The first keyword-based ad was launched by OpenText in 1996. Since then, how keywords are used has changed a lot, but their role in promoting target pages has only grown.
In this article, we’ll look at the differences between search intent, search terms, and keywords. Knowing these differences and how they relate can help bring in more targeted visitors and, in turn, increase the success of ad campaigns.
What is it about?
- Search Intent and User Queries
- Keywords as a Marketer’s Tool
- Expanding Keywords Based on Search Terms
- Choosing the Correct Match Type
- Adding Negative Keywords
- Conclusions
Search Intent and User Queries
Search intent means what the user wants to achieve. It’s the topic or question they’re interested in. This intent is why people search and visit different websites. For example, if someone searches for “how to make sushi at home,” they likely want to cook. Extra words in the search term show the user’s goal more clearly. Among the search results, there might be an ad with the keyword “sushi delivery.” This ad could be helpful if the person is interested in eating sushi or serving it to guests, but isn’t sure if they want to make it themselves.
A search term, or query, is the word or words a user types into a search engine. The intent is in the user’s mind, and they type a query into Google based on that intent.
Search terms can vary in length, depending on how specifically a user wants to narrow down their results or how clearly they know what they’re searching for—like ‘buy a black tweed suit with gold buttons.’ The search engine will show a range of pages, some of which may only partly match the query.
Queries feel natural because they reflect a user’s description of what they want—content, products, or services. Keywords, on the other hand, are more structured and specific, often shorter, especially when they’re common, high-frequency terms.
In this way, a search term shows a user’s intent, while a keyword helps display relevant ad content. Search terms give marketers a direct view into a niche through the audience’s eyes, which is why many experts stress the importance of analyzing search queries over keywords.
Queries act as an intermediate link between intent and keywords—they are less vague than intent but less specific than keywords, allowing for a variety of answers that Google or other search engines may offer.
To show your ads when people search for your product or service, the keywords you choose need to match the words or phrases they’re searching for. When someone searches for a term that matches your keyword, your ad goes into an auction to decide if it will appear.
Search terms vs. Keywords: what’s the main difference?
Keywords are the words or phrases a marketer adds when starting a search campaign. These keywords can have different match types: broad, exact, or phrase.
Search terms, on the other hand, are the actual queries that users type into Google, and the search system decides to show the ad based on the match type.
For example, if we add one keyword in phrase match type, like “texas boots”, Google will show the ad to users who use as queries:
- texas boots
- texas boots buy
- cowboy boots
- texas shoes
- best price for texas boots
- how to choose texas boots
- texas boots tecovas
- texas boots store
- custom made texas boots austin
But it won’t show for terms like:
- chisos store
- cowboy shoes
Search terms encompass everything a user enters into the search bar. Therefore, they may include errors, synonyms, similar variations, and related queries. This feature allows for accounting for the human factor and always offering relevant content, regardless of how accurately a user formulates their query.
Thus, the difference between keywords and search queries is linked to whether it involves user action or marketer action. While search queries refer specifically to the text a person enters when searching for information or shopping online, a keyword is used within a specific advertising campaign and may match the query, not match it, or only approximate it. A single keyword can correspond to numerous search queries—both commercial and informational.
To avoid confusion and filter out irrelevant traffic, you must track the queries of target page visitors and optimize campaigns according to the search terms that drive paid traffic to the site. The same applies to organic traffic. Even if a user reaches the page through SEO and not an ad campaign, content mismatch with their queries will increase the bounce rate, negatively affecting the site’s internal optimization metrics.
Returning to the previous example with ‘Texas boots’—if a store is based in Georgia and sells Texas-style boots nationalwide, it’s better to add certain terms as negative keywords, such as ‘custom,’ competitors’ brand names, and cities like Austin (since these terms suggest the user is looking for local stores in Austin, TX).
Our Yakiv Ads tool makes it easy to not only remove keywords containing irrelevant words from the keyword list, but also to add them as negative keywords at the campaign level.
Keywords as a Marketer’s Tool
Even experienced marketers and business owners often confuse “keyword” and “search term”. However, understanding the connection and difference between them allows for a new approach to setting up and optimizing advertising campaigns. Moreover, your marketing strategy may drastically change when you stop treating search queries and keywords as interchangeable and focus primarily on queries.
Google automatically offers alternatives for queries that lack fully relevant results. Today, search engines are intuitive enough to understand what users mean. The Google Ads system itself demonstrates the difference between keywords and search terms. For example, if a user enters an overly long query or uses an uncommon phrase, Google may offer similar options with the note “Showing results for…”.
Once you understand which search queries your potential customers are using, apply this knowledge to improve your campaigns. Several strategies can help achieve better results by researching search terms:
- Expanding keywords based on queries
- Using the search terms report
- Adding effective search terms as keywords
- Choosing the correct match type
- Adding negative keywords
Expanding Keywords Based on Search Terms
Users rarely search for keywords exactly as advertisers select and add them to their ads. More realistic are search terms.
Therefore, while focusing on keywords, don’t forget to expand them into groups of related search terms. For example, our tool offers not just additional variations for exact keywords that you enter, but also similar ideas that we used from Google Ads planner and third party providers (SEMrush, Ahrefs, Serpstat, Open AI).
You might discover that a single keyword phrase is associated with various queries that, in turn, bring traffic from different segments of the target audience.
For example, if you target the keyword “buy coffee”, explore it using Google Trends, Google suggestions, and the Google Search Terms report. This will help you understand the typical interests of potential buyers and engage them at any stage of their customer journey. For instance, when they compare pure Arabica to an Arabica-Robusta blend or search for ways to make cappuccinos at home.
These could include keywords like “buy whole bean coffee”, “buy coffee pods”, “wholesale coffee”, “where to buy coffee in [region or city name]”, “buy flavored coffee by weight”, and more.
The list can go on since many queries will contain the exact keyword. However, not all search terms need to include the primary keyword “buy coffee”. Related phrases such as “wholesale coffee in [region or city name]”, “buy premium Arabica”, or “cappuccino sale” are also viable.
Exploring and using related queries will help capture more target traffic and improve campaign performance.
Using Yakiv Ads you don’t need to enter and manually explore yourselves in different services, you may just one time enter, and if you see a great idea quickly create one more campaign for this exact idea (like “whole beans coffee” campaign).
The better you perform keyword research, the less optimization you’ll need later, and the more high-quality traffic you’ll attract.
Using the Search Terms Report
The search terms report provides a list of terms users entered into the search engine that, in the system’s opinion, are synonyms or closely related to your keywords. These terms are the ones your ads were displayed for and clicked on.
When conducting keyword research, we recommend adding a few dozen—or even hundreds—of keywords. This approach makes it easier to manage campaigns effectively.
For instance, even if you select just a dozen keywords you consider the best, Google can display your ads for hundreds or even thousands of related search terms. By starting with a larger list, you’ll have more control over performance and reach.
Pay attention to the “Keyword” section—it indicates which keywords matched the user’s search term and triggered the ad display. The “Match Type” shows how closely the search terms, which triggered the ads, are related to the exact keywords.
The report also provides insights into how match types are determined and how useful search terms relate to your keywords.
The best practice how do keyword research check on our article how to set search campaign.
Adding Effective Search Terms as Keywords
This point continues the previous one. The search terms report provides valuable information for both adjusting bids and adding new keywords you may not have previously considered.
Imagine you missed a couple good keywords, on keyword research, and see good in a search report.
The best way to chose them, and wrap them in to [] symbols (means exact keyword match type).
Search systems are tricky, and as default they add in broad keywords type.
Choosing the Correct Match Type
Using various match types can extend the quantity of search terms.
For example, broad match allows your ads to show for search queries with spelling errors, synonyms (and not), etc.
Phrase match ensures that ads appear for the phrase and its close variants, including additional words before or after. Ads will be displayed if the words in the key phrase are rearranged but the meaning is preserved.
The exact word order can differ, or the user can add a modifier to their query, but overall, Google will understand that the intended meaning of the keyword is the same.
Lastly, exact match offers the best control over ad relevance. Ads will be shown to users searching for content using the exact keyword from the campaign or its close variants with similar meaning.
From our experience, for 80% of businesses, the best strategy is to use exact match and phrase match keywords within the same ad group.
If you find that even phrase match generates irrelevant search terms, it’s better to stick with exact match only.
Broad match works well for very few businesses. For example, if your business sells car tires, using broad match could lead Google to show your ads for search terms related to car rims—wasting your ad spend on irrelevant clicks.
Adding Negative Keywords
Sometimes a search term may not be relevant enough to the topic of the ad or the overall product offering. To avoid confusion and unnecessary clicks that drain your ad budget, add such popular “mistaken” keywords as negative keywords.
Thus, researching search terms will significantly improve campaign results when the knowledge gained is used correctly. Such analysis can help increase targeted impressions, improve ad click-through rates, and monitor existing demand for a product or service by identifying trending queries in your niche.
For instance, imagine your shop specializes in Italian Whole Bean Coffee. When running a campaign targeting “buy coffee,” you might notice irrelevant terms appearing, such as instant, Keurig, Starbucks, lounge, near me, Vietnamese, table, etc. In this case, the “buy coffee” campaign isn’t ideal. A better approach would be to create more focused campaigns:
- Brand Name Campaign — for easier word of mouth recommendations and protecting your brand from competitors ads.
- Italian Whole Bean Coffee campaign, including Italian Bean Coffee related keywords, to highlight your unique selling point.
If sales are still insufficient, you can create two additional campaigns to broaden your reach while maintaining control over relevance:
- Italian Coffee Campaign
- Target broader keywords like Italian coffee without restricting to whole beans.
- Include negative keywords such as whole and bean to avoid overlapping with your Italian Whole Bean Coffee campaign.
- This campaign captures traffic from users interested in Italian coffee in general, but not necessarily specifying the bean type.
- Whole Bean Coffee Campaign
- Focus on whole bean coffee keywords without restricting to Italian.
- Use Italian as a negative keyword to keep it distinct from the Italian Whole Bean Coffee campaign.
- This allows you to attract users searching for whole bean coffee in a broader context.
These additional campaigns help expand your audience by targeting slightly broader segments, but not as broad as just buy coffee.
How AI and Voice Search Affect Search Queries
Sometimes in search terms you may find queries like”hey siri best restaurant near me.”
In this case, if you see keywords or search terms like it—reasonable to add them as keywords. Sometimes voice assistant can enter more that user has intent too (“restaurant near me find right now”), this is also one of the reason why we recommend to use phrase match type too.
Data engineers and researchers continuously study voice queries to improve machine learning models, in 2024 they started to cut some part from requests, and we see less quantity of using “ok google” in search terms in Google Ads, because Google engineers understand that “ok google” was technical phrase, and main intent to buy or find something.
In general in voice search are not as many long tail keywords, but with AI search systems may add previous intent and make more clear request.
Frequently Asked Questions
Search intent refers to the motives that drive users to start searching for information on the internet.
Search terms or search queries are the combinations of words people enter into a search engine.
Keywords, on the other hand, are the words and phrases that marketers specify in Google Ads when setting up PPC campaigns.
Knowing how works Ads and Search terms helps expand keyword lists, find less relevant words and add them to negative keywords. Working with search terms allows optimizing Ads and increasing return on investment in ads.
Conclusions
Keywords are words, phrases, or expressions that digital marketers use in settings for PPC advertising. They help predict users’ search intent.
Search terms are actual words and phrases that users enter into search engines. Queries represent people’s search intent, i.e., the question they want to be answered, and are highly diverse.
Analyzing search terms can help marketers adjust their keywords and identify new ways to attract target traffic to the site. Advertising strategies such as choosing the correct match type and adding negative keywords contribute to more successful marketing campaigns.
Understanding the difference between search terms, keywords, and user intent increases a business’s ability to attract the right traffic and optimize the budget for paid and organic search campaigns.