Google Ad Extensions You Need To Use And How to Make Them Kick Ass

Ad extensions are essential to your paid digital advertising strategy. They act as little tidbits of information that you can add on to your ad to make it more compelling and to offer more areas for the user to click.

Utilizing ad extensions can improve the appearance of your ads, clickthrough rate, and Quality Score. Not only can it improve your overall ad quality, but it also takes up more real estate on the search engine results page (SERP), pushing your competition further down the page!

Google recommends adding four or more extensions to your ads, but consider adding all of them, as long as they are relevant to your business. For example, if I run an online store, I probably wouldn’t want to have location extensions since I don’t have an actual brick-and-mortar location to send people to. 

Let’s take a look at all of the extensions that Google has to offer:

1. Sitelink extension

This extension allows for up to four additional links that can show with your ad. Despite the maximum, you can still as many as you can that are related to your ads, business, and potential customers. 

A few examples that you could use are hours and directions, blog, contact us, or resource library.

Components and Character Limits:

• Sitelink Text: 25 characters
• Description Line 1: 35 characters
• Description Line 2: 35 characters
• URL

2. Callout extension

This presents additional bits of text that can bring attention to why people should use your business. Callout extensions can be used to encourage people to convert offline or online.

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A couple of examples could be “free delivery” or “24/7 customer support.”

Components and Character Limits:

• Callout Text: 25 characters

3. Structured snippet extension

This also presents additional bits of text, but it contains a header or category for what all of your text must fit into.

For example, one the the headers you can choose from is “Destinations,” so a few items that could fit under that header might be Miami, Fort Lauderdale, and Orlando.

Below are all of the headers you have to choose from:

• Amenities
• Brands
• Courses
• Degree programs
• Destinations
• Featured hotels
• Insurance coverage
• Models
• Neighborhoods
• Service catalog
• Shows
• Styles
• Types

Components and Character Limits:

• Header: There are 13 options to choose from
• Values: 25 characters
• You can choose up to 10 values to include in one extension

4. Call extension

Similar to its name, call extensions allow you to add a phone number for users to call your business.

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Components and Character Limits:

• Phone number
• Call reporting

5. Message extension

Also similar to its name, message extensions are where you can include a texting option for users to reach out to your business. You can also customize a predefined message that appears after a user clicks on the original button. 

Components and Character Limits:

• Phone Number
• Extension text: 35 characters
• Business Name: 25 characters
• Message Text: 100 characters

6. Location extension

In order to create a location extension, you must have a Google My Business account created for all locations.

After that, you will need to link your Google Ads and Google My Business accounts. From there, you will be able to add your location to your ad.

7. Affiliate location extension

This helps users find retail chain stores that sell your products.

For example, if I work at a video game company and Target sells some of our video games, I would include an affiliate location extension to let users know if there is a Target nearby that sells my company's games. 

8. Price extension

Continuing my video game example, price extensions allow me to include a price in my ad to let users know how much my video games cost.

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You can include up to five price extension items.

Components and Character Limits:

• Type
• Currency
• Price Qualifier
• Header: 25 characters
• Price
• Units
• Description: 25 characters
• Final URL

9. App extension

These help promote your app within your ad and offer users the ability to download your app directly from your ad.

Components and Character Limits:

• Mobile Apps Platform
• Look up your app
• Link Text: 25 characters

10. Promotion extension

This allows you to show a discount you're currently running with your business. It can either be standalone or tied to a specific holiday or yearly event.

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Below are the occasions that you can choose from:

• None
• New Year's
• Valentine's Day
• Easter
• Mother's Day
• Father's Day
• Labor Day
• Back to school
• Halloween
• Black Friday
• Cyber Monday
• Christmas
• Boxing Day 

Components and Character Limits:

• Occasion
• Currency
• Promotion Type
• Monetary discount
• Percent discount
• Up to monetary discount
• Up to percent discount
• Item Text: 20 characters
• Final URL

There are plenty of awesome ad extension options you can select for your business. The most important takeaway here is plain and simple: Use them!

If you still aren’t sure which extensions are the best option for you, try this extension quiz to know which one to choose!

Extension Quiz:

1. I want to get customers to visit my location.
1. Location extensions
2. Affiliate location extensions
3. Callout extensions
2. I want to get customers to contact me.
1. Call extensions
2. Message extensions
3. I want to get customers to convert on my website.
1. Sitelink extensions
2. Callout extensions
3. Structured snippet extensions
4. Price extensions

Any of these extensions help you take up more real estate on SERPs, improve your click-through rate, and boost your Quality Score!