Negative keyword example lists for six industries

Assume a law practice advertises paid legal representation and does not recruit through these campaigns. Employment and legal education queries are reasonable exclusion categories. They are stronger candidates than broad words such as "advice," which can appear in searches from people ready to hire an attorney.

• "attorney jobs" for searches about employment as an attorney.
• "paralegal salary" for compensation research rather than legal representation.
• "law school admissions" for prospective students.
• "bar exam prep" for examination preparation.
• [free legal aid] when the practice does not provide that service through this campaign.

Keep "free consultation" eligible if the intake offer includes one. Do not add a phrase negative for an unrelated practice area until you check mixed-intent cases. A personal injury campaign may receive valuable queries involving employment or insurance disputes. Exclude the unwanted full query first if the broader words also describe cases you accept.

For geography, use service boundaries and location settings together. A city name in a query may describe where an incident happened rather than where the prospect lives. Review actual intake eligibility before blocking locations across the account. The law firm PPC workflow provides product context for recurring query control in legal campaigns.

Assume a dental practice wants patient appointments and does not advertise professional training or supplies. Queries about credentials, staff compensation, and equipment resale are typically outside that objective. Patient searches about cost, pain, recovery, and financing can still lead to appointments and should receive a relevance review.

• "dental hygienist jobs" for recruitment intent.
• "dental assistant certification" for career training.
• "dental school application" for education intent.
• "used dental equipment" when the practice does not sell equipment.
• [free dental clinic] when this campaign does not offer free clinic care.

Use exact negatives for ambiguous treatment searches until the practice confirms what it provides. "Dentures repair kit" may be irrelevant to an appointment campaign, while "denture repair near me" may be a valuable service inquiry. A broad negative for "repair" would suppress both.

Do not automatically exclude insurance names, Medicaid, or financing terms. Eligibility varies by practice, treatment, and campaign. Confirm accepted coverage and the page's explanation first. If a treatment is unavailable, exclude it at the relevant campaign scope rather than removing it from a separate campaign that does offer it. Align exclusions with the appointment goals described in PPC for dentists.

Assume a plumbing contractor advertises paid repair visits and does not sell parts, teach courses, or recruit through the same campaign. DIY instructions and trade education can consume budget without producing service requests. Still, homeowners sometimes research a repair before deciding to hire help, so inspect the full phrase.

• "plumbing apprenticeship" for trade training.
• "plumber jobs" for recruitment.
• "plumbing license exam" for professional certification research.
• "wholesale plumbing supplies" when no supplies are sold.
• [how to replace a toilet yourself] for a narrowly defined DIY query.

Avoid a phrase negative for "how to" across the account. A search such as "how to find an emergency plumber" expresses hiring intent. Similarly, "water heater parts" can describe a retail need, but a homeowner searching about a failed part may need installation. Use exact exclusions when the service boundary is uncertain.

Review emergency availability, service radius, and unsupported equipment categories with the dispatcher. If the business does not service boilers, a boiler exclusion may be appropriate for that campaign. If another campaign handles boilers, keep the exclusion local. Check calls and accepted jobs because a submitted form alone does not establish that the requested work is eligible.

Assume a store sells new office furniture directly to shoppers. It does not operate a resale marketplace, distribute assembly files, or hire through product campaigns. These boundaries create more defensible exclusions than assumptions that bargain shoppers never purchase.

• "used office chairs" when every chair is sold new.
• "office chair repair manual" when the store does not provide repair manuals.
• "furniture warehouse jobs" for employment intent.
• [office chair cad file] when downloadable design files are not the offer.
• [office chair rental] when the store sells furniture but does not rent it.

Keep product reviews, comparisons, dimensions, and shipping questions under review. These searches can appear close to purchase. A negative for "cheap" can also remove shoppers searching for an affordable product that you actually sell. Compare order values, returns, and contribution margin before deciding that a price modifier signals poor economics.

Segment exclusions by catalog eligibility. If one collection includes refurbished products, a shared "refurbished" negative can damage that collection. For Shopping, inspect feed accuracy and product availability alongside query exclusions. Better query control cannot repair an incorrect price or an unavailable variant. The ecommerce PPC workflow connects recurring optimization with ROAS and budget pacing.

Assume a SaaS business sells a commercial CRM subscription and offers neither an open-source edition nor a locally installed package. Searches for those delivery models may be irrelevant. However, security, integration, migration, and setup searches can be part of a serious evaluation rather than low-value support traffic.

• "crm source code" when source code is not sold or licensed.
• "crm developer jobs" for recruitment.
• "crm certification exam" when certification is not the product.
• [crm crack download] for unauthorized software acquisition intent.
• [free crm] when the business does not offer that purchase path.

Do not expand [free crm] into a phrase negative for "free" if a free trial or consultation is part of acquisition. A query for "crm with free trial" can express a different intent from a request for permanently no-cost software. An exact exclusion preserves that distinction.

Separate acquisition campaigns from existing-customer support where the account structure permits it. Excluding "login" may be reasonable in a prospecting campaign, but evaluate the full query and brand strategy first. A product comparison mentioning a competitor's login experience is not necessarily a support request. Validate lead quality through activated trials or qualified opportunities, rather than optimizing only toward form completions.

Assume a B2B supplier sells commercial cleaning equipment outright, with no residential service or equipment rental. The most useful exclusions describe a purchasing model or service category that the sales team cannot fulfill. Broad exclusions based on company size can be risky when a small business still meets the order requirements.

• "cleaning equipment rental" when only outright sales are available.
• "house cleaning jobs" for employment intent.
• "residential maid service" when the business sells commercial equipment.
• "cleaning certification course" when no training course is sold.
• [used floor scrubber] when the catalog contains only new equipment.

Keep "supplier," "distributor," "pricing," and "quote" eligible when they match the sales motion. Researchers may be gathering procurement information for a buying committee. An immediate conversion is not the only evidence of value, especially when offline qualification takes time.

Review minimum order requirements, service agreements, and territory rules with sales before building shared lists. A phrase such as "small office" should not be excluded merely because larger contracts are preferred. Check whether those inquiries actually fail qualification. For low-frequency, high-value deals, extend the review period and inspect the opportunity outcome before using cost alone to exclude a relevant term.

Build a review sheet with the query, cost, mature conversions, intent label, proposed negative, match type, scope, and reason. Calculate confirmed irrelevant spend as the sum of costs for queries you verify are outside the offer. Calculate its share as confirmed irrelevant spend divided by total spend for the same period, multiplied by 100.

If verified irrelevant queries cost $420 within $3,000 of campaign spend, the share is 14%. That is arithmetic for prioritizing a review, not proof that the entire amount becomes future savings. Auction mix and traffic can change after exclusions. Also distinguish visible-query findings from unreported queries.

Use cost above two times target CPA with no mature conversions as a review trigger. Check lag and relevance before acting. A recurring n-gram with poor outcomes warrants inspection of every query it would block. Do not add up overlapping n-gram costs as if each group represents separate spend.

• Put universal, verified exclusions in a shared list only after checking every assigned campaign.
• Keep product, territory, and campaign-routing exclusions at the narrowest suitable scope.
• Compare proposed negatives against valuable historical queries.
• Check singular, plural, and alternate wording individually.
• Log the change date and reassess mature traffic after implementation.

Use the 30-day account review checklist to coordinate exclusions with tracking and budget checks. For accounts with rising acquisition costs, the CPA diagnosis guide helps establish whether traffic quality is actually the main problem.