---
title: "Google Ads Structure for Quebec SMBs Using Smart Bidding"
description: "Google Ads structure for Quebec small businesses using Smart Bidding: fewer campaigns, broader ad groups, separate French ad groups and Loi 25 consent."
canonical: "https://socialinfluencebuilder.com/blog/google-ads-structure-smart-bidding-quebec/"
lastmod: "2026-10-12T20:31:33+00:00"
lang: "en-CA"
format: "markdown"
---
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# Google Ads Structure for Quebec SMBs Using Smart Bidding

Google Ads structure for Quebec small businesses using Smart Bidding: the layout that worked under manual bidding now cuts off the data the bid strategy learns from. I'm Marven Salgado, founder of Social Influence in Mascouche, and I build and clean up [Google Ads accounts](/google-ads-montreal/) for small businesses around Mascouche and Greater Montréal every week. The habit I run into most is splitting campaigns by city, device or budget slice, which leaves each piece with too little data to learn from.

## Google Ads structure for Quebec small businesses using Smart Bidding: what changed

 Smart Bidding now sets each bid at auction time, so building dozens of tightly themed ad groups no longer gives you the control it did under manual bidding.

 I used to split campaigns by every keyword variation because I thought it gave me control. Smart Bidding needs enough clicks and conversions in one place to find patterns, and when the account is cut too thin, every ad group starves.

 For Quebec small businesses, I now build a simpler Google Ads account structure: fewer campaigns, broader ad groups and themes based on the services you sell instead of on exact keywords. That gives the bid strategy a bigger pool of searches to learn from. I still group by intent and language, but I've stopped micromanaging.

## Why a manual-bidding structure starves Smart Bidding of data

 Smart Bidding learns from conversions, and a structure built for manual bidding spreads those conversions across so many campaigns and ad groups that none of them collects enough to learn from.

 Accounts built in the manual-bidding days usually split the data twice, once at the ad group level and again at the campaign level.

### Over-split ad groups and exact-match silos

 When I open older accounts around Mascouche and Terrebonne, I usually find one ad group per keyword. Sometimes a single campaign holds dozens of them, each with one exact-match term that gets a handful of clicks a month. That split made sense when you needed tight control over which ad showed for which search. Under Smart Bidding, each of those ad groups is an isolated signal, too small for the bid strategy to see any pattern across them.

 My fix is campaign consolidation. I group related keywords by theme and intent, merge thin ad groups into fewer and bigger ones, and use broader match types so more searches flow into each group. Broader matching only works if someone reads the search terms report, which I come back to below.

### Separate campaigns by city, device or small budget slice

 Small business Google Ads accounts often repeat the same split one level up, with a campaign for each city, each device or each small piece of the budget.

 | Habit | What it does to Smart Bidding |
| --- | --- |
| One campaign per city | Each campaign collects too few conversions to learn from |
| Separate mobile and desktop campaigns | Splits data the bid strategy already reads in every auction |
| Micro-campaigns on tiny daily budgets | The bid strategy rarely gathers enough conversions to settle |
| Several overlapping campaigns | Budgets compete with each other for the same searches |

 Combine these into one well-funded campaign. Set location targeting to the area you serve, then let Smart Bidding adjust for device and location in each auction, since it already reads both when it sets a bid.

## Conversion actions: what Smart Bidding should actually learn from

 Smart Bidding should learn from the actions that bring you customers: phone calls, form submissions and confirmed bookings. A page view tells it nothing about who became a lead.

 Before you choose conversion actions, decide what counts as a lead for your business. Loi 25 comes in at this step too. People have to see a clear notice about what you track, and tracking has to wait until they agree, so a line of fine print at the bottom of the page won't do. I set up the consent banner and Google's consent mode first, then connect calls and bookings as conversions, because Smart Bidding can only learn from signals you're allowed to collect.

### Calls, forms and bookings under Loi 25 consent

 Once consent is in place, Smart Bidding only sees conversions from visitors who agreed, so each conversion action has to count the real outcome.

 For businesses that win customers by phone, calls are the conversion that matters most. An account that only counts forms trains Smart Bidding to look for people who fill in forms. I set up [call tracking](/services/call-conversion-tracking/) on the website that runs only after the visitor accepts cookies, and I set a minimum call length in Google Ads so a call counts once it lasts long enough to be a real conversation.

 For forms, I count the lead when the thank-you page loads after a completed submission, and a click on the submit button doesn't count on its own. For bookings, I count the confirmed appointment instead of the click into the calendar tool.

 In practice, Loi 25 conversion measurement means you record fewer conversions than really happen, because visitors who decline aren't tracked. The ones you do record are honest, and a small count of real leads still points Smart Bidding toward people who become customers.

## Consolidating campaigns by business goal in a Quebec account

 In a Quebec account, I build each campaign around one clear business goal and stop splitting by city, language or product line out of habit.

 Take a plumber in Mascouche as an example. One campaign covers emergency calls and another covers scheduled installations, with no separate campaigns for Mascouche, Terrebonne and Repentigny. Each campaign then has more conversions to learn from, where a split by town would leave every one of them short. On a limited daily budget this matters even more, because one campaign holding the whole budget gathers data faster than three campaigns sharing it.

 When the French and English ads serve the same goal, I keep them in the same campaign with a separate ad group for each language. Smart Bidding gets more conversions to work with when it decides which searches deserve your budget.

## French and English campaigns under Loi 96 expectations

 Loi 96 makes French the expected language of commercial communication in Quebec, so every French ad group needs headlines, descriptions and a landing page written properly in French.

 I have a native French speaker write or review the copy so it reads as if it were written in French first. A French ad that sends someone to an English page also loses the visitor, and every lost lead is a conversion Smart Bidding never gets to learn from.

 Keywords are targeting settings that searchers never see, so most of the French-language work belongs on what they do see: the ads, the assets and the landing page. This is the setup I use for bilingual Google Ads:

1. French and English never share an ad group.
2. They get separate campaigns only where the offer, the landing page or the budget differs between the two audiences.
3. French ads point to French landing pages with the same offer as the English ones.
4. Conversions are reported by language, so you can see what each audience brings in.

## Budget, search terms and the learning period

 Each campaign needs enough budget to collect conversions, and while Smart Bidding is learning, the search terms report is the one thing worth checking every week.

 After a big change, such as merging campaigns or switching bid strategies, Google Ads shows the bid strategy status as learning, and performance can look shaky for a while. Don't panic, and don't touch settings every day. Leave the budget, the bid strategy, its targets and the conversion actions alone until that status clears, because a significant change to any of them starts the learning over.

 The search terms report shows the phrases people typed before they clicked your ad, in both languages. With broader match types, it's how you stop the automation from drifting toward searches that have nothing to do with your business. Add negative keywords for the terms that don't fit, and pull new keyword ideas from the ones that convert. French and English searches often behave differently, and the report helps you split the budget between them.

 If your campaigns are [spending without bringing in calls or leads](/your-situation/ads-without-results/), structure and conversion tracking are the first two things I check.

## Account structure checklist for a Quebec small business

 Before you launch a Quebec small business account on Smart Bidding, or rebuild an old one, go through these five points.

1. Campaigns are built around business goals, and each one gets enough budget to collect conversions.
2. Ad groups are themed by service and intent with broader match types, and the one-keyword ad groups are gone.
3. Conversion tracking fires correctly for calls, form submissions and confirmed bookings, with Loi 25 consent in place, before you spend anything.
4. French and English sit in separate ad groups, and in separate campaigns only where the offer, landing page or budget differs.
5. Someone reads the search terms report every week, and nobody changes the budget, bid strategy or conversion actions while the strategy is still learning.

## Go further

- **Service:** [Google Ads Montreal: management that generates leads](https://socialinfluencebuilder.com/google-ads-montreal/)