Excel Formulas for PPC Keyword Match Type Manipulation
How to use TRIM, CONCATENATE, and SUBSTITUTE formulas in Excel to quickly convert keywords between exact, phrase, and broad match modifier types for PPC campaigns.
A few simple Excel formulas can make your life easier when dealing with positive and negative keyword match types. Pretty much any keyword match type manipulation can be performed using the following three functions.
The Function Trifecta
TRIM
One of the most useful functions for keyword work. If you've ever performed keyword research and ended up with trailing or double spaces in cells, TRIM removes them all — leading spaces, trailing spaces, and consecutive internal spaces.
=TRIM(A1)
CONCATENATE
The ampersand form is faster than the long-form CONCATENATE function. Both combine values from cells or manual text into a single cell. Remember to manually insert spaces between values using " ".
=CONCATENATE(A1,"text",C1)
=A1&"text"&C1
SUBSTITUTE
The SUBSTITUTE function replaces a defined value with another defined value — faster than Find & Replace for bulk work. You can nest multiple SUBSTITUTE functions to perform many swaps simultaneously or in a preferred order.
=SUBSTITUTE(A1,"original value","replacement value")
Match Type Conversions
Always wrap keywords in TRIM before applying match type formatting. Without it, trailing spaces can silently corrupt keyword lists — especially painful when uploading hundreds or thousands of keywords.
To view formulas across multiple cells, use CTRL + ` to toggle formula view.
Exact Match
Wrap the trimmed keyword with square brackets using CONCATENATE:
="["&TRIM(A1)&"]"
Phrase Match
Wrap with quotation marks. Since Excel uses quotes to indicate text, use four consecutive quotes to display a literal quote character:
=""""&TRIM(A1)&""""
Broad Match Modifier
Prepend a plus sign, then replace each space with a space followed by a plus sign:
="+"&SUBSTITUTE(TRIM(A1)," "," +")
Summary
Incorporating TRIM, CONCATENATE, and SUBSTITUTE into your PPC workflow saves time and reduces errors when building or restructuring keyword lists at scale.