June digital round up

Digital Roundup – June 2024

SocialB Digital Marketing Blog Last modified: 10 Jun 2024 by Rich Clarke
Content Marketing | Digital Roundup | Social Media

6 New AI Features Added to Performance Max Campaigns

Google Ads has introduced six new AI features to enhance Performance Max (PMax) campaigns, and they’re worth exploring to see how they can help improve your campaign performance and return on investment (ROI).

The new AI PMax features include

Customer Value Mode

This new feature, currently in beta, aims to help advertisers using purchase conversion goals to attract high-value customers. It’s a great tool for those looking to focus on quality over quantity.

Customer Retention Goal

Also in beta, this feature is designed to help you win back lost customers. By setting retention goals, you can strategise on re-engaging those who have previously interacted with your brand.

Detailed Demographics

Google is rolling out data on age and gender groups, available in audience insights. This allows you to understand which demographics you might be missing and tailor your ads to resonate with specific age and gender groups.

Budget Pacing Insights

Now you can see real-time spend tracking, current and projected spending, and forecast conversion performance. This feature lets you quickly analyse your campaign pacing to make strategic budget adjustments. For example, you can shift the budget from an underperforming campaign to one that is close to reaching its budget limit.

Account-Level IP Address Exclusions

You now have the option to exclude specific IP addresses, such as your company’s, to reduce wasted budget on unwanted ad interactions. This helps ensure your ad spend is more efficiently used in your PMax campaigns.

Final URL Expansion

In beta, this feature lets you test whether replacing your final URL with a more relevant landing page from your website drives better results. By opting into this experiment, your traffic is split, with a portion of your budget allocated to test landing page variations while tracking results alongside your control setup. Advertisers testing this feature have seen an average increase of over 9% in conversions or conversion value at a similar Cost Per Action (CPA) or Return on Ad Spend (ROAS), according to Google data.

How to Get Started

To explore these new features and see how they can benefit your campaigns, contact Google support or your Google account team for more details and to join the beta programs.

What Is The Significance?

These new PMax features could uncover valuable insights and help optimise your campaigns for better performance. Whether you’re focusing on acquiring high-value customers, retaining lost ones, or fine-tuning your budget, these tools offer new ways to enhance your advertising strategy.

 

Google Rolls Out AI Overviews in the US with More Countries Coming Soon

Google has just announced the rollout of AI Overviews to all US-based searchers. This means that by next week, hundreds of millions of users will have access to this new feature. The plan is to expand AI Overviews to more countries soon, aiming to reach over a billion users by the end of the year.

What Are AI Overviews?

AI Overviews were introduced last year as part of Google’s Search Generative Experience. Initially available through Google Search Labs, they started being tested with a small group of users in March 2024. AI Overviews use generative AI to answer queries by providing concise snippets based on information found across the web.

According to Google, the link cards within AI Overviews generate higher click-through rates compared to traditional web search results.

Along with AI Overviews, Google is introducing multistep reasoning capabilities, planning capabilities, AI-organised search results, and a new feature in Google Lens called “Ask with Video.”

Limited Queries

AI Overviews won’t appear for every search. They are reserved for more complex questions where Google believes they can add value beyond standard search results. If an AI Overview doesn’t enhance the search results, it won’t be shown.

Click Data in Search Console

Google Search Console will begin reporting AI Overview impressions and clicks. However, these metrics will be combined with traditional search data, so content creators won’t be able to see specific figures for AI Overviews.

Handling Errors

Like any new technology, AI Overviews can sometimes provide incorrect information. If users encounter harmful or inaccurate AI Overviews, they can report them by clicking on the three dots at the top of the AI Overview.

Opting Out

If you don’t want your content to appear in AI Overviews, the only way to opt out is by blocking your site from Google Search entirely using methods like robots.txt or meta tags. Currently, searchers don’t have an option to opt out of seeing AI Overviews.

Featured Snippets and Ads

Featured snippets will continue to appear in search results alongside these new AI Overviews. Ads will also remain, with Google experimenting with new ad formats that integrate with AI Overviews for Search and Shopping ads.

Why You Should Take Notice

AI Overviews represent the next step in the evolution of Google Search. Although they won’t always be perfect, they offer a new way for users to get answers and interact with search results. Google claims that people are clicking through to a more diverse range of websites and are pleased with the answers provided by AI Overviews.

Google’s new AI features, powered by the advanced Gemini model, promise to enhance the search experience by providing smarter and more organised results. There’s much more to come as Google continues to innovate and expand its use of AI in search.

For more details on these new features, you can check out Google’s latest updates on Search Labs.

LinkedIn Click-to-message Ads

LinkedIn has rolled out a new style of ad, click-to-message ads. This style of ad isn’t new as a concept, they are incredibly popular on Facebook and Instagram, however, they are new to LinkedIn.

How do these ads work?

These ads are designed to help you engage with potential prospects and consist of two parts: a single image ad and a conversation asset, which work together:

  1. A scroll-stopping single image ad captures your audience’s attention in feed and contains a call-to-action (CTA) button. Whereas previous single image ads sent members to a website, landing page, or Lead Gen Form, clicking the CTA on a click-to-message ad sends members to a conversation in the Focused tab of their LinkedIn Messaging inbox.
  2. The second part of a click-to–message ad is similar to a LinkedIn conversation ad. Once members are in the conversation, they can select from multiple CTA buttons that guide them to take a specific action. For example, visiting your brand’s website or requesting more information.

Can I use Lead Gen Forms with Click-to-Message Ads on LinkedIn?

No, Lead Gen Forms are currently not available for click-to-message ads.

What are the benefits of LinkedIn Click-to-message Ads?

A click-to-message ad campaign provides several benefits:

  • Creates a powerful, custom message with a single image and CTA that capture your audience’s attention and drive conversations.
  • As a Sponsored Content ad format, advertisers have the option to target members in the European Union.
  • Helps drive brand consideration and generate demand, for example, share free trials and product demos.

Instagram has added more engaging features to Stories

Instagram has added 4 new stickers to Instagram Stories, Add Yours Music, Frames, Reveal, Cutouts.

Add Yours Music

For the past year, add your image stickers have been shared eagerly on Instagram Stories. The new Add Yours Music stickers combine the fun of Add Yours with the iconic music sticker, allowing you to jump on music trends by sharing a song that fits your posts.

Frames

Whether you want to reveal a new product, shine a spotlight on memories or throwback to a special business moment, the Frames sticker turns any photo into an instant print. To reveal the content inside, your followers will have to shake their phones to develop the image.

Reveal

With the Reveal sticker, you can post a hidden story for your friends and followers to uncover. The only way for them to see the content is to send you a DM. This could be used for exclusive promos or to hype up a new release.

Cutouts

Perhaps you have a new product that you want to playfully include in different environments? You can now turn part of any video or photo in your camera roll into a Cutout sticker that you can add to your story or reel. Once you create your cutouts, they are saved and easily accessible in your sticker tray, so you can come back to them time and time again.

To create a sticker from your camera roll:

  • Tap the stickers stickers icon at the top, then tap on the scissors icon that says Cutouts.
  • Select a photo or video with a clear subject from your gallery.
  • A sticker will be automatically generated. If it’s not what you wanted, you can manually select the object you want for your sticker. Note: you can only pick one object.
  • Tap the “Use sticker” button to add it to your reel or story.

To create a sticker from photos on Instagram:

  • Go to the photo you want to create a sticker from. Note: you’ll only see the option to create a sticker from eligible photos shared by public accounts on Instagram.
  • Tap the three dots in the top right of the post.
  • Tap Create sticker.

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