1 Bid to profit 🤑
*The fact that Google has included standard shopping in this update is a good sign for its continued future as a more controllable option than PMax for PLA purists.
Hit the ground running when it lands, by making sure the cost_of_goods_sold field is filled in your Merchant Center feeds.
(and meanwhile, don’t miss Mike Rhodes’ excellent new free tool for estimating the most profitable spend level based on current performance and COGS)
2 Broad Match setting priority 🤠
- If you have an eligible keyword that exactly matches the user’s search term, that keyword takes priority in matching the search term.
- If you have multiple eligible keywords that match a search term, the keyword on the most refined match type takes priority. Exact > Phrase > Broad
- Where no keyword wins on these prioritisation rules, we’re back to an ad rank shootout (like it all used it be)
- Sneaking in there alongside Phrase match keywords are PMax Search themes that exactly match the search
- ❗The new exception. Where we have keywords that are on broad match by virtue of the campaign-level ‘broad match’ setting, those keywords are bumped up the queue to take equal priority to exact match keywords (so that a broad match ‘setting’ keyword and an exact match keyword will fight it out on ad rank).
3 Negative keyword changes… 🤔
This has generally been well received… And while admittedly the downside is minor, I’m more on the fence about this one.
Until this update, we’ve always been able to rely on the reassuringly simple rule that negatives don’t expand… Instead they use original match typing rules (exact match = exact match; phrase match = unbroken string; broad match = all words in any order, with or without additional words.)
But now those straightforward rules are now admitting their first exceptions, taking a small step in direction of the more expansive positive match typing. Mildly irksome as that is, I don’t see it moving any further in that direction. Google has no reason to get overzealous with negating keyword matches; it would be contrary to their interests to do so.
4 Google’s U-turn on third-party cookie deprecation 🙏🏽
After years of delays and adjustments to those plans, Google has decided NOT to deprecate third-pary cookies in Chrome
First it was announced in April that 3rd party cookie phase-out would be delayed until 2025 (following earlier delays from the initial 2022 plan, to late 2023, then to late 2024…). Then – in July – Google backed out of it altogether.
Frankly, the whole process looked a lot like a mess. It was very hard to find real clarity on the implications of the cookie changes, the consequent requirements, the effects of the different solutions, the implementation methods or how they would work together.
The Privacy Sandbox initiative – which includes consent mode and enhanced conversions – is still in play – but no longer hangs over us like the sword of Damocles, and Google can now take the requisite time to make it simpler and clearer.
5 PMax Asset-Level conversion data 🌟
The most useful update of the year so far…
Another feature announced from Marketing Live – now apparently imminent – we will soon be able to see PMax asset-level conversion data .
This is how it will appear – (and a note under Google’s screenshot says “You can modify the columns to show different conversion metrics: – so presumably conversion rate will also be available.
Like ‘ad extension’ asset reporting, it may be slightly hard to parse, as it each conversion is inevitably attributed to multiple assets, but it will give some some much-needed insight into the efficacy of different assets (now let’s have the same for RSAs… 🙏🏽)
