Today I’d like to show you a powerful feature Google’s released: How to target your YouTube ads based on what someone has searched on.
For example, this is something I’ve been searching on recently: ‘How to keto diet’.
So when I go over to YouTube, what do I see? I’m seeing ads based on keto, and the reason why is this advertiser is using my keto phrases as part of their targeting. So your future customer sees ads related to their keyword search when on YouTube. It’s kind of one of those things where it’s already in their mind then you suddenly are targeting them when they’re trying to watch something. That can sometimes work pretty well.
There’s three things I find that make it easy to get these things going. First you have to create the audience. Two: you need keywords. And three: you’ve got to target. Pretty simple.
In any Google Ad, you need to create an ad group and so when you’re creating the ad group that’s going to help determine your targeting. The current term in Google Ads is Custom segments. You create a new segment and choose “People who searched for any of these terms on Google properties (such as https://www.google.com/search?q=Google.com and YouTube)” to target based on search history.
Then from that choice you can pick ‘custom audiences’ and click on the plus.
And from there choose ‘custom intent’. As you can see, this isn’t normally that clear.
So when you get here, this is where you’re going to add your search terms.
Now you can click over on ‘Keyword planner’ and bring that up to go grab some, or you could pre-prep with 50 keywords in a plain text file ahead of time and then paste them in, but I advise getting your search terms ready before you get to this page.
So after you go through that process, your ‘custom intent audience’ is now available to be selected. So once you select it, that’s it: you’re done. You now have these search terms being used for when people are on YouTube to see your video ads.
Now just target them with some ads, and you’d be surprised … if you combine this with Google's conversion-focused ad types like Video action campaigns (VAC) or leverage Performance Max campaigns for broader reach for action ads that allow true call-to-action layered over the video that’s trackable, which is on our blog how to do that, then you’ve got a trackable, solid YouTube ad strategy.
We can give you some wicked goodness. We’ll be able to show you the ROI over time based on actual sales from actual leads from your Google Ad campaigns.
Because the whole purpose of Wicked Reports is marketing attribution for lead-based small and medium business pay traffic marketers; We identify your marketing and it finds the highest lifetime value customers at great ROI over time.
We’ve tracked over 2.3 billion in sales and counting.
We’ve got a lot of partners. And this particular video came from a Google Partner event where they were showing all these advertisers how to do this; so I’m sharing that with you now.
Thanks for your time.
FAQ
What is the updated term for "Custom Intent Audiences" in Google Ads?
They are now referred to as Custom segments and are managed in the Audience Manager. When creating a custom segment, you specifically choose the option to target "People who searched for any of these terms on Google properties (such as https://www.google.com/search?q=Google.com and YouTube)” to replicate the original intent targeting functionality.
Why is using search history targeting for YouTube video ads effective?
This strategy allows you to target users with video ads precisely when their purchase or research intent (based on recent Google searches) is already high, maximizing relevance, engagement, and conversion likelihood compared to broader demographic targeting.
How does Wicked Reports help optimize this YouTube ad strategy?
Wicked Reports provides multi-touch marketing attribution, showing the true ROI and Customer Lifetime Value (LTV) of leads generated specifically from these Google Ads campaigns. This allows marketers to confidently scale the search-to-YouTube targeting strategy that generates the best long-term profit.
