What Is The Difference Between Google Search Ads And Display Ads?

What is the difference between search and display for Google Ads? They're two different networks completely, and you shouldn't be running the same campaign on the search as well as display, because the metrics are completely different. Is going to make things very difficult for you to understand the data. What I would recommend is you run a search campaign separately and a display campaign separately.

So let's look at the search campaign and how we separate this out. We go into our account, go to campaigns, new campaign, and you select a goal. I’ll say, let's select the leads, and you've got the choice over here. So search campaign is when somebody goes on Google and searches for something like this. So when I go to Google and search for a product or a service, the shopping ad came up over here and a couple of ads popped up on here. That is the search campaign.

The display campaigns are these ones where you go to websites like Huffington Post, The New York Times, ESPN, BBC, and you see all these ads, banner ads as well as text ads, pop up, as well as on YouTube, when you see these banner ads or video, in-stream video ads, which play before your video starts. These are on the display network. Hence I said earlier on that they are completely two different networks and you must always keep it separate.

Now, you must be thinking, why am I saying that I keep it separate when I’m selecting a campaign type over here? So if I select search, that does not mean that it will not show up on Google. So if I just select, this is why, what I meant. When you are running a search campaign, you must uncheck this box, because otherwise your ads are also going to run on the display network.

Although they will say easy way to get additional conversions at similar or lower cost than search with unused search budget, what you will find is most of the budget is going to be spent over here, and you probably will not get the same conversions at similar or lower cost than the search network, although the search network is expensive than the display network.

What I found is, when I do run campaigns on display network, I run them separately and with a different funnel, where we need to do a fair bit of remarketing as well, because there's no intent. That is the biggest difference between these two. You got to understand this network. Why would the conversion rate be a lot higher on search? Because when we have a problem, a pain or an emergency, we go to Google and search for the plumber or the carpenter or the car insurance and whatnot.

Whereas on the display network, we're going there for education, entertainment, browsing. We're not going to these websites or blogs to particularly search for something. We're just there to browse, and just like reading a magazine, you will see ads in there. You stumble upon a brand or a product, and the same thing applies over here on the display network. You need multiple touch points before somebody will consider you or your business to, and click on your ads.

Whereas on the search campaign, if you have got a leaking tap and you need a plumber, you are not going to be phoning 20 different plumbers to get the best price. You will just want somebody who is reasonable and who can come to your home or to your office as quickly as possible. Whereas on the display network is the complete opposite.

So this is why I said you should never put these two together in the same campaign. Always uncheck this, because this is checked as a default when you're setting up these campaigns. That's how you want to keep it.