Why are my keywords getting low impressions?

Low impressions: what’s actually happening (and why it matters)

When someone says “my keywords are getting low impressions,” I first separate two possibilities: either your keywords aren’t eligible to enter auctions (so they can’t trigger ads reliably), or they’re eligible but losing auctions in real time (so they could have shown, but didn’t). The fix is very different depending on which bucket you’re in.

Also, double-check you’re not being misled by reporting. A surprisingly common “low impressions” scare is simply a date-range issue (for example, looking at “today” while the campaign just started, or comparing a 7-day window to a seasonal prior period). Before you change anything, confirm the time range, time zone, and that the campaign/ad group/keyword is actually enabled.

If you meant “SEO keywords” (organic rankings), the diagnostics are completely different. Everything below is specifically about Search ads keywords and the mechanics that control whether ads can show and how often they win impressions.

Diagnose low keyword impressions the same way an expert would

Step 1: Check keyword status first (it tells you if you’re even allowed to show)

Keyword status is your fastest truth serum. If the status is Not eligible or Eligible (limited), impressions will be constrained no matter how good your ads are.

Two statuses cause a lot of “why am I getting no impressions?” moments:

Low search volume means the system has very little to no recent search history for that keyword and will keep it inactive until traffic increases. Importantly, this is not a Quality Score problem, and changing bids or ad copy typically won’t “fix” it. It’s a keyword-demand problem (often caused by being too specific, obscure, or misspelled).

Rarely shown due to low Quality Score is different: that’s the platform effectively saying “we don’t want to show this because the expected user experience is very poor.” In this scenario, impressions are low because the keyword can’t compete well enough to clear minimum thresholds in auctions.

Step 2: Determine whether it’s a demand problem or an auction problem

If your keyword is eligible, you’re usually dealing with auction dynamics—meaning your ads are entering auctions but losing. This is where Ad Rank matters. Ad Rank determines whether you’re eligible to show and where you show relative to others, and it’s influenced by your bid, ad/landing page quality, auction-time context (device, location, query intent, time), competition, and the expected impact of assets (extensions).

Even strong advertisers run into Ad Rank thresholds—minimum levels required to compete that shift dynamically by query, device, location, and even the nature of the search. Lower-quality ads face higher thresholds, and top placements have higher thresholds than lower placements.

Step 3: Use impression share columns to pinpoint what’s choking volume

If you want a clean, executive-level answer to “why low impressions?”, look at impression share. It tells you whether you’re missing impressions because of rank or budget. When you see high “lost due to rank,” the fix is usually a mix of improving ad quality and raising effective bids (or loosening overly strict automated bidding targets). When you see high “lost due to budget,” you’re simply running out of eligible spend and need to reallocate or increase budget to buy more reach.

One nuance: impression share metrics don’t always populate if you don’t have enough traffic, and they typically update with a short delay—so don’t panic if yesterday looks “blank” in a brand-new campaign.

Step 4: Confirm your match behavior using the search terms report

Many advertisers assume, “I added the keyword, so I’ll show for that exact phrase.” That’s not how real search behavior works. The search terms report is where you validate what users actually typed and how your keywords matched.

Be aware that match types can still match to close variants (misspellings, singular/plural, stemmings, reordered words with the same meaning, and adding/removing function words). Close variants are on by default for all match types, and you can’t opt out. That means you may be matching in ways you didn’t expect—or not matching because your keywords are too narrow and don’t connect with real-world phrasing.

Step 5: Check for “invisible blockers” outside the keyword list

Low impressions are often caused by settings that quietly reduce reach:

• Low budget (campaign may show as eligible but limited): the system will throttle serving to avoid exceeding spend limits.
• Low bids or unrealistic automated bidding targets: very low manual bids, or targets like tCPA/tROAS set far tighter than historical performance, can prevent you from entering/winning enough auctions to generate impressions.
• Targeting too narrow: tiny geographies (single postal code, small radius, low-population areas), restrictive audiences, or remarketing lists that are too small to serve can bottleneck impressions.
• Negative keywords: a negative keyword prevents ads from serving on searches that match the excluded term. Overuse (or the wrong match type) can unintentionally wipe out your eligible traffic.
• Policy or review issues: disapproved ads/assets will stop serving regardless of keyword eligibility.
• Conversion tracking + automated bidding conflicts: if you’re using automated bidding to optimize for conversions but conversion tracking is broken or too sparse, serving can become limited.

How to boost keyword impressions (without “buying junk”)

Fix low search volume the right way: broaden intelligently

If keywords are flagged as low search volume, the fastest lift usually comes from changing what you’re targeting, not how aggressively you’re bidding. Consolidate overly specific long-tail terms into clearer, higher-demand concepts, and consider less restrictive match types where it’s safe to do so. In practice, I’ll often keep a small set of precise “must-have” terms, then add a broader discovery layer designed to capture how people actually search (validated and pruned weekly using the search terms report).

Also remove obvious misspellings or ultra-niche phrasing unless you have evidence people truly search that way. If demand isn’t there, impressions won’t be either.

Raise eligibility and win-rate by improving Ad Rank (not just bids)

When impressions are low due to rank, many advertisers over-rotate on bids. Yes—bidding matters. But you can often buy the same impressions for less by improving quality signals that feed Ad Rank.

Start with Quality Score as a diagnostic, not a goal. It’s measured at the keyword level and is based on expected CTR, ad relevance, and landing page experience. If one component is “below average,” treat it like a directional clue:

If expected CTR is weak, tighten ad copy to the query intent, improve your offer clarity, and make sure you’re using strong, relevant assets so your ad is more compelling on the results page.

If ad relevance is weak, stop forcing one ad group to cover too many intents. Split themes so your keyword → ad text relationship is tighter and more literal.

If landing page experience is weak, align the page to the promise in the ad, reduce friction (speed, clarity, navigation), and keep the content tightly related to the keyword theme.

Use bid estimates and targets as guardrails (not guesses)

If your keyword is sitting below the levels typically required to reach first-page visibility, impressions can be sporadic. First-page and top-of-page bid estimates are useful directional indicators because they reflect quality and competitive pressure. They are not guarantees—but if the estimate is very high, it’s commonly a signal that either competition is intense or your quality signals need work (or both).

For automated bidding, the parallel concept is your target. If you set a target CPA far below what your account has historically achieved, or a target ROAS far above what the market supports, the system may throttle bids to the point where you don’t enter enough auctions to earn impressions. Loosen targets strategically, then let performance stabilize before tightening again.

Expand reach safely with structure, not chaos

The easiest way to “get more impressions” is to go broad everywhere. The fastest way to regret it is to do that without controls. Instead, widen in a controlled manner: expand keyword themes one cluster at a time, keep ad groups coherent, and use negatives sparingly and intentionally to block only truly irrelevant traffic.

If you suspect overlap or internal competition (multiple campaigns/ad groups eligible for similar auctions), simplify. Consolidating overlapping targeting often improves impression consistency because you stop splitting signals and budget across near-duplicates.

Make sure your settings aren’t quietly shrinking your audience

If impressions are low even with reasonable keywords and competitive bids, revisit reach constraints. Overly tight location targeting (especially tiny radii or single postal codes), audience restrictions that are too small to serve, and limited schedules can all make a healthy keyword look “dead.” Widen one constraint at a time so you can attribute the improvement to the correct change.

Keep the system “healthy” so it can serve consistently

Finally, check the operational basics that experienced managers treat as non-negotiable: campaigns active, ads/assets approved, billing in good standing, conversion tracking accurate (especially if you’re using conversion-based automated bidding), and budgets aligned with your goals. Once those are solid, low impressions stop being mysterious—and turn into a solvable mix of demand, eligibility, and auction competitiveness.

If your keywords are getting low impressions, it’s usually because they’re not eligible to enter auctions (status, low search volume, policy issues), they’re eligible but losing on Ad Rank (bid and quality signals), or account settings are quietly shrinking reach (budgets, targeting, negatives, schedules, or tracking/bidding constraints). If you want a faster way to pinpoint which of these is happening across your account, Blobr connects to Google Ads and continuously analyzes your campaigns to turn those diagnostics into clear next steps, with specialized AI agents that can, for example, uncover new keyword opportunities (Keyword Ideas Finder) and improve keyword-to-landing-page alignment to lift relevance and win more auctions (Keyword Landing Optimizer), while keeping you in control of what gets applied.