We rounded up the best free PPC tools to help you maximize your campaigns (and your productivity)!
“It takes a village” is probably a saying that comes to mind when you think back to how your business or agency started. You likely leaned on friends, teammates, and other resources to bring your business’s vision to fruition.
PPC is the same way, you don’t have to muscle through all the work online advertising entails on your own. There are PPC tools to help streamline your business’s path to success on platforms like Google Ads, Facebook Ads, and more. If you’re wondering “What’s the best PPC tool to use?” you’ve come to the right place. Use this list of PPC tools as your go-to guide to all the free PPC resources you could be using.
Click to jump to a PPC tool:
No matter which niche market you’re advertising for, these free PPC tools can come in handy.
The Google Ads Editor is a free app created by Google to make quick edits to campaigns as easy as possible for advertisers. Instead of pulling up the full Google Ads user interface on a desktop browser, you can download the Google Ads Editor app to your mobile device to take your edits on the go.
Similar to Google Ads Editor, Microsoft also offers an easy-to-use free app any advertiser can use across devices called Microsoft Ads Editor. It functions the same as the Google Ads Editor, where advertisers can download Microsoft Ads campaigns to work on them offline.
Our Free Google Ads Performance Grader tool helps advertisers overcome challenges like wasted spend, poorly optimized accounts, or fewer leads and sales by identifying new opportunities and suggesting account improvements for greater ROI.
In 60 seconds or less, the Google Ads Performance Grader securely assesses the strengths and weaknesses of a PPC account before presenting the user with a detailed, step-by-step performance evaluation report.
This report is broken down across key PPC metrics, such as account activity, wasted spend, mobile optimization, and impression share.
Few other free PPC tool provides as accurate and comprehensive a PPC audit as WordStream’s Google Ads Performance Grader. Try grading your account now and identify profitable new opportunities for free.
Google Looker Studio (formerly known as Google Data Studio) is Google’s one-stop shop for all your PPC reporting needs. It’s self-service, so you can tailor your reports and the data you track from your PPC campaigns based on your business’s specific needs. It also allows you the ability to report on data from multiple marketing and advertising channels in one central dashboard for a holistic view of your marketing.
The Google Ads Transparency Center (informally also called the Google Ads Library) is a PPC tool anyone can use to get a competitive edge with their ad copy and creative assets. The Transparency Center is a hub that holds information on all active ads from all advertisers across the platform. You can use this PPC tool to search for ads based on different filters to find ads similar to businesses in your industry.
For social media advertising, Facebook offers the Facebook Ads Library—which you can consider similar to the Google Transparency Center. This PPC tool also allows anyone to search and filter for information on active ads across the platform.
Use the Facebook Ads Library to identify Facebook advertising trends, and get a feel for what you like (or don’t like) about different Facebook ad examples within your industry. That way, you can create an offensive game plan for how you tailor your ads to stand out from competitors.
Google Trends is a tried-and-true PPC tool for advertisers looking to better understand the current state of the search engine results pages for top keywords. If you’re struggling with your Google Ads impression share, for example, you can use Google Trends to see how much search volume your keywords have been getting within your targeted locations.
For those new to the world of PPC, knowing precisely where to begin is often among the greatest challenges. Identifying profitable keywords is an ongoing process, and our own Free Keyword Tool can help you quickly and easily begin your keyword research.
Simply enter a keyword relevant to your business into the Free Keyword Tool to get started. Next, you’ll be presented with a range of keyword data, from relevant keyword suggestions to their estimated search volume and competition in Google Ads. You can use the data from the Free Keyword Tool as the foundational basis of your keyword research, or as a quick and easy way to come up with new ideas for established accounts and campaigns.
If you want a central spot to organize, track, and manage all your PPC campaigns HubSpot offers a comprehensive PPC management template. It’s complete with features like a spend tracker, a PPC checklist, and Responsive Search Ad variation management as shown below.
AI is a trend in PPC that is only going to continue to evolve, so why not lean into AI-powered PPC tools? While you should never rely on AI for final forms of content, a generative AI tool or an AI copywriting tool like ChatGPT can be great for ad headline, description, and call-to-action ideation. For example, here are a few AI prompts you could try on ChatGPT for PPC:
You can find more ChatGPT prompts here.
If you want to try another AI-powered PPC tool for ad copy ideation, try StoryLab’s Google Ads headline generator. The best part of this tool is that it allows you to choose a writing style to align your ad’s tone with your brand messaging.
Whether you’re looking to create custom Facebook or Instagram image ads or get royalty-free stock images for Google display ads and image assets, Canva has everything you need to find creative success in PPC. Learn how to use Canva here!
As you use all the PPC tools above to elevate your campaigns, you’ll likely see an increase in clicks to your website. As you improve your click-through rates, be sure that your website is ready to handle the uptick in visitor volume. This means your site should be ready to provide a smooth experience to all users across devices. LocaliQ’s Website Grader can help you do just that by instantly providing a complete report of your business’s online presence. The LocaliQ Website Grader even provides suggestions on how to improve your site, so you know exactly where to optimize your landing pages.
We all need somebody to lean on every now and again, and your PPC accounts are the same way. These PPC tools are here for you when you need to “phone a friend” during times of high spend, low click-through rates, and increased CPA. If you try these free PPC tools but still want to squeeze more out of your campaigns, see how our solutions can help you maximize your business’s success on crucial platforms like Google Ads, Facebook Ads, and more!
