How to Use Google Local Campaigns

Do you need to get more customers to walk through your door? I would like to welcome you to the world of local campaigns on Google.

This feature allows your company to promote its locations across Search, Maps, YouTube, and Display Network. Just add a little text and Google will do the rest. The overview will include what requirements are needed to run these campaigns and how to set them up.

The following are the basic requirements:

Almost goes without saying, but you're going to need a storefront that allows foot traffic. To put it simply, you need to be able to track store visit conversions which includes some minimum requirements. Google says:

• Own physical stores in all eligible countries. Check with your account representative to see if store visit conversions are available at your location.
• Get thousands of clicks and viewable impressions.
• Ensure that your Google Ads account is linked to Google My Business.
• You need to create each store location in your Google My Business account.
• A minimum of 90 percent of your linked locations must be verified in Google My Business.
• Make sure you have location extensions enabled on your account.
• Have enough store visits data to attribute to ad clicks or viewable impressions traffic on the backend, and pass our privacy thresholds.

Google utilizes a phone's GPS history to determine if someone visited your store after seeing an advertisement.

Next, prepare your Google Ads locations and ensure they are linked properly to Google my Business.

When you upload a new campaign, the objective to drive local traffic will appear when you complete all the steps.

How to Build a Campaign:

As this campaign is smart, it should be easy to build one. Ad assets and campaign budget are our most important levers. 

You'll be greeted by the familiar goal screen when you create your campaign. The process begins when you click on the local store visits and promotions option.

As a user, you have a few levers to pull but can create location groups. This is helpful if you have regional budgets or if you know that performance varies by region. Consider this to be similar to segmenting product feeds. It's good to group similar locations but it's not a necessity or something you'd want to do for every company.

As part of the next step, you set a campaign budget, language targeting, as well as the option to display a product feed if you wish.

The last step is to create an advertisement. These are basic ads that Google manages and distributes to various networks. In addition to testing traditional search options, it's recommended to test a variety of alternative ideas. In order to drive people to your store, it is important to grab their attention. A much greater ask than clicking a link on your website!

These are simple ads as you can see. Images and videos are important so be sure to use imagery that is eye-catching. If someone is searching for fashion clothes near them, it never hurts to show them a list of fashion stores with their offers:-)

In addition, I recommend constant testing to ensure you're consistently driving more customers to your stores. Adding your average order value to the in-store visit conversion action will allow you to see even more granular data.

The following tests are possible:

Despite limitations in campaign creation, you can run a number of tests to continually improve performance. Starting with audience targeting is a good place to start. You can test out new audiences by separating the recent visitors from the audience you have just reached.

Alternatively, you might think about testing the landing page of your website. If you’re a retail store, land people directly on a sales page. If you’re a restaurant, try the menu.

In-store traffic won't work for every business; however, it can be a valuable tool to ensure steady traffic to your brick and mortar store.

Bonus facts -

*These countries are currently supported by store visit conversion ads -

* If you are facing any issue with setting up this campaign then you can directly connect with Google support team.