Google Ads controls: the settings sheet for 2026
Google Ads controls are back in Performance Max: negative keywords, account-wide placement blocks and a search terms report. All three wired in 20 minutes.
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If you run Google Ads, part of your budget is almost certainly going to searches that will never buy from you, and to people who already know you. Google quietly gave you back the tools to stop both. Twenty minutes of settings work inside your ad account cleans it up. The stack: your Google Ads account, a keyword tool to speed up the reading, and your CRM (the software that stores leads and sends follow-up) to catch the clicks you keep.
Some background. Performance Max is Google's all-in-one automated campaign: you hand it a budget, a goal, and your ads, and its AI decides who sees them and where. For two years it gave you almost nothing to steer with. Across 2025 and early 2026, Google shipped three genuine steering inputs back into the product. None were announced loudly. All matter if you spend money on Google.
What you'll build
A supervised campaign instead of a black box:
- Negative keywords: a list of searches you tell Google never to show your ad on, stripping the junk you never wanted to pay for.
- One account-level placement exclusion list. Placements are the websites, apps, and videos your ads appear on; one list now protects every campaign.
- A brand fence, so the automated campaign stops taking credit for people who searched your name and would have found you anyway.
Stack
- Your Google Ads account. All three controls live inside it.
- Semrush, a keyword tool, to read the search data faster.
- GoHighLevel as the CRM downstream, so the clicks you just protected turn into booked work.
The stack
Google Adsall three controls live inside the account
Semrushmine the search terms report for junk themes faster
GoHighLevelcatch the protected clicks before they leakIn order of money saved: campaign-level negative keywords rolled out to every advertiser in January 2025, and Google later lifted the cap far past the old 100-keyword ceiling. (Search Engine Journal has tracked the rollout.) Account-level placement exclusions came next: as of early 2026 one list applies across all of Google's ad surfaces, after researchers caught Google running ads on junk websites and Google responded with more transparency from March 2025. (eMarketer covered the transparency push.) Third, the search terms report: the list of actual searches your ads ran on. Thinner than in a normal Search campaign, but it finally shows what you paid for. A fourth change ships on Google's schedule, not yours: AI Max for Search is replacing an older campaign type called Dynamic Search Ads, with forced migration pushed to 2027. (Google's announcement lays out the features.)
Steps
Spend twenty minutes and do these in order.
The build, in order
Pull the search terms report
Set your brand straight
Build one account-level placement exclusion list
Decide on AI Max deliberately
Your move this week
The part that breaks
The second trap is protecting the click and then wasting it. The ad gets the visit, but if the page has no clear next step and nobody follows up, the budget you just cleaned up leaks out the other end. A lead-to-CRM automation in Make closes that gap.
Copy this
A starting negative-keyword list to paste in after your first search-terms read, then expand monthly:
free
jobs / careers / hiring
diy / how to / tutorial
[competitor names]
cheap / wholesale (if you are not those)
These themes most often burn budget on people who will never buy.
Same destination either way. Turning it on yourself keeps configuration control.
Upgrade path
Once the controls and brand fence are live, watch for budget control to catch up with the reporting. Performance Max shows how spend split across Google's surfaces but still will not let you set a budget per surface. Reporting without control is half a gift.
Google and Meta are moving the same way: the AI owns the targeting, and your ads, offer, and exclusion lists are the levers you keep. The Meta Advantage+ build covers the other platform, the automation hub tracks what's shifting, and the full archive has the rest.
Frequently asked questions
Where do I add negative keywords to a Performance Max campaign?
In the campaign's settings, the same place a Search campaign takes them. Campaign-level negatives reached every Performance Max advertiser in January 2025, and Google later lifted the cap well past the old 100-keyword ceiling, so paste in your junk themes and expand the list monthly from the search terms report.
Which report shows the searches my Performance Max ads ran on?
Open your PMax campaign, then Insights, then Search terms. It is thinner than the Search-campaign version but it lists the real queries you paid for. Read it before touching bids: every theme that has nothing to do with what you sell becomes a campaign-level negative.
How do I set up a brand exclusion on Performance Max?
Run a separate, cheap brand campaign first, then on the PMax campaign go to Settings, then Brand exclusions, and add your brand list. From that point the automated campaign stops claiming people who typed your name, and its numbers finally reflect real prospecting.
Should I turn on AI Max for Search now or wait for the migration?
Turn it on yourself if you rely on Dynamic Search Ads. Doing it now means you configure the brand controls and URL settings on your own schedule; waiting means Google flips it on during the forced migration, currently pushed to 2027, with its defaults instead of yours.
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