iprospect pov: google adwords expanded text ads

iProspect.com Copyright 2016 © iProspect, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Driving Digital Performance

+ Published by: Jeremy Hull | 24th May 2016

Google AdWords Expanded Text Ads: The New Paid Search Ad Format

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Copyright 2016 © iProspect, Inc. All Rights Reserved.


Google Announces Changes to AdWords

On May 24th 2016 Google announced several game-‐changing revisions to their AdWords advertising ecosystem. These updates are designed to enable advertisers to better reach and connect with their customers across all devices, with features that give more targeting capabilities, more control, and richer ways to deliver a relevant, personal message to individuals in the micro-‐moments that matter most. One of the most exciting features announced is Expanded Text Ads (abbreviated as ETA). This new format for AdWords paid search ads gives advertisers significantly more space for ad copy, which allows for richer messaging that drives much higher clickthrough rates. This new format is also much more mobile-‐friendly, cementing Google’s dedication to a mobile-‐first approach. However, in order to take full advantage of this new format, advertisers face the daunting task of rewriting all ads in their AdWords paid search accounts. Google has thoughtfully provided a long timeframe for advertisers to shift to this new ad format, but given the massive performance improvements driven by ETA advertisers will benefit greatly from writing and launching new ads as soon as this format is fully released in July.

Expanded Text Ads: Nearly 50% More Ad Text

Since the launch of AdWords over fifteen years ago, Google has regularly altered and updated almost every component of the system. Keyword match types have been altered, Ad Extensions have been added, targeting settings have expanded, etcetera. However, the core text ad in AdWords has remained essentially the same since the product’s launch — a 25-‐character title and two 35-‐character description lines. Expanded Text Ads are a brand new format for text ads on AdWords, providing advertisers with almost 50% more space in which to deliver their message. The headline has been expanded from 25 characters to 30. While that may seem like a minor change, brands with long names will appreciate the extra room to craft a title that is more aligned with how they want to position their trademark. In addition, Google has added a second headline which provides an additional 30 characters for the ad’s title.

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http://www.iprospect.com/en/us/our-blog/google-performance-summit-2016-winning-in-the-mobile-first-world/

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The two description lines of 35 characters each have been combined into a single description line, and the character limit has been increased to 80 characters. By eliminating the right-‐hand rail ads, Google has simplified the number of formats these ads need to accommodate, and thus they no longer need advertisers to provide their ads in a two-‐line format. Below is a chart illustrating these major changes to the core ad text:

Current Text Ads Expanded Text Ads Headline 25 characters 30 characters Headline 2 (Did not exist) 30 characters Description Two lines 35 characters each

(70 characters total) One line, 80 characters

Display URL Changes

In addition to providing advertisers more space in the ad text, Google is changing how ad display URLs function. Advertisers will no longer have a field in which to provide a display URL. Instead, the display URL will be automatically populated based on the “final URL” (the landing page). We see this as a smart move by Google. It removes the potential for user error due to mismatched display URLs and landing pages. Previously, if an advertiser entered a different display URL domain than the actual destination landing page, it would get flagged as an error. By auto-‐populating this portion of the ad, Google removes this potential mistake, streamlining ad creation and management for AdWords users. Google still allows advertisers to customize the display URL with the inclusion of two new optional, 15-‐character “Path” fields within each ad. Advertisers can enter additional text into these fields, which will then be appended to the display URL after a backslash. For example, if an advertiser’s final URL (landing page) was for the domain “www.example.com,” the advertiser could include the path fields “shoes” and “sale,” which would make the display URL appear as “www.example.com/shoes/sale”. However, advertisers should be aware of one current limitation in the new display URL format. Ads driving to landing pages build on subdomains will see this subdomain rearranged in their display URL to appear as if it was a path field. For example, a landing page of “subdomain.domain.com” would serve “www.domain.com/subdomain” as the display URL in an ETA paid search ad. While

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instances such as this won’t cause an error in AdWords, some brands aren’t happy to see their subdomain rearranged this way in their ads. There is no workaround at this point during the beta version of the ETA, but due to feedback from many beta testers Google is planning to address this limitation before the full launch of Expanded Text Ads in July.

ETA Drives Significant Clickthrough Rate Increases

In early testing, Google found that Expanded Text Ads drive significantly higher clickthrough rates. Their testing data shows CTR increases of 20% when compared to the current version of AdWords search text ads.

As impressive as a 20% increase sounds, iProspect’s early testing of Expanded Text Ads actually shows that Google’s prediction may be conservative. Overall, across all of the numerous brands we’ve tested ETA on iProspect has seen an aggregate CTR increase of 28%. Some brands see as much as a 41% higher CTR for Expanded Text Ads compared to regular ads. However, a few brands saw slightly lower CTR for some of their new ads during this testing. These findings reinforce the fact that while the new ad format provides higher CTR overall, advertisers will still have to continuously test and iterate to determine which messaging best engages their search audience.

Because ETA delivers such an increase in CTR, Google has taken a very thoughtful approach to the testing period in order to keep the auction fair for all advertisers. Until the full launch, advertisers beta testing this feature should see little change to CPC or Quality Score for keywords triggering Expanded Text Ads, because Google is adjusting their auction calculations to account for this expected CTR increase. Google is doing this in order to keep things fair and ensure beta testers don’t have an early advantage against other advertisers due to their early access to this powerful new ad format.

During our tests, iProspect did see slight variations to both CPC and quality score. The quality score variations (before/after testing ETA) were very slight, and the majority of accounts testing saw no quality score changes at all. CPC changes for ETA traffic vs non-‐ETA traffic were more significant, but didn’t reflect CTR changes in ETA, leading us to believe that these CPC changes were driven by (or at least strongly influenced by) changes in ad position and competition. iProspect will continue watching these numbers closely throughout the coming weeks and after the full launch of ETA in July, and we will share our findings on the iProspect blog.

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We see Google’s decision to “weight” the auction during the beta test period as a very smart move. This weighting not only keeps the auction fair for advertisers not participating in the test, it also challenges agencies and brands who are testing to focus on deriving learnings from ad copy variations in an accurate context of how well the ads truly perform.

Timing and Rollout

Google is currently testing this new ad format with select partners for a portion of AdWords search traffic. The full rollout of Expanded Text Ads will come in three phases:

1. July 2016: Expanded Text Ads are made available to all AdWords paid search advertisers. 2. Winter 2016: AdWords advertisers will no longer be able to create ads in the old ad format.

However, ads in the old format will continue to serve. 3. Mid-‐2017: The old ad format is completely depreciated, and ads in the old format no longer

serve. All paid search management platforms will release support for Expanded Text Ads soon. Google has already provided API documentation for this feature, and full API support launches today (5/24/2016). Reach out to your bid management platform for details about timing of their support for this feature. Because rewriting all text ads in an AdWords account is a daunting task, Google is giving advertisers at least a year after launch to make the full switch to the new format. However, due to the increased CTR demonstrated by Expanded Text Ads, iProspect recommends advertisers leverage the new format as soon as it is available for them and begin making plans now to rewrite all AdWords ads into the new ETA format as quickly as possible, prioritizing top volume and highly competitive campaign segments first. iProspect has built a rapid rollout plan to launch ETA versions of all AdWords ads in a timely fashion.

Next Steps

iProspect will continue to test Expanded Text Ads during the coming weeks, and we will share additional findings on the iProspect Blog. We recommend all agencies and advertisers utilizing

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Google AdWords paid search begin drafting new ads now even if they aren’t included in the test period, so that they are prepared to take advantage of the July 2016 launch. Google has provided advertisers with a powerful new ad format, and it’s not just another extension—it’s the new format for AdWords text ads moving forward, and the sooner advertisers take advantage of this new format the quicker they’ll see the proven performance benefits.

About iProspect

At iProspect, we transform our clients’ businesses by connecting brands to their consumers. Leveraging our suite of services, smart technology, extensive global footprint and the industry’s best specialists, we provide best-‐in-‐class performance strategies to get you the results your business needs. iProspect is the first truly global digital marketing agency, with 3,000-‐plus employees in 82 offices across 52 countries. Our global reach, in-‐depth knowledge of diverse local markets and expertise produce award-‐winning, performance-‐based marketing strategies for leading brands such as General Motors, adidas, T-‐Mobile, Hilton Worldwide, Sunglass Hut, Lenovo and many others. iProspect has been named the Best Agency for Performance Marketing by iMedia for three years in a row, the 2015 MediaPost Search Agency of the Year and iMedia’s Best Agency for Search. For more information, visit iProspect.com or follow us on Twitter @iProspect.