Close Variant Analyzer

Analyze how Google’s close variant matching perform in your account

Paste up to 100,000 Query/Keyword combinations with related KPIs if you want

Get a score for each Query/Keyword combination’s similarity

Use results for adding negative keywords or understanding your performance

Place your Query/Keyword matching and KPIs (optional)

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2211 keywords

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How does the Close Variant Analyzer work?

1) Paste your data

The first 2 columns should contain keywords and queries, and you can add more metrics as needed. If you only want to focus on close variant matching, you should filter your input data. Of course, you also use it for analyzing phrases, broad or modified broad keyword matches.

2) Download the File

After a few seconds, the report will be ready to download. Your provided data will have one new column. This column will have values from 0 to 100 and describe the similarity between the keyword and queries. The higher score you have, the closer match you will get.

How to use the data for further analysis

What do the worst matches look like?

What is the worst example of a query to keyword match we can find? You’ll find it right away when you sort by the matching score in ascending order.

How does the matching change over time?

By dividing your data to time periods (like week, month, etc.), you can monitor queries and matched keywords in Google side over time.

Feel free to weigh the matching scores with impressions or clicks. This perspective is very interesting for understanding how they force the close variant matches. Exact match keywords seem to be a thing of the past.

Matching Quality vs. Conversion Rate

What does the matching similarity mean for your conversion rate? Based on big numbers, you can group your performance metrics (if you provided them in your data input) to get answers by the matching similarity. If you like, you can create bigger buckets like 0-10, 11-20, …, 91-100 to get even bigger numbers per bucket. Then use the matching score to derive negative keywords.

Extra tip: also score the “not significant” queries that are hidden in Google Ads, but still available in Google Analytics.

Worst Matches of Close Variants

I was quite surprised what google is matching to exact keywords.

Matching Quality over time

Close Variants get more fuzzy over time. Google is forcing this heavily.

Close Variants bring poor traffic

Poor Close Variant Matches do not convert that well.

How to clean close variant matches by using negative keywords

Stefan Neefischer

17 Jan 2021

The negative impact of close variant matches on overall performance will result in increased challenges over time. Here is an approach to solve the hidden problems with “non-significant” searches and…

Close variants could be the ultimate move to push Smart Bidding into the market

Stefan Neefischer

11 Jan 2021

Google seems to have big plans for Smart Bidding. One can expect that they can alter their product in many ways for success. Close variants could be the ultimate move…

Analyzing Close Variant Matches in Google Ads with Python

Stefan Neefischer

8 Jan 2021

We have lost exact match keyword and “not significant” queries with the updates in Google Ads. But we can still measure the effects with a smart Python solution. Here’s how.…

Close Variant Analyzer

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Avg. Matching Similarity

How does the Close Variant Analyzer work?

How to use the data for further analysis

What do the worst matches look like?

How does the matching change over time?

Matching Quality vs. Conversion Rate

Read more about close variant matches in Google Ads

How to clean close variant matches by using negative keywords

Close variants could be the ultimate move to push Smart Bidding into the market

Analyzing Close Variant Matches in Google Ads with Python