A Marketer’s Guide to Using Account-Level Placement Exclusions and Negative Keywords Together

Hook: Stop wasting ad spend on the wrong inventory — protect targeting across Search, Display and YouTube

Marketers in 2026 face a familiar — and growing — problem: automation drives scale and efficiency, but it also magnifies the impact of a few poorly targeted placements or mismatched search intent. The result: wasted spend, noisy conversions, and damage to ad quality. The good news: Google’s January 15, 2026 rollout of account-level placement exclusions gives us a new, centralized lever to stop bad placements before they scale. Paired with disciplined negative keyword lists, you can lock down targeting across Performance Max, Demand Gen, YouTube, Display and Search.

Most important first: how account-level exclusions + negative keywords protect your targeting

In short: use account-level placement exclusions to stop unwanted inventory (websites, apps, YouTube channels) at scale, and use shared negative keyword lists to block irrelevant search intent that would otherwise trigger ads. Together they create complementary guardrails:

• Placement exclusions = block specific inventory where your creative, brand or product should never appear.
• Negative keywords = block search queries and query intent that don’t align with your campaign goals.

"Google Ads is adding account-level placement exclusions, letting advertisers block unwanted inventory across all campaigns from a single setting." — Search Engine Land, Jan 15, 2026

Why this matters in 2026

Two major trends elevated this capability in late 2025–early 2026:

• Advertising automation (Performance Max, Demand Gen, smart bidding) consumes more of our budgets. Automation scales fast; errors do too.
• Advertisers demanded stronger guardrails for brand safety and intent control. Google’s response: centralized, account-level exclusion lists to complement existing campaign-level controls.

Quick tactical checklist (what you’ll implement in this guide)

1. Audit your account for poor placements and irrelevant search queries.
2. Create an account-level placement exclusion list and apply it across the account.
3. Build shared negative keyword lists by intent category and attach to relevant campaigns.
4. Layer campaign-level negatives for sensitive campaigns and test.
5. Monitor placement reports, search query reports, and key KPIs — then iterate weekly.

Step 1 — Audit: find the gaps automation misses

Start with data. Automation optimizes to conversions and cost metrics, not to context. That means unusual pockets of spend can exist for weeks unless you proactively audit.

What to pull

• Placement report (Display & YouTube): top placements by spend, impressions, view rate and conversions.
• Search Terms report (Search + Shopping): queries generating clicks and conversions.
• Campaign performance over 30–90 days: CPA, conversion rate, CTR, impression share, and conversion quality metrics (lead fit, LTV).
• Invalid traffic reports & unusual spikes (CTR anomalies or view-through conversion spikes on low-quality inventory).

How to prioritize findings

1. High spend, low / zero conversion: immediate block candidate.
2. High impressions with poor CTR and brand-safety concerns: evaluate creative fit and consider exclusion.
3. Search queries with irrelevant intent (e.g., "free", "how to", "download", or competitor careers) but high click volume: negative keyword candidates.

Step 2 — Build and apply an account-level placement exclusion list

The Jan 15, 2026 update means you can now block placements once and have the exclusion applied across eligible campaign types (Performance Max, Demand Gen, YouTube, Display). That saves time and reduces miss-configuration risk.

Best practices for the account-level list

• Start conservative — exclude the worst offenders first (top spend, zero conversions, brand-safety concerns).
• Use grouping: maintain lists by theme (brand safety, low-quality apps, content buckets, specific YouTube channels).
• Document the reason for each exclusion (e.g., 'High CTR from non-converting traffic - Nov 2025').
• Use the Manager (MCC) level for multi-client accounts to push standardized lists to clients where appropriate.

Example: what to exclude at account level

• YouTube channels with sensationalist content that drives views but no conversions.
• Low-quality app inventory flagged by ad quality partners.
• Private blog networks or websites with excessive ad placements that generate accidental clicks.

Step 3 — Build shared negative keyword lists focused on intent

Negative keywords are your primary tool for protecting ads from the wrong search intent. Shared negative keyword lists let you apply consistent intent controls across many campaigns quickly.

How to structure negative lists

• Thematic lists: 'Free-downloads', 'Jobs & Careers', 'Educational queries', 'Comparison shoppers'.
• Funnel-based: Top-of-funnel informational negatives ("how to", "what is") for purchase-focused campaigns.
• Competitor-brand negatives: For campaigns where you don’t want to bid on competitor brand queries (or where you prefer separate competitor campaigns).

Match type guidance

• Use phrase negatives to block common intent patterns without over-blocking. Example: phrase negative "free trial" stops queries containing that phrase.
• Use exact negatives sparingly for very specific one-off queries that ate spend.
• Avoid blocking core intent terms in broad-match campaigns without testing — you can accidentally suppress scale.

Example negative lists

• Free & Download List: "free", "download", "crack", "torrent"
• Research Intent (for conversion-focused campaigns): "how to", "what is", "tutorial", "example"
• Careers & Hiring: "jobs", "salary", "internship", "career"

Step 4 — Layering strategy: account-level vs campaign-level controls

Think of layering as defense-in-depth. The account-level placement exclusion is your broad perimeter fence. Shared negative keyword lists are your interior checkpoints. Campaign-level exclusions and negatives are the local guards for sensitive campaigns.

Recommended layering model

1. Account-level placement exclusions: broad, high-impact blocks applied universally.
2. Shared negative keyword lists: apply by campaign type or objective (acquisition vs. awareness).
3. Campaign-level negatives: adjust for unique product lines or testing experiments.

Special note: Performance Max and Demand Gen

Performance Max and Demand Gen are powerful but opaque. Account-level placement exclusions now cover these formats, which is a major win. Negative keyword behavior can vary by campaign type; historically, Performance Max had limited negative keyword control — so your primary lever for PMax and Demand Gen is placement exclusions and audience signals. Always test and log observed behavior in your account.

Step 5 — Practical example: SaaS company protects ad quality

Scenario: You run ads for a mid-market SaaS product. Recently you saw high YouTube views and display clicks from 'how-to' tutorial videos and free download sites. Conversions fell and cost-per-lead rose.

Actions taken

1. Audit: found 12 YouTube channels and 22 sites responsible for 38% of Display spend with 0 conversions.
2. Account-level placement exclusions: added those 34 placements and a 'Free-download' site list to the account-level exclusions.
3. Shared negative keyword lists: added a 'Research Intent' list to all purchase-oriented search campaigns with phrase negatives like "how to", "tutorial", "example", and added a 'Free-downloads' list with "free", "download".
4. Campaign-level adjustments: for a lead-gen campaign targeting enterprise buyers, added additional negatives like "internship" and "student".

Results (30 days post-implementation)

• Irrelevant impressions decreased by 23%.
• Overall CPA improved by 12%.
• Conversion-quality score (internal lead-fit metric) improved as fewer low-fit leads entered the funnel.

Step 6 — Monitoring, automation, and scale

Once exclusions and negatives are in place, automate monitoring so you don’t need constant manual checks.

Key KPIs to monitor

• Spend by placement (weekly) and top 50 search queries by spend.
• CTR and conversion rate per placement and query cluster.
• Invalid traffic and suspicious spikes (use Google signals and third-party verification).

Automation tools & techniques

• Use Google Ads Scripts or the Ads API to extract placement and query reports and auto-suggest exclusions when a placement meets conditions (e.g., >$X spend and 0 conversions for 14 days).
• Create automated rules to alert on sudden increases in spend on new placements.
• Use shared lists and Manager account controls for consistent governance across large accounts or clients.

Advanced tactics and pitfalls to avoid

Advanced tactics

• Use negative keyword mining from CRM lead notes — map lead quality back to search queries and update lists accordingly.
• Combine placement exclusions with content category exclusions and inventory type controls for layered brand safety.
• For large publishers or app stores that produce mixed-quality inventory, add both domain-level exclusions and specific path/channel exclusions for surgical blocking.

Pitfalls

• Over-excluding: too many negatives or placements can starve automation and reduce scale. Track lost impressions and impression share after changes.
• Mis-scoped negatives: placing a broad negative at account-level can block intent that is valuable to other campaigns. Use campaign-level exceptions where needed.
• Not monitoring PMax behavior: automation updates can change where ads show — don’t assume exclusions forever solve new inventory types without periodic checks.

Sample implementation timeline (first 30 days)

1. Days 1–3: Pull reports, identify top offenders, and create initial account-level placement exclusion list.
2. Days 4–7: Build and apply shared negative keyword lists to high-impact campaigns.
3. Days 8–14: Monitor KPIs and tune match types; address campaign-level exceptions.
4. Days 15–30: Implement automation for alerts and schedule weekly review meetings to capture new blocks.

Actionable takeaways (implement in the next 7 days)

• Export placement and search terms reports for the last 90 days and identify top 25 low-quality placements and queries.
• Create one account-level placement exclusion list and apply it to the account.
• Create two shared negative keyword lists: one for 'Free & Download' intent and one for 'Research Intent', then attach them to conversion-focused campaigns.
• Set up an automated alert for any placement that spends >$100 and records 0 conversions in 7 days (adjust thresholds to your account scale).

Final notes on governance and reporting

Establishing clear ownership and change logs for exclusion and negative lists prevents accidental overreach. Use a shared spreadsheet or a governance tool to record:

• Who added an exclusion/negative
• Why it was added (data evidence)
• When to review (30/90 days)

Closing: defend automation with guardrails — protect targeting, improve ad quality

In 2026, automation will continue to control more of the ad decisioning. That makes centralized guardrails essential. The combination of account-level placement exclusions (rolled out Jan 15, 2026) and disciplined, shared negative keyword lists gives you a practical, scalable way to protect targeting, improve ad quality, and reduce waste without breaking automation.

Get started now

Download our 30-day checklist and shared negative keyword starter packs (intent-based lists) to implement the steps above quickly. If you want a targeted audit, schedule a 30-minute account review and I’ll show the top 10 placements and queries to block in your account.

Call to action: Ready to stop wasted spend? Grab the checklist or request a free 30-minute audit to get tailored placement exclusions and negative keyword lists for your account.

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