Highlights of Google Marketing live-2019
Google Marketing Live 2019 started on May 14, with more than 5,000 attendees from over 68 Countries. As Premier Google Partner, AdEspresso and Hootsuite were there (and still are, for GML 2019 day 2).
The first day started off for real with a multi-speaker keynote on ads innovation where Top Google managers revealed a ton of live or upcoming changes to the Google Ads & Marketing platform.
This presentation was followed by several more hours of follow-up content to dive deeper into the upcoming changes at Google.
And we’re starting with the most exciting part; the new Google Ads types.
DISCOVERY ADS
Did you know that the Google discovery feed alone reaches 800 million people around the globe? And it’s not even Google’s biggest property with a feed.
To help marketers and business owners to maximize this reach, Google announced Discovery Ads.
We’re talking about Ads that show in the Google discovery feed, as well as on Youtube and the Gmail Promotions and Social tabs.
In theory, Discovery ads could reach hundreds of millions of people. And it’s not a shotgun strategy like untargeted display ads.
Ad Specifications:
- At least one landscape image and one logo.
- Up to 5 headlines
- Up to 5 descriptions
Like Google’s other dynamic ad formats, machine learning will mix and match the creative to best appeal to the individual.
Discovery Ads will be opened to all advertisers on the Google Ads platform later in 2019.
GALLERY ADS
In many industries, images do a lot better job of selling the products than words.
But when marketing with Google Search Ads, you didn’t use to have a choice. The text was your only option for advertising.
Not anymore.
Meet Gallery Ads, the first Google Search Ad type that includes a visual element.
If you’re a real Google Ads geek, you might remember the Google Auto ad, and think that this looks similar. And you’d be right; it is the same ad unit except made available regardless of industry.
Not only does this new ad format include a gallery of photos, but it also expands into its own full-page experience (like Facebook & Instagram ads instant experiences).
Ad Specifications:
- Four to eight images
- A 70-character description for each image
- Up to three headlines to test
Since the gallery expands, you need to include descriptions for every image. So you can get creative and tell a story over the course of your ad, while still selling your product.
With Gallery ads we wanted to combine the intent of search with a more visual and interactive ad format. With Gallery ads people can swipe through a visual ad that sits at the top of the search result page. When they tap on the ad a scrollable image gallery will open featuring a text headline at the top and taglines beneath each image. As people browse the image gallery the headline will remain visible at the top, and any further click will take people to your site. This makes easier for you to show more content and connect with peopke that are still researching for your brand providing them all the information they need with fewer taps.”
Sissie Hsiao VP, Mobile Apps Google
SHOPPING ADS
With the original Google Shopping Ads, Google showed your ads only when people searched for precise terms.
If you sell a specific brand of yellow T-shirts, the ads would appear when someone searched the brand-name, or perhaps for “yellow t-shirts.” (This all depends on the accuracy of your product description.)
Many searches of high commercial intent don’t use product names or specifications. Someone might search for “men’s ties” or “running shoes” instead of “Adidas Yeezy 700 v2.”
That’s where Showcase Shopping ads come in.
While they are not new, these new (to non-beta users) ads target shopping and image searches for related broad commercial intent searches.
They now also automatically reach in-market audiences in other places, like the Google Discover Feed or on Youtube.
Ad Specifications:
- Since it is a Google Shopping ad, it uses the images and descriptions from your merchant center. You can set up lists of products that should show up for more general terms
- It was the last ad format to be announced during the keynote, but the first one Google made available to all advertisers.
- It is officially available in the following countries: The U.S, Canada, The U.K., Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Germany, France, South Africa, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, South Africa, Taiwan, United Arab Emirates.
Major Changes to Google Shopping
During Google Marketing Live 2019 they also announced significant changes coming to the Google Shopping platform.
It’s no secret that the new Amazon Ads have made a dent in the retail market Google used to dominate on digital. One large advertiser switched over 225 million dollars in advertising which used to be allocated to Google, to Amazon ads in 2019. And Emarketer projects 29% growth in market share from 6.8 to 8.8, with a solid one percent coming out of Google’s pockets.
Something had to change.
The New Google Shopping Homepage
It’s official, Google Express is becoming a new and reborn Google Shopping.
This change means that Google Shopping will no longer only focus on search, but will start with a personalized page based on your interests, purchases and recent commercial searches.
Shopping Actions will Expand to More Google Properties
While Google initially announced Shopping Actions and Purchase Ads in Google Image search at Shoptalk 2 in March, Oliver Heckmann expanded on their plans for 2019.
The long-term plan is to enable Shopping Actions enabled merchants to directly sell in Google Search results (image and standard), through the Google Assistant voice technology, and even directly in Youtube videos.
Brand Partners Can Share Budgets
If your brand lives and dies on retail, you no longer have to advertise globally to “create interest.”
You will soon (right now, if you are based in France) be able to support local retailer’s campaigns for your products.
This functionality allows a much closer partnership in digital advertising, without having to plan out and agree months in advance.
For now,f it’s in a closed beta phase (that you can apply to join), but the feature is planned to launch later this year.
Bumper Machine: YouTube Magic Wand to Create Bumper Video Ads
The best-received announcement from the entire presentation was the “bumper machine”, a tool that will automatically create 6-second “bumper ads” from longer form Youtube videos.
But why this focus on Bumper Ads? The simple truth of the matter is that several short ads deliver more bang for your buck than one view of the longer, 30-second TrueView ads.
They revealed that running 3 6-second ads had 107% higher ad recall and 134% higher purchase intent than the single longer ad.
Not to mention the ill-will you generate by forcing a Youtube viewer to sit through half a minute instead of the few seconds they are used to.
The Bumper Machine will automatically create 3 to 4 different ads that fit the format. Then you can use light editing features to finish up the visual/audio.
This video is an example of what the machine learning tool can create:
Display & Video 360 Ads Coming to Smart TVs, National TV Channels and Audio
While Google has cemented itself as the king of digital advertising, now they are coming for traditional media as well.
At least, the modernized version of traditional media: The smart tv.
And 74% of US households now have at least one connected TV, so Google has impeccable timing.
Right now a few channels are in beta-testing, but later this year, the program will go live, and all advertisers on the platform will be able to buy ad inventory on national and thousands of local channels.
Audio Ad Inventory Added (Google Play Music, Spotify, etc.)
With an enterprise media buyer Display & Video 360 account, you will be able to buy audio ad inventory on Google Play Music, Spotify and more.
That means that you will be able to advertise not only in between music but also in podcasts without having to broker exclusive deals.
Changes to Google Ads Audiences
Nicky Rettke, the Director of Product Management in Video Ads at Google, also shared some fundamental changes that will be made to the Google Ads audiences.
Custom Affinity and Intent Audiences will be Merged
In 2019, Google is merging the affinity and intent-based audience into one Custom Audience.
Nothing too exciting about this announced change, except it will likely clean up the dashboards of marketers who have invested a lot of time into segmentation.
Introducing AI-Powered Audience Expansion
Google is improving on the automatic targeting function in their display advertising and will release it as a new tool on the audience side.
Instead of just being able to choose between conservative and aggressive, Audience Expansion allows you to select degrees of specificity.
There is even a specific forecasting tool that predicts the change in ad spend, clicks and conversions.
Early beta-testers of the tools reported back jaw-dropping results. Some were seeing 50% more conversions from the same ad spend.
Changes to Conversions and Google Ads Smart Bidding
The team also announced a few changes coming to conversions and bidding, with particular significance for people who use smart bidding to optimize campaigns. (Most large advertisers at this point.)
Campaign-Level Conversions
If you bid manually, obviously you would want to track every kind of conversion for your campaign to see the results you are truly getting.
But with smart bidding, the algorithm optimizes for conversions, and assigning values to help it prioritize can be a very complex project.
To solve this issue, Google has introduced campaign-level conversions.
By setting conversions at the campaign level, you control exactly what the algorithm will optimize for.
Google will also allow optimizing campaigns for in-store-visits.
Later in 2019, you will be able to implement these changes through the campaign table in the Google Ads dashboard.
Conversion Value Rules
Google will allow you to set rules that affect how the algorithm calculates conversion value and optimizes accordingly.
For example, if you know that at your company your conversions tend to be worth more when they come from a certain audience segment, you can add that as a conversion value rule. You could multiply the standard conversion value by 1.3 if they are included in certain audience lists.
Or, if you know that one display audience or placement tends to yield lower quality leads, you can adjust down the conversion value from those sources with rules.
Seasonality Adjustments
Perhaps the biggest announcement for retail advertisers who use smart bidding, was seasonality adjustments.
Because big events, like a summer sale, can predictably have a large impact on conversion rates, CTR and ad rank, it can cause trouble for an algorithm settled in historical data.
Google will introduce seasonality adjustments so you can “warn” the algorithm of the upcoming changes, allowing the smart bidding algorithm to help you capitalize fully on during the period of the sale, and excluding the period from the data set after the campaign is over.
Deep Linking and In-App Conversion Tracking
The concept of deep linking is not exactly new to the Google Ads platform, as they have been previously supported through App Engagement Campaigns.
But with Google’s public rollout of Google Analytics for Firebase, you can now accurately measure and return conversion data to your Google Ads interface without having to do extensive development work.
And this is great news, as one early adopter was able to get a 40% increase in overall mobile purchases by doubling down on deep link ads and campaigns.
Google Travel Goes Live on Desktop
While Google launched a set of travel-focused tools on smartphones around the globe last year, their travel portal didn’t go live on desktop until yesterday.
The travel planning portal is now live on desktop and features flights, hotels, sights, and even package trips.
Tour and attraction companies should take note, as this could significantly impact the volume of Search Ads for travel-related keywords in the long term.
Conclusion
The team behind every aspect of Google’s Ad products show that they still very much desire to be on the cutting edge.
But it is clear that they are feeling the heat and trying to play catch up in some areas. Finally adding feed-based advertising options (years after Facebook Ads suddenly ate up 20% of the digital ads market), and completely revamping Google Shopping in response to Amazon Ads starting to take their piece in the retail advertising market.
At least they are trying to show that they are listening, by adding more flexibility to smart bidding campaigns and
While there were many important announcements made today that impact advertisers around the globe, there was also a lot of filler during today’s event.
Digital Marketing Expert
Vinay Panday