When setting up Google AdWords ads, you have to split your ad copy up into two lines of 35 characters or less. To save space, you may be tempted to split up a word with a hyphen, starting the word on the first line and continuing on the second line. This is often the only way to squeeze all of your words into the ad.

For example:

This is test ad copy that is going to be hy-
phenated. This will save some space.

When your ad is positioned on the right-hand side of a search engine results page, the ad looks fine. However, if your ad is positioned at the very top of the page, the body of the ad will be on a single line, and the hyphen will still be there. From a practical standpoint, it doesn’t matter, but it won’t look nearly as good.

So if your bidding strategy is to try and achieve top ad rankings, then you are best to avoid the use of hyphenated words. If your bidding strategy is more conservative and will generally result in right-hand positioned ads, then you’re fine using hyphens to save space.

For help managing your paid search campaigns, contact Work Media at 888-299-4837 or email Info@WorkMedia.net.