One key aspect of compliance with the Google Ads Grant is to properly geotarget your ads. According to Google’s Account management policy, your Ads account must contain “Specific geo-targeting to show ads in locations where users will find your nonprofit’s information and services useful.”

For the majority of non-profits, that will mean that people physically close to you will find your message most appealing. If you serve Thanksgiving dinner to homeless in your area, someone from another state or country is less likely to volunteer. They would (probably) like to find a charity closer to their hometown and support their initiatives.

It is rarely relevant to show ads to the entire globe. In fact, doing so presents two risks. First, Google flags your ads on the compliance report. Rectify the situation within the month or risk losing your grant. Secondly, because you are less relevant to searchers abroad, your click-through-rate (CTR) could suffer. Drop below 5% CTR on your ads, and you again, run the risk of being non-compliant with the grant.

Steps to add geotargeting

1. Open your Campaign
2. Choose Locations from the left-hand navigation
3. Here you can choose between either:
   1. Location. For example, “Dallas-Fort Worth.” This will highlight the included regions and you can evaluate the potential total reach for that location.
   2. Radius. You can choose a radius of any size around a particular location, say, 50 miles around downtown Dallas.
4. Any combination or these can be inclusions or exclusions.

In this example, the DFW area as defined by Nielsen DMA regions has been combined with an area of a 60 mile radius around Dallas. While most of the two areas are redundant, the inclusion of the radius adds a small area up near Sherman to include the best coverage for this example.