Introducing four new insights on the Insights page to help your business keep up with the holidays and beyond.
The holiday season is the most beautiful time of the year and, for retailers, it’s also the busiest. This year has been particularly challenging for retailers and shoppers, alike, with the presence of global uncertainties like supply chain disruptions. Still, holiday shopping is poised to surge and retailers can turn to Google to drive sales.
This past holiday season, 54% of shoppers used five or more channels, like video and social media, to shop over a two-day period.
For more holiday insights, tune into Think Retail on Air at 10 a.m. PDT later today and check out in-depth recommendations in our Holiday Best Practices guide.
The countdown is officially on as holiday shopping kicks off earlier in the year. In May, we found that, on average, 17% of consumers in surveyed markets have started their holiday shopping and more than a third (36%) say they already have ideas for gifts they are going to buy.
Make your grand entrance with demand forecasts on the Insights page. This predicts upcoming trends relevant to your business so you can adjust your budget and bidding strategy to capture growing demand. Additionally, use Performance Planner to understand how these changes to your advertising spend will impact your predicted clicks, conversions and conversion values.
Beyond optimizing your campaign settings, you’ll also need to get your product feed in shape. Product-specific insights are now at your disposal at the account level in the Google Ads products tab. These insights let you spot underperforming offers, identify products with missing feed attributes and compare your bidding strategy with your top competitors’.
Review product-specific insights on the products tab in Google Ads
With more ways to shop than ever, it can be difficult to keep up with complex purchasing journeys. Last holiday, we saw that shoppers who used at least five channels to inform their decisions and complete their holiday shopping reported making two times more purchases and spending twice as much, on average, compared to those who just used one or two channels.
It starts with Search where people conduct billions of searches every day.
But Search is just one part of the equation. Complement keyword-based Search campaigns with Performance Max, which finds even more converting customers across channels like YouTube, Display, Search, Discover, Gmail and Maps.
Round off your advertising strategy by inspiring shoppers when they least expect it. For example, 60 percent of people say they often or sometimes get prompted to buy something even when they weren’t actively shopping.
Finally, don’t forget about your mobile-first shoppers. In the next 2-3 years, 68% of retail marketers anticipate increasing apps use as a primary means of increasing customer loyalty.
Give shoppers a reason to turn from browsers to buyers wherever they may be. More than half a million online businesses use Google Merchant Center to show their products for free across Google websites and apps.
More than half (55%) of holiday shoppers across surveyed countries are planning to hold off on buying gift items until they are on sale.
Like last year, shoppers are still anxious about getting what they need in time where 3 in 10 consumers are shopping for things they don’t need until later because of stock concerns.
View sales price annotations and shipping and return options (US example)
Your audience won’t just be shopping online. In-store shopping has made a big comeback this year, as searches for "store open" have grown globally by over 400% YoY.
Make it easy for shoppers to find you by updating your Business Profile with store hours, location and images. Then grow in-store foot traffic and sales by promoting your location to online shoppers in the area with Performance Max campaigns for store goals, such as in-store promotions or seasonal specials. You now have more control over your Smart Bidding to meet your store visits or store sales goals this holiday season.
And for last-minute shoppers or shoppers who prefer to browse in-person, you can use local inventory ads to promote your in-store inventory online and convenient curbside or in-store pickup options.
We’re here for you this season to help you hit your holiday milestones, so make Think Retail on Air your next stop to get more insights. We will be going live today at 10 a.m. PDT. For more recommendations, visit the Holiday Best Practices guide.
Today’s consumers are always-on, where curiosity and inspiration can strike them anytime and anywhere. They’re also kicking off their holiday buying earlier than in previous years to find the best deals and avoid supply chain issues. As of June, 26% of shoppers in the US reported already having started their 2022 holiday shopping.
To win customers throughout the extended season, look no further than Performance Max campaigns. They find the right mix of inventory and formats across all of Google’s advertising channels to help you drive more sales both online and in-store.
Earlier this year, we shared the timeline and process for upgrading your Smart Shopping and Local campaigns to Performance Max using the “one-click” upgrade tool in Google Ads. The tool started rolling out in April for Smart Shopping campaigns and is available now for most advertisers. We strongly recommend using the tool to upgrade your campaigns as soon as you can to get a head start on the holiday season. The self-upgrade tool for Local campaigns will be available soon. More information is coming in the next few weeks, stay tuned for updates published to the Help Center.
If you use Smart Shopping campaigns you’ll have advance access to the self-upgrade tool for two months on average to give you time to upgrade yourself before automatic upgrades begin. Automatic upgrades are happening on a rolling basis for Smart Shopping campaigns that have not already been self-upgraded using the tool. Keep these details in mind as automatic upgrades begin:
YouTube has over 2 billion monthly logged-in users and attracts a generation that has grown up watching what they want, when they want, on any screen.
Once you’ve upgraded to Performance Max, upload your own video assets to drive better results on YouTube. It’s never been easier to create video ads! With video ad creation now available in Google Ads, you can build a high-quality video ad in a matter of minutes and then add it to your campaigns including Performance Max.
At first we were hesitant to use automation to make such important decisions. But the results spoke for themselves. Automation stays on top of customer trends and behavior faster than we can.
Performance Max outperformed our existing Smart Shopping campaigns. We’ve increased our quality traffic and our overall efficiency.
Upgrade to Performance Max as soon as you can to make sure you’re well positioned for the holiday season. Visit the Help Center for best practices and mark your calendars for Think Retail on August 30. Join us at this virtual event to hear Google product leaders and industry experts share the latest holiday trends and ways you can get your business ready.
As people move quickly between channels and devices, today’s consumer journey is always-on and rarely straightforward. Automation is helping businesses meet their customers at the right moment along this complex journey. Whether you’re looking to stay ahead of shifting consumer behavior or unlock incremental conversions from new places, Performance Max finds the optimal mix of Google Ads inventory and formats to help you drive better results.
In the coming weeks, we’re introducing new features to help you acquire new customers, better understand performance and start upgrading your Smart Shopping campaigns to Performance Max in just one click.
Performance Max optimizes results based on your conversion goals and looks for the highest-ROI conversion opportunities — regardless of channel. The new customer acquisition goal in Performance Max is rolling out over the next few weeks for all advertisers looking to generate leads or increase online sales. This was previously available for retailers using Smart Shopping campaigns and is now expanding to more advertiser goals in Performance Max.
This goal will allow you to either bid more for new customers compared to existing customers, or focus your optimizations on new customers only while maintaining your cost efficiency. You’ll also have more flexible ways to identify new customers, like providing your own first-party data through Customer Match lists, setting up conversion tags and using Google’s autodetection method.
The Insights page helps you understand decisions guided by automation and find levers to improve results in your campaigns. In the coming weeks, we’re rolling out consumer interest insights to all advertisers to help you uncover search themes that are delivering conversions. Two new types of insights are also arriving for Performance Max.
With asset audience insights, you’ll be able to better understand how your text, image and video assets resonate with specific customer segments. For instance, if you’re an outdoor retailer running a campaign for bikes, you may find that exercise enthusiasts engage more with images of people mountain biking rather than product images of the bike itself. Using these insights, you can tailor your creative and influence your broader marketing strategy.
After you create your Performance Max campaigns, diagnostic insights will provide a snapshot of outstanding setup issues preventing your ads from showing. Each issue will include suggestions to resolve them, so you can easily and quickly get your campaign up and running. For example, if your creative assets are disapproved, you’ll be prompted to fix them so you can start serving your ads and avoid missing out on conversion opportunities.
In January, we shared a preview of how to upgrade your Smart Shopping and Local campaigns to Performance Max to access additional inventory and formats across YouTube, Search text ads and Discover.
When you upgrade your Smart Shopping or Local campaign, it will become a new, separate Performance Max campaign that keeps the learnings from your previous campaign to maintain consistent performance. The campaign budget and settings from your previous campaign will also be carried over. Visit our Help Center for more details on the upgrade experience.
Retailers across the globe are seeing continued success with Performance Max. In fact, advertisers who upgrade Smart Shopping campaigns to Performance Max see an average increase of 12% in conversion value at the same or better ROAS.
Upgrading your existing Smart Shopping and Local campaigns helps ensure you can take advantage of expanded inventory and get your campaigns ready for the holiday season. You’ll be able to choose when to upgrade your campaigns until the automatic upgrade process begins. Smart Shopping campaigns will be automatically upgraded from July through September, and Local campaigns will be automatically upgraded from August through September. You’ll also be able to create new Performance Max campaigns through Google Ads, the Google Ads API, or starting in early summer, through e-commerce partners like WooCommerce and BigCommerce.
Check out our upgrade video tutorial and best practices to set up your Performance Max campaigns, and follow @AdsLiasion to stay informed throughout the upgrade process. On May 24, join us at Google Marketing Live where we’ll share what’s ahead for Performance Max.
Like many of you, I’ve spent the first month of 2022 ramping back up at work and making progress on plans for this year. And while there still isn’t a playbook for navigating a pandemic that’s upended daily life, my team is continuing to focus on ways Google can help you respond and deliver on your greatest business needs.
Buying behavior will continue to change, and people will use technology in new ways to discover products and brands. That’s why my team and I are more committed than ever to connecting consumers with the businesses around them, while continuing to power a free and open internet.
Buying behavior will continue to change, and people will use technology in new ways to discover products and brands.
This is an intentionally ambitious goal, and today, I want to share the three priorities that are guiding our product roadmap: unlocking new opportunities for business growth, preparing for the future of measurement and ensuring we exceed consumer expectations for privacy.
Shifts in consumer behavior continue to present challenges and opportunities for businesses around the globe. And despite some parts of the world reopening, it appears many of these shifts will not only stay, but accelerate. Take food delivery, for example. Searches for “takeout restaurants” surged 400% last year compared to the start of the pandemic.
In meeting with many advertisers, I’ve heard how readiness, speed and agility have been critical for managing complexity and driving growth in these uncertain times. That’s why advertisers are turning to automation more than ever before. In fact, over 80% of Google advertisers are now using automated bidding to free up time and improve ad performance.
Over 80% of Google advertisers are now using automated bidding to free up time and improve ad performance.
It’s also important to build on innovations like Performance Max campaigns — and make them easy to use. This single campaign enables marketers to find incremental, high-value customers across Google’s full range of advertising channels and inventory. By simply providing conversion goals, audience signals and a number of creative assets, advertisers that use Performance Max campaigns in their accounts have seen an average increase of 13% total incremental conversions at a similar cost per action.
Performance Max campaigns help you increase conversions across
Google’s full range of advertising channels and inventory.
Similarly, Discovery campaigns allow you to reach up to three billion users across Google feeds like YouTube and Discover — all from a single campaign. You can deliver highly visual, inspiring and personalized ad experiences to people who are ready to discover your brand.
Across all Google Ads campaigns — including Video action campaigns and Smart Display campaigns — our data shows that automation is unlocking growth for businesses around the world. This is especially true for Search campaigns. As we continue improving our Search products, we’re seeing the multiplicative effect of using automated targeting, creative and bidding together.
Automation is unlocking growth for businesses around the world.
One of my favorite examples comes from tails.com, which is based in the UK. The tailor-made dog food brand took a test, learn and scale approach as it expanded into new markets across Europe. Using the combination of broad match, Smart Bidding and responsive search ads, tails.com increased sign-ups in Germany from its generic Search campaigns by 182%.
Whether it’s Google Ads or Google Analytics, the products you use should help you solve the unique challenges facing your business. They also need to deliver meaningful results and performance, especially during times of change and uncertainty.
For example, we know that new approaches to measurement are critical as cookies and other identifiers are phased out. The future of measurement is combining consented first-party data with insights from new, privacy-safe technology, like browser APIs, and using modeling to close data gaps. Solutions like enhanced conversions, consent mode, conversion modeling and data-driven attribution allow you to respect your customers’ privacy preferences, while confidently measuring the impact of your ads.
The future of measurement is combining consented first-party data with insights from new, privacy-safe technology.
First-party data is not only critical for measuring your media, it’s also essential in understanding your customers. Our research shows that companies that link their first-party data sources can generate 1.5 times the incremental revenue from single ad placement, communication or outreach.
There’s been a massive acceleration in the way people use technology to connect with businesses during the pandemic. Meanwhile, there are rising expectations for user privacy and control. You have to meet your customers where they are and build meaningful relationships in a privacy-safe way.
Whether a global brand like PepsiCo or an online business like tails.com, your stories of resilience and ingenuity continue to inspire my team to build for the future.
There’s never been a more exciting time to be a marketer, and we’re here to be your partner along the way. As you make progress on your plans for the year ahead, continue to share your stories and feedback within the product and at events like Think Retail and Google Marketing Live. We’ll continue listening, sharing insights and building products to help you come back stronger in 2022.
New year, same trend: Consumers continue to tap into an ever-growing number of places to get inspiration and find what they need. This past holiday season, 54% of shoppers used five or more channels, like video and social media, to shop over a two-day period.
Performance Max uses Google’s automation to help advertisers reach shoppers as they browse for things they love — online and in stores.
Performance Max allows you to grow online, offline or omnichannel sales by unlocking all of Google’s ad inventory from a single campaign with a product feed. For example, you can transform your Video ads into your digital storefront and highlight your top products on YouTube — right where valuable customers are watching relevant video content every day.
Here’s a preview of the upgrade process so you know what to expect and how to plan ahead to set your campaigns up for success.
Keep these key milestones in mind as you prepare for the upgrade:
Leading e-commerce partners like Shopify, WooCommerce and BigCommerce are already working to support Performance Max so more merchants can benefit from new inventory and formats to connect with their customers. All merchants and partners will be able to upgrade their Smart Shopping and Local campaigns through the Google Ads API later this year. Learn more about the process in our developer blog.
Tune in to our upcoming webinar in February, where product experts will demonstrate the one-click upgrade tool and dive into best practices for creating new Performance Max campaigns. They’ll also explain the new technology used in your campaign upgrades to help you get better results, faster.
Meanwhile, our updated Performance Max best practices guide has new recommendations geared towards achieving your online and offline goals. You can also explore the infographic below to understand how to use Performance Max with other Google Ads campaigns.
In the coming months, we’ll share tools and tips to help you at each milestone and make your upgrade process as smooth as possible. In the meantime, share your questions and comments and we’ll address them in our upcoming webinar. You can also follow @AdsLiasion to stay updated throughout the process.
The holidays are quickly approaching and 40% of U.S. consumers have already started their holiday shopping. Supporting local businesses is top of mind this year. In fact, 60% of U.S. consumers who are planning to shop for the holidays say they will shop more at local small businesses.
If your stores are open for in-store shopping or dining, you know it's important to make sure your customers can easily find you online. We’ve unwrapped new local solutions plus a local holiday guide to help you stand out on Google and connect shoppers to your stores.
Starting this week, you can easily claim and verify your Business Profile directly on Google Search or the Google Maps app. Search for your business by name and you’ll see an option to claim and verify the associated Business Profile. Once your business is verified, you can edit your business’ information, including the address, store hours, photos and more.
Update your Business Profile and engage with customers directly from Search and Maps.
We’re also adding new ways to get even more out of your Business Profile. You can now message customers directly from Search, and merchants in the U.S. and Canada can use call history to see which inbound customer calls came from their Business Profile on Google.
View your call history from your Business Profile.
Moving forward, we recommend small businesses manage their profiles directly on Search or Maps. To keep things simple, “Google My Business” is being renamed “Google Business Profile.” And in 2022, we’ll retire the Google My Business app so more merchants can take advantage of the upgraded experience on Search and Maps. The existing Google My Business web experience will transition to primarily support larger businesses with multiple locations, and will be renamed “Business Profile Manager.” We’ll share more details on these changes in the months ahead.
Holiday shoppers want to know what’s available before they get to your store. In a recent survey, more than half of U.S. holiday shoppers said they’ll confirm online that an item is in stock before going to buy it. There are a few ways to make sure your business shows up when holiday shoppers search for the products you offer.
We recently announced the new “in stock” filter on Search so shoppers can see only the nearby stores that have a specific item. To make sure your products show up, retailers in the U.S. and Canada can sign up for Pointy from Google — free of charge and right from your Business Profile on Search. Pointy helps you automatically upload all your in-store product inventory by connecting directly to your existing point of sale system. If you already have a local inventory feed, you can submit your feed through Google Merchant Center. To showcase individual products, you can also manually add them to your Business Profile on Search.
Shoppers can now use the “in stock” filter on Search to see only the nearby stores with a specific item on their shelves.
If you want to focus on store-specific goals, like promoting in-store products or seasonal menu items, you can promote your location to nearby shoppers using Local campaigns. Easily connect with shoppers searching for businesses like yours across Google Maps, Search, Display or YouTube, and help them find what they need at your local store, restaurant or dealership.
Now it's even easier to plan your Local campaign budgets heading into the holidays using Performance Planner. This tool helps you create plans for your local advertising investment, and see how changes to those plans might affect your outcomes and performance.
Local campaigns Performance Planner can help determine how much to invest this holiday season and beyond.
Even franchises like Wendy's use Performance Planner to more easily determine the appropriate investment for their Local campaigns to drive their store-level business goals.
Because the holidays are a critical time of year for your business, you should continue using Local campaigns to reach shoppers this season. However, when the time is right for your business, you can also start testing Performance Max campaigns before next year’s campaign upgrades. Performance Max allows you to promote your business across all Google Ads channels to help you drive more foot traffic to your physical locations — and includes new inventory and formats not currently available in Local campaigns.
For more on how to make this season even merrier — and easier — for local shoppers, check out the Local holiday guide or the Google for Small Business holiday checklist.
The holidays are quickly approaching and 40% of U.S. consumers have already started their holiday shopping. Supporting local businesses is top of mind this year. In fact, 60% of U.S. consumers who are planning to shop for the holidays say they will shop more at local small businesses.
If your stores are open for in-store shopping or dining, you know it's important to make sure your customers can easily find you online. We’ve unwrapped new local solutions plus a local holiday guide to help you stand out on Google and connect shoppers to your stores.
Starting this week, you can easily claim and verify your Business Profile directly on Google Search or the Google Maps app. Search for your business by name and you’ll see an option to claim and verify the associated Business Profile. Once your business is verified, you can edit your business’ information, including the address, store hours, photos and more.
Update your Business Profile and engage with customers directly from Search and Maps.
We’re also adding new ways to get even more out of your Business Profile. You can now message customers directly from Search, and merchants in the U.S. and Canada can use call history to see which inbound customer calls came from their Business Profile on Google.
View your call history from your Business Profile.
Moving forward, we recommend small businesses manage their profiles directly on Search or Maps. To keep things simple, “Google My Business” is being renamed “Google Business Profile.” And in 2022, we’ll retire the Google My Business app so more merchants can take advantage of the upgraded experience on Search and Maps. The existing Google My Business web experience will transition to primarily support larger businesses with multiple locations, and will be renamed “Business Profile Manager.” We’ll share more details on these changes in the months ahead.
Holiday shoppers want to know what’s available before they get to your store. In a recent survey, more than half of U.S. holiday shoppers said they’ll confirm online that an item is in stock before going to buy it. There are a few ways to make sure your business shows up when holiday shoppers search for the products you offer.
We recently announced the new “in stock” filter on Search so shoppers can see only the nearby stores that have a specific item. To make sure your products show up, retailers in the U.S. and Canada can sign up for Pointy from Google — free of charge and right from your Business Profile on Search. Pointy helps you automatically upload all your in-store product inventory by connecting directly to your existing point of sale system. If you already have a local inventory feed, you can submit your feed through Google Merchant Center. To showcase individual products, you can also manually add them to your Business Profile on Search.
Shoppers can now use the “in stock” filter on Search to see only the nearby stores with a specific item on their shelves.
If you want to focus on store-specific goals, like promoting in-store products or seasonal menu items, you can promote your location to nearby shoppers using Local campaigns. Easily connect with shoppers searching for businesses like yours across Google Maps, Search, Display or YouTube, and help them find what they need at your local store, restaurant or dealership.
Now it's even easier to plan your Local campaign budgets heading into the holidays using Performance Planner. This tool helps you create plans for your local advertising investment, and see how changes to those plans might affect your outcomes and performance.
Local campaigns Performance Planner can help determine how much to invest this holiday season and beyond.
Even franchises like Wendy's use Performance Planner to more easily determine the appropriate investment for their Local campaigns to drive their store-level business goals.
Because the holidays are a critical time of year for your business, you should continue using Local campaigns to reach shoppers this season. However, when the time is right for your business, you can also start testing Performance Max campaigns before next year’s campaign upgrades. Performance Max allows you to promote your business across all Google Ads channels to help you drive more foot traffic to your physical locations — and includes new inventory and formats not currently available in Local campaigns.
For more on how to make this season even merrier — and easier — for local shoppers, check out the Local holiday guide or the Google for Small Business holiday checklist.
In an unpredictable year, change has been a reliable constant. And we’ve seen this clearly in online consumer behavior. For example, Google Image searches for "yard landscaping ideas" have grown globally by over 80% YoY1 as people look for more ways to spruce up their homes. Meanwhile, searches for "best all-inclusive resorts" have grown globally by over 200% YoY2 as people get inspired to travel again.
Thankfully, advertisers don’t have to predict the future to be ready for it. If change is the challenge, automation is the solution businesses and agencies are using to stay ahead of ongoing shifts in consumer demand. Last year, we introduced Performance Max campaigns as a new way to buy Google ads across YouTube, Display, Search, Discover, Gmail and Maps from a single campaign. They complement your keyword-based Search campaigns to help you grow performance across Google’s full range of advertising channels and inventory.
After strong beta results, Performance Max campaigns will roll out to all advertisers around the world starting today. They will also become the next generation of Smart Shopping and Local campaigns, which will both upgrade to Performance Max next year.3
Performance Max campaigns help you increase conversions across Google’s full range of advertising channels and inventory.
Consumers are moving seamlessly between online experiences to find buying inspiration. 70% of U.S. shoppers report buying from a brand after seeing it on YouTube,4 and 91% of Google feed users say they took some kind of shopping or product-related action immediately after discovering new products, services or brands on their feed.5
Performance Max allows you to promote your business across all Google Ads inventory. As a result, you can show up for more customers and drive more conversions based on your goals. In fact, advertisers that use Performance Max campaigns in their account see an average increase of 13% total incremental conversions at a similar cost per action.6 Whether you’re focused on increasing online sales, generating leads, or growing offline sales, Performance Max helps you achieve your goals in four main ways:
1. Increasing conversions and value: Automation optimizes your budget and bids across channels to help you capture new conversion opportunities in real time.
Performance Max has helped us activate a complementary, full-funnel strategy. Thanks to advanced machine learning capabilities, we’ve been able to gain incremental reach and conversions very efficiently.
2. Finding new customers: Unlock new audience segments by using Google’s real-time understanding of user intent, behavior and context to show up in the right moments with more relevant ads.
Performance Max can be activated quickly and at scale to optimize the web journey and drive more subscriptions. It delivers strong targeting signals for a more competitive CPA and dynamic budget optimization by channel.
3. Gaining richer insights: Performance Max campaigns are now part of the Insights page to help you understand how automation is working and how you can improve your campaign. Using the Combinations report, you can also see how your top-performing assets are being combined to build creatives.
4. Working together with automation: Steer automation by providing high-quality creative assets and sharing your expertise about which audiences are most likely to convert.
The results from Performance Max campaigns were amazing. They helped us enter a new market to grow potential customers in a short period. We’d like to roll out Performance Max to other markets as well!
Performance Max campaigns allow retailers and local marketers to access new ad inventory and formats not currently available with Smart Shopping or Local campaigns — including on channels like YouTube, Search and Discover. To help you increase sales, Smart Shopping and Local campaigns will both upgrade to Performance Max in 2022. We’ll work closely with you and your partners to get feedback and build the right tools to help you easily transition your campaigns. Stay tuned for more information early next year.
We know the holidays are a critical time of year for your business. You should continue using Smart Shopping and Local campaigns to reach more shoppers across online and in-store experiences this holiday season. However, when the time is right for your business, you can start testing Performance Max campaigns before next year’s campaign upgrades.
Not only did Performance Max outperform our previous Smart Shopping campaigns, but it also took our efficiency to the next level, and allowed us to grow our revenue in a more profitable way.
Performance Max became such a significant contributor towards our marketing objectives that we are now planning to roll it out across all of our accounts.
In the next few months, we’ll introduce new features in Performance Max specifically for retailers and businesses with store locations. For example, you’ll have the option to focus your campaigns to exclusively optimize for new customer acquisition. If you’re a retailer with a local inventory feed, you’ll also see new Search and Maps ad formats powered by your products to help drive more foot traffic to your stores.
Upgrading Smart Shopping and Local campaigns to Performance Max next year will help you get more value from Google Ads while simplifying the number of campaigns you use to achieve your goals. We’ll continue investing in Performance Max and improving our automation technology over time to help you get better results.
To set your Performance Max campaigns up for success, check out our new best practices guide and video. You can also take the Skillshop e-learning course for Performance Max campaigns to get more tips on how to use them to their full potential. And explore the Demystifying Automation interactive demo to learn how different automation technologies can supercharge your marketing capabilities.
1. Google Data, Global English, Jun 22, 2021 - Aug 20, 2021 vs Jun 22, 2020 - Aug 20, 2020
2. Google Data, Global English, Jun 22, 2021 - Aug 20, 2021 vs Jun 22, 2020 - Aug 20, 2020
3. In Europe, Performance Max campaigns can be used with any Comparison Shopping Service (CSS) you work with. The ads will show on general search results pages and on any other surfaces the CSS has opted in to.
4. Google/Talkshoppe, US, whyVideo study, n=2000 A18-64 Genpop video users, Feb 2020
5. Google/Ipsos, Google Feed Consumer Insights, June 2020, Online survey. Americans 18+ who made a discovery on at least one Google feed (feeds defined as Google app, Chrome app, YouTube, Gmail) on a mobile device. Base: Feed users n=1,053
6. Google Data, Global, Ads, July - September 2021
In an unpredictable year, change has been a reliable constant. And we’ve seen this clearly in online consumer behavior. For example, Google Image searches for "yard landscaping ideas" have grown globally by over 80% YoY1 as people look for more ways to spruce up their homes. Meanwhile, searches for "best all-inclusive resorts" have grown globally by over 200% YoY2 as people get inspired to travel again.
Thankfully, advertisers don’t have to predict the future to be ready for it. If change is the challenge, automation is the solution businesses and agencies are using to stay ahead of ongoing shifts in consumer demand. Last year, we introduced Performance Max campaigns as a new way to buy Google ads across YouTube, Display, Search, Discover, Gmail and Maps from a single campaign. They complement your keyword-based Search campaigns to help you grow performance across Google’s full range of advertising channels and inventory.
After strong beta results, Performance Max campaigns will roll out to all advertisers around the world starting today. They will also become the next generation of Smart Shopping and Local campaigns, which will both upgrade to Performance Max next year.3
Performance Max campaigns help you increase conversions across Google’s full range of advertising channels and inventory.
Consumers are moving seamlessly between online experiences to find buying inspiration. 70% of U.S. shoppers report buying from a brand after seeing it on YouTube,4 and 91% of Google feed users say they took some kind of shopping or product-related action immediately after discovering new products, services or brands on their feed.5
Performance Max allows you to promote your business across all Google Ads inventory. As a result, you can show up for more customers and drive more conversions based on your goals. In fact, advertisers that use Performance Max campaigns in their account see an average increase of 13% total incremental conversions at a similar cost per action.6 Whether you’re focused on increasing online sales, generating leads, or growing offline sales, Performance Max helps you achieve your goals in four main ways:
1. Increasing conversions and value: Automation optimizes your budget and bids across channels to help you capture new conversion opportunities in real time.
Performance Max has helped us activate a complementary, full-funnel strategy. Thanks to advanced machine learning capabilities, we’ve been able to gain incremental reach and conversions very efficiently.
2. Finding new customers: Unlock new audience segments by using Google’s real-time understanding of user intent, behavior and context to show up in the right moments with more relevant ads.
Performance Max can be activated quickly and at scale to optimize the web journey and drive more subscriptions. It delivers strong targeting signals for a more competitive CPA and dynamic budget optimization by channel.
3. Gaining richer insights: Performance Max campaigns are now part of the Insights page to help you understand how automation is working and how you can improve your campaign. Using the Combinations report, you can also see how your top-performing assets are being combined to build creatives.
4. Working together with automation: Steer automation by providing high-quality creative assets and sharing your expertise about which audiences are most likely to convert.
The results from Performance Max campaigns were amazing. They helped us enter a new market to grow potential customers in a short period. We’d like to roll out Performance Max to other markets as well!
Performance Max campaigns allow retailers and local marketers to access new ad inventory and formats not currently available with Smart Shopping or Local campaigns — including on channels like YouTube, Search and Discover. To help you increase sales, Smart Shopping and Local campaigns will both upgrade to Performance Max in 2022. We’ll work closely with you and your partners to get feedback and build the right tools to help you easily transition your campaigns. Stay tuned for more information early next year.
We know the holidays are a critical time of year for your business. You should continue using Smart Shopping and Local campaigns to reach more shoppers across online and in-store experiences this holiday season. However, when the time is right for your business, you can start testing Performance Max campaigns before next year’s campaign upgrades.
Not only did Performance Max outperform our previous Smart Shopping campaigns, but it also took our efficiency to the next level, and allowed us to grow our revenue in a more profitable way.
Performance Max became such a significant contributor towards our marketing objectives that we are now planning to roll it out across all of our accounts.
In the next few months, we’ll introduce new features in Performance Max specifically for retailers and businesses with store locations. For example, you’ll have the option to focus your campaigns to exclusively optimize for new customer acquisition. If you’re a retailer with a local inventory feed, you’ll also see new Search and Maps ad formats powered by your products to help drive more foot traffic to your stores.
Upgrading Smart Shopping and Local campaigns to Performance Max next year will help you get more value from Google Ads while simplifying the number of campaigns you use to achieve your goals. We’ll continue investing in Performance Max and improving our automation technology over time to help you get better results.
To set your Performance Max campaigns up for success, check out our new best practices guide and video. You can also take the Skillshop e-learning course for Performance Max campaigns to get more tips on how to use them to their full potential. And explore the Demystifying Automation interactive demo to learn how different automation technologies can supercharge your marketing capabilities.
1. Google Data, Global English, Jun 22, 2021 - Aug 20, 2021 vs Jun 22, 2020 - Aug 20, 2020
2. Google Data, Global English, Jun 22, 2021 - Aug 20, 2021 vs Jun 22, 2020 - Aug 20, 2020
3. In Europe, Performance Max campaigns can be used with any Comparison Shopping Service (CSS) you work with. The ads will show on general search results pages and on any other surfaces the CSS has opted in to.
4. Google/Talkshoppe, US, whyVideo study, n=2000 A18-64 Genpop video users, Feb 2020
5. Google/Ipsos, Google Feed Consumer Insights, June 2020, Online survey. Americans 18+ who made a discovery on at least one Google feed (feeds defined as Google app, Chrome app, YouTube, Gmail) on a mobile device. Base: Feed users n=1,053
6. Google Data, Global, Ads, July - September 2021
