Navigating your campaigns through COVID-19As communities respond to COVID-19, we know that this time presents unique challenges for businesses. We’ve shared some considerations as you evaluate your ads and adapt to dynamic market conditions. Read the full list here.Read more
Deadline removed to adopt parallel tracking for Video campaigns April 28, 2020 We recently extended the migration deadline to adopt parallel tracking for Video campaigns to June 15, 2020. Given the current environment where businesses may have other priorities, we are extending the deadline indefinitely to give everyone extra time to make this transition. We will provide ample notice of a new deadline at a later date. If you’ve already completed most of the work needed to adopt parallel tracking, you are still welcome to finish the process and opt-in. Posted by Nicky Rettke, Director of Product Management, Google Video Ads Read more
Introducing call ads, with an optional website link April 23, 2020 Managing call volume can be challenging if your business is operating on limited hours or staffing. To give your customers more flexibility in how they connect with your business, you can now include an optional “Visit website” link with your call-only ads. As part of this update, we’re also simplifying the name of “call-only ads” to “call ads.” Call ad with optional “Visit website” link The “Visit website” link expands your call ad, giving you greater visibility on the search results page. By tapping on the “Visit website” link in your ad, your customers will be taken directly to your site. Taps on the headline will still lead to a call. If your business relies on phone calls for new sales, you’ll get fewer accidental calls and more qualified leads. In addition, you can now engage consumers who may only be interested in visiting your site, and may not have previously interacted with your brand. To get started with the optional “Visit website” link, include a Final URL when creating new call ads. If you have existing call ads, add a Final URL to start taking advantage of the website link. To help you measure your performance, be sure to track phone calls from your website. You can learn more about call ads in the Google Ads Help Center. Posted by Mike Russo, Product Manager, Google Ads Read more
Requiring advertiser identity verification to improve transparency April 23, 2020 Users should be empowered to make informed decisions about the ads they see online. That’s why we’re launching advertiser identity verification, a policy that requires advertisers to verify their identities for ads served through Google Ads. Once this is implemented, users will see the advertiser’s name and country disclosed in Why this ad?. This builds on existing user controls, including options to block an ad or advertiser and Ad Settings. This change will increase trust in the ads ecosystem by providing users with more information on who is advertising to them and is part of our ongoing efforts to increase transparency, choice and control for users. We expect it will take a few years to cover all current advertisers globally. We will start by verifying advertisers in phases in the U.S. and continue to expand globally. Advertisers will receive an email from us when it is time to verify their identity. Learn more about the verification process and get answers to frequently asked questions. Posted by John Canfield, Director of Product Management, Ads Integrity Read more
Google Ads Editor v1.3: Support for shared budgets, optimization score, and more April 10, 2020 Today, we’re introducing Google Ads Editor v1.3. This release includes support for shared budgets, optimization score and an improved edit pane. Shared budgets Editor now supports shared budgets. This means that you can create and edit shared budgets from your Shared Library within Editor. Optimization score Optimization score helps you prioritize recommendations for your campaigns so you can quickly improve performance. Now, you can access your account and campaign-level scores within Editor. If you select a set of campaigns and accounts in the account tree1, you’ll see a combined, weighted-average optimization score for your selection. This makes it easier for you to prioritize where to take action and work at scale. Improved edit pane Based on your feedback, we’ve made several improvements to reduce the time you spend scrolling within the edit pane. In our last Editor release, we introduced a condensed edit pane that hides groups of repeated, empty fields. Now, the edit pane will hide sections that are not relevant to your selection – such as the “App settings” section on the Campaigns view with no App campaigns. In addition, you can resize and position the edit pane by popping it out into a separate window. For a complete list of new features in Google Ads Editor v1.3, visit the Google Ads Help Center. Download the latest version by opening Google Ads Editor or visiting the Google Ads homepage. Posted by Herlen Zoljargal, Product Manager, Google Ads 1. In the main grid, you can select and right-click on any group of campaigns or ad groups to copy them to the account tree.Read more
Google Trends for marketers in a dynamic environment April 7, 2020 When market dynamics change rapidly, it can be hard to grasp how people’s needs are evolving. Google Trends allows you to see the topics people are—or aren’t—searching, almost in real time. For example, did you know that in March 2020, the search term “virtual birthday party ideas” became very popular in just a few days in the US? You can use this information to explore what’s top of mind for your audience and figure how to adjust your ad campaigns to meet their expectations. Click here for a few ways you can use Google Trends to find the data you need to navigate disruptions to your business and be helpful to your customers.Read more
Find more cross-account insights with Report Editor March 26, 2020 Report Editor helps you analyze and compile your Google Ads performance data with ease. Last year, Report Editor enabled real-time reporting for up to 10 accounts at once. However, if you manage more than 10 accounts, downloading reports can still be time consuming. To help you save time and make better decisions, you can now report across 200 accounts directly from your browser. This makes it easy for you to analyze your data across accounts in real-time and identify cross-account patterns without leaving Google Ads. Access Report Editor by navigating to the “Reports” tab in your Manager account. Learn more about creating and managing reports here. Posted by Jon Diorio, Director of Product Management, Google Ads Read more
Get better App campaigns creative insights with new asset reporting features March 23, 2020 Uploading high quality creatives to your App campaigns can help you deliver more relevant ads and improve your campaign performance. Asset reporting in App campaigns gives you the data you need to evaluate your creative assets and make informed optimization decisions. We’re rolling out four new asset reporting updates for App campaigns to provide you more helpful, detailed and actionable insights. Get clearer guidance on performance ratings Tooltips for performance ratings help you understand how we define our “low”, “good”, and “best” asset ratings. Every tooltip—visible when you hover over a rating—recommends an action you should take with that specific asset. This makes it easier for you to double down on concepts or themes that resonate with users, and to move away from those that don’t. Keep better tabs on your assets We’re adding two new columns in asset reporting at the ad group level: one for asset source, and a second for orientation. You will be able to determine which assets are those you uploaded during your App campaign setup, and next to your images and videos, you’ll also see their orientations (landscape, portrait, square). Since we rate assets only against other assets with the same source and orientation, finding this information at a glance will help you make easier, apples-to-apples performance comparisons. These updates will start rolling out to active App campaigns in the coming weeks. Track performance changes over time Your ad assets’ performance is always changing. This is why we will soon introduce performance charts that enable you to view performance changes for your assets over time. You will be able to select date ranges and various metrics against which to evaluate performance movement. If you have similar assets that share the same performance rating, you can look to their performance trends in the charts to guide your decision on which to retain or replace. Preview your assets Ad previews let you preview how your creatives may show up to users who see your ads. They’re designed to help ensure your assets will appear on-brand across different App campaign formats. Click on “View ad previews” in the asset column of your report, and our ad previews tool will show you sample ads assembled from your assets as they might appear in all eligible App campaign placements. This feature, along with performance charts, will be available in the next few months. You can find more details on asset reporting in the Google Ads Help Center. Posted by Belinda Langner, Senior Product Manager, App Ads Read more
Easier resubmissions and appeals of ad policy issues March 19, 2020 Our advertising policies exist in order to protect users, advertisers and publishers from bad actors and ensure only high-quality ads are served across our platforms. But we understand that sometimes well-intentioned advertisers make honest mistakes, and we want to empower every business to get their ads up as soon as possible. So we are launching a new feature that enables you to appeal policy decisions directly in Google Ads. Appealing a policy decision right from your Google Ads account Until now, a policy appeal required you to go through our support team. With this new feature, you can quickly resubmit an ad after fixing the policy issue. If you’ve checked the policy affecting your ad and believe we’ve made an error, you can also appeal the policy decision directly in Google Ads. In both cases, all you have to do is hover over a disapproved or limited ad and look for the “appeal” link to see if you’re eligible. You’ll be able to track the status of your appeal in Policy Manager, which is also available by hovering over a disapproved or limited ad. We’re committed to helping you be more knowledgeable about our policies and get your ads approved faster. Check out our Help Center article for more details. An important note: We’ve been taking action to protect the health of our team members during the evolving COVID-19 situation and reduce the need for people to come into our offices. As a result, we are currently experiencing longer than usual times to process appeals of ad disapprovals. We encourage you to use the self-service tools described above during this time, so you can resubmit or appeal a decision directly within Google Ads without contacting customer support. Posted by Brett Kline, Product Manager, Google AdsRead more
Deadline extended to adopt parallel tracking for Video campaigns March 12, 2020 The deadline to adopt parallel tracking for Video campaigns has been extended to June 15, 2020. Given recent global events, we wanted to give everyone extra time to make this transition. If you’ve already completed most of the work needed to adopt parallel tracking, you are still welcome to finish the process and opt-in. However, that step will not be mandatory until June 15, 2020. We’ll continue to monitor the situation and will adjust this date if necessary. Posted by Nicky Rettke, Product Management Director, Google Video Ads Read more
Use Maximize conversions and Maximize conversion value with portfolio bid strategies March 10, 2020 Portfolio bid strategies help you optimize performance across multiple campaigns. To date, portfolio strategies have been available for Target CPA, Target ROAS, Maximize clicks, and Target impression share. To make it even easier to use Smart Bidding with Search campaigns, Maximize conversions and Maximize conversion value are now both available to use with portfolios. In addition, you can pair these new portfolios with shared budgets to get more conversions or conversion value. For campaigns that share a budget and use Maximize clicks, Maximize conversions, or Maximize conversion value, we recommend that you include them in the same portfolio. Learn more about using portfolio strategies in the Google Ads Help Center. Posted by Sagar Shah, Product Manager, Google Ads Read more
A new look for attribution reports in Google Ads March 5, 2020 Attribution in Google Ads (previously known as Search attribution) gives you detailed information about the paths that lead people to convert for your business. Every business is different, so reports cover a range of insights–from the most common sequences of ad interactions leading up to a conversion, to how much credit is assigned to each interaction along the way. To make it easier for you to uncover these insights going forward, we’re launching a new experience in Google Ads that features a simplified and intuitive set of attribution reports. Get to the most important insights, faster The new experience can help you quickly understand how customers interact with your marketing throughout the purchase cycle, making it easy for you to take action in the areas that are driving results. We’ve combined some reports and removed others to help you get the most important insights, faster. Starting today, available attribution reports in Google Ads include: Overview Top paths Path metrics Assisted conversions Model comparison Examples of cards on the revamped overview page The revamped overview page helps you better visualize your customers’ paths to conversion. For example, you can see the percentage of customers who converted after multiple clicks on your ads. You’ll also be able to see the percentage of customers who engaged with your ads on each device, and who did so using more than one device. Compare different attribution models with the model comparison report Model comparison helps you compare your cost per conversion and return on ad spend for different attribution models, such as last click, rules-based, and data-driven attribution. Attribution reports can be found in Google Ads by clicking the tools icon in the upper right. Then, under Measurement, select Attribution. Learn more about attribution reports and attribution models. Posted by Charles Huyi, Product Manager, Google Ads Read more
Do more on the go with new features in the Google Ads mobile app March 3, 2020 The Google Ads mobile app helps you monitor your campaigns in real time, review high-impact recommendations, and take quick action to improve performance. Over the past few months, we’ve been making several improvements to the app to address some of your feedback. That’s why, starting today, we’re introducing new optimization score features and Dark mode in the app. Prioritize top recommendations faster Optimization score helps you prioritize recommendations for your campaigns, making it easy for you to quickly improve performance from within the app. To make it even easier for you to find your most critical recommendations, you can now see your account and campaign-level optimization scores on the account overview screen. Campaigns that have recommendations with the highest potential impact are listed first, so you can prioritize actions that will drive performance. Get notified when your optimization score changes To help you stay on top of new recommendations, you’ll be notified in real time when your optimization score changes. Tap the notification to open your Recommendations page, where you can take action to raise your score and improve performance. To receive these notifications, opt in on the Settings page of the app. Work in comfort with Dark mode Dark mode is designed for visual comfort. Whether you’re in a low-light environment or prefer darker background colors on your phone, you can now use Dark mode in the Google Ads mobile app. If you’ve already turned on Dark mode in your phone’s settings, you’ll see Dark mode in the app automatically. You can also turn on Dark mode on the Settings page of the app. Diesel.ie, one of Ireland’s leading fashion and apparel brands, used optimization score on the Google Ads mobile app to prioritize, review, and apply recommendations on their mobile phones. As a result, they were able to more effectively promote their products and promotions—increasing their traffic by 30X year-over-year. AGY47, a leading digital marketing agency, used the Google Ads mobile app to check in on performance, make improvements with optimization score, and keep their account organized on the go — saving them 2+ hours per week per account. To see your optimization score and Dark mode on mobile, download the Google Ads mobile app on Android (4.5/5 star rating) or iOS (4.5/5 star rating). Use these best practices to get the most out of your account with the Google Ads mobile app. Posted by Ryan Beauchamp, Product Manager, Google Ads Read more
Easily share remarketing lists across your manager and sub-accounts February 18, 2020 Whether your goal is to increase sales or drive brand awareness, remarketing to people who have already engaged with your website can help you grow your business. With a manager account, you can share audience lists across accounts–but it requires multiple steps to set up. To make it easier to quickly share your audience lists, you can now enable continuous audience sharing in your manager accounts. When you opt in, any remarketing lists you create in your manager account will be shared with all of your existing and future sub-accounts. These accounts can receive lists from multiple manager accounts, and you still have control over which lists are active. In the coming months, you’ll also have the option to share lists created in sub-accounts with your manager account. Learn more about continuous audience sharing in the Google Ads Help Center. Posted by Pulkit Khurana, Staff Software Engineer, Google Ads Read more
Making it easier to see how campaign changes impact ads performance in Google Ads February 12, 2020 Historically, it wasn’t easy to review your change history report and reporting data in order to understand changes in your campaign performance. To help you understand the impact of your campaign changes, you can now view changes annotated in your performance charts. For example, let’s say you notice a drop in conversions for one of your active campaigns. With the change history report, you can now hover over the markers in the performance chart to get more details about the changes you’ve made over a defined period. Clicking the links within the hover cards will filter the change history tables to highlight additional information. You’ll notice under the performance chart we’ve now also highlighted audience list, optimization goal and asset (only for App campaigns) changes to help you better identify the type of change to investigate. Posted by Duo Wu, Product Manager, App Ads Read more
All Google Ads campaigns will now be using improved Standard delivery January 29, 2020 Your ad delivery method determines how long your daily budget lasts within a day. Last year, we announced that Standard delivery would be the only delivery method for Search campaigns, Shopping campaigns, and shared budgets. Standard delivery takes into account expected ad performance throughout the day, making it more effective at maximizing performance within your daily budget. We’re continuing to update your ad delivery options to help you maximize performance within your daily budget. That’s why, starting April 2020, Standard delivery will be the only ad delivery method for any new Display, Video, App and Hotel campaigns. Accelerated delivery will no longer be available. All existing Display, Video, App and Hotel campaigns using Accelerated delivery will be automatically switched to Standard delivery starting May 2020. To manage how your ads are delivered throughout the day, we recommend using ad scheduling to increase or decrease bids. If your goal is to maximize performance, we recommend using Maximize conversion value, Maximize conversions, or Maximize clicks bidding to stay within your daily budget. Learn more about Standard delivery in the Google Ads Help Center. Posted by Ramil Sobti, Product Manager, Google Ads Read more
Automate your Google Ads conversion imports with Zapier January 23, 2020 When you’re trying to generate leads for your business, it can be a challenge to optimize campaigns for lead quality. In some cases, this is because your conversion data may be captured in offline customer relationship management (CRM) systems. Offline conversion tracking enables you to import these conversions directly into Google Ads, giving you a better view of how your targeting, bids, and creative combine to drive performance. In addition, it makes it easier for you to use Smart Bidding, as this imported conversion data provides a more reliable signal for our bidding models. However, getting this data out of a CRM system and into Google Ads can be difficult–especially if you have limited technical resources. That’s why we’ve collaborated with Zapier to help them develop their Google Ads integration. Zapier’s automation solution will make it easier for you to identify and extract CRM-based conversion events, format the data, and upload it directly to Google Ads. Learn more about offline conversion tracking in the Google Ads Help Center. Download this guide to learn more about the Zapier integration. Posted by Jon Diorio, Director of Product Management, Google Ads Read more
Parallel tracking for Video campaigns: mandatory March 31, 2020 January 14, 2020 Your mobile site speed matters now more than ever. In fact, retail advertisers saw that a one-second delay in mobile load times can impact conversion rates by up to 20%.1 Parallel tracking helps your mobile site speed by bringing people directly to your landing page while measurement happens in the background. On average, we’ve seen that advertisers who adopt parallel tracking have reduced page load time by up to 5 seconds.2 Parallel tracking is now available for Video campaigns, and will become mandatory for all Video campaigns starting March 31st, 2020 (as it already is for Search, Shopping, and Display). If you work with a click measurement provider, reach out to them as soon as possible to ensure that there’s no disruption to your click measurement system. If you need to make ad URL changes, your ads will need to be reviewed. To learn more about parallel tracking and how to opt in for your Video campaigns, click here. Posted by Nicky Rettke, Product Management Director, Google Video Ads 1. SOASTA,The State of Online Retail Performance, U.S., April 2017. 2. Google Internal Data, September 2018 Read more
Understand how budget and goal changes may impact Smart Bidding January 13, 2020 Simulators help you understand your potential performance at different bid levels. To date, these simulations have only been available for campaigns using manual bidding or Target CPA. To make it easier for you to get more insights from a wider variety of campaigns, we’re adding simulator support for budgets and for the Target ROAS bid strategy. Find the right target ROAS to achieve your goals The Target ROAS simulator shows the relationship between a ROAS target and your key metrics. For example, let’s say you’re interested in seeing how a higher target would impact your performance. Using data from the auctions you participated in over the last 7 days, this tool will show you what would have happened assuming everything else (e.g., your ads, landing pages, competitor ads, competitor bids etc.) stayed the same. Find your ideal budget to maximize performance On occasion, you may need to update your budgets for campaigns that use Maximize clicks or Maximize conversions. The budget simulator will show how these changes could have impacted your performance. This makes it easy for you to find your ideal budget allocation across campaigns. Learn more about simulators in the Google Ads Help Center. Posted by Sagar Shah, Product Manager, Google AdsRead more
