The Search Term report shows only the searches your ads paid for, with clicks, spend and orders per term, which makes it the tool for cutting waste and harvesting winners. Search Query Performance, in Brand Analytics, shows the whole marketplace funnel for a query — impressions, clicks, cart adds and purchases — alongside your brand's share of each, covering organic as well as paid. Use the first to manage campaigns and the second to see how much of a query you are actually winning.
Different denominators, different questions
The Search Term report's universe is your own ad spend. It cannot tell you how big a query is, only what you bought of it — exactly right for deciding what to negate and what to promote.
Search Query Performance's universe is the query across the marketplace. It answers whether a term is worth pursuing at all, and where in the funnel you are losing.
Using both together
Search Query Performance identifies which queries are large and where your share is weak; the Search Term report tells you what your ads are currently doing about them.
A query where your click share is high but purchase share is low is a conversion problem, and no amount of bidding will fix it. That diagnosis is only visible when you read the two against each other.
Want this checked on your own account?
The free audit answers this question with your numbers instead of general rules — no Seller Central password needed.
Get my free audit