July 1st, 2019
Google Ads Grant Process From Start to Finish
How To Apply for Google Ad Grants
Let's be honest, the Google Ad Grant is pretty daunting. We mapped out every little detail, saving you hours of frustrating support calls and, hopefully, we can save you from those disheartening "your ads grant is disapproved" emails. Here are the steps you must take in order to gain the Google Ads Grant:
Step 1: Apply for the Google Nonprofit Account
This is the first hurdle to get over. First you must apply here, provide all relevant details, and keep in mind that all nonprofits that apply must hold a valid charity status. It's also a good idea to complete steps 1 and 2 in the google ad grant activation guide.
Step 2: While You're Waiting for Google Nonprofit Account to be Approved...
While you're waiting, you can set up a Google Ads account here. After you click the sign up button, you should see a "are you a professional marketer? Switch to expert mode." Click on that, it will switch over to the full version of Google Ads instead of an express account.
Step 1: Apply for the Google Nonprofit Account
This is the first hurdle to get over. First you must apply here, provide all relevant details, and keep in mind that all nonprofits that apply must hold a valid charity status. It's also a good idea to complete steps 1 and 2 in the google ad grant activation guide.
Step 2: While You're Waiting for Google Nonprofit Account to be Approved...
While you're waiting, you can set up a Google Ads account here. After you click the sign up button, you should see a "are you a professional marketer? Switch to expert mode." Click on that, it will switch over to the full version of Google Ads instead of an express account.
After this, you'll want to click on "Create an account without a campaign" because this skips over the billing part and steps to create a campaign. You DO NOT want to fill out your billing info because that will lead you to a normal Google Ads account and not an Ads Grant account. If you get to a point where it is asking for your billing info, do not fill it out.
Fill out your info, then click on submit.
Next you'll want to click on "explore your account"
At this point, you'll see the screen below. The red rectangle in this photo is outlining your google ad account ID, which you will use to connect your Google Ad Grant to once you are approved and can log in to your google nonprofit account. At this point, it is likely a good idea to follow the rest of the Google Ad Grants activation guide. This will allow you to know what you need to comply with and how to set up campaigns, ad groups, and ads. There are a couple tricky areas which we'll outline below.
Tricky Areas for Google Ads Grant
1. Keep in mind, there are two hurdles to clear in this process. The first is that you are approved for a Google nonprofit account. The second is that you must create a Google ads account that complies with all policies, copy your Google Ad account ID, log into your Google for Nonprofit account, and finally connect your Google Ads Grant with the ID you copied under the Google Ad Grant section. You'll then have to wait up to 14 days to hear back. If you're disapproved, you'll get an email with what's wrong, and then you can fix it and reapply by pasting your Google ad account ID back into the section of your Google nonprofit account. This reapplication usually takes about 5 days in our experience to hear back on the status of your ads account.
2..When you're creating your campaign, make sure you deselect Google search partners and Google Display Network. These two simple checkboxes can lead to you getting disapproved for the ads grant if you leave them on.
3. Definitely set up automated rules that monitor your click through rate (which has to be greater than 5%) and your keyword quality (don't let it drop below 3!).
4. Monitor your negative keywords to make sure that people are typing in relevant things and clicking on your ad.
5. Do not forget that you need to have 1 campaign with 2 ad groups, 2 ads, and 2 unique sitelink extensions. We usually do 2 campaigns with all of these details just to be safe. If you target a specific region, you'll also want to make sure that you are including these in your campaigns. If you target nation-wide, simply set the location to target the nation you choose.
6. Good news: that $329 per day maximum spend? That's per campaign. Make sure you set it at that daily budget to maximize your budget!
7. You'll also want to make sure that after you have created your campaign, go into the settings and change it to maximize clicks or, if you want to skip the learning phase, change it to manual CPC and uncheck the enhanced CPC. This should help your ads get results faster.
8. After you set up your ads account and you have your google ads ID, you can contact Google Live Support here with any questions. Just scroll down to the bottom and click contact us for phone number, email, or live chat online.
2..When you're creating your campaign, make sure you deselect Google search partners and Google Display Network. These two simple checkboxes can lead to you getting disapproved for the ads grant if you leave them on.
3. Definitely set up automated rules that monitor your click through rate (which has to be greater than 5%) and your keyword quality (don't let it drop below 3!).
4. Monitor your negative keywords to make sure that people are typing in relevant things and clicking on your ad.
5. Do not forget that you need to have 1 campaign with 2 ad groups, 2 ads, and 2 unique sitelink extensions. We usually do 2 campaigns with all of these details just to be safe. If you target a specific region, you'll also want to make sure that you are including these in your campaigns. If you target nation-wide, simply set the location to target the nation you choose.
6. Good news: that $329 per day maximum spend? That's per campaign. Make sure you set it at that daily budget to maximize your budget!
7. You'll also want to make sure that after you have created your campaign, go into the settings and change it to maximize clicks or, if you want to skip the learning phase, change it to manual CPC and uncheck the enhanced CPC. This should help your ads get results faster.
8. After you set up your ads account and you have your google ads ID, you can contact Google Live Support here with any questions. Just scroll down to the bottom and click contact us for phone number, email, or live chat online.