Stop Blaming Google: How to Solve Your "Rising Costs" with a Cost-Intent Strategy

Introduction: Why Your Google Ads Costs Are Skyrocketing (And It’s Not Always Google’s Fault)

I hear it every single day in my coaching calls: “Google is getting greedy, and my costs are rising.” While it’s true that Google often "shakes the couch cushions," if you're feeling the squeeze, it might be time to look within.

It might just be your campaigns, your strategy, or a simple oversight that's costing you a premium.

As a Google Ads coach, I’m here to tell you that sometimes, the problem isn't the system—it’s the Google Ads Trap of What We Know. We rely on old maintenance habits like adding negative keywords or adjusting ROAS targets, but these don't address the core issue.

The real problem is often that you’re paying a premium for top-tier inventory because you’re caught in the Cost-Intent Mismatch.

The Intent Spectrum: Are You Paying for a Steak Dinner or a Water?

To illustrate this, let’s talk about a recent client, Bill, who sells athletic wear. He was running fantastic, well-optimized non-brand search campaigns, but the conversions just weren't there. He was targeting terms like “athletic wear for women” and “high-performance shorts.” The clicks were plentiful, but the cost was astronomical, and the ROI was sinking.

Why? Bill was treating all search traffic the same, failing to recognize the key difference in the searcher's mind: Intent.

I break the search universe down into three critical buckets:

1. Awareness (The Problem-Aware Searcher)

• What they know: They have a problem, but no solution or brand in mind.

• Typical Search: “Running shorts so my thighs don’t rub” or “What running shirts are great for a marathon.”

• Your Mistake: You’re bidding high on these broad, top-of-funnel non-brand terms expecting an immediate sale. It’s the equivalent of paying for a five-star steak dinner when all the person wanted was to look at the menu.

2. Consideration (The Comparison Shopper)

• What they know: They have decided on a solution (e.g., they want shorts, not a skirt) and are now comparing a handful of known brands.

• Your Strategy: This is where you need to be visible to guide them to your product through compelling product differentiation and value.

3. Conversion (The Money Zone)

• What they know: They are ready to buy. They have narrowed down the brand, and their intent is extremely high.

• Typical Search: They type in your Brand Name.

• Your Strategy: Maximize visibility here. This is your brand campaign, where high intent justifies the cost—but you must have done the work in the previous two phases to earn the search!

The Non-Brand Search Trap in 2025

The high price of non-brand search real estate is driven up by modern campaign types like Performance Max (PMAX). Here's why your standalone non-brand search campaigns are becoming an expensive liability:

• PMAX Competition: PMAX leans heavily into non-brand, adding more competition to those auctions. This inherently drives up your Cost Per Click (CPC).

• Fewer Auctions: Google is running fewer non-brand auctions outside of Shopping Ads (which come largely from PMAX). Fewer auctions + more advertisers = exponentially higher prices.

If the intent isn't in the Conversion Zone, and the price is going up, you have to ask: Is this asset helping my bottom line?

📈 My Radical Restructure Strategy: From a ROAS of 2 to 8

To solve Bill’s problem, we didn’t just tweak things; we blew up the non-brand campaigns that were draining his budget and converted them to a multi-stage approach.

Here is the exact strategy that took his ROAS from a frustrated 2 to an unheard-of 8 for a retail brand:

1. Pivot from Non-Brand Search to Awareness Campaigns

We paused the expensive, top-of-funnel non-brand search campaigns. The budget was re-allocated to campaigns that are inherently more affordable for the Awareness and Consideration stages: Demand Gen and a standalone YouTube Campaign.

• The Benefit: These platforms are way more cost-effective for building brand awareness and warming up an audience before they search.

2. Deep Audience Cross-Hatching

Instead of simply targeting "women," we got granular. We cross-hatched audiences to signal the ideal multi-passionate customer to Google:

• Parents who are into travel.

• Deal shopping audiences with affinity audiences around specific sporty lifestyles.

• The result: A much better signal to Google, leading to more relevant impressions.

3. Strategic Video Content

We launched three simple, non-Hollywood-level video concepts—because in 2025, people are looking for real and authentic:

• A 15-second Product-in-Action video.

• A 30-second Problem/Solution video (focusing on the customer pain point).

• A simple Design/Fabric Highlight video.

4. Close the Loop with Search

This is the advanced part of the strategy. We took the audience of people who watched the YouTube videos and added them back into the Branded Search Campaigns in Observation mode. This allowed us to:

• Track how those video viewers were converting after they later searched for the brand.

• Confirm that our Demand Gen and YouTube efforts were directly leading to a 40% increase in brand searches—a powerful sign of a healthy, growing funnel.

This shift resulted in a budget cap on his branded campaign for the first time ever, proving that the awareness-building media was directly fueling high-intent searches.

Your Next Step: Audit Your Intent

Stop overpaying for mismatched intent. If you're encountering rising costs, it's not always Google's fault; it's often your fault for being in the wrong place at the wrong time in the buyer’s journey.

Your next step is to look at your goals and truly question the state of mind of the searcher when they encounter your ads. That is the key success moment—getting in the head of the searcher.

For more in-depth discussion on this topic and to see the specific campaign builds I use, check out my companion YouTube video: