July 10, 2018
On Tuesday, July 10th,Google live-streamed their annual Google Marketing Live keynote. This live stream details many initiatives and features that are coming to the recently rebranded Google Ads platform.
Like 2017, the main focus this year was on machine learning tools that enhance digital marketing results. If you missed the keynote, here’s the rundown of Google’s biggest announcements on features that will be available to your business soon.
Responsive Search Ads
Google announced that their new text ad format currently in beta, Responsive Search Ads (RSAs), will be rolling out to all advertisers in the coming months. This format expands upon the current expanded text ads by using 3 headlines and 2 description lines dynamically chosen from a selection of up to 15 headlines and 4 description lines.
This new format automates A/B ad testing for advertisers as Google does the heavy lifting in determining which headline and description assets perform best across campaigns.
Paired with the ad optimization setting, Google continues to show confidence in their ability to serve the best possible ad to each individual at any given time. Here at Perfect Search, we’ve seen client CTRs improve over 50% with RSAs in comparison to expanded text ads, and we’re excited to see that more ad characters will be the new norm.
Smart Shopping campaigns
Following the past releases of Dynamic Search Ads and Smart Display Campaigns, as of May 2018, Google is offering a new automated Shopping campaign type. This new feature targets product ads to new users and remarketing audiences and optimizes around a specific conversion revenue or ROAS goal.
Also, Google announced that “Store Visits” and “New Customers” will be goal options for these campaigns.
Cross-device reporting & remarketing in Analytics
As digital marketing continues to contend with a multi-device, multi-touchpoint world, Google will be rolling out cross-device reporting within Analytics.
Google has offered some cross-device reports within the AdWords interface, but this will be the first time this data will be reported across Google users (who allow it) within Analytics. This is a huge deal, as it’ll allow businesses to create powerful remarketing audiences to be created from across certain devices or touch-point funnels.
Local campaigns
In the opening remarks of the keynote, Google’s head of ads Sridhar Ramaswamy shared that Google has seen a 10x increase in the number of searches including the phrase “open near me tonight.” To help advertisers capitalize on these local searches, Google announced a new local campaign type.
Similar to other Smart Campaign types, this new campaign type is fully automated, but its singular goal is to drive in-store visits. This aligns with Google’s initiatives of expanding the availability of store visit data across all sizes of businesses, in addition to the new per-store visit reporting.
An important note with local campaigns is that it delivers across Google products—including Search, Display, YouTube, Maps, and Place Pages.
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Google Marketing Live’s keynote announcements all demonstrate Google’s commitment to machine learning and how digital marketing will continue to evolve with more of these capabilities. As an advertiser, it’s exciting to see new product offerings that help businesses serve better ads that are optimized for their goals.
Any questions about the keynote? Tweet us @Perfect_Search.
Director, Search & Social Advertising
Eric Yarnik is a Northwestern University Alum who considers writing the Perfect Search Ping Pong Power Rankings Column to be one of his favorite tasks at work. If he had to pick one fictional character to be friends with, it’d have to be the one who lives in a pineapple under the sea.