This is the most useful report in Google Ads and the least often opened. It shows the actual searches that triggered your ads, which on anything other than exact match is frequently unrecognisable from the keywords you chose.

The gap between the two is where a small budget quietly disappears.

Finding it

Open the campaign, then Insights and reports, then Search terms. You can also reach it from the keyword view.

Set the date range to the last 30 days and add these columns: cost, clicks, conversions, cost per conversion, and match type.

How to read it

Sort by cost, descending. Start where the money went. A term that consumed R800 and produced nothing matters far more than one that cost R12.

Then work down the list asking one question of each row: could this person have become a customer?

Three answers, three actions.

Answer	Action
No, never	Add as a negative keyword
Yes, and it converted	Add as an exact match keyword
Maybe, no conversions yet	Leave it, review next month

What to exclude, with South African examples

Job seekers. "plumber jobs pretoria", "electrician salary south africa". Common, expensive, and never a customer.

DIY. "how to fix a leaking geyser", "replace geyser element yourself".

Training. "plumbing course", "electrical certificate training".

Wrong geography. Any city or suburb you do not serve. This is worth checking carefully, because location targeting does not prevent someone in your area searching for a service in another one.

Wrong product. "second hand geyser", "geyser element price" when you sell installation, not parts.

Competitor names, unless you are deliberately bidding on them.

Free. "free plumbing advice", "free quote template".

Negative match types

Negatives have match types too, and getting them wrong either blocks too much or too little.

Broad negative -jobs blocks any search containing that word. Good for words that are never relevant.

Phrase negative -"geyser element" blocks searches containing that phrase.

Exact negative -[plumber] blocks only that exact search.

Build a shared negative keyword list at account level for the universal ones such as jobs, free, DIY and course, then apply it to every campaign. Campaign-specific negatives handle the rest.

One caution: check that a negative does not block terms you want. Adding -repair to stop repair enquiries on an installation campaign will also block "geyser repair and replacement", which you may want.

Promoting the winners

Terms that converted deserve to become keywords in their own right, usually on exact match.

Doing so gives you deliberate control of the bid, lets you write ad copy that matches the query exactly, which raises quality score, and stops the term competing for budget against unrelated searches in the same ad group.

This half of the report is the one most people skip. Cutting waste protects the budget; promoting winners grows the account.

Why some terms are missing

Google withholds queries searched by very few people, for privacy reasons. So the report never accounts for 100% of spend, and the unattributed share is larger in Performance Max than in Search campaigns.

That is one more reason Search campaigns suit small budgets: you can see more of where the money went.

The routine

Weekly for the first two months, then fortnightly. Ten minutes each time. Sort by cost, add negatives, promote converters.

On a small budget this single habit does more for cost per lead than any bidding strategy.

Juicy Designs works the search terms report weekly on every managed account. See Google Ads management or a free account audit. Related: negative keywords and match types on a small budget.

Frequently asked questions

How do I read the Google Ads search terms report?

Find it under the campaign's Insights and reports menu. It shows the actual queries that triggered your ads, as opposed to the keywords you chose. Sort by cost, read the top rows, and add anything irrelevant as a negative keyword.

How is it different from my keyword list?

Your keywords are what you bid on. Search terms are what people actually typed. On broad and phrase match the two can be very different, and the gap between them is where wasted spend lives.

How often should I check it?

Weekly for the first two months, then fortnightly. On a small budget it is the single most valuable routine in the account.

Why can I not see all my search terms?

Google withholds terms searched by very few people for privacy reasons, so a share of spend appears without query detail. The proportion is larger in Performance Max than in Search campaigns.

What do I do with terms that convert well?

Add them as their own keyword, usually on exact match, so you can bid on them deliberately and write ad copy that matches them precisely.