Negative Keywords in Google Ads: How to Stop Wasting Budget as a Tradesperson

The 500 euros that never customer yields

Painter Marc spends €500 a month on Google Ads. He gets clicks, but hardly any calls. When I ask him to open his search terms report, it's full of searches like “DIY wall painting step-by-step guide”, “painter's tape tips”, “Gamma paint roller offer”, and “MBO painter training”. People looking for DIY tips, study opportunities, or cheap materials. None of those people want to hire Marc.

That's the problem with missing negative keywords. Not his advert. Not his landing page. Simply that Google shows his advert to people who never need a tradesperson, and Marc pays for it.

And Marc isn't the only one. Handymen, gardeners, plumbers, roofers. With almost everyone who starts with Google Ads without guidance, I see the same pattern. A list of keywords that looks good on paper, but where nobody has filled in the blocklist. The result: every day you leak budget to people who will never become your customer.

Negative keywords are search terms that you do not want your adverts to appear for. actually

If you create an advert for the keyword “painter”, Google will show your advert to anyone who uses that word in a search query. At first glance, that seems logical. But in practice, it means you’ll also be paying for searches such as “painter Vincent van Gogh”, “become a painter job vacancies” and “painter delivery time for brown paint”. People who’ll never actually ring you.

Negative keywords are the words and phrases you pass on to Google as a signal: DO NOT show my ad if someone searches for this. You consciously block certain searches before they cost you budget. Such a block list costs nothing extra and only needs to be set up properly once. After that, Google itself filters out the irrelevant searches.

In practice, the difference is significant. A DIY enthusiast without a negative keyword list spends, on average, 20 to 30% of their monthly budget on clicks from people who never actually ring them. With a well-configured list, that figure can be reduced to five per cent or less. On a budget of 500 euros a month, that quickly adds up to a saving of 100 euros, without you spending a single cent more on Google. You can then invest that 100 euros in better clicks, or simply keep it in your pocket.

Why do craftsmen do this so often miss

Google Ads has a wizard that allows you to set up a campaign in twenty minutes. This wizard asks for your keywords, your budget, your location, and your ad copy. The wizard says almost nothing about negative keywords. It's an extra step that you have to look up and add yourself. Google doesn't have much interest in helping you pay less, so they don't actively promote that step either.

Many tradespeople who start with Google Ads themselves don't even realise that negative keywords exist. Others know, but think: "I'll do that later." Later then never comes. And a third group once set something up, but that was three years ago and they haven't touched it since, even though their campaigns have been significantly expanded.

The other problem is that Google will be matching queries more and more aggressively by 2026. Broad match, the default setting for new keywords, now also matches synonyms, related search queries and even topics that Google itself associates with your keyword. This means that your advert for “hire a painter” could also appear for “apply for council painting work” or “report paint damage to your insurer”. These are search queries that have absolutely nothing to do with you, but for which you’ll still pay if someone clicks on your ad. Without an up-to-date exclusion list, you’ll be wasting budget every single day.

And it's not getting any better. Google has also adjusted the budget calculation as of June 1st., meaning that small advertisers can quickly end up paying 30% more than they expected. This makes a good block list all the more urgent.

Concrete blacklist for DIYers, painters and gardeners

Below is a starting list which you can use immediately. These are common search terms that cost clicks without generating leads. They are based on search term reports from tradespeople in the regions where TheSEO operates. No theory, just what we're actually seeing come through.

Add these terms as a negative phrase (more on this in the next section). This will block any searches containing this combination, without blocking relevant searches.

For DIYers and contractors:

• DIY manual
• Key course
• Buy building materials
• DIY store offer
• DIY
• Vacancies
• Access training
• Internship
• free advice
• Wikipedia

For painters:

• buy a verification
• painter's tape
• verfrol gamma
• gamma practice
• Painting apprenticeship
• Painter vacancy
• painter
• Vincent van Gogh
• Tips voor het zelf schilderen
• DIY painting

For gardeners:

• Order plants online
• seed list
• Tips for creating your own garden
• Horticulture training
• Trainee Green Spaces Vacancy
• start a vegetable patch
• Garden design inspiration

This is a starter list. After two weeks, we recommend opening your search terms report and seeing what comes up. You'll see searches that no one could have predicted beforehand but that match your campaign. Add those to your blocklist. This is how that list gets sharper over time.

Phrase match versus exact negative nel 2026

There are three types of negative keywords in Google Ads: broad negative, phrase negative, and exact negative. For tradespeople, the choice isn't actually that complicated, even though Google does everything it can to make it seem more complicated than it is.

Broad negative keywords block too aggressively. If you set “painter” as a broad negative, Google will also block “hire painter Amsterdam”, making your ad completely invisible to anyone searching for a painter. You don't want that.

For most terms, negative keywords are the best choice. You enter “do it yourself painting” as a negative keyword, and Google will block any search query containing that word combination. Searchers for “DIY wall painting tips” or “DIY exterior painting steps” will no longer see your ad. However, “hire a painter Rotterdam” will remain visible. This way, you maintain control without blocking too much.

Exact match negative keywords only block the exact search query. You use this for specific terms that you are very sure will not result in a conversion and are not part of a phrase. Competitor names are a good example, or product names of materials that you do not sell. In most cases, phrase negative keywords suffice, and you will hardly need to use exact match negative keywords.

Another helpful point: in 2026, Google made Performance Max campaigns slightly more flexible when it comes to negative keywords. You can now set up to 100 negative keywords per Performance Max campaign, something that was virtually impossible before. If you’re running PMax alongside a Search Network campaign, make sure to include your best phrase negatives there as well. Otherwise, you’ll still end up paying for the same poor-quality clicks through that channel.

This is how you set it, step by step

Go to your Google Ads account at ads.google.com. In the left-hand menu, click “Keywords” and then “Negative keywords”. You will now see the existing negative keywords for your campaign, or an empty list if you haven't set anything up yet.

You can set negative keywords at the campaign level or the ad group level. Campaign level is the strongest as it blocks across the entire campaign. Use ad group level only if you want to block a specific keyword for a specific group but not for the rest of your campaign.

For most professionals, we recommend creating a shared negative keyword list. This is a central list that you can link to multiple campaigns. If you later create a second campaign for a different service, you can link the same list and you’ll be protected straight away. That way, you only need to keep it up to date once. You can find this under “Tools” (the key icon at the top of your account), then “Shared library”, then “Negative keyword lists”.

Create a new list, give it a recognisable name such as “General Tradesperson Blocklist” and add the keywords. Use quotation marks for negative phrases, or select “Phrase” from the dropdown menu if available. Save the list and then link it to your active campaigns via the “Apply to campaigns” button.

This might take you half an hour the first time. After that, maintenance is minimal. Set a monthly alarm on your phone for “check Google Ads search terms report”. Fifteen minutes a month is enough to discover new bad search terms and add them to your list. The longer you do this, the sharper your list becomes and the more you save.

Would you like to know how your Google Ads campaign is getting on? Then read our article on whether Google Ads really works for tradespeople., or see how Google Local Services Ads can be an alternative where you only pay per lead.

Frequently asked questions about negative keywords