If you’re trying to maximize conversions for a Google Ads campaign that is part of a shared budget and get the error “The bidding strategy does not support shared budgets”, don’t worry. You can still optimize for conversions. You just need to create a portfolio bidding strategy. Once you do that, you can make all of the campaigns that are part of that shared budget use the same strategy. Here’s how.

Optimize for Conversions With a Shared Budget

  1. Navigate to one of the campaigns that are part of the shared budget

  2. Click Settings – > Bidding

  3. Click Change bid strategy

  4. Choose Maximize conversions

  5. Click Use a portfolio strategy (in blue)Use a portfolio bid strategy

  6. Click Create new portfolio strategy and name your strategyCreate & Name Portfolio Bid Strategy

  7. Click Save

Repeat this process for all of the campaigns that belong to the shared budget. However, choose the bid strategy that you just made when you add more campaigns to the strategy.

Analyzing the Effectiveness of Portfolio Bid Strategies

You can see which campaigns belong to which portfolio bidding strategy by navigating to Settings – > Bid Strategies.Tools -> Bid Strategies

Next, click the bid strategy that you want to inspect. There, you can see how the bid strategy is performing, and which campaigns belong to it.

Bid Strategy Report

If you are worried about one campaign getting conversions at the expense of the others, consider this: that campaign is getting the most conversions for a reason. There might be a particularly high demand for your services in that area. If you want to maximize your ROI from Google Ads, you want to get as many conversions as possible for your budget.

Remember to Set Up Meaningful Conversions

If you haven’t set up engagement-based conversions on your site (like clicks on links or form submissions) then I highly encourage you do so. It’s easy! Check out our article on how to do that here. If you’re struggling to juggle your shared budgets while still keeping your campaigns optimized and beating the competition, give bfw a call at 561-962-3330. We can help you out!