Are you accidentally bidding against yourself?

If your Google Ads account isn’t structured carefully, you might be driving up your own costs just by letting campaigns overlap without realizing it. It’s one of the most common (and costly) mistakes we see in B2B campaigns.

And it adds up fast. Google Ads experts estimate that advertisers waste $11 billion per year on unnecessary branded clicks and internal competition, according to Search Engine Land.

What does “bidding against yourself” mean?

It happens when two or more of your campaigns, ad groups, or match types are targeting the same keyword. Google enters both ads into the same auction, and you pay more for the winner while cannibalizing your own results.

It’s especially common in B2B accounts with:

• Overlapping broad match and phrase match terms
• Branded campaigns that aren’t excluded from non-branded ad groups
• Search intent that isn’t clear

If you’re running multiple campaigns without proper exclusions, you’re likely inflating your own cost-per-click (CPC) without realizing it.

Related: How Long Does it Take for Google Ads to Work?

Signs you’re competing with yourself

You might be bidding against yourself if:

• CPCs are rising, but competitor activity hasn’t
• Impression share keeps shifting between similar campaigns
• Your branded campaign is losing out… to your own non-branded one
• Auction Insights show your name competing with itself (yikes)

Related: Top 5 Hyperlocal SEO Methods for Multi-Location Healthcare and B2B Services

How to fix it and stop wasting money

1. Use negative keywords across campaigns

Apply campaign-level negatives to prevent overlap between branded and non-branded terms. This is one of the fastest ways to reduce waste.

Example:
Add “your brand name” as a negative keyword in all non-branded campaigns.

2. Audit match types and segment them cleanly

Broad match is powerful, but it can backfire when left loose. Make sure each campaign or ad group uses one match type only, and that they don’t overlap.

3. Pause or restructure redundant campaigns

If you’re running multiple campaigns for similar goals (Lead Gen and Brand Awareness both targeting “CRM software”), consider consolidating or clarifying the intent.

4. Review Auction Insights

Look at who’s competing with you. If your own campaigns show up consistently, that’s a red flag. Revisit how keywords are being shared across your structure.

5. Use portfolio bid strategies with intent

When possible, manage campaigns with shared bidding strategies to control how Google distributes your budget, especially if brand and non-brand traffic are part of the same funnel.

Bonus: Watch for Smart Campaigns and Auto-Applied Suggestions

Google’s default settings (like auto-applied recommendations or Smart Campaigns) often create overlap without warning. These “helpful” features might be pushing ads into branded queries or duplicating your coverage… and unless you’re looking for it, you may never catch it.

Always review:

• Auto-applied recommendations
• Dynamic keyword insertions
• Performance Max campaigns that aren’t fully segmented

For more on this topic, check out Search Engine Journal’s webinar, which breaks down how advertisers are losing control over budgets due to overlapping Google Ads structures.

Final thoughts from our team

It’s easy to assume that rising CPCs are just part of the game. But if you’re not checking for self-competition, you might be wasting budget without knowing it.

At ThinkPod, we help B2B teams spot and stop hidden waste in their ad accounts. And, we’ve seen this issue in companies spending $2K and $200K per month alike.

Before you throw more budget at the problem, please pause. You might not need to spend more. You might just need to stop bidding against yourself and calling it growth.

If your impressions are up but your traffic is dipping, you’re not alone.
And no, you’re not stuck.

Let’s talk about how to turn that visibility into real results.