Boost PPC Performance with Display & Search Campaigns

Running a display campaign alongside a search campaign can often boost PPC performance at the account level. When the two campaign types are structured to work together, display can help expand qualified reach while search captures active demand. The combination is more powerful than either channel running in isolation — but only when it is set up correctly.

Why Display and Search Work Together To Boost PPC Performance

Search campaigns are direct response. A prospect types a query, your ad appears, and if the match is strong, they click through to a landing page. The intent signal is clear, which is why search tends to produce the most efficient cost per conversion — especially for advertisers who have invested in strong keyword discovery and negative keyword management.

The limitation of search alone is that it only reaches people who are already actively searching. It does nothing to build awareness earlier in the buying process, stay visible between searches, or re-engage visitors who clicked but did not convert.

Display fills those gaps. Display ads run across millions of websites and apps in Google’s Display Network, reaching prospects who may be researching, comparing options, or simply browsing content related to your category. They are not raising their hand with a search query, but they are reachable — and at a significantly lower cost per impression than search.

Pairing display and search campaigns can help advertisers:

• Increase account-wide conversion volume
• Lower cost per acquisition over time
• Create more consistent conversion patterns
• Stay visible to prospects before and after they search

The key is not simply running more ads. The campaigns need to be structured, tracked, and optimized so display activity supports the larger PPC strategy rather than creating wasted spend.

How the Sales Funnel Shapes the Strategy

Display and search campaigns operate at different stages of the paid search sales funnel, and understanding that distinction is what makes the combination work.

Search operates primarily at the bottom of the funnel — capturing prospects who have already decided they want something and are actively looking for it. The conversion path is often short. A prospect searches, clicks, and either converts or doesn’t, usually within the same session or within a day or two. That’s the underlying reason that search clicks can be so expensive.

Display operates further up the funnel. At the top, it builds awareness among people who may not yet be searching but match the profile of your target customer. In the middle of the funnel, it keeps your brand visible to people who have shown interest — visited your site, engaged with content, or searched related terms — but have not yet converted. At the bottom, display remarketing can re-engage visitors who clicked a search ad but left without converting.

When both campaigns are running, the funnel becomes more complete. Display creates the conditions that make search more effective — prospects who have already seen your brand are more likely to click your search ad when they eventually do search, and more likely to convert when they land on your page.

Budget Allocation Between Display and Search

One of the more common questions when running both campaign types is how to split the budget. There is no universal answer, but there are useful principles.

Search should generally receive the larger share of budget, particularly in the early stages of an paid search inititative. Search traffic is higher intent, easier to measure, and faster to optimize. It produces cleaner conversion data, which is important for accounts using automated bidding — the algorithms need reliable conversion volume to perform well.

Display budget can start smaller and be scaled based on performance. A common starting framework is to allocate roughly 80-90% of total budget to search and 10–20% to display, then adjust based on what the data shows. If display remarketing is producing conversions at an acceptable cost, that allocation may grow. If display prospecting is driving search volume — visible through assisted conversion reports in GA4 — the case for increasing display budget becomes clearer.

For eCommerce accounts, the allocation question often intersects with Performance Max campaigns, which serve across search, display, Shopping, and YouTube inventory simultaneously. In those accounts, the budget relationship between campaign types requires a different kind of analysis — one focused on which inventory is actually driving revenue, not just which campaign label the conversion is attributed to.

Avoiding Budget Cannibalization

A risk when running display and search together is cannibalization — display spending budget on clicks that search would have captured anyway, at a lower cost. This is most likely to happen with remarketing campaigns targeting recent site visitors who were already planning to return and convert.

The way to manage this is through careful audience segmentation and audience configuration. Remarketing lists can be structured to target visitors who have shown stronger buying signals — multiple page visits, time on site, specific product page views — rather than anyone who bounced after one page. This keeps remarketing spend focused on prospects who genuinely need a nudge, rather than users who would have returned without any additional ad exposure.

Structuring the Campaigns to Work Together

For display and search to complement each other effectively, they need to be built with that relationship in mind — not simply launched independently and left to run in parallel.

Shared audience lists are one of the most important connective elements. The remarketing audiences built from search campaign traffic can be used in display — targeting people who clicked a search ad, visited specific landing pages, or started but did not complete a conversion. This creates a logical handoff between the two channels.

Conversion tracking needs to be configured to capture assisted conversions and view-through conversions from display, not just last-click attributions. Without that visibility, display will consistently appear to underperform relative to search — because display rarely gets the last click, but it often influences the conversion path. Understanding the full picture requires display campaign web analytics that are set up to show the channel’s actual contribution.

Landing pages for display traffic should also be considered separately from search landing pages. A visitor who clicked a display ad is in a different mindset than one who typed a search query. Display traffic is typically cooler — less committed, earlier in the process. The landing page needs to do more work to establish relevance and build the case, rather than simply confirming what the searcher already knows they want.

When the Combination Makes the Most Sense

Not every account benefits equally from running display alongside search. The combination tends to work best when:

• The sales cycle is longer than a single session — prospects research, compare, and return before converting
• The product or service requires some explanation before a visitor is ready to act
• Search volume for target keywords is limited, making display a useful way to expand reach
• The advertiser has enough site traffic to build meaningful remarketing audiences
• Brand visibility matters — the advertiser benefits from being seen repeatedly, not just at the moment of search

For accounts where search is already producing strong results, adding display is often the most efficient next step for scaling. The search campaigns have already validated the conversion funnel. Display can now expand the top of that funnel and recover visitors who didn’t convert the first time.

In the video below, Steve explains how this works in practice — including why the structure of the campaigns matters as much as the budget split.