Подесување на Google Ads

Google Ads setup

You’ve probably had that month where the card gets charged, the clicks look “fine”, and still nothing real happens. No clean trail from spend to enquiries. No bookings you can confidently attribute. Just a report full of graphs and a feeling you’re being taken for a ride.

This service is for small tourism businesses in Greece that want paid search to be measurable and controlled. It’s for owners who want to know what they bought, what worked, and what didn’t. It’s not for you if you want “more traffic” as a goal, or if you’re not willing to turn off things that look busy but don’t bring bookings. If this feels uncomfortable, we are not for you.

The real problem we solve: money disappears in the gaps

In tourism, Google Ads can work, but it fails in predictable ways. The most common failure is not “bad keywords”. It’s weak measurement and messy account control, so spend can’t be tied to outcomes and nobody can explain what happened.

Owners usually come to us after a season where ads were “running” but results were vague. They were shown clicks, impressions, and a cost-per-click that looked acceptable. Then the bank statement shows a different kind of reality, and there’s no hard link to enquiries, calls, or bookings.

This is why we treat Google Ads like an operational system, not a creative project. When it’s installed correctly, you can trace spend to actions that matter. When it’s not, it becomes a quiet leak that looks like marketing.

What “good” looks like (in plain terms)

A good Google Ads setup is boring in the right way. You can open a report and answer basic business questions without guessing. You can see which market is paying for the account, which queries are triggering ads, and what those clicks did next.

More importantly, “good” means you can trace spend to enquiries and bookings, not just clicks. That doesn’t mean every booking is perfectly attributed. It means you have a reliable chain of evidence that lets you make decisions without lying to yourself.

When this is working, you’ll notice a few things quickly. The account becomes quieter. Fewer irrelevant clicks. Fewer “mystery” searches. And fewer conversations where someone tries to distract you with metrics that don’t pay salaries.

For reference on how Google itself defines core measurement concepts, Google’s own documentation on conversion tracking is a good baseline: https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/1722022

The order matters: measurement first, brand protection next, then intent

Most wasted budget comes from doing this in the wrong order. People launch campaigns first, then later try to “add tracking”. By then, the account has already learned the wrong lessons, and you’ve paid for data you can’t use.

We run this in a strict sequence because we’ve seen it fail many times when it’s reversed. The sequence is simple and not negotiable, because it protects your budget and your sanity.

1) Measurement first (so you can prove what happened)

If we can’t measure enquiries, calls, booking engine steps, and real lead quality, we don’t really have Google Ads. We have a paid guessing game. Measurement is the part owners don’t see, but it’s the part that stops the “money disappeared” feeling.

This is also where we define what counts as success for your business. A contact form is not always a lead. A call is not always a booking. A booking engine “start” is not revenue. We decide what signals you can trust and which ones are just noise, then we track the right ones consistently.

If you want a neutral reference on why measurement discipline matters, this overview from Google Analytics is helpful: https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/10089681

2) Brand protection next (so you stop paying for your own name)

If your brand is not protected, you can end up paying for traffic that was already looking for you. Or worse, someone else can show above you when your own name is searched. This happens more often than owners think, especially in competitive areas and during high season.

Brand protection is not about vanity. It’s about control. You should know when you’re paying for demand you created through years of work, reviews, and repeat guests.

We’ve also seen brand traffic get mixed with generic traffic in reporting, which makes the whole account look “healthy” while the real acquisition work is failing. That’s a classic way budgets get defended while bookings stay flat.

3) Focused campaigns that match intent (so clicks behave like guests)

Only after measurement and brand control are stable do we expand into intent-based campaigns. This is where most agencies start, because it looks like progress. It also burns money fast if you haven’t locked down targeting, search terms, and conversion signals.

In tourism, intent is everything. Someone searching “хотел со приватен базен во Солун” behaves differently than someone searching “што да се прави во Халкидики”. One is closer to booking. The other is often research, and research clicks are expensive if you treat them like buyers.

We build campaigns around what the searcher is trying to do, not around what you wish they were trying to do. That sounds obvious, but it’s rare in real accounts.

What changes after it’s in place (day-to-day, not theory)

The biggest change is that conversations become specific. You stop hearing “Google needs time” as a blanket excuse for everything. Instead, you can look at the account and see which searches triggered ads, what each market cost, and what it produced.

You also gain budget control that feels real, not cosmetic. That means you can cap waste, isolate risky experiments, and scale only what’s behaving. Owners usually notice this after the first season because the account doesn’t drift into chaos when demand shifts.

Another change is that reporting becomes readable. Not simplified to the point of being useless, but translated into business terms. Spend, enquiries, booking value when available, and clear notes on what was changed and why. If you can’t explain it to your partner in 2 minutes, the system is not serving you.

If you want an industry reference on why “clicks” are not a business outcome, even Google’s own ads glossary makes it clear that clicks are just interactions, not results: https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/6320

What this does not solve (so you don’t buy the wrong thing)

Google Ads won’t fix a weak offer. If your pricing is out of the market, your photos are tired, or your property page doesn’t answer basic questions, ads will only send more people to bounce. You’ll pay to learn what your website should have told you for free.

It also won’t fix operational issues. If you reply to enquiries two days later, or you can’t answer calls reliably, paid traffic will expose the problem fast. You’ll think ads “don’t work” when the real issue is response time or unclear booking steps.

And it won’t magically create demand in markets that don’t want what you sell. Ads can capture demand and shape it a bit. They can’t invent it without a cost that usually doesn’t make sense for small properties.

One boundary that matters: we don’t run ads in mixed-control environments

We don’t manage Google Ads if another agency, freelancer, or “friend who helps” also has access and makes changes. Not because we’re precious, but because it breaks accountability and measurement.

Mixed control creates ghost problems. One person changes targeting. Another edits conversion actions. Someone links a different Analytics property. Suddenly spend shifts and nobody can trace why. You end up paying for arguments, not outcomes.

If you need multiple stakeholders, that’s fine. But there must be one accountable operator for the ad account and its measurement stack. Otherwise, we can’t tell you what caused what, and you’re back to the same doubt you started with.

Country and language controls: where budget quietly burns

Tourism accounts in Greece often attract irrelevant international traffic if targeting is loose. Not malicious, just predictable. Google will happily find “interest” wherever it can if you don’t tell it clearly where not to spend.

This is where owners get the worst kind of report. Spend looks active. Clicks look plentiful. Enquiries are strange or unusable. Sometimes you get messages you can’t even reply to properly, and it feels like your property is being shown to the wrong planet.

We have a separate blog story we point people to internally when they doubt this risk. It’s the “China budget burn” story, and it’s exactly what happens when country and language controls are left open and measurement is weak. If you ask, we’ll send the link and you’ll recognise the pattern fast.

What’s included (so you can decide without guessing)

• Account review focused on waste, measurement gaps, and control issues that cause “unexplained spend”.
• Conversion measurement setup or correction so enquiries, calls, and booking steps are trackable and consistent.
• Brand protection structure so your name and core brand searches are controlled and reported separately.
• Intent-based search campaigns built around what guests actually search when they’re ready to choose.
• Market targeting controls (location and language) to stop accidental international spend that doesn’t convert.
• Search term discipline (negative control and query review) so you don’t keep paying for the wrong intent.
• Budget governance and change logging so you can see what changed and what it did, without drama.
• Reporting that ties spend to business actions and explains performance in owner language, not platform jargon.

When this is a bad fit

This is a bad fit if you want Google Ads to “handle everything” while the website, offer, and response process stay untouched. Ads amplify what’s already there. If the foundation is shaky, you’ll just pay to feel it shake faster.

It’s also a bad fit if you need us to run ads while you keep changing the website and booking flow weekly without telling anyone. That breaks measurement and makes results look random. We can work with change, but not with constant untracked change.

And it’s a bad fit if your main goal is visibility with no agreed definition of a qualified lead. Visibility is easy to buy. Profit is harder, and it requires saying no to traffic that looks flattering but doesn’t book.

What you should bring if you contact us

This decision is simpler when we look at real numbers, not hopes. If you reach out, bring three things so we can talk like business owners, not like people trading opinions.

First, your last 30 days of ad spend and where it was spent. Second, your main goals, written in plain terms, like “more direct bookings from Germany” or “fill weekdays in May and October.” Third, the markets you actually want, not the ones Google happened to send.

If you don’t have clean answers yet, that’s fine. The point is to surface what’s known and what’s guesswork, then decide if it’s worth fixing.

The decision, in business terms

If you’re okay with vague reporting and you just want to “be running ads,” you don’t need us. You can keep paying for activity and hope it turns into bookings. Many owners do that for years, and it’s oddly stable because nobody has to be accountable.

If you want control, traceability, and a system you can question without being gaslit, this is the right kind of work. It’s not exciting, but it stops the quiet leak that kills small tourism businesses over time. You’ll know what you’re paying for, and you’ll know what to stop.

Не сте сигурни од каде да почнете? Контактирајте го нашиот локален тим за пријателски, персонализиран совет и за да договориме средба во живо.

No shortcuts. No noise. Data analysis. Use only what works.