Common Google Ads Mistakes That Kill eCommerce Profit (And How to Avoid Them)

So, you fancy yourself a Google Ads aficionado running a lean, mean ecommerce machine? Good for you. But before you start high-fiving your marketing team, let’s talk about the oh-so-common mistakes quietly destroying your profit. Forget about “rookie errors” — some of these blunders are made by brands spending into the tens of thousands. Let’s cut through the fluff and get to what’s genuinely holding back your profit… and most importantly, how to fix it.

You Don’t Know What a Conversion Actually Is

Yes, you read that correctly. Google makes it so easy to “track conversions” that many eCommerce teams end up counting everything from newsletter signups to random add-to-carts as wins. Here’s the catch: if you’re optimising for every click, scroll, and distracted window-shopper, your campaigns are optimising for nothing.

Classic Blunders:

• Tracking phone number clicks as “leads” when no sale occurred

• Counting every add-to-basket as a conversion

• Not distinguishing between actual purchases and other micro-actions

Why Does This Wreck Profit? Optimising for vanity metrics rather than hard revenue lets Google spend your budget in ways that bring you volume, not value. The result? Fantastic “conversion” numbers, dreadful profit.

How to Fix It: Set up your conversions so only real revenue actions (completed purchases, revenue from carts, actual phone orders) are counted. Use distinct conversion actions tailored to your eCommerce objectives. Consider reading more on this in our post on understanding conversions.

Your Conversion Tracking Is an Inconsistent Mess

Let’s talk attribution. If your Google Ads account is running a mixture of conversion windows, attribution models (last click, data-driven, etc.), or double-logged purchase events, congratulations: no one can actually trust your data.

Where It All Goes Wrong:

• One product counts conversions for 90 days, another for 7

• You’re mixing ‘every conversion’ and ‘one conversion’ metrics interchangeably

• Some sales are tracked multiple times, others not at all

The Fallout: You can’t optimise what you can’t measure. Sloppy conversion tracking means you can’t scale profit. And no, Google’s default settings are not there to help you make more money.

How to Put Things Right:

• Use one conversion action for sales, with a standard window (usually 30 days)

• Select “one conversion” unless you want to count every purchase item as a new sale (rare for eCommerce)

• Align your Google Analytics and Google Ads settings — double tracking does you no favours

You’re Overcomplicating Campaign Structure for No Good Reason

Remember when having 17 different campaigns, 60 ad groups, and every match type under the sun looked impressive? Like a peacock showing off its feathers, except the feathers are wasted spend.

Where Brands Go Overboard:

• Dozens of nearly-identical campaigns for single products or locations

• Excessive segmentation by gender, colour, season, etc

• Overlapping keyword targeting between campaigns

How It Kills Profit: Google isn’t any smarter for all the noise. In reality, it spreads your budget painfully thin and triggers unwanted internal competition (your ads outbidding… your other ads).

Get It Sorted: Keep it simple: one campaign for each meaningful segment. Think top sellers or categories. Test multi-ad group setups sparingly and only if there’s a clear reason (different ROAS targets, seasonal promos, etc). Let Google’s machine learning work with enough conversion data instead of drowning it in micro-segments.

Ditching Exact Match: Because Broad Is Always Better… Said No One Ever

If you’ve let Google “upgrade” all your keywords to broad or phrase match, you’ve handed over the keys to your profit. Google’s suggestions aren’t always in your brand’s best interest.

Misguided Moves:

• Removing exact match for convenience or “automation”

• Letting Google suggest keywords with their dubious ‘Add All’ button

Why It Hurts Profit: Broad match loves to bring you volume, including utterly irrelevant traffic. Even phrase match has blurred lines these days. Exact match, like a loyal hound, consistently fetches the highest-intent buyers.

The Fix:

• Always use exact match for core SKU terms

• Build out broad and phrase match ad groups after exact match has proven the concept

• Regularly review search term reports to see the true cost of Google’s “helpful” broad suggestions

Need the data breakdown? Our team explains the measurement mess most agencies skip here.

Sloppy Geotargeting: Advertising in Antarctica, Are We?

The default setting for geotargeting in Google Ads? “Presence or interest.” Translation: the algorithm will happily show your ads to users interested in your location… even if they’re physically nowhere close, or can’t even receive your products.

How Brands Get Burned:

• International sales enabled by mistake

• UK-only delivery but ads running in Ireland, USA or worse

• Wild, inaccurate targeting burning through budget

What It Costs You: Budget wasted on unshippable customers and bloated location reports.

How to Fix It:

• Switch to “Presence” only in geotargeting settings

• Check (and regularly review) your excluded locations

• If you’re UK-only, stick to the UK (yes, really). No exceptions unless there’s a fulfilment reason

Neglecting Negative Keywords: Unwelcome Guests Consuming Your Budget

It’s classic: you set your negatives at campaign launch and figure “job done.” Unfortunately, new irrelevant search terms slip through every single day.

Common Oversights:

• Forgetting to review search term reports

• Allowing “free”, “jobs”, “reviews” or competitors’ search terms to slip in

Why It Matters: Every irrelevant click squeezes your margin, especially if cost-per-click is high. Over time, you’ll see your CPA creep into unmanageable territory.

Smart Solutions:

• Review search term reports weekly (daily, if possible)

• Add obvious exclusions — brand names, “review” variants, non-buyer intent keywords

• Don’t just set it and forget it; make negative keywords a living list

You Hate Testing, Apparently

The Amazons and Booking.coms of the world are constantly running experiments, iterating through thousands of ad copy, creative, and offer tests annually. But most eCommerce brands? Sporadic, at best — sometimes none at all.

Where You’re Going Wrong:

• Never running A/B tests on creative, targeting, or landing pages

• Launching a single ad with the hope it’ll become your golden goose

• Ending tests too soon and acting on incomplete data

You’re Leaving Profit on the Table: Without real testing, you’re flying blind. Your Google Ads account stagnates, your competitors leapfrog you, and Google’s machine learning has nothing fresh to chew on.

How to Do It Properly:

• Run at least one test per campaign at all times

• Change one variable at a time (ad text, landing page, audience)

• Give tests minimum two weeks or three conversion cycles for valid results

• Document what works, bin what doesn’t

Obsessing Over ROAS (and Forgetting What Actually Moves the Needle)

Are you optimising for the highest possible ROAS and treating your Google Ads dashboard like the gospel? Bad news: high ROAS doesn’t always equal profit. If you only chase ROAS, you may miss opportunities to expand profitable sales or ignore higher-value customer types.

Classic Pitfalls:

• Ignoring customer lifetime value in ad spend decisions

• Prioritising cheap wins over sustainable, scalable sales growth

• Focusing on short-term metrics, not strategic growth

What You Should Do Instead:

• Align PPC strategy to overall business objectives (growth, retention, new customers)

• Consider lifetime value, market share, and other metrics — not just ROAS

• Use your data to drive adjusted, nuanced bidding strategies

For a dose of PPC reality, see how we recommend measuring profitability.

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Final Word: If you recognise your eCommerce brand in even two of these mistakes, rejoice! That’s your shortcut to recovering wasted budget and listing “growth” (not “Google Ads frustration”) as your top achievement this quarter.

For more no-nonsense guidance, check out the JudeLuxe blog or drop our team a line. Let’s make this the year Google actually works for your profit.