Google Ads competitive analysis for B2B

Google Ads competitive analysis for B2B, in detail

The real problem isn't a lack of budget

Most B2B decision-makers think about Google Ads in terms of budget: more money, more clicks, more inquiries. It's not that simple.

Here's an example from a real account. The approved budget was €240 a month. Only €16.63 was spent. The rest sat untouched.

The money wasn't missing. It simply wasn't flowing out. The culprit was the auction logic (the system Google uses to allocate ad placements), plus wasted spend on searches that led nowhere.

That's exactly the point in B2B. Your budget doesn't burn because there's too little of it. It burns because it goes to the wrong search queries.

Your target audience is small. Maybe only a few hundred people a month search for what you offer. Every click counts more than in the consumer market.

This is exactly where competitive analysis comes in. It shows you who's bidding against you. And it shows where your money flows to irrelevant searches.

Why the competition stays invisible in B2B

In the consumer market, you see your competitors everywhere. In B2B, it's different.

Whoever bids against you barely shows up during normal browsing. Yet the competition is there. They bid on the same keywords (the search terms that trigger your ad).

Sometimes they even bid on your brand name. That's allowed. A competitor may book your company name as a keyword.

When someone searches for you, they see the competitor's ad at the top. This is exactly where competitive analysis makes visible what otherwise stays hidden.

Auction Insights: Google's own competitive report

Your first tool is already in your Google Ads account. It's called Auction Insights.

The report shows you who you share ad placements with. You'll find it at the campaign, ad group, or keyword level.

It gives you these metrics:

• Impression Share: how often your ad appears compared with others.
• Overlap Rate: how often a competitor shows up at the same time as you.
• Position Above Rate: how often a competitor ranks above you.
• Top of Page Rate: how often a domain lands right at the top.

An example makes the value clear. You see an unfamiliar domain with a high overlap rate. It often stands above you. Then you know: you're fighting for the same clicks here.

Auction Insights names the domains directly. You spot immediately whether a known competitor is among them, or an attacker you hadn't been watching.

Third-party tools: competitors' keywords and ad copy

Auction Insights shows you the *who*. It doesn't show you the *what*.

For competitors' keywords and ad copy, you need external tools. They tap into large databases and estimate what a competitor is paying for.

With them, you answer three questions:

1. Which keywords is the competition bidding on? This is how you find search terms you've overlooked.
2. Which ad copy are they running? This is how you see which messages are live in the market.
3. Which landing pages do they send traffic to? This is how you understand the offer behind them.

Keep one limit in mind: these tools estimate. They can't see into other accounts. The numbers are approximations, not an exact account statement.

#### Tool comparison for B2B competitive analysis

The two free tools sit in your account. The two external tools cost money, but they give you the view from outside.

The search terms report: where your budget burns

Your second free tool is the Search Terms Report.

It shows the real search queries where your ad appeared. Not your booked keywords. The actual words people typed.

In B2B, a lot of hidden budget often sits here. An example: you book "CRM software". Your ad also shows up for "free CRM software".

Whoever searches for "free" rarely buys a B2B system. The click still costs you money.

You add such terms as a negative keyword (exclusion search term). From then on, your ad no longer appears there. Your budget flows to the right queries.

Go through the report regularly. Once a week is often enough. That way you catch expensive misclicks early.

What you take away from the analysis

Competitive analysis gives you three concrete things.

Worthwhile keywords. You find search terms the competition bids on and you don't. Some of them fit your offer. Others you deliberately leave alone.

Spots where budget burns. The search terms report uncovers expensive misclicks. Negative keywords stop them. The money flows to purchase-ready queries.

Messages that land. You see which ad copy is running in the market. From that, you learn how competitors phrase their value. You sharpen your own message against it.

A note on your brand: check whether anyone is bidding on your company name. If so, run your own brand campaign. That secures the top spot for your own name.

This campaign works differently from the rest. It doesn't acquire. It defends.

For one client, I optimized the brand campaign to a Quality Score of 10/10 (Google's quality rating for keyword, ad, and landing page). The click price is around 10 cents.

The point isn't the cheap click. The campaign keeps competitors from bidding on your own brand name. It protects the position you've built.

B2B specifics: small target audience, high click prices

In B2B, different rules apply than in the consumer market. Three points make the difference.

Small target audience. Few people search, so every click counts more. You can't offset wasted spend with volume.

High click prices. B2B keywords often cost more per click (CPC, cost-per-click). A wasted click hurts more here than in the consumer sector.

Long buying decisions. Weeks or months pass before a B2B customer buys. A click rarely leads straight to a deal. It's the start of a long path.

From that follows a clear rule. In B2B, precision counts more than reach. Better a few relevant clicks than many cheap ones.

That's exactly what competitive analysis is for. It helps you steer your tight budget toward the right search queries.

An account case: how I approached it

A real-world example makes the logic tangible. The numbers are real, the account anonymous.

The account used only €16.63 of a €240 approved monthly budget. At first glance, a budget problem. It wasn't.

I first looked at the search terms report. There, search queries stood out that had nothing to do with the offer. Money was flowing out for them.

I set these terms as negative keywords, 13 in total. That saved around €25 of wasted spend a month.

The result was measurable. The cost per sign-up was €2.38. Other campaigns in the same account ran from €35 to €60.

The difference didn't come from more budget. It came from more precise budget. That's exactly the lever in B2B.

A simple process to get started

You don't have to do it all at once. This order works:

1. Open Auction Insights. See who you're really bidding against.
2. Check your brand. Is someone bidding on your name? Then push back.
3. Go through the search terms report. Exclude expensive misclicks as negative keywords.
4. Look at an external tool. Review competitors' keywords and ad copy.
5. Fill the gaps. Add worthwhile keywords, sharpen your own message.

You repeat this process. Competition shifts. A one-time analysis goes stale fast.

Next step

Want to know who's bidding against you in B2B and where your budget burns? Then let's look at your Google Ads account together. Honest, with no sales pressure.

[Have a no-obligation chat](/contact/?ref=google-ads-competitive-analysis-for-b2b)

Official primary sources and further documentation:

• Google Ads Help: Auction Insights (auction data). support.google.com/google-ads/answer/2579754
• Google Ads Help: Keyword Planner. support.google.com/google-ads/answer/2472708
• Google Ads Help: Ad Preview and Diagnosis. support.google.com/google-ads/answer/6167118
• Google Ads Help: Trademark policy. support.google.com/google-ads/answer/2453972