If you’re running Google Ads for a luxury brand, your cost per click is often £5 to £20+. A handful of irrelevant clicks a day isn’t a rounding error, it’s real budget leaking away on people who were never going to buy.
Higher price points also mean unwanted associations, think “cheap” or “replica” next to your brand name, damage more than just that day’s spend. Here are the keyword groups worth excluding across the account.
Price qualifiers
Cheap, discount, budget, second hand, used, dupe, replica. These signal someone looking for the opposite of what you sell, and they show up on both brand and generic searches (“[brand] cheap,” “handbag cheap”), so add them broadly.
Counterfeit and grey market terms
Fake, replica, AAA quality, wholesale, outlet, factory seconds. These sit right next to counterfeit search behaviour and are worth excluding wherever they appear.
Research and informational searches
Jobs/careers, how is [product] made, reviews, history of [brand], how to make, pattern, template, tutorial. These tend to come from job seekers, researchers or hobbyists rather than buyers.
Resale and marketplace terms
On ebay, on vinted, on vestiaire, on depop, stockx, preloved. Someone searching “[brand] on vestiaire” wants a resale listing, not your site.
Cross-category mismatches
Terms that share a word but not the category: a handbag brand excluding “leather sofa” or “leather repair,” a jewellery brand excluding “jewellery box” or “jewellery insurance.”
Materials, rental and segment mismatches
Vegan, faux or synthetic, if you only sell genuine materials. Rent, hire, for hire, if you sell rather than rent. Kids, plus size, or other ranges you don’t stock, along with regions you don’t ship to.
Trade and B2B intent
Supplier, manufacturer, wholesale account, stockist application. These look relevant but come from businesses looking to buy in bulk or stock the brand, not individual customers.
The takeaway
Negative keywords aren’t a one-off task. Done properly across the whole account, they protect margin and brand positioning at once, which matters more for luxury given higher CPCs and reputational stakes. If you’re not sure what’s hiding in your search terms report right now, we can take a look. Get in touch for an audit.
Want to know what’s quietly draining your ad spend? Let’s audit your Google Ads account and find out, get in touch.
