Published February 18, 2016

Improve Your Franchise Ad Performance by 10 Percent with an FBR “Review Extension”

Here’s a brand new way to get the word about your status as a Top Franchise Opportunity, courtesy of Google Adwords.

(A note before we dive in: If you’re unfamiliar with Google Adwords and the concept of ad extensions, we recommend sharing this with your digital marketing team to review.)

You’re probably already using ad extensions in your consumer marketing, highlighting different products, locations, and other callouts. The new Review Extensions option gives you an opportunity to highlight third-party reviews and awards in your ads as well. What better differentiator to highlight than your status as a top-rated franchise opportunity by FBR?

These extensions can have a great effect on your ad visibility and performance. This post from Google  indicates that “review extensions can boost clickthrough rate by up to 10%.

It’s simple to activate. There are some guidelines from Google you might want to be familiar with, but if you’d like to streamline the process, just follow these easy instructions:


  1. In your Google Adwords campaign (or specific ad group) head to the “ad extensions” tab.
  2. From the “View” dropdown menu on the left, select “Review extensions.”
  3. Click the red “+ Extension” button.
  4. Click the gray “+ New review” button.
  5. Enter the extension content:
    1. Keep the radio button on “Paraphrased.”
    2. In the “Source” box (skipping the “Text” box momentarily), enter “Franchise Business Review”
    3. In the “Text” box, use the remaining allowed characters for the callout. “An Award-Winning Franchise for 2016.” fits nicely, though you should feel free to adjust as you prefer.
    4. For “Source URL,” there are three options:
      1. FBR Members: Link to your Member profile (find yours here)
      2. FBR Lead Generation clients: Link to your profile (find yours here)
      3. Other Award-Winning brands: Link to the complete list of award-winners.
  6. Click “Save”
  7. Make sure the new extension is listed under “selected reviews” on the right. Add it there if not.
  8. Click “Save”

Once your extension is approved, it will start showing when your ad displays in a “top of page” placement.

Special thanks to Mark Kennedy of SEOM Interactive for Tweeting the idea and being the first to bring it to his client, CertaPro!

About the Author: Ali Forman

As the Marketing Director, Ali’s role is to educate franchise companies about and inspire them to participate in FBR’s research in order to grow and improve their brands. Ali's previous experience includes senior marketing communications roles in the employee benefits, data privacy, and publishing sectors. She lives in Maine with her husband and two sons.
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