Quality Score is a 1 to 10 rating per keyword, made up of expected click-through rate, ad relevance and landing page experience. Google calls it a diagnostic, says it is not an input in the ad auction and advises against optimising for it. A chauffeur company should check the keywords that spend the most, see which part is rated low, fix that and judge the result by enquiries and bookings.
What is Quality Score, and does it matter?
Quality Score is a number from 1 to 10 that Google Ads gives each keyword. Google describes it as “a diagnostic tool meant to give you a sense of how well your ad quality compares to other advertisers”. It is useful for finding a problem, and it should not be a goal in itself.
Google is clear on two points that most advice gets wrong. “Quality Score is not an input in the ad auction”, and Google says it is not a key performance indicator, so you should not optimise for it or average it with your other figures. A chauffeur company with a 6 on a keyword that brings profitable bookings is in a better place than one with a 9 on a keyword that brings none.
So read it the way you would read a warning light on a dashboard. It tells you where to look, and your enquiries and bookings tell you whether anything needs fixing.
What is it made of?
Quality Score combines three parts, and each of them is rated Above average, Average or Below average against other advertisers whose ads showed for the same search over the last 90 days. The overall number matters less than which part is low.
- Expected click-through rate “The likelihood that your ad will be clicked when shown.”
- Ad relevance “How closely your ad matches the intent behind a user’s search.”
- Landing page experience “How relevant and useful your landing page is to people who click your ad.”
You can see all three in your account. In the keywords view, add the columns for Quality Score, expected click-through rate, ad relevance and landing page experience. If you see a dash, Google says there “aren’t enough searches that exactly match your keywords” to give a score. For a chauffeur company with a small account this is common on long, specific searches, and it needs no action.
Which keywords should you look at?
Look only at the ones that spend real money. Sort your keywords by cost and take the top ten or twenty. A low score on a keyword that spent €4 last month is not worth your afternoon, while a below-average rating on your main airport keyword may be costing you every day.
Then look at each of those keywords next to the numbers that pay your bills: enquiries, cost per enquiry and bookings. A low-scoring keyword with a good cost per lead can be left alone for now, or improved when you have time. A low score with a poor cost per lead is where to start.
What do you do about each part?
Each rating points to a different fix, so resist the temptation to rewrite everything at once.
| If this is low | What it usually means | What to try |
|---|---|---|
| Expected click-through rate | People see the ad and choose someone else | Put the route or service in the headline, add what the customer cares about (fixed price, flight tracking, vehicle type), and only say what is true |
| Ad relevance | The ad does not match what the person searched for | Split a broad ad group so that “Dublin airport transfer” and “corporate chauffeur” each get their own ad |
| Landing page experience | The page does not answer the search, or it is hard to use | Send the ad to the page for that route rather than your home page, and fix what is slow or awkward on a phone |
Ad relevance is usually the quickest to fix in a chauffeur account. Many accounts start with one ad group holding every keyword and one set of ads about the company. A person searching for an airport transfer sees an ad about chauffeur services in general, and the rating says so. Separating airport, corporate, wedding and tour searches into their own groups, each with its own ads and its own page, often helps both the rating and the results.
Landing page experience is often the most valuable one to work on, because whatever improves it also tends to bring more enquiries from the clicks you already pay for. The guide on landing page conversion rate goes through what to check.
Expected click-through rate is the most tempting to game, and it needs some care. A headline that promises the cheapest price may lift clicks and fill your inbox with people you cannot serve at a profit. Check what happens to your enquiries after you change an ad, and compare the ads by what they brought in, including who booked. Excluding the wrong searches with negative keywords can help too, as it removes people who were never going to click your ad.
How long should you wait after a change?
Allow a few weeks at least. The ratings compare you with others over the last 90 days, and a small account may need a good while to gather enough searches for anything to move. Change one thing at a time on one ad group, and write down the date. If you also change the budget and bidding that week, you will not be able to tell what helped.
Meanwhile, watch your cost per enquiry and your enquiries for that group. If those improve and the score stays the same, you have succeeded, and the number can catch up in its own time.
What should you ignore?
Be sceptical of anyone who sells you Quality Score as the main result of their work. An agency can raise the average on a report by pausing low-scoring keywords, some of which may have been bringing bookings. Ask to see the cost per enquiry and the number of bookings beside any Quality Score they show you.
Ignore account-wide averages as well, since Google itself says not to aggregate the figure. Ignore small moves too: a keyword going from 6 to 7 is not an event. And do not pause a keyword that books well because its score is low, as that would be fixing the warning light by removing the bulb.
If your account does not yet count real enquiries, Quality Score should wait, because you have no way of knowing which keywords matter. The conversion tracking guide comes first, followed by what a booking is worth. The Know which ads pay page shows how these fit together.