Location targeting is the Google Ads setting that decides where your ads can appear, based on where people are and, depending on your settings, the places they show interest in. A UK advertiser can target the whole country, a nation such as Scotland, a county or city, a London borough, a postcode district or a radius around an address.
How location targeting works
Google estimates where someone is from signals such as their device location where they have allowed it, their IP address and their recent activity, and reads any place names in the search itself. It then compares that with your targets. The main options for a UK business:
- Country: the United Kingdom as a whole, which suits national ecommerce and services delivered online.
- Nations and counties: England, Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland, and counties such as Kent or Surrey.
- Cities and London boroughs: Manchester, Leeds or Bristol, and most London boroughs as named targets. Where a named area does not match your patch, combine smaller targets.
- Postcode districts: the outward part of a postcode, such as SW11 or E14, for service areas that follow postcodes rather than borough lines.
- Radius targeting: a circle around an address or pin, in miles or kilometres, for a shop or clinic whose customers travel a predictable distance.
Under the advanced location options you also choose who counts as being in a location. The default, presence or interest, includes people in your area and people elsewhere who search about it. Presence limits ads to people who are, or regularly are, in your targeted area. The difference is explained under presence or interest targeting.
Why it matters
Location is where many UK accounts lose money without anyone noticing. An electrician in Wandsworth on the default setting can pay for clicks from someone in Leeds searching “electrician London” for a relative, or from a person on holiday abroad. A hotel in Bath wants the opposite, because its guests mostly search from somewhere else. The right setting depends on whether customers come to you, you go to them or you deliver nationally.
Location also shapes what you learn. Results by borough or postcode district show where enquiries actually come from, which informs budgets, opening hours, where to open a second site and which local pages are worth building for organic search.
Common mistakes
- Leaving presence or interest switched on for a business that only serves people locally.
- Targeting all of London when the business covers six boroughs, and paying for clicks from across Greater London.
- Drawing a 20-mile radius around central London, which takes in commuter towns the business never visits.
- Adding location bid adjustments to a campaign on Smart Bidding, which largely ignores them. They matter with manual bids.
- Never checking where conversions come from once the campaign is live.
How to act on it
Map your real service area before you open Google Ads: the postcodes, boroughs or travel time customers accept. Target that as closely as the available locations allow, set the option to presence unless people genuinely search from elsewhere about your area, and use location exclusions to remove pockets you do not cover.
After a few weeks, check the location report for spend and conversions by area. If one district produces most of your enquiries, consider giving it its own campaign or budget. With manual bidding, bid adjustments by location can push spend towards areas that pay. Location settings are among the first things I set and check in Google search campaigns for local businesses.