In French-speaking Switzerland, most wasted Google Ads budgets are not lost to timid bids or an overly competitive market. They are lost to sloppy structure: dozens of keywords crammed into a single ad group, generic ads that speak to everyone, and no negative keywords at all. The result: Google casts a wide net, every click costs too much, and the contact form stays stubbornly empty.
The good news? Structuring a campaign properly requires neither paid tools nor a five-figure budget. It requires a method. Here is the one we apply in 2026 for Swiss SMEs, with benchmark figures in CHF and a fully commented sample structure for a local service provider.
Why structure decides your profitability
Google Ads works as an auction weighted by relevance. For every search, Google evaluates how well your keyword, your ad and your landing page fit together. That coherence, measured in particular by the Quality Score, directly affects what you pay: a score of 4 out of 10 can leave you paying a CPC of CHF 6.– where a better-structured competitor pays CHF 3.– for the same position.
Your account structure is the way you tell Google what you sell, to whom and where. A well-segmented campaign produces precise ads, relevant landing pages and high Quality Scores. A catch-all campaign produces the opposite — and you pay for it on every click.
How many campaigns? The "one goal, one budget" rule
The campaign is the level where budget, geography and bidding strategy are set. The rule is therefore simple: create a new campaign only when you need a separate budget or separate targeting. For a local SME, that usually means two to three campaigns:
- Campaign 1 — priority services: the services that bring in the most revenue, with the majority of the budget;
- Campaign 2 — secondary or seasonal services: a separate budget so they never cannibalise the main campaign;
- Campaign 3 (optional) — brand: your company name, a few francs a day, to lock down searches for your own business.
Below CHF 800.– to 1,000.– of monthly budget, stick to a single, well-built Search campaign. Multiplying campaigns on a small budget scatters your data and prevents the algorithm from learning.
How many ad groups? One intent per group
The ad group is the relevance level: it connects a family of keywords to ads that answer them word for word. The rule: one group = one search intent. Plan for three to six groups per campaign for an SME.
Forget the old single-keyword-ad-group technique (SKAG): now that Google broadens match types, it fragments your data with no upside. Instead, group the keywords the same prospect would type for the same need: "power failure", "no electricity in my flat" and "electrical breakdown" all express a single intent — emergency repair — and deserve a single group with dedicated ads.
How many keywords? Fewer than you think
Ten to twenty keywords per group are more than enough. Beyond that, you have almost certainly mixed several intents. Three settings make the difference:
- Match types: start with phrase match ("electrician geneva") and exact match ([emergency electrician geneva]). Save broad match for accounts that already have a solid conversion history;
- Negative keywords: from day one, exclude "free", "job", "salary", "training", "course", "reviews". It is the cheapest protection your budget will ever get;
- Search terms report: review it every week and exclude anything unrelated to your offer. Fifteen minutes that save hundreds of francs.
A commented sample structure: an electrician in Geneva
Take a self-employed electrician in Geneva with a budget of CHF 1,500.– per month. Here is the structure we recommend:
Campaign 1 — Repairs and emergencies (CHF 900.–/month)
- "Emergency electrician" group: [emergency electrician geneva], "24h electrician geneva"… Ads focused on speed: "On site within 45 minutes";
- "Power failure" group: "power failure geneva", "flat power cut"… Reassuring, diagnosis-driven ads;
- "Fuse box" group: "fuse box keeps tripping"… Ads that name the exact problem.
Campaign 2 — Installations and projects (CHF 600.–/month)
- "EV charger" group: "EV charger installation geneva"… A high-ticket service, often CHF 2,000.– and up;
- "Compliance" group: "OIBT inspection geneva", "electrical compliance upgrade"… Lower volume but highly qualified searches;
- "Electrical renovation" group: "rewire apartment"… A longer decision cycle, with ads built around a free quote.
Why two campaigns? Because emergencies convert fast and justify aggressive bidding, while installation projects take weeks to decide: mixing the two would force a losing compromise on both bids and messaging. On the numbers: with an average CPC of CHF 4.50 in Geneva for these queries, CHF 1,500.– buys roughly 330 clicks per month. At an 8% conversion rate on dedicated landing pages, that is 26 enquiries, or a cost per enquiry of about CHF 57.–. When a call-out is invoiced at CHF 350.– and an EV charger at CHF 2,500.–, the campaign is profitable from month one, even if you only close one enquiry out of two.
One detail that is anything but minor: every ad group must point to a page about the exact service being searched for, never your homepage. If your site lacks those pages, our website creation team in Geneva builds landing pages designed to convert paid traffic.
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Extensions and conversion tracking: the free multipliers
With equal structure, the ads that occupy the most space win. Systematically add at least four sitelinks (Pricing, Service area, Contact, Reviews), six callouts ("Free quote", "OIBT certified"…) and a structured snippet listing your services. These extensions are free and improve click-through rates by 10 to 15% on average.
Above all, launch nothing without conversion tracking: submitted forms, calls from the ad, WhatsApp clicks. Without it, you are flying blind — and so is Google's algorithm. Allow half a day for setup: the most profitable half-day of your quarter.
The five mistakes that drain a budget
- The catch-all campaign: every service, every keyword, one single group. Quality Score sinks, CPC climbs;
- Default settings: the Display Network and search partners, enabled by default, dilute your budget across low-quality placements;
- Zero negative keywords: every click on "electrician job offer" is a franc thrown away;
- Sending everything to the homepage: relevance drops, Quality Score follows, and cost per enquiry soars;
- Impatience: changing bids every two days keeps the learning phase from ever completing. Leave two to three weeks between structural changes.
Your pre-launch checklist
- One campaign per goal and per budget — two to three at most to start;
- Three to six ad groups per campaign, one intent per group;
- Ten to twenty keywords per group, in exact and phrase match;
- An active negative keyword list from day one;
- One dedicated landing page per ad group;
- Conversion tracking tested and working before the first franc is spent.
A well-structured campaign is no guarantee of success, but a badly structured one is a guarantee of waste. If you would rather hand the whole thing to specialists, our Google Ads management service in Geneva builds, monitors and optimises your campaigns with clear reporting — and our quotes are clear, with no surprises.
