Google Ads Complete Guide - How to Set Up Google Ads and Complete Google Ads Verification Form

If your Google ads account is paused Complete Google Ads business operations Verification Form to resume your campaigns.

To provide a safe and trustworthy advertising ecosystem for all Google Ads (Google AdWords) users, Google now requires advertisers to complete one or more verification programs to continue advertising.

There are various verification programs that Google will require advertisers to complete, however, today we talk about the Advertiser verification program. But before we get to that, let's talk about Google ads and How they work.

What are Google Ads and How do they Work?

With Google ads, you can show up when people search for what you offer. It helps you get your business in front of customers as they are searching business like yours on the Google search engine and display network. Google ads helps you grow your business online, no matter your industry or niche.

How do Google Ads Work?

Remember that Google is where people go to search for where to go, where to eat, and what to buy, you can set up your campaign based on certain keywords and your business will appear when people search for those keywords.

You always include something called a Call To Action (CTA) on your ads and only pay for when you get the results you are looking for. Your Call to Action can be a more phone calls, website visits, Clicks on your link, Video views, or personal visits to your physical store or business location via Google maps.

In addition to helping you reach the right people and relevant customers, Google ads has a smart technology (AI) that help you improve your ads over time by suggesting changes and custom audiences based on your ads settings and target audience. This helps you get more of the results that actually matter to your business.

How is Google Ads Different from Google AdSense?

Google ads - is an online advertising (Google's pay-per-click - PPC) platform developed by Google that enables all businesses of all sizes, from all around the world, to promote a wide variety of products (for eCommerce sites), services (for Insurance companies, Real estate agencies, Digital marketing agencies), Mobile apps and games (applications on Google Play Store), and websites on the Google Ads network.

Advertisers can bid to display text-based or video ads (brief advertisements), their service offerings, and product listing (online shopping or ecommerce shops).

Google AdSence - is a program run by Google through which content creators (website publishers, bloggers of all sorts) apply to join the Google Network of content sites and serve text, images, or video advertisements to visitors. These ads are targeted to the site content and audience. These advertisements are from the Google ads program.

If you own a website, mobile application, or YouTube channel, you can earn money with website monetization, or YouTube channel monetization from the Google AdSense program. Ads are optimized for all sizes of screens.

The Google Ads Network (Types of Google Ads to run)

1. Google Search Ads

Google Search Ads appear on Google search engine results pages especially at the top. You can tell it's an ad by a small text on the top right corner of the result. They allow you to place ads across Google's vast network of search results, including Gmail search.

You can place ads in front of (highly relevant audience) people who are actively searching online for your products and services to help you grow online sales, increase website traffic, and lead generation.

Tip: Two Ways to Create ad groups

• Standard: Use keywords related to searches and create ads to match them.

• Dynamic: Use website content to automatically target searches and create ads.

2. Google Display Ads

Display ad campaigns serve visually engaging ads (Display ads examples include images, videos, or gifs to users on websites or apps) on the Google display network. These are displayed on other people's websites sometimes as images, text, or even videos.

They appear in between posts on Blog feeds, and in between content in blog articles, as well as side panels especially for news sites. The Display network helps you specifically target millions of people as they browse millions of websites.

3. YouTube Video Ads

With over 2 Billion active users, there isn't a better platform for you to promote your videos. Google has over the years developed smarter targeting options and deeper audience insights that don't require expert knowledge to promote your video on YouTube.

With Google Ads, you can create video campaigns from a range of video ad formats to engage your relevant customers in different ways on YouTube and across Google's video partner sites.

Some of Google YouTube video ads examples include:

• Skippable in-stream ads

• Non-skippable in-stream ads

• In-feed video ads)

You can choose who you want to see your video ads based on many factors like location, interests targeting, demographic, and more.

Pro Tip: If you want to get your business online, learn Digital Marketing or Google ads and get certified, check out Google's Skillshop to get Google ads Certified, Google Video ads certified, or Google Search ads Certification.

People watch all sorts of videos, from business knowledge, programming, Graphic design, Science and Psychology, the list goes on. YouTube video ads is the best way to get real views and grow your YouTube channel fast.

4. Shopping Ads

Google shopping ads feature detailed information about specific products that you sell. These types of ads especially work if you do print designs, or have a retail even whole sale business. You can use shopping campaigns to promote your online and local inventory, boost website traffic, and personal visits to your local (physical) store.

How to Set up Google Shopping Ads

• To create shopping ads, start by creating a Google Merchant account

• Upload your product (details) information into the Google Merchant Center.

• Be sure to connect your Google ads account with the Google Merchant account.

• Set up and run a Shopping campaigns in Google Ads.

What are Requirements for Running Google Ads?

To start using Google Ads for your business or brand, you will need a Google Ads account. Just like you need a Facebook Ads account. In the last article we looked at how to get started with Facebook Ads.

• Email - To create your Google Ads account, you will need an email address

• Website - and a website to send (Website traffic) people to. In the last video, I showed you how to create a Free Website using the Free Drag-and-drop Wix Website Builder.

But, even if you don't have a website, yet, you can still create and manage (run Google ads campaigns) that reach users looking for your products or services on YouTube, Display, and Google Search. You can choose from various goals, like Getting more calls or more visits to your physical store via Google maps.

Once you have your Google ads login, you can visit the Google ads website to either create your first ad, go to Google ads settings to customize your Google ads account, or go the Google ads manager in case you have campaigns running.

But as we mentioned earlier, Google now requires advertisers to go through a verification program. So what is the Advertiser Verification Program?

What is the Advertiser verification program

The Advertiser verification program is Google’s unified verification program that consolidates identity and business operations verification. Under this program, advertisers will be asked to provide basic information about their business and identity.

Google will use this information to show a disclosure including your name, or the name of the business you represent, and location, linked to any ads you run.

The program comprises a series of steps that advertisers will be required to follow and complete. Below is a very easy to follow step-by-step guide.

Step 1: Start from the Email you received about the Advertiser Verification Program

You will receive an email that includes a verification link (button). Once you get this email, you (advertiser) will have 30 days to initiate the verification and another 30 days to complete it.

Advertisers will be notified via an email and an in-account notification when they have been selected for the Advertiser verification program. Below are the details of the Advertiser verification program.

Step 2: Start Advertiser Verification with Business Info

Start your Google ads advertiser verification by adding your business operations information. In this step, you will answer a series of questions in a checkbox option format. For example:

• You will have to choose whether you an affiliate (who advertises other brands and services on a per-conversion basis), brand, or if you manage ads for clients as an organization/agency but also run your own ad campaigns (self-advertise).

• Then you will have to choose whether you are in this case verifying your own or one of your client's Google ad account.

Step 3: Do you manufacture Products or offer Services?

This step is very important. Google needs to know whether you are a manufacturer of the products you will be promoting with Google ads. If you don't produce the products, it means you might be offering services like insurance (not one of the agents), social media marketing and website design services, among others.

What is most important here is for Google to understand whether the products on your website are your own.

For example, online marketplaces like eBay, Fiverr, Upwork, Jiji, Real estate agents, Dealerships and franchises, fall among the advertiser category that is not selling their own products or do not manufacture their own products.

Step 4: What is your Business Industry or Niche

Here you choose between various business categories and industry from hundreds of options. You can choose from Sports, People & Society, Shopping, news, Advertising and marketing, among others.

By the way, if you want to get into YouTube video ads that appear as skippable videos, search ads that appear on top of the search results pages, or display ads that appear in other people's websites in blog feeds and side bars, check out the YouTube channel.

Step 5: Upload Personal Identification Documents

Now that we are done entering the business information, it's time to enter our own personal Google ads identity verification information. You can say, there is the Google Ads business operations Verification Form and the Personal info Verification Form.

You will also need an ID of any type. It can be a Driver's Licence, Passport, Residence permit, or your National Identity card. You need the front and back photo of the ID.

You complete this step by entering your legal name, as it appears on the ID you have chosen to upload for verification. And then your address, followed by uploading your Identification documents both front and back.

How much Do Ads on Google Cost? Is Google ads free?

You can start from $1 per day based on your campaign objective, business goals, and your budget. Google ads give you control over your advertising budget while reaching relevant customers, by allowing you to choose a budget that fits your goals and works for you business.

You can set a monthly budget cap if you are limited and you will never go over it. Better yet, when you visit Google ads manager, you can adjust your settings and budget however and whenever you want.

But I must say that the amount of traffic you can get from a very small budget is almost as if Google ads is for free. I think the return is unbelievable especially if you are running Video ads on YouTube. In think Google video ads are by far the cheapest.

How to Set Up your Google Ads account for Success.

1. Use Google Analytics

Make sure you install Google analytics and connect it to your Google ads account. This will help you monitor, and measure the results from your Google advertising budget. Google analytics also helps you run retargeted or remarketing campaigns.

2. Use Google Search Console

When we talk about Google Analytics, other tools like the Google Search Console are not left out. This is because Google Search Console gives you more details about your website traffic.

For example, it lays out in list format, the most visited pages, the most searched keywords people use to get to your website, as well as monitor site speed and performance as it regularly suggests improvements.

3. Use Google ads Keyword Planner

Google ads keyword planner is a free yet very powerful online tool that helps advertisers find the right keywords and target the right people. When you use Google ads, you get access to very important tools to help you grow your traffic. Some of these tools include the Google ads keyword planner.

With the right keywords, your ads can get to the right people. Google ads keyword planner has all the keyword ideas.

4. Optimize your Landing Page

Before you launch your ads campaign, cross check to make sure you are sending people to the right website. Luckily for you, Google automatically checks and verifies the link for you.

There are basically 2 Types of keywords

Long-tail keywords - These a long search queries consisting of two or more words.

Short-tail keywords - These a short and more precise queries of one to two words.

The keyword planner is a long-tail and short-tail keywords generator that helps you research keywords for your search campaigns while you discover new keywords related to your business (or niche). It also gives you estimates of the searches they receive and the cost, if you want to target these keywords in your ad.

Conclusion

That is how to go about completing the Google Ads business operations Verification Form. If you are not an advertiser or didn't even know about Google ads, I believe you have learned a thing or two about getting started with your Google ads account, and even how to run basic ads on YouTube from our last Google ads tutorial.

If you want to get into Google advertising, it's free, you can follow this link to get started.

We have covered a lot about Google ads in this post including types of ads you can run, and tools you can use to generate keyword (long tail and short tail keywords) ideas for your campaigns.

By the way, if you are looking for a digital marketing agency in Uganda to help you run the Google advertising campaigns, check out our agency, Silverstar Digital.

And if you want to learn other digital marketing strategies you can use to grow your business online, check out our detailed Digital marketing guide for the 7 digital marketing categories, including Social media marketing, Search Engine optimization, Content marketing, among others.