Google has just revealed their future plans for AdWords in a video livestream. Some of these changes are big, meaning they are also (probably) important. To save you some time and help you understand what Jerry Dischler, Vice President of Product Management, AdWords, was going on about, I watched the Step inside the future of AdWords livestream for you and distilled the pertinent facts.
Before we go on though, I must ask you a crucial question: what does Google think is the key to getting your advert out to your consumers in 2014?
I know…you are thinking Mobile?
Well, if you said mobile, you have four options:
- Hang your head in shame
- Get a donkey
- Ride to Ipswich or someplace
- Work in SEO
If you said, ‘It’s about connecting people to content with whatever device they’re using right now to the content they want now,’ take the rest of the day off. You’re allowed, I have already cleared it with your boss.
The new buzzword on the market is connecting.
Say that at parties and everyone will think you know more than you do. People will probably even buy you free drinks. Please remember to drink responsibly – You. Are. Gonna. Get. Hammered.
Oh ya, here are the 3 main things that Google will be rolling out in AdWords over the next few months:
1. App Specific ads
Google calls this ‘Innovative Ads’ but really they just want to help app promoters advertise their apps because that’s where loads of dosh is at the moment.
The sequence for app advertisers is:
Awareness > Install > Engagement > Conversions ie. monetisation
60% of apps are never installed and 80% of apps are only fiddled about with once.
Look at your phone. Are you one of the 80%? If you are, buy some pink and green socks tomorrow so you can be unique again.
Google wants to help app advertisers increase installations and engagement. They’re going to do this by having:
a) App keyword suggestions – there will now be ‘app ads’ which recommend a relevant app based on what you’re searching for. Google thinks hotel apps are a particularly relevant example.
b) Ads inside apps – based on what apps you have already downloaded /what you have been searching for/what you had for supper last Tuesday.
c) Ads that deep link inside an app. Eg. ‘Doner kebab sellers near me’ in a HungryHouse app.
2. Insightful Reporting
Google has very helpfully carried out some case studies which tell us that ‘yes, online desktop purchases have originated from mobile’ and ‘yes, people who originate from a mobile advert spend more in an online store or even a physical store’.
Thanks guys! That means we can see the effect that our mobile ads are having on end conversions and bid MORE so our ‘effective’ ads are showing more often.
In summary, Google is trying to close the loop from online to offline and make another $23,834,091 billion in the process.
3. Intelligent Tools
There are 4 main functions that Google are bringing to us:
1) For people who can’t change their own bidding, the tongue-in-cheekily named ‘intelligent tool’ offers new goals for automated bidding.
They’ll introduce ‘max conversions’ and ‘max revenue’. Sure, Google will help you sell more pink and green socks at your online shop but at a £54 cost.
b) Do you get annoyed having to export AdWords data and manipulate the numbers in Excel?
No? It doesn’t matter. Google still wants to trample all over Excel and offer exciting reporting possibilities within Adwords.
What is kind of cool, is that all the data can be manipulated live. So, you will never have an excuse that your info is old and your account ‘should be doing much better now’. Also, Google lets us have some pretty colours and graphs to spend our time on.
c) Bulk Changes
No need to mess around with Editor if you want to make some large-scale campaign changes. You will soon be able to do it within AdWords. Maybe Excel and Editor can have a farewell party together?
d) ‘Drafts and Experiments’
If you want to change your bids from £0.35 to £45 and are scared at what will happen, don’t worry as the new tool makes it easier to find out. A kind of ‘shopping cart’ for Adwords changes, you can carry out some experiments and test with a certain % of your total traffic to see what will happen. Personally, I’d opt for £55, call me reckless.
All of these changes are coming to a screen near you soon, but in the meantime let me share with you something new you can see today.
1. Go to the Keyword Planner
2. Get some ideas for keywords of your choosing. I like ‘secret rum punch recipes you can sip at work and no-one will know you’re drinking rum’.
What do you notice?
Exactly! New reporting graphs which show us trends on seasonality, devices and location. A welcome visual encapsulation for when my eyes go all blurry from too many stats.
So now you’re fully up-to-date with the latest Google goings on. Use the information for good not evil. And enjoy the ever evolving Google landscape!
