---
title: "How do I set up location targeting in Google Ads? · Goldbeater"
description: "Pick where your ads show, decide between Presence and Presence or interest, exclude the places you don't serve, and see where your clicks came from."
canonical: https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-location-targeting
last-updated: 2026-10-04
---

Guide

# How do I set up location targeting in Google Ads?

Pick where your ads show, decide between Presence and Presence or interest, exclude the places you don't serve, and see where your clicks came from.

In short

- Location targeting decides where a campaign's ads can show: countries, areas within a country such as states, cities or postal codes, or a radius of at least 1 km around an address.
- Its location option decides who counts as there. Google's default, Presence or interest, also reaches people elsewhere who search for your locations or show interest in them; Presence reaches only people in, or regularly in, them.
- Presence or interest suits a hotel or a school people travel to. If you serve people where they are, you usually want Presence, with the places inside a target you don't serve excluded.
- To see where the clicks came from, read the Matched locations report by country and state, and Report editor's Locations report for where people physically were.
- Goldbeater reads every campaign's locations and where its clicks came from every day, and raises spend outside your targets, a campaign that can show in every country, and a country or state converting far below or above the rest.

Stop paying for clicks outside your targets.

- Ads shown to people interested in your locations, not only people in them
- Paying for clicks outside your area
- A country converting far below the rest of its campaign
- [and 4 more](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-location-targeting#goldbeater)

Goldbeater finds these in your own account, says what each is worth and drafts the fix. 159 other checks find what else is wasting your budget and where it could earn more. Goldbeater's AI agent follows up every week.

[Get a free first look](https://goldbeater.ai/app?start=look)

No card needed. Then $49 a month up to $5,000 of ad spend, or from $249 with a 7-day trial above that.

1. [01 Location targeting sets where ads show, and its option sets who counts.](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-location-targeting#where-and-who)
2. [02 Presence or interest reaches people who aren’t there](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-location-targeting#location-options)
3. [03 How to set a campaign’s locations and its option](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-location-targeting#by-hand)
4. [04 Exclude the places inside a target you don’t serve](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-location-targeting#exclusions)
5. [05 How to read location reporting by country and state](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-location-targeting#reports)
6. [06 Tighten where it leaks, and give more where it converts](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-location-targeting#decide)
7. [07 What it looks like when Goldbeater finds it](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-location-targeting#in-goldbeater)
8. [08 Questions](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-location-targeting#questions)

Contents

1. [01 Location targeting sets where ads show, and its option sets who counts.](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-location-targeting#where-and-who)
2. [02 Presence or interest reaches people who aren’t there](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-location-targeting#location-options)
3. [03 How to set a campaign’s locations and its option](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-location-targeting#by-hand)
4. [04 Exclude the places inside a target you don’t serve](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-location-targeting#exclusions)
5. [05 How to read location reporting by country and state](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-location-targeting#reports)
6. [06 Tighten where it leaks, and give more where it converts](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-location-targeting#decide)
7. [07 What it looks like when Goldbeater finds it](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-location-targeting#in-goldbeater)
8. [08 Questions](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-location-targeting#questions)

Stop paying for clicks outside your targets.

[Get a free first look](https://goldbeater.ai/app?start=look)

No card needed.

The manual way comes first, in Google Ads itself. Then the same problem as Goldbeater finds it, every day, without anyone asking.

## Location targeting sets where ads show, and its option sets who counts.

Each campaign targets locations: whole countries, areas within a country such as states, cities or postal codes, depending on the country, or a radius of at least 1 km around an address. Google’s advice is to target where your customers are, which isn’t always where your business is: an online store targets every place it ships to.

A second setting, Location options, decides who counts as being in them. Google reads where a person physically is from their device’s IP address, or, where their settings allow, from GPS, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth or cell towers. It also reads the places a person has shown interest in: a place named in a search, past searches, places they’ve been, the page an ad would appear on, and searches on Google Maps.

Google calls all of this its best effort, and says 100% accuracy isn’t guaranteed. It may also show your ads in nearby areas that can’t be targeted on their own, such as the suburbs of a city you target. So even a well-set campaign takes some clicks from outside its locations, and the reports below show how many.

## Presence or interest reaches people who aren’t there

A campaign has two location options, and starts on the first:

- Presence or interest: people in, regularly in, or who’ve shown interest in your included locations. It’s Google’s default, marked recommended. Google’s example is a bakery in Paris that targets Paris: its ads can show to people in Paris, and to people who have shown interest in Paris bakeries, now or in the past.
- Presence: people in or regularly in your targeted locations. Hotel campaigns use only this one.

Interest has no border. Google’s example is someone in Paris searching for “Los Angeles taxi” on google.fr, whom it may count as interested in Los Angeles. For a taxi firm in Los Angeles, that’s a customer on the way. For a plumber there, the same reach buys clicks from people who can’t hire one.

Google recommends Presence or interest on Search, and cites 5% more conversions on Search campaigns for advertisers in travel, real estate and education who switched to it. It says to consider Presence when you only want people in your locations, not people elsewhere who are interested in them, or when your business is in a sensitive category with strict targeting limits. Most campaigns see fewer impressions after switching away from the default; the ones lost are people who aren’t there.

Which option fits

Example

| Your business                                                     | Location option      | Why                                                                                                                   |
| ----------------------------------------------------------------- | -------------------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| A shop, clinic or trade serving the people nearby                 | Presence             | Someone elsewhere searching about your town can’t come in.                                                            |
| A store delivering to some states or countries                    | Presence             | Someone outside them can’t take delivery. Exclude any place inside a target you don’t serve.                          |
| A hotel, a school or a real estate agent people travel or move to | Presence or interest | Customers search from where they are now. Google’s figure for switching comes from travel, real estate and education. |

An example of how the choice usually goes, not a rule. Your own location reports say which it is (below).

## How to set a campaign’s locations and its option

1. Go to Campaigns › Campaigns, select the Settings tab and select the campaign’s name.
2. Expand Locations and select Enter another location. Type a country, region, city or postal code. Add the country or state to a city’s name: Google’s example is a seller of cowboy hats who wants Paris, Texas, not Paris, France.
3. Select Location options, then Presence: People in or regularly in your targeted locations if that’s the one that fits.
4. Select Save.

For a radius, go to Campaigns › Locations, select the pencil icon and the campaign, choose Radius, and enter an address and a distance. Google warns that a very small radius or place may show your ads only now and then, or not at all. The [image extensions guide](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-image-extensions#location-assets) covers location assets, which show your address with the ad.

To change several campaigns at once, tick them on the Settings tab and choose Edit, then Change locations: you can replace their locations, add to them, or copy another campaign’s. A campaign holds up to 10,500 locations, targeted and excluded together, of which up to 500 can be a radius. The [ad group guide](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-ad-groups#names) covers a campaign whose name says one market and whose locations target another.

## Exclude the places inside a target you don’t serve

An exclusion stops your ads for people likely to be in the excluded place. It works by presence alone: Google notes that people located outside an excluded area may still see your ads, so it keeps out the people there, not the people interested in it.

An exclusion wins over a target. Google’s example: exclude California and target Los Angeles, and Los Angeles gets no ads, because it’s in California. Google also says there’s no need to exclude a place you don’t target, with one exception: on Presence or interest a campaign reaches people outside its targets, and an exclusion there keeps out the people in that place.

1. In the campaign’s Settings, expand Locations.
2. Search for the place and select Exclude. For many at once, select Advanced search, tick Add locations in bulk and paste up to 1,000, one country at a time, select Search, then Exclude all.
3. Select Save. The places are listed under Excluded locations, and Show locations on map outlines them in red.

Google’s own example is a brokerage in Hawaii with no office on Maui: it targets Hawaii and excludes Maui. A campaign set to All countries and territories, with no location targeted, shows in every country, and can exclude up to 122 of them.

## How to read location reporting by country and state

Two reports answer two different questions:

- Matched locations, at Campaigns › Insights and reports › When and where ads showed, is where your ads showed by the location that matched them: where a person was, or a place they showed interest in. View it by country, region (a state, in the US) or city, and compare each place’s cost per conversion with the rest of the campaign’s.
- The Locations report in Campaigns › Insights and reports › Report editor, under When and where ads showed, is where people physically were, whatever location matched the ad. It’s the one that shows spend from outside your targets.

To see the results page as someone in one of those places would, without a search of your own counting, the [ad preview tool guide](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-ad-preview-tool) covers the preview’s location setting.

Locations, last 30 days

Sample data

| Location   | Clicks | Cost   | Conversions |
| ---------- | ------ | ------ | ----------- |
| All places | 470    | $1,990 | 27          |
| Illinois   | 312    | $1,318 | 19          |
| Wisconsin  | 71     | $302   | 4           |
| Indiana    | 52     | $221   | 3           |
| Michigan   | 18     | $76    | 0           |
| Florida    | 11     | $47    | 1           |
| Ohio       | 3      | $14    | 0           |
| California | 3      | $12    | 0           |

Sofas — Phrase targets Illinois, Wisconsin and Indiana, the states the store delivers to, on Presence or interest. The marked rows are people outside them: $149 of its $1,990, 7.5%, with 1 conversion from 35 clicks, against 26 from 435 inside.

Google notes that the figures below country level may not add up to the campaign’s total, because some impressions are matched only to a country.

## Tighten where it leaks, and give more where it converts

Where people outside your locations take real spend and you can’t serve them, switch the campaign to Presence. If it’s on Presence already, those clicks are its regulars seen elsewhere, or Google placing people loosely: exclude the place that took most of them, if you don’t sell there. If they look like click fraud to you, the [invalid clicks guide](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-invalid-clicks#rule-out) covers what to rule out first.

Where a country or state converts far below the rest, Google suggests excluding a region that keeps getting clicks at a low conversion rate; its example excludes Wyoming from a campaign targeting the United States. Be sure the gap is real first: a few conversions either way is often chance.

Where one converts far better, give it more. Under manual bidding or Maximize clicks, a location bid adjustment, from −90% to +900%, changes the campaign’s bids for a place it targets. Under Smart Bidding, Google sets the bids itself and says a manual adjustment isn’t supported. Google’s other suggestion works under either: a campaign of its own for the place, with its own budget, as in its example of a snorkeling store that sells most in Hawaii. The [targeting guide](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-targeting) reads a city, a device, an age range and an audience the same way, and has the sum that tells a real gap from a few conversions’ luck.

Naming the place in the ad helps as well. Google’s example turns “coffee shop” into “Boston coffee shop”, which fewer people outside Boston click.

## What it looks like when Goldbeater finds it

Every day Goldbeater reads each campaign’s locations, its location option and where its clicks came from over the last 30 days, and raises:

- A campaign on Presence or interest, with the change to Presence drafted.
- Spend outside your targets: a campaign that spent at least $20 on people outside the locations it targets, as Google itself reports it, with the places named and what each took. On Presence or interest it drafts Presence. On Presence, where one or two places took at least half of it, it drafts excluding them, and only where Google’s location table shows the place shares no ground with anything the campaign targets, so an exclusion can’t stop the ads where you mean them to show.
- A campaign that can show in every country: a Search, Display, Performance Max, Video or Demand Gen campaign with no location, radius or location group targeted, that spent at least $20. It lists the countries it spent in and where its conversions came from, for you to set the ones you sell in.
- A country or state far below the rest: one that bought under half the conversions its spend would at the rate of the campaign’s other countries, or the rest of its country, on at least $20, and too far under to be chance once every campaign and place tested in the account is allowed for; where your conversion value is real, its return under half too. For a state that bought nothing it drafts excluding it, and for one the campaign targets by name under manual bidding or Maximize clicks, halving its bids there. For a country, it says what its conversions cost above the rest’s price.
- A country or state far above the rest: over twice, by the same test. Where the campaign targets it by name under manual bidding or Maximize clicks, it drafts a fifth more on its bids there; under Smart Bidding, the finding says when a campaign of its own would let it have more.

Each drafted change goes to the change set, and nothing reaches your account until a person approves it and presses Apply; an applied change can be undone.

Finding

Sample data

Medium Medium severity Risk

Sofas — Phrase reaches people interested in its locations, and spent $149 on people outside them

Sofas — Phrase

What Goldbeater saw

Its location option reaches people in, or interested in, its locations, and $149 of its spend in the last 30 days, 7.5%, went to people outside Illinois, Indiana and Wisconsin.

- Spent outside its targets

  $149

- Share of its spend

  7.5%

- Clicks

  35

- Cost, 30 days

  $1,990

The last 30 days

| Figure              | Outside its targets | Inside its targets |
| ------------------- | ------------------- | ------------------ |
| Spend               | $149                | $1,841             |
| Conversions         | 1                   | 26                 |
| Cost per conversion | $149                | $71                |

Outside its targets

Inside its targets

Spend

$149

$1,841

Conv.

1

26

Cost / conv.

$149

$71

|                           |    |     |   |
| ------------------------- | -- | --- | - |
| Michigan, United States   | 18 | $76 | 0 |
| Florida, United States    | 11 | $47 | 1 |
| Ohio, United States       | 3  | $14 | 0 |
| California, United States | 3  | $12 | 0 |

Why it matters

A campaign that targets places, whose location option is Presence or interest, Google's default, so its ads also show to people outside those places who search for them or show interest in them. For a business that serves people where they are, that's spend on people who aren't there, and the finding says how much went outside in the last 30 days. Goldbeater drafts Presence: people in, or regularly in, your locations.

What to do

Show its ads only to people in its locations, not people interested in them, unless you mean to reach people planning to travel there. It's the change below.

What would change

- Show ads only to people in your target locations, not people interested in them Campaign Sofas — Phrase

It reaches your account when you approve it in the change set and press Apply. An applied change can be undone.

This is “Ads shown to people interested in your locations, not only people in them” on a sample account. See what it finds in your own account and what the fix is worth, and ask your AI analyst about any finding.

[Get a free first look](https://goldbeater.ai/app?start=look)

Sample data. Cedar & Pine Interiors is an invented account, and its figures are made up.

On the same campaign, the spend outside its targets is a finding of its own: what it cost, from the Locations figures above, and each place it went. On Presence or interest its drafted change is the one above, so adding either finding to the change set is the same change.

Finding

Sample data

Medium Medium severity

$149 Spend outside your targets, last 30 days

Sofas — Phrase spent $149 on people outside the locations it targets

Sofas — Phrase

What Goldbeater saw

7.5% of its spend, 35 clicks and 1 conversion, came from outside Illinois, Indiana and Wisconsin, with a location option that reaches people in, or interested in, its locations.

- Spent outside its targets

  $149

- Share of its spend

  7.5%

- Clicks

  35

The last 30 days

| Figure              | Outside its targets | Inside its targets |
| ------------------- | ------------------- | ------------------ |
| Spend               | $149                | $1,841             |
| Conversions         | 1                   | 26                 |
| Cost per conversion | $149                | $71                |

Outside its targets

Inside its targets

Spend

$149

$1,841

Conv.

1

26

Cost / conv.

$149

$71

|                           |    |     |   |
| ------------------------- | -- | --- | - |
| Michigan, United States   | 18 | $76 | 0 |
| Florida, United States    | 11 | $47 | 1 |
| Ohio, United States       | 3  | $14 | 0 |
| California, United States | 3  | $12 | 0 |

Why it matters

Clicks billed from outside the places you chose to target, with the share of spend they take, country by country. Whether they are worth anything depends on whether you sell there, and on whether people there bought at your usual price; the figure is the spend outside your targets.

What to do

Show Sofas — Phrase's ads only to people in the locations it targets, not people interested in them. That stops most of this, and it's the change below.

What would change

- Show ads only to people in your target locations, not people interested in them Campaign Sofas — Phrase

It reaches your account when you approve it in the change set and press Apply. An applied change can be undone.

This is “Paying for clicks outside your area” on a sample account. See what it finds in your own account and what the fix is worth, and ask your AI analyst about any finding.

[Get a free first look](https://goldbeater.ai/app?start=look)

Sample data. Cedar & Pine Interiors is an invented account, and its figures are made up.

The same setting is one of the [common Google Ads mistakes](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-mistakes), and the [audit checklist](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-audit-checklist) has every location line with where to find it in Google Ads.

## Questions

- Why are my Google Ads showing outside my target location?

  Most often the location option: Presence or interest, Google’s default, also reaches people elsewhere who search for your locations or show interest in them. Even on Presence, Google counts people regularly in your locations wherever they are, may show ads in nearby areas that can’t be targeted on their own, and calls its reading of location a best effort.

- What’s the difference between Presence and Presence or interest?

  Presence reaches people in or regularly in your targeted locations. Presence or interest also reaches people elsewhere who have shown interest in them, through their searches, places they’ve been or the pages they read.

- Can I target a radius around my business?

  Yes. On the Locations page choose Radius, and enter an address and a distance of at least 1 km. Google warns that a very small radius may show your ads only now and then, or not at all.

- Do location bid adjustments work with Smart Bidding?

  No. Google says Smart Bidding strategies such as Target CPA and Target ROAS set bids themselves, and a manual bid adjustment isn’t supported. Your targets and exclusions still apply.

- What happens if I target and exclude the same place?

  The exclusion wins. Google’s example: exclude California and target Los Angeles, and Los Angeles gets no ads.

How Goldbeater checks this

## Stop paying for clicks outside your targets.

Goldbeater finds these in your own account every day. Each finding shows its evidence, an estimate of what it costs a month where it costs money, and, where a setting fixes it, a change drafted for you to approve.

A check is code that runs the same way every time, so a new finding means your account changed. Each week Goldbeater's AI agent follows up on what the checks find, and [your AI analyst](https://goldbeater.ai/ai-analyst) answers any question about your account.

Checks A finding is worth

- Ads shown to people interested in your locations, not only people in them

  Fixing it lowers the Risk

- Paying for clicks outside your area

  Fixing it lowers the Spend outside your targets

- A country converting far below the rest of its campaign

  Fixing it lowers the Cost per conversion

- A country converting far better than the rest of its campaign

  Fixing it raises the Conversions

- A region converting far below the rest of its country

  Fixing it lowers the Cost per conversion

- A region converting far better than the rest of its country

  Fixing it raises the Conversions

- A campaign that can show in every country

  Fixing it lowers the Risk

[Get a free first look](https://goldbeater.ai/app?start=look)

No card needed. [See every check](https://goldbeater.ai/checks).

Google's own pages

## Where the manual method comes from.

1. [Target ads to geographic locations](https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/1722043?hl=en)
2. [About advanced location options](https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/1722038?hl=en)
3. [About targeting geographic locations](https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/2453995?hl=en)
4. [Prevent clicks outside of your geo-targeted locations](https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/9376662?hl=en)
5. [Exclude ads from geographic locations](https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/1722040?hl=en)
6. [View matched locations and distance reports](https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/7492954?hl=en)
7. [About measuring geographic performance](https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/2453994?hl=en)
8. [Report Editor Glossary](https://support.google.com/google-ads/table/13845063?hl=en)
9. [Refine your location targeting](https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/2404184?hl=en)
10. [About bid adjustments](https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/2732132?hl=en)
11. [About your Google Ads account limits](https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/6372658?hl=en)

More guides

## Other things worth checking by hand.

- [How do I audit a Google Ads account? Work through 166 checks, area by area, conversions first.](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-audit-checklist)
- [What are the Google Ads targeting options, and which ones pay off? Read each device, age range, audience and city against the rest.](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-targeting)
- [What is a Demand Gen campaign in Google Ads, and does yours pay off? Read who it reached and where, each against the rest.](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-demand-gen)
- [What are common Google Ads mistakes, and how do I find them? Ten that cost money quietly, and where to find each.](https://goldbeater.ai/guides/google-ads-mistakes)

[All 75 guides](https://goldbeater.ai/guides)

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