Auditing Google Ads Location & Device Settings to Eliminate Junk Traffic

One of the most important settings to check is Google's location targeting option.

Google Ads can use different signals to determine whether someone should be eligible to see an ad based on a selected location.

Depending on the campaign's settings, targeting can include people:

• In your targeted locations
• Regularly in your targeted locations
• Showing interest in your targeted locations

For a business that only serves people physically located in a particular area, that distinction matters.

For example, suppose you're advertising a London-based dental clinic.

You target: London

Someone physically in London may be an appropriate prospect.

But someone living in Manchester who searches for "London dentist" may not be a realistic customer for a local clinic.

For businesses where physical presence matters, review whether your campaign should use:

rather than allowing people who merely show interest in the location.

Google documents these location options under its advanced location targeting settings.

The exact Google Ads interface can change over time, but the workflow generally involves your campaign's location settings.

Open the relevant Search campaign and navigate to its location settings.

Look for the location targeting options or advanced location settings.

Review the option related to: Presence or interest

If your business only wants people physically in the selected location, choose the presence-focused option:

Then save the change.

Don't make this change blindly.

An international hotel, tourism company, university, or travel business may intentionally want people outside the location who are researching or planning to visit it.

The correct setting depends on the business model.

Changing the targeting setting isn't the end of the audit.

You also need to understand where your ads actually received traffic.

Google Ads provides location reporting that can show performance based on users' locations and, where available, more granular geographic information.

Look at metrics such as:

• Impressions
• Clicks
• Cost
• Conversions
• Conversion rate
• Cost per conversion

Then compare performance between locations.

For example:

The point isn't to automatically eliminate Birmingham because it has zero conversions.

You need enough data before making geographic decisions.

Instead, use this report to identify where your budget is actually going.

Depending on your campaign and available geographic reporting, you may be able to investigate performance at more granular levels.

Look for available data around:

• Country
• Region/state
• City
• Postal area
• Other available geographic segments

Don't assume every account will provide reliable neighborhood-level reporting.

Google's available geographic reporting and location granularity can vary by campaign, location, and available data.

The important principle is:

Move from "Where am I targeting?" to "Where are my clicks and conversions actually coming from?"

That distinction is critical.

There are two common ways local advertisers approach geographic targeting.

Option 1: Explicit Locations

You can target named locations such as:

• Cities
• Regions
• Countries
• Postal areas
• Other supported geographic areas

This works well when your service area follows recognizable municipal boundaries.

For example: Manchester may be appropriate for a company serving customers throughout the city.

But municipal boundaries don't always match commercial service areas.

A business might serve: Manchester + 20 miles around Manchester. In that situation, a radius may be more appropriate.

Option 2: Radius Targeting

Radius targeting allows you to define an area around a selected location.

For example: 25 miles around Manchester

This can work particularly well for:

• Local service businesses
• Clinics
• Restaurants
• Tradespeople
• Automotive businesses
• Physical stores
• Home-service companies

But radius targeting isn't automatically superior. A 20-mile radius doesn't mean every person inside that circle is a customer. Geography, roads, travel time, competition, and service availability can all affect whether someone is realistically within your service area.

Don't wait until you've spent hundreds of pounds in the wrong location.

If there are areas your business definitely cannot serve, consider excluding them.

For example, a local service business might target London while explicitly excluding locations outside its service territory.

Exclusions can be particularly useful when your service boundaries don't line up neatly with Google's predefined location options.

However, avoid building hundreds of exclusions simply because you're worried about theoretical waste. Use your actual business service area and campaign data to guide the structure.

One bad day doesn't make a location bad.

Suppose a campaign shows: Leeds — 0 conversions

That alone doesn't mean Leeds should be excluded. Ask:

• How much did Leeds spend?
• How many clicks occurred?
• What is the average CPC?
• How long has the campaign been running?
• Does the business actually serve Leeds?
• Is there enough conversion data?
• What is the value of the leads generated?

A location that spent £8 without a conversion tells you very little. A location that spent £800 without a qualified lead deserves much more attention.

This is one of the most common mistakes. Imagine:

Mobile generated the most traffic. Desktop generated the most conversions. Desktop also produced the lowest CPA.

If you only looked at clicks, you might conclude that mobile is the most important device. Conversion data gives you a completely different picture.

Mobile isn't inherently low quality. In many industries, mobile produces the majority of conversions.

The problem occurs when the mobile user experience or traffic quality doesn't match your business model.

Look for patterns such as:

• Very high mobile CTR
• Very low mobile conversion rate
• Extremely short engagement
• Accidental button clicks
• Poor mobile landing page experience
• High bounce or low-quality traffic
• Form completion problems
• Phone interactions that don't become qualified leads

For example, a complex B2B software demo may receive many mobile clicks from people researching the product but more qualified enquiries from desktop users. That doesn't mean mobile should automatically be excluded. It means the difference deserves investigation.

Before reducing mobile traffic, test the website yourself.

Open the landing page on a phone and check:

• Does it load quickly?
• Is the headline visible immediately?
• Is the CTA easy to tap?
• Does the form work properly?
• Are fields easy to complete?
• Does the phone number work?
• Is important information hidden below the fold?
• Are popups blocking the page?
• Does the page look trustworthy?

Sometimes the problem isn't mobile traffic. It's a mobile conversion experience problem.

Conversion rate is:

Suppose:

• Mobile: 100 clicks → 4 conversions (4% conversion rate)
• Desktop: 100 clicks → 10 conversions (10% conversion rate)

Desktop converts at more than twice the rate. But don't stop there.

Also compare Cost per conversion and, where appropriate, Conversion value / cost. A device with a lower conversion rate can still be economically valuable if the resulting customers have significantly higher value.

Google Ads has historically allowed advertisers to use device bid adjustments in certain campaign and bidding configurations.

Depending on the campaign and bidding strategy, available bid adjustment ranges and controls can differ.

For manual bidding, advertisers may have more direct control over device bid adjustments. For example, you might adjust mobile bids downward if the data strongly indicates that mobile traffic performs worse.

A bid adjustment such as -20% means you're reducing the bid for that device relative to the base bid. Similarly, a positive adjustment increases the bid.

Google's current documentation should be checked for the exact adjustment ranges and campaign types because device controls vary by bidding strategy and campaign configuration.

You'll sometimes see Google Ads guides mention device bid adjustments ranging from -100% to +900%.

The exact available range depends on the campaign type and bidding setup.

More importantly, don't interpret a large adjustment as a recommendation to use it. A +900% adjustment would be an extremely aggressive change and should never be applied simply because one device performed well for a small amount of data.

Use statistically meaningful performance and business economics to justify significant changes.

This is where many older Google Ads tutorials become outdated.

Smart Bidding automatically adjusts bids using auction-time signals. If you're using a Smart Bidding strategy, don't assume that manually applying large device adjustments is the correct optimization method.

Google's automated bidding systems can already incorporate device signals when determining bids.

Instead, ask: Is the campaign's device performance sufficiently different that the account structure itself needs to change?

If the answer is no, allow the automated strategy to use its available signals. If device behavior is fundamentally different, you may consider structural solutions such as separate campaigns, but only when the business objective and data justify that complexity.

Don't create a Mobile Campaign and a Desktop Campaign just because the devices have different conversion rates.

Separate campaigns create additional management complexity and split data.

Consider device-specific campaign structures only when you have a strong business reason, such as:

• Completely different landing experiences
• Different budgets
• Different geographic requirements
• Different conversion goals
• Substantially different economics
• A strategic requirement for device-specific control

For most advertisers, device segmentation should begin as an analysis tool, not automatically become a campaign architecture decision.

Ask:

• What locations does the business actually serve?
• Are they physical locations or service areas?
• Are there locations that should be excluded?

Verify whether the campaign is using the appropriate Presence or Presence or interest setting for the business model.

Analyze where clicks, spend, and conversions actually came from.

Look for locations that:

• Cannot be served
• Consume significant spend
• Generate irrelevant traffic
• Produce consistently poor results

Compare:

• Mobile
• Desktop
• Tablet

Don't stop at CTR. Compare:

• Conversion rate
• CPA
• Conversion value
• Qualified lead rate

Especially on mobile. Make sure the landing page and forms work correctly.

Only after the data is clear should you consider:

• Location exclusions
• Radius changes
• Device adjustments
• Campaign restructuring

• Correct countries targeted
• Correct regions/cities targeted
• Presence vs. interest setting reviewed
• Service area confirmed
• Matched Locations report reviewed
• High-spend locations analyzed
• Non-serviceable areas excluded
• Radius targeting reviewed
• Municipal targeting reviewed

• Mobile performance reviewed
• Desktop performance reviewed
• Tablet performance reviewed
• Conversion rate compared
• CPA compared
• Conversion value compared
• Mobile landing page tested
• Form functionality tested
• Device bid controls reviewed
• Smart Bidding implications considered