Google Ads Quality Score explained for service businesses

Two plumbers bid on "blocked drain repair" in the same city. One regularly pays much more per click than the other and still shows lower on the page. Budget is part of the story. Relevance is another part, and Quality Score is how Google shows you where you stand.

What Quality Score is

Google describes Quality Score as a diagnostic tool that shows how your ad quality compares with other advertisers. It is reported per keyword on a scale of 1 to 10, and has three components:

1. Expected click-through rate. How likely your ad is to be clicked when shown for that keyword.
2. Ad relevance. How closely the ad matches the intent of the search.
3. Landing page experience. How relevant and useful the landing page is to people who click.

Each is rated below average, average, or above average compared with other advertisers.

Why it matters

Google says the score itself is not an input in the ad auction. But the same factors feed into Ad Rank, which decides whether your ad shows, where it shows, and what you pay. In practice, relevant ads with good landing pages tend to cost less per click.

How to improve each component

Expected click-through rate

• Put the service and location in the headline
• Use ad assets such as call, sitelink and callout assets
• Add proof: ratings, years in business, guarantees
• Remove keywords that trigger your ad for unrelated searches, using negative keywords

Ad relevance

• Group keywords tightly by service, so each ad group has one clear theme
• Write ads that speak to that theme, not general "we do everything" ads
• Separate emergency searches from planned-work searches

Landing page experience

• Send each ad group to a page about that service
• Make the page fast and easy to use on mobile
• Confirm what the ad promised in the headline
• Check it against the landing page checklist

When not to chase it

• Low-volume keywords with few impressions can show unstable scores.
• Branded competitor keywords will often have low scores. That can be fine if they produce leads at a good cost.
• A high score is not the goal. A keyword with a score of 5 that produces jobs cheaply is better than a 9 that produces none.

Judge keywords on cost per booked job first. Use Quality Score to find out why some are more expensive than they should be.

Where to start

Add the Quality Score columns to your keywords report and sort by spend. Look at the three component ratings for your top ten keywords and fix whichever is "below average". For structure, see Google Ads for service businesses.

We review Quality Score as part of our Google Ads management. Request a free audit for a look at yours.

Questions owners ask

What is a good Quality Score?

Scores of 7 and above are generally considered good. For most service businesses, getting important keywords from below average to average on each component is where the value is.

Does Quality Score affect cost per click?

Not directly, as Google says it is not used in the auction. The factors behind it do affect Ad Rank and so what you pay.

Why is my Quality Score showing a dash?

A dash appears when a keyword does not have enough impressions or clicks for Google to calculate a score.

How is Quality Score calculated?

Google rates three components for each keyword as above average, average or below average: expected click-through rate, ad relevance and landing page experience. Together they produce a score from 1 to 10. Google describes it as a diagnostic tool, not a direct input into the ad auction.

Sources

• About Quality Score (Google Ads Help)
• About Ad Rank (Google Ads Help)