How Can Google Ads Help You Advance Your Business?
Most business owners at some point find themselves asking if Google Ads still works. Or maybe they know it works but question how it can help their business grow.
It is a question I deeply understand because I have questioned situations in like this in my own business.
This questioning of Google Ads working or not comes from a few places:
What the PPC industry is saying that business owners overhear (Google Ads Echo Chamber)
Frustration when thy feel like Google Ads has not worked (The Scar Tissue Of Past Failure)
A fear factor when investing and waiting to see if it will pan out (The Waiting Room Factor)
Wondering if it is the right place for their business (Are People Even Searching For Me)
This post will answer these questions from the perspective of a Google Ads consultant that never questioned IF Google Ads worked but instead questioned if clients WANT expertise in Google Ads.
The Google Ads Industry Echo Chamber
The Google Ads industry echo chamber is alive and real.
I know because I’m personally in it.
I’m a Google Ads expert, and I spend a ton of time on LinkedIn and a ton of time on social media in general. That’s how I built my influence in the paid search and Google Ads community.
Which basically means: if you’re a business owner and you wander into my world on LinkedIn or what used to be Twitter, you’re going to hear me complaining about technical things regarding Google Ads.
I also realize it’s really easy to walk away thinking, Oh, she’s saying Google Ads doesn’t work for small businesses. She’s speaking in these absolute terms, so I’m not going to try this for my business.
And the reason I relate so much to that reaction is because it’s exactly why I didn’t start SEO and writing like I do for my own business until December of this year. I spent a year and a half getting all my leads from LinkedIn… until it stopped working. I’ve written about how I found my way back to blogging here. So I get it.
So to answer this: yes, just because you hear Google Ads practitioners screaming all day — and you’ve accidentally fallen into that loop on social media, which is easy to do if you’re trying to understand Google Ads — just know that’s us venting and processing all the changes and loss of control we once had.
The reality is: Google Ads still works. You just happened to wander onto our turf while you were looking for answers on how to run Google Ads and we are venting more about how we feel inside.
The Scar Tissue Of Google Ads Failing
The scar tissue of past failure is real, even if I didn’t personally experience it the same way.
I’ve worked with plenty of clients who came in convinced Google Ads “didn’t work” for them, and I understand why they felt that way.
I felt that failure when I came back to blogging and started to process my own desire for leads and clients.
Losing money or time makes it hard to try again — especially when the setup or execution was the real problem, not the ad platform.
The truth is, what failed before might actually work now.
The platform has evolved, but the core behavior hasn’t changed: people still go to search engines when they need something. If your business solves a problem people actively search for, Google Ads can make sense. The only real limitation is margin. If you’re selling a $5 piece of jewelry, it’s going to be tough to make the math work. Low‑margin products — makeup, certain clothing — are just harder to scale profitably. Not impossible, just harder.
A few years ago consulted for a vitamin company. Vitamins are a commodity, they’re everywhere, and this brand wanted to try Google Ads after already competing on Amazon.
It didn’t work. Could it have worked at scale with enough data? Likely. But starting from zero in a crowded space is a steep climb. That’s not the same as saying Google Ads doesn’t work — it’s just a reminder that some categories require more data, more time, and more margin than others.
The Waiting Room Anxiety
You started paying for Google Ads. Now you are questioning everything. Your see data, but it is trickling in more slowly than you would like.
The waiting room anxiety fear hits so hard.
You try something like Google Ads, and suddenly you’re stuck in this three‑month window where you’re watching money go out while you wait for the algorithm to learn.
You’re hearing things like “you have to pay for learning” or “you need more data,” and you can literally see in the account that the keyword hasn’t gotten enough clicks or the campaign hasn’t had enough volume. You understand all of that — you’re not confused — but it doesn’t stop the questioning.
Will it ever get enough clicks? Does it just keep spending? How much data is enough?
Everyone knows this part of Google Ads feels terrible. But Google Ads does work. It absolutely works. That gap between effort and payoff is just really uncomfortable.
I feel this in my own business, too.
When I started doing SEO — December 8, 2025 — I questioned whether it would work.
I still have days where I question myself.
That’s normal for a business owner. It’s normal for a marketer who’s gone out on a limb to try something new and investing time and money.
Honestly, it’s normal across life. I see it in my business and in my personal world all the time.
Are People Even Searching Google For Me
The last fear is the big one: Are people even searching for me? Do they go into Google and look for what I offer? And sometimes the honest answer is no.
My mom is a tailor — she alters clothing for a living — and her best customers don’t go to Google. Do they search for a tailor yes but those aren’t her customers. Her best customers come from refferals.
They go to a Facebook group and ask, “Does anyone know someone who can hem a prom dress?” or “Who can alter a wedding dress?” That’s where all her clients come from. For her, Google wouldn’t be the right fit. Google works best for an established business with a physical location because that’s the kind of footprint Google wants to reward. She works out of her home, so it just doesn’t line up.
And it’s not just that.
Someone who would search on Google for a tailor isn’t as warm. Using Google in her situation is a volume play, and she doesn’t need volume — she needs a few great clients. That’s not a knock on Google Ads or a statement that Google Ads doesn’t work. It just doesn’t match her business model.
At the end of the day, you go where the traffic already is that aligns with your business.
If people are searching, that’s where you show up. And if they are asking elsewhere, you don’t have to force yourself onto a platform that isn’t built for how your audience actually behaves.
What Do I Think
From my perspective as a Google Ads consultant, I’ve never doubted the platform. I see Google Ads working every single day with my clients.
When you’re inside something daily, you don’t experience it the way people on the outside do.
It reminds me of when I worked in collections for BMW on the client side — not even a marketing role.
I’d drive around town and every time I saw a BMW, I’d wonder if it was out for repossession.
In reality, less than one percent of the portfolio was ever in that situation at one time. But because I was staring at repossessions all day, that’s what my brain fixated on.
Google Ads is the same for me, but in the opposite direction.
I always, always see it work. And when I don’t, it’s because something in the market or the business conditions isn’t aligned — not because the ad platform suddenly stopped working.
The intent is still there. The demand is still there. The mechanics still work. It’s the advertiser’s situation that needs adjusting, not the platform of Google Ads itself.
Looking Back At My Own Fear
Looking back at my own fear around getting Google Ads consulting clients, a lot of it came from listening to my own industry. I kept questioning whether clients even wanted my services, but the truth is I didn’t have a good place for them to find me.
That’s why I relate so much to the businesses I work with — it took me a lot of tries to find my market, too.
I never imagined someone would just Google something about Google Ads and end up finding me.
I had so much self‑doubt.
I was busy listening to the SEO industry saying SEO didn’t work, so I didn’t try something I knew would work — even though I was formally trained in SEO. That’s how loud the industry noise can get. It can drown out your own expertise.
My Expertise In Google Ads
I never doubted my skill — that part was solid. I was just busy writing to teach the industry Google Ads.
What I questioned was whether clients even wanted my knowledge.
A lot of that came from watching automation get so easy inside Google Ads. I assumed clients were probably thinking the same thing I was thinking: This is expensive. I’ll just opt out or hire a cheap agency.
But the reality is, there are a lot of customers in between those extremes. I just had to do the deep work of defining the audience I actually serve, and then talk to that audience over and over again.
And that’s the full circle moment with Google Ads. It forces you to know your audience, speak directly to them, and reach them loudly, broadly, and quickly. When you do that, you find out if there’s market fit — and once there is, Google Ads works. It’s like putting a rocket ship on what already works.
Turning The Doubt Into Strategy
The entire reason you would be reading this post is if you were questioning if Google Ads is working or could work.
What we really want to do at this point is take that fear and turn it into strategy.
The first question is:Is your offer clear enough that somebody actually wants it?
Using my own business as an example —
I’m for business owners who want to bring Google Ads in‑house and be trained to run their own account so they don’t lose control of their Google Ads.
That’s a clear offer.
On top of that, I coach people who are already running their own Google Ads through quick calls, I audit existing Google Ads accounts and give them a roadmap, or I build the account from scratch and then train them to run it. It’s a tiered structure, but it’s still simple:
I know exactly who I’m for and who I’m not for.
You need that same level of clarity in your own business. When your offer and your audience are defined, the fear starts turning into direction — and direction is what makes strategy possible.
You also have to genuinely ask yourself if you’re giving it enough time.
It’s so easy to declare something like Google Ads isn’t working, even when you know deep down it hasn’t been long enough.
I’ve written lot about the Rule of 100 — back when we did this manually, we wanted 100 clicks on a keyword before deciding it wasn’t working.
Today, you might not get that at the keyword level. You might get it at the ad group level, the campaign level, or over a longer stretch of time.
The point is simple: without enough data density, you can’t make good decisions, and the algorithm definitely can’t make them for you. You have to give it enough time or enough budget.
Tracking Your End Goal
And the last piece: are you even tracking the right metrics? You must do this to prove to yourself Google Ads works.
You can’t say that it’s not working if you’re not looking at revenue, leads, phone calls — the actual business outcomes.
If you’re not tracking the full path, you don’t know where the breakdown is.
Maybe Google Ads is working and your phone is ringing, but your sales team isn’t answering.
Maybe you’re getting form fills, but the quality is off, so you assume the ad platform is the problem when it’s really the signal you’re sending.
There are so many layers to “it’s not working,” and most of them have nothing to do with Google Ads itself.
Final Thoughts
Questioning whether your marketing is working is universal.
I’ve felt it in my own business as a Google Ads practitioner wondering if anyone even wanted Google Ads help.
You’ve felt it as a business owner wondering if your Google Ads are working.
I’ve felt it again trying to do SEO for this blog.
We all do the same thing — we question whether the thing we’re investing in is actually going to work. Maybe that’s just part of being human.
And yes, Google Ads absolutely works. It has worked since the day I started in this industry, and it will continue to work. We just have to treat it like the business platform it is. It’s highly advanced, and it’s not something you can casually tinker with for fun.
So as we close this out, I’ll ask you: which of the four fears is yours? Is there one that hits you in your business? Naming it is the first step. If you want to talk through it, feel free to reach out by clicking the button below.
