If you're a luxury brand, stay away from Google search ads

What you find when you search “kitchens”

Someone needs nappies and searches for them on the web: what comes up on Google is exactly what a luxury brand must not do. No sponsored ads on explicit search. The concern of a high-end consumer is how they position themselves on the social ladder. An ad of that kind is of no use to them.

Yet there are companies in my sector that do it. What do they promote? “High-quality kitchens” with 40% off as the selling point, a quote in 48 hours, a four-year guarantee, a free survey. Next to it, another ad from Amazon, Google's biggest advertiser: a user searches “kitchens” and finds a kitchen unit at €586.96. They search “bathroom furniture” and find 115 million results: one at €248, and for €248 I'll give you the soap dish; one at €1,199, one at €144, one at €279. At this point, tell me how it is possible to do marketing among those results.

Logically, a high-end brand should not be on a page like that. It is there through SEO, the blog and YouTube, which are free and undoubtedly do something. There is no point spending money on search ads.

The click is expensive and converts badly

When I ran the test, a click on those keywords cost €10–15. Prices haven't come down: in 2025 the average cost of a click on Google rose by almost 13%, and in 2026 it kept rising. If each sale can end up costing you €40–50 in advertising and you sell a unit at €144, where is your margin? And there is a second problem.

In class a participant asked me how a company can sell a €144 unit while spending €30–40 on advertising for each sale. It can't. Or it stole a container. Another, who uses paid search a lot, told me it works for him because his customer has an urgent problem. True, and in fact that customer doesn't have much money and is missing the before: the before is what catches you out. With people who come from your marketing you call the shots; with people who come from an ad, you are one of ten results.

The user who arrives from search doesn't have much money and, above all, is missing the whole indoctrination stage: it is a customer who doesn't come from your marketing.

Even if they click and you have the most convincing page in the world, you are missing the content marketing journey. They are hard customers to convert for a high-end brand because they haven't had the “brainwashing” of photos, videos, articles and testimonials. Your customer certainly doesn't go on Google and search “cars” if they want a Porsche 911. Someone searching “car available now province of Milan” has a specific need and is after the best price or the biggest discount. That isn't your customer.

And Google and Amazon are fighting a commercial war to answer explicit demand, joined since 2025 by generative AI search. The sooner you get out of it the better: let the others tear each other apart.

How I use Google instead: remarketing

You need to use Google in this other way: display network remarketing, banners. It costs almost nothing but it indoctrinates: only people who have visited your site or your blog see this advertising, and they see it while browsing other sites on their own business. Here is a company that has done a whole before, because the user has been on the site, left it, and comes across your advertising.

Paid search answers conscious demand with a line of text: and how can you sell a kitchen, a Vuitton bag or a €500 shoe with a caption? Banners, on the other hand, are falling in cost, because everyone thinks they convert poorly and bring few clicks. That's true, but all the better: I only pay per click and meanwhile I get the visibility, which is what I want. Are you doing it so people click, or so your target sees your brand and your product? If you want to position yourself in luxury, choose remarketing banners to keep being present in the potential customer's mind. That's why you have marketing costs, graphics and photos done in a certain way; the advertising cost is what you pay Google for the space: they are two different things.

For how long? Remarketing ads run from 180 up to 365 days. The second case is for people looking for a kitchen now who don't buy it straight away: perhaps they are researching because they are renovating in April. My sector is tied to renovations and new homes, so the customer thinks about it over and over. And the more you are in their head, the better.

YouTube: only to people who know you

The same applies to YouTube. We keep a handful of videos sponsored, for visitors to our site only: to a new user you are just a nuisance, while someone who has already visited the site has a reason to watch it. It applies offline too: if I send my American client the link to look at our projects, and he visits the page, then in his downtime on YouTube he sees my kitchen sponsored thanks to remarketing. He thinks we are a multinational, and all of this adds to the brand's prestige.

People believe what they see: advertising also serves to increase the perceived authority of the company. When we produce a new video we keep it sponsored for fifteen days, so the customer always sees new videos and thinks we do a lot. After fifteen days we put the product videos back into sponsorship. We spend little and we are always present.

From my book Direct from Milano and my classroom courses. Figures and examples updated to September 2026.