Google Ads agency.

2. Choose a campaign type

Google Ads starts with a goal and a campaign type. When you choose a goal such as sales, leads or website traffic, the system suggests suitable campaign types. To see all types, use the option to create a campaign without a goal's guidance.

For most service businesses, a Search campaign is an easy-to-follow start, because the ad is shown only to people searching for the service you offer, and the report shows which search brought an inquiry. In the settings of a Search campaign, the Google search partners and Display Network boxes can also be ticked. Choose these on purpose. Leaving them ticked means the ad can also be shown outside the search results.

3. Choose keywords and match types

A keyword is the word or phrase that determines which searches your ad can show on. The match type says how close a search has to be to the keyword. According to Google, broad match is the default type and is recommended together with Smart Bidding.

To keep irrelevant searches out, you add negative keywords. For example, a business that only serves corporate clients can put words such as "free" or "jobs" on its negative list. The search terms report shows which searches triggered your ad. Google recommends adding terms you find irrelevant in that report as negative keywords.

Starting with a small number of keywords that describe the service directly makes the report easier to read. Adding near-identical keywords separately brings no extra benefit. According to Google, only one of them is used for the same search.

4. Set the budget and bid strategy

In Google Ads you set an average daily budget for each campaign. As of November 2026, according to the Google Ads Help Center, Google can go above this amount on days when clicks or conversions are more likely. For most campaigns, spend in a single day does not exceed twice the average daily budget, and spend in a month does not exceed 30.4 times it. To turn a monthly budget into a daily one, divide the monthly amount by 30.4.

The bid strategy determines which result the ad is managed toward. If conversions such as sales or forms are measured, Smart Bidding strategies such as Maximize conversions or Target CPA (target cost per action) can be used. If sales have values assigned, Maximize conversion value or Target ROAS is chosen. If there is no conversion data yet, Google notes that Maximize clicks can be useful for new campaigns. If the aim is to keep your brand name visible in searches, there is a Target impression share strategy.

According to Google's conversion measurement page, Smart Bidding strategies need a learning phase of 7 to 14 days. Making frequent changes to the budget, targets and conversion settings during this period restarts the learning. Google's budget page says to choose the average daily budget based on your advertising goals and the amount you can spend per day. When you set the amount, also consider what a customer is worth to your business and how long it will take to collect enough data for measurement. When managing the account yourself makes sense on a small budget is covered in our article on running Google Ads yourself.

5. Write the ad copy

The ad format used on the Search Network is the responsive search ad. According to the Google Ads Help Center, each ad takes at least 3 and at most 15 headlines, and at least 2 and at most 4 descriptions. A headline can be up to 30 characters, a description up to 90, and each field of the display URL path up to 15. Google tests the headlines and descriptions by combining them in different orders.

Since headlines can appear in any order, each one should make sense on its own. If a piece of information has to appear in every ad, such as the name of the service or the way to request a quote, it can be pinned to Headline 1, Headline 2 or Description 1. Concrete details such as the service area, delivery time or price let people who are not interested filter themselves out before they click.

Before an ad goes live, it goes through Google's policy review. According to the Help Center, most ads are reviewed within one business day. The page the ad sends people to should be finished by then. If the page loads slowly or does not contain the information promised in the ad, even a well-written ad will struggle to bring inquiries.

6. Set up conversion tracking

A conversion is an action you consider valuable for your business: a purchase, a form submission, a phone call or a WhatsApp click. According to Google, website conversions are measured with the Google tag or imported from Google Analytics. Calls from the call button in the ad can be tracked with a Google forwarding number, without a tag.

Each conversion action is set as primary or secondary. Primary actions are the signals the bid strategy optimizes for; secondary actions are for observation only. A new tag shows as Unverified until the first conversion or a successful test is recorded. Sending a test form after setup and waiting for the conversion to appear in the dashboard prevents months of campaign management based on faulty data.

The Google Ads conversion tag uses cookies. In Türkiye, marketing cookies require the visitor's consent, and the tag should only fire after that consent. Inquiries from visitors who do not consent do not appear in the ad report, so read the reports together with your own form and call records. This is not legal advice; consult your lawyer about your own site. In our Business website Premium package, conversion tracking for forms, WhatsApp, phone calls and the Google Ads tag is part of the setup.

7. Payment, invoices and tax

This section applies to accounts billed in Türkiye. As of November 2026, according to the Türkiye section of the Google Ads Help Center page on taxes in your country, the account is served by Google Ireland Ltd. For accounts notified about Affected Products, the counterparty is Google Türkiye (Google Reklamcılık ve Pazarlama Ltd. Şti.) until further notice, and Google Ads is among those products. According to the same page, accounts served by Google Türkiye are subject to VAT at the Turkish standard rate. The rate can change by government decision. Businesses entitled to a full VAT exemption send their exemption certificate to Google.

As of November 2026, the Google Ads Help Center page on jurisdiction-specific surcharges says that a surcharge called the Regulatory Operating Cost is added to ads served in Türkiye; the current rate and effective date are published on that page. The surcharge depends on where the ad is served, not where the business is located. It appears as a separate line on the invoice or statement, and applicable taxes are added on top of it.

Statements and tax documents are downloaded from the Documents page in the Billing menu. According to Google, these documents are not sent by email or post for accounts that do not use monthly invoicing. Google does not give tax advice. For bookkeeping and tax filing, consult your accountant. This section is not legal or financial advice.

What to check in the first weeks

On the first day, check the approval status of your ads and whether your conversion actions have moved to Active. According to the Help Center, if a review takes more than two full business days you should check the ad's status, and if it takes more than a week you should contact the Google Ads support team.

In the first weeks, the most informative report is the search terms report. It shows the real searches that triggered your ad. Terms unrelated to your business go on the negative list, and terms that bring inquiries are considered as separate keywords. In this period, also check whether the budget runs out early in the day and whether the ad is shown in areas you do not serve.

If you use Smart Bidding, do not change the budget and targets often before the learning phase ends. Looking at a single metric misleads. Read spend, number of conversions and cost per conversion together, and compare how many inquiries actually turned into business against your own records. No setup guarantees a certain number of inquiries or sales. The first period is when you learn which searches work.

If you plan to advertise on Instagram and Facebook, the Meta side of the same steps is covered in our guide to running Instagram ads. If you are thinking of handing the account to an agency or specialist, the questions to ask when you choose a Google Ads agency can be used in the first meeting.