Google Ads for travel: structure and the negative keyword list

You turn on Google Ads for your travel agency, set a daily budget of ₹1,000, and by the second week half your clicks are people checking their PNR status or looking for a job at MakeMyTrip. None of them were ever going to book a Kerala honeymoon package. The budget is gone by the 20th and you can't tell your CA where it went.

This isn't a mistake you made. It's how Google Ads ships: broad match keywords, "Presence or interest" location targeting, and network expansion are all switched on, or close to it, the moment you create a campaign. None of those defaults were built for a five-person agency on ₹30,000-₹50,000 a month; they were built for advertisers who can absorb waste while an algorithm learns.

This post gives you the fix in two parts: a campaign structure a small agency can actually maintain, and three paste-ready negative keyword lists (universal, travel-specific, per-campaign) for Google Ads Editor, swapping in your own destinations and competitors.

Why a travel agency's Google Ads account leaks money by default

These defaults are built for reach, not for a narrow, high-intent audience on a fixed budget: broad match keywords match on meaning rather than literal words, wide location targeting reaches people merely "interested in" a place rather than physically there, and network expansion runs ads beyond plain search results. None of it is a bug, just not tuned for you.

Even keywords locked to exact or phrase match aren't fully safe. Google's own documentation says both can trigger ads for searches with the "same meaning or intent" as your keyword, not only the literal words typed (source). That's why negatives stay necessary even in a disciplined, exact/phrase-only account.

The cost compounds too. Quality Score is built from expected clickthrough rate, ad relevance, and landing page experience (source). A stream of irrelevant clicks drags down clickthrough and relevance, raising cost-per-click on the bookings that do convert.

Example: Say your agency runs ₹1,000 a day on Search, roughly ₹30,000 a month, on default settings. If a quarter of that lands on job searches, IRCTC status checks and "kaise khole" queries, that's ₹7,500 a month, ₹90,000 a year, on clicks that were never going to convert.

The campaign skeleton a five-person agency can actually maintain

Keep it to a handful of moving parts: one ad group per destination-plus-intent, exact and phrase match only, and a standalone brand campaign, small enough for one person to review in the weekly search-terms check.

The ad group naming convention does most of the work:

[Destination] + [Intent]

Kerala Honeymoon Packages
Kerala Family Packages
Kerala Houseboat Tour
Ladakh Bike Trip Package
Ladakh Group Tour
Vietnam Honeymoon Package
Vietnam Family Tour

Don't run one giant "Packages" ad group with every destination stuffed inside. It can't write one relevant ad for Kerala honeymoons and Ladakh bike trips at once, and you can't cleanly negative "Ladakh" out of a mixed ad group.

Match types: exact and phrase only. Exclude broad match until months of clean search-term data give you reason to test it. Keep every keyword in [brackets] (exact) or "quotes" (phrase) inside Google Ads Editor. Language: match how customers actually search, usually English with Hindi added only where enquiries genuinely arrive that way.

The universal negative keyword list (paste-ready)

Every agency's account, regardless of destinations sold, attracts the same categories of irrelevant searches: job-seekers, course-seekers, people researching how to start their own agency, and people who just want a definition.

# UNIVERSAL NEGATIVE KEYWORDS
# Add as a shared negative keyword list, applied to every campaign

# Jobs and careers
job
jobs
salary
vacancy
vacancies
hiring
walk-in
walk in interview
internship
near me jobs

# Courses and training
course
courses
training
certificate
diploma

# Business opportunity / "start your own" searches
franchise
license
licence
wholesale
distributor
become an agent
how to start
how to open
kaise khole

# Generic informational / definitional
business plan
meaning
definition
wikipedia

Add this as a shared negative keyword list, built once and applied across multiple campaigns rather than typed into each one (source), and attach it to every campaign.

The travel-specific negative keyword list (paste-ready)

Travel agencies get a second layer of waste generic businesses don't see: rail-status searches, application-status searches, and OTA job-seekers.

# TRAVEL-SPECIFIC NEGATIVE KEYWORDS
# Add as a second shared negative list, applied to every campaign

# IRCTC / rail
irctc
pnr status
train ticket status
tatkal

# Status-check searches
refund status
visa status check
application status
booking status
order status

# Careers at OTAs and travel companies
careers
jobs at makemytrip
jobs at yatra
walk-in interview travel
travel agency jobs

# Competitor brand terms: add your own named competitors here
# [competitor agency name]
# [competitor OTA name]
# example: makemytrip (only if you don't want to appear on their brand searches)

The competitor line is a placeholder on purpose. Add agencies and OTAs you don't want your ads showing alongside on their own brand searches. Worth knowing: Google's trademark policy states it "will not restrict... using trademarks as keywords," so your competitors are equally free to bid on your agency's own name (source).

Building your per-campaign negative list

The two shared lists above can't catch destination-specific noise, or stop a search for a destination you don't sell from triggering a campaign you do run. Build one negative list per destination campaign, same pattern each time, starting with Kerala.

# PER-CAMPAIGN NEGATIVES: TEMPLATE (worked for a Kerala campaign)

# Informational / government / news noise for this destination
kerala tourism board
kerala tourism website
kerala government
kerala news
kerala weather
kerala map
distance from kerala
kerala population
kerala history

# Every destination you don't sell, add each as its own negative
# goa
# manali
# thailand
# (repeat this pattern for the destinations outside your product range)

Replicate per destination: swap "kerala" for the name, keep the noise pattern, and list the destinations that campaign shouldn't show for, the same boundary you should already have drawn when picking which segments you actually sell.

Why you need a brand campaign, and what it stops

A standalone brand campaign, bidding only on your own agency's name, stops competitors capturing clicks that were already looking for you. Not optional even at small scale, and usually your cheapest campaign to run.

As the trademark policy above notes, nothing stops another agency or OTA bidding on searches for your name. Without a brand campaign, someone searching for you can land on a competitor's ad above your own listing. It's a cheap, defensive buy: you're the most relevant advertiser for your own name.

Keep it separate from destination campaigns, with its own ad copy and its own, usually tiny, budget.

The location and language settings that stop spend leaking nationwide

The setting most agencies never touch costs them the most. Google Ads defaults new campaigns to "Presence or interest," not the narrower "Presence" (people in or regularly in the target location). For an agency selling to a specific city or region, "Presence" is almost always right.

Google's own documentation notes advertisers who switched from Presence to Presence-or-interest saw an average 5% more conversions on Search (source), so the broader setting isn't wrong in general. But the same page recommends Presence-only for advertisers who want clicks only from people physically in the location, exactly the case for a walk-in or regionally-served agency.

Setting	Who it reaches	Best fit
Presence	People physically in, or regularly in, the location	Local, walk-in, regionally-served agencies
Presence or interest	The above, plus anyone Google judges "interested," from anywhere	National reach, higher budget tolerance

Careful: "Presence or interest" is the default. If you never touch it, you're on the broader setting even if you serve just one city.

Pair this with the language setting from the skeleton above.

The weekly 20-minute search-terms-report ritual

The Search Terms Report shows the literal queries that triggered your ads, which keyword and match type matched each, and how each performed; Google's own guidance is to use it to refine negatives and match types (source).

Find it under Campaigns, then Insights and reports, then Search terms. Each week:

1. Sort by cost, scan the top 15-20 rows for anything that clearly isn't booking intent.
2. Add anything irrelevant to the right list: universal, travel-specific, or the matching per-campaign list.
3. For queries that converted or came close, promote them into their own exact-match keyword so you control the bid and ad copy directly.
4. For queries that spent with zero conversions after enough clicks, negative them out even if they're travel-adjacent.

A fixed weekly cadence is what makes this stick; slot it into a 12-week marketing plan built for a one-person marketing seat if you don't already run one.

The two settings that quietly burn budget

Two settings, easy to leave on because they default that way, do more quiet damage than almost anything else in the account.

The first is broad match paired with fully automated bidding before the account has enough conversion history to bid well. This isn't a documented Google warning: Google's own Search Terms Report guidance recommends feeding data into Smart Bidding once optimised, and broad match with Smart Bidding pairs well for accounts with real conversion volume. The caution is narrower: a small agency with limited monthly conversions hasn't given automated bidding enough signal, and broad match without it can spend fast in directions you didn't intend.

The second is leaving network expansion switched on inside a Search campaign, shown at campaign creation as checkboxes for Search Partners and Display Network. Confirm exactly what these are labelled in your account today, since Google reshuffles this screen, but the substance holds: leaving them ticked runs your ads on placements a shopper isn't actively searching, rarely where a real enquiry starts.

Careful: Neither setting is wrong for every advertiser. They're just on by default for you, not chosen by you, so a small agency on a fixed budget should decide deliberately rather than inherit the setting.

Common questions

What are negative keywords in Google Ads?

A negative keyword stops your ad showing when a search contains that term. Three match types: Negative Broad blocks a search containing all the negative terms in any order, Negative Phrase blocks the exact terms in order even with extra words, and Negative Exact blocks only an exact match with nothing added (source).

How many negative keywords should I use?

There's no fixed number. Build from the two shared lists here, add a per-campaign list per destination, and let the weekly Search Terms Report grow it. Google Ads enforces account-level caps; check current limits in Google Ads Help rather than assume a figure.

What's the difference between broad match and exact match?

Broad match is the default when no match type is specified, showing your ad for searches Google judges related in meaning, often far looser than the literal words. Exact match, in [brackets], shows your ad only for searches with the same meaning or intent as the keyword, the tightest of the three (source).

Is Google Ads good for travel agencies?

It can be: it reaches people actively searching for the exact trip they want, a higher-intent moment than most social platforms offer. Google holds roughly 97.85% of India's search market as of July 2026 (source), which is why it's the paid-search channel to get right first. Meta lead ads and SEO matter too, but whether Ads works for your agency depends on whether the structure and negatives here match your budget.

The short version

• Google Ads defaults (broad match, "Presence or interest," network expansion) are built for reach, not a small agency's fixed budget. None are wrong, just not tuned for you.
• Structure the account as one ad group per destination-plus-intent, exact and phrase match only, plus a standalone brand campaign.
• Run three negative lists: universal (jobs, courses, franchise terms), travel-specific (IRCTC/PNR, status checks, OTA careers), and per-campaign (each destination's noise, plus destinations you don't sell).
• Set location targeting to "Presence," not the "Presence or interest" default, if you serve a specific city or region rather than pan-India.
• Run a standalone brand campaign regardless of budget: competitors can bid on your name, and defending it is usually your cheapest campaign.
• Check the Search Terms Report weekly, promote genuine converters into exact-match keywords, and negative out the rest.
• Confirm current negative-keyword caps and network-expansion labels in your own account first; Google's documentation and interface both shift over time.