Negative keywords for solar Google Ads

The keyword list is what your ads can show against. The negative keyword list is what they will never show against. Both are the same decision, from opposite ends. For solar contractors the second one usually matters more, because solar auction floors are high enough that one wasted click costs what three or four wasted clicks cost in most other home services.

An account that bids properly but filters badly loses money. An account that filters properly even at a modest budget starts paying for itself in month two. The broader account build sits in google ads for solar contractors.

This is the practical version: what to add before the first click, how to find the terms the starter list misses, and where each negative belongs.

Why negatives decide what the budget actually buys

Google Ads shows your ad on more terms than you added, because every match type except exact-match allows some looseness. On broad match, a lot. That looseness is why a residential install campaign can serve against 'solar panel diy kit uk' if nothing stops it. The auction wins the click, the click costs twelve dollars, the visitor was never a buyer, and the budget is a little smaller for the next real enquiry.

The job of a negative is to tell Google: never. Not with a lower bid, not with a worse ad, never. The budget is reserved for terms that can convert.

The six categories every solar account should exclude from day one

These are the categories almost every solar account should block at the account level before any ad serves:

1. 01DIY and research. Searchers teaching themselves. Not customers.
2. 02Jobs and education. People looking for work, salary information, or training. Not customers.
3. 03Free and cheap. Price-anchored to the wrong number. These leads call once and quote-chase forever.
4. 04Downloadable and digital. Downloadable solar calculators, PDFs, software. Different intent entirely.
5. 05Forum and comparison intent. Reddit, YouTube, Wikipedia, forums. Still researching, and your landing page is not the one they want.
6. 06Unrelated solar words. Solar system (planets), solar eclipse, solar lights (garden), solar oven. The word is overloaded.

Blocking these six categories at the account level removes the most obvious waste in one afternoon.

The starter list to paste into a new account

Add every term below as a phrase-match negative at the account level. Phrase match catches the close variants that exact match would miss.

• DIY and research. diy, do it yourself, build your own, build a, how to build, how to install, how to make, kit, kits, assembly, blueprint, blueprints, plan, plans, project, projects, instructable, tutorial, guide to, step by step
• Jobs and education. job, jobs, career, careers, salary, pay, wage, wages, apprentice, apprenticeship, hiring, hire me, resume, cv, course, courses, certification, nabcep, training, class, classes, degree, diploma, school, university, student
• Free and cheap. free, free install, free solar, no cost, no money, cheap, cheapest, bargain, discount, discounted, used, second hand, refurbished, surplus, auction, ebay, amazon, alibaba
• Downloadable and digital. download, downloads, pdf, pdfs, software, app, apps, template, templates, calculator, calc, spreadsheet, excel, estimator app
• Forum, comparison, research platforms. reddit, forum, forums, youtube, wikipedia, wiki, quora, review site, best of, top 10, top ten, versus, vs
• Unrelated solar words. solar system, solar eclipse, solar flare, solar wind, solar oven, solar cooker, solar lights, solar lamp, solar fountain, solar fence, solar watch, solar nails, solar battery charger, solar panel for rv, solar panel for boat, solar panel for camping

The last category is the longest in practice because solar is a surprisingly overloaded word. A single pass through the search terms report in month one usually adds twenty more.

How do you mine the search terms report for the ones you missed?

The starter list catches the obvious. The search terms report catches the ones specific to your market, your category, and the auction you are actually running in.

The process, in five steps:

1. 01Google Ads interface, Campaigns, Insights and reports, Search terms. Set the date range to the last 30 days.
2. 02Sort by cost, descending. The expensive wrong terms are the ones to kill first.
3. 03For each term in the top fifty, ask: would this searcher ever buy from me? If no, add as a negative at the right level. If yes but underperforming, that is a different problem, usually a landing page one.
4. 04Then sort by conversions equal to zero and impressions high. This finds the terms spending budget without producing results.
5. 05Repeat weekly for the first ninety days. The list grows fast at first, then slower, then settles into a monthly rhythm after about month four.

Most new solar accounts find thirty to sixty market-specific negatives in month one that the starter list did not catch. That is not a problem with the starter list; it is the point of the search terms report. The downstream signal that tells you which keywords are converting lives in solar Google Ads conversion tracking.

Should the negative sit at account, campaign or ad group level?

Three levels, three different jobs.

Account-level negatives are the absolute no. Terms that no part of the account should ever show for: diy, jobs, free, pdf, reddit, solar eclipse. The starter list above is almost all account level.

Campaign-level negatives block one campaign from stealing another's traffic. On a residential install campaign, add 'battery' and 'ev charger' as negatives so install clicks go to the install campaign and battery clicks go to the battery campaign. Without this, campaigns cannibalise each other, which looks like one performing well and the others badly when really all four are tangled.

Ad group-level negatives are fine-tuning inside a campaign. If an ad group targets 'solar panel installation' and a sibling ad group targets 'solar panel installation cost', add 'cost' as a negative in the first ad group so the cost query goes to the cost ad group, where the ad and landing page are built for it.

The rule: put the negative at the lowest level that works. Account-level blocks everything; campaign-level blocks within a campaign; ad group-level blocks within one ad group. Lower is more surgical.

What match type should negatives use?

Negative match types work differently from positive match types, which is where most installers get caught.

• Negative broad match blocks any search that contains all the words, in any order, with other words allowed. Narrow in practice. Rarely the right default.
• Negative phrase match blocks any search that contains the words in that order, with other words before or after. This is the right default for almost all negatives.
• Negative exact match blocks only that exact query. Use sparingly, usually to block one specific wrong term when a close variant should still be allowed.

The practical rule: add negatives as phrase match. The ones above are written to be pasted as phrase match without modification.