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2024 has been a significant year in terms of technology rollouts for Google. Starting with the introduction of AI search back in May, the tech giant continued to roll out new technologies, this time within their paid advertising platforms.
Google’s push for AI components & functionalities is highly evident in the latest Google Ads beta release. With big tech continuing to shift their efforts toward artificial intelligence, it is wise for digital marketers & business owners alike to stay ahead of the curve and take advantage of the latest & greatest advancements.
What are Google Betas?
Google Ads betas are experimental features and tools that Google rolls out to select advertisers before they are made available to the general public. Google betas allow advertisers to test new functionalities, ad formats, bidding strategies, and other enhancements that Google is looking to gain user feedback on.
Simple SEO Group is a Google Agency Partner, which allows us to gain access to these beta tools before they’re eventually moved to the live platform. Our team of Google-certified PPC experts has reviewed all of these latest betas, highlighting a few of the most intriguing below.
Bidding Exploration
Search Bidding Exploration is an AI-powered feature that aims to uncover additional sources of traffic that are not being fully utilized by current bidding strategies. This tool is specifically designed to help advertisers using Smart Bidding strategies to scale their performance by finding new opportunities for lead generation.
Currently, Smart Bidding strategies bid towards queries that have historically converted well. However, with this strategy marketers are missing out on low-volume searches, as Smart Bidding strategies have historically neglected these unique queries.
Through beta testing, we’ve observed an increase in clicks and conversions, however, return on ad spend (ROAS) tends to take a small hit. Using Search Bidding Exploration, you’re likely to see a slightly lower return on ad spend, but with the potential for higher overall volume.
Google recommends this tool for advertisers looking to expand their search reach and are using tROAS bid strategies, as well as campaigns with Dynamic Search Ads. Another item to note here is that this beta will not be available for campaigns with budget constraints.
In short, Search Bidding Exploration can be a useful tool for advertisers who are willing to trade a slight decrease in ROAS efficiency for a broader reach without compromising lead volume.
Gross Profit Optimization
Another Smart Bidding lift, Gross Profit Optimization is an AI-driven function that allows businesses to optimize their bidding strategies based on gross profit rather than revenue. For e-commerce advertisers, his strategy targets the leads that deliver the highest profit margins, rather than just focusing on total revenue.
For each transaction, Google’s algorithm calculates both a revenue value and a gross profit value using conversion data and cost of goods sold (COSG) data integrated with the Merchant Center feed. An AI model then analyzes this data to optimize bids directly toward maximizing gross profit.
Gross Profit Optimization will be a game-changing tool for e-commerce businesses looking to grow explosively. Using gross profit optimization, we’ve witnessed roughly a 15% increase in profit compared to campaigns using traditional revenue-bidding strategies.
The optimal advertisers for this bid strategy are online sales-focused advertisers who have a wide range of profit margins across their products. This tool is specifically designed for advertisers who spend upwards of $30k/month on PPC efforts or who see approximately 400 conversions per month.
As previously mentioned, this bid strategy requires a few data integrations with Google Ads. You’ll want to have data ready from your conversions, cart data, COGS, & the ability to integrate the platform with your Google Merchant Center.
AI-Generated Display Assets
Google’s new AI-generated display asset tool uses Generative AI to create ad assets automatically. Users can simply prompt the AI tool to create a design and within minutes it’s ready, simplifying the campaign creation process for advertisers.
There is an abundance of reasons why marketers would implement AI-generated assets in their display campaigns. For starters, some businesses simply do not have the resources to work with a graphic designer. The ability to generate customized assets quickly and for free will be massive in providing smaller advertisers the ability to serve display ads.
Not only do AI-generated assets help businesses save money, but they also save significant time. This is notable for many reasons, as marketers can test more variations of ads, get campaigns up and running quicker, and better make decisions with more data sets to review.
In terms of downsides, considering this is a beta AI model the assets created are not quite on the level of a seasoned graphic designer. The difference in quality is noticeable compared to the designs you see in most display advertisements today. In addition, when working with a prompt-based generative AI model, marketers must be very explicit in their instructions.
Though these AI-generated assets still have a bit of a way to go until they’ll be on par with professional human graphic design work, they do make sense for some advertisers. If you’re working with limited resources and are advertising your goods or services in the B2C space, working with a Google Partner Agency & implementing AI-generated display assets could be wise.
Target Frequency 2.0
Target Frequency 2.0 Multi-Format is a new capability for video advertisers that allows for the management and optimization of ad frequency across multiple ad formats all within a single Video campaign. This includes in-stream ads, in-feed ads, shorts ads, bumpers, & skippable ads. This technology helps advertisers to efficiently reach users across different YouTube viewing experiences while controlling how often their ads are shown to the same user.
This beta is designed using a strategy called frequency building, which is when the platform progressively builds toward the campaign’s frequency goals using multiple formats over a given period. It does so while maximizing the campaign’s reach and remaining within the target frequency goal.
Why utilize target frequency? Mixing different ad formats within a single campaign has been shown to deliver better frequency results and lower CPMs, or cost per thousand impressions, compared to campaigns that use a single format. Moreover, Target Frequency 2.0 also ensures that users are reached in various contexts—whether they’re watching short-form or long-form content.
Advertisers who are looking to optimize the frequency of their ads while using a combination of YouTube formats should take note of this new Target Frequency rollout. It is ideal for businesses and campaigns that aim to maximize reach while maintaining a consistent ad frequency across different viewing experiences.
How Do I Access Google Ads Betas?
As is consistent with the world of digital marketing, Google is constantly upgrading, testing, and implementing new technology initiatives. To stay ahead of the competition & avoid getting left behind by AI-driven technologies, businesses and marketers alike must educate themselves on the latest industry tools & practices.
To access Google Ads’ Beta tools, you’ll need to work with a Google Agency Partner, such as Simple SEO Group. We pride ourselves on staying up to date with Google’s best practices, latest technological advancements, and maintaining a close relationship with Google itself. We use these resources along with our nearly two decades of PPC expertise to deliver results-driven Google Ads campaigns.
If you’re looking to stay ahead of the Google technology curve and capitalize on the latest Google Ads rollouts, contact Simple SEO Group online today. We’ll schedule a free consultation with our PPC experts to discuss how your organization can benefit from Google’s latest tech rollouts.