SEO

Google Ad Customizers: The How and Why

Published

2 years ago

August 9, 2022

“I have never seen a kid work so hard at being lazy.”

A teacher once said this to my parents. However, she didn’t mean it in a demeaning way. She was impressed with me.

I stayed after school and automated an Excel sheet so that the data entry I was in charge of for our yearbook class would only take half as long.

I spent hours of up-front, hard work to be as lazy as possible for the rest of the semester.

I didn’t know it then, but this was my first automation – and my first experience working hard at being lazy!

Years later, as a marketing professional, I sought ways to speed up the process of creating ads for my Google Ads search campaigns.

And that is when I discovered ad customizers.

Just like in high school, I saw the value in doing some heavy lifting upfront to make things easier for myself down the road.

It was worth it then, and it’s worth it now.

If you learn to create ad customizers, it will be worth it for you, too.

Here’s how to set up ad customizers and why they are worth your time.

Why Ad Customizers Are Important

Learning all the different features and functions of Google Ads can be overwhelming, and sometimes it feels impossible to keep up with everything.

But, there are some good reasons why learning to use ad customizers in Google Ads campaigns is a good use of your time.

Your Ads Need To Stand Out

You know you need to break through the clutter.

But, you also know you don’t have the time to create all new campaigns, ad copy, and the new account structure that goes along with designing all new ads that are ultra-relevant to users.

This is precisely where ad customizers are worth their weight in gold.

With a bit of extra time upfront now, you can have ultra-relevant ads that increase your Quality Score and engage your customer for months to come.

Lower Conversion Costs Without Making Changes

Ultimately, conversions (and conversion costs) start at the search engine results page (SERP) and your ads.

Without changing your price, product, landing page, marketing funnel, etc., you can still increase conversions and conversion rates, and lower conversion costs with ad customizers.

What other tool has the power and ability to do that without a massive amount of work or change to your product, price, landing page, or marketing funnel?

Personalization Without Privacy Concerns

No other tool on the market allows you to personalize advertising to such a degree without running afoul of privacy concerns or laws.

Ad customizers are a freebie waiting to be used.

You can be ultra-relevant to a user, using just the data they freely (and legally) offer you, so let’s use it.

Long-Term Benefits With Small, Up-Front Time Cost

Getting ad customizers set up can take a while, especially if you are doing this for the first time.

However, once your business data is connected and attributes set up, you can indefinitely run relevant ads to users.

You can do so without additional work outside the general maintenance of updating business data.

How To Set Up Ad Customizers

While keeping all the data formatting straight can be complicated, there are three main steps to creating and launching customized ads.

Set up your business data.
Create a data feed.
Set up your customized ad in Google Ads.

Setting Up Your Business Data

In true Google fashion, setting up your business data is the most challenging part, as there are very specific rules about how your data must be formatted.

But once you learn the rules and get a few of these campaigns under your belt, the entire process can be done in 20-to-30 minutes.

First, download the template that Google suggests you use.

(Once you hit step three, you will see a link to download the template, so keep following along.)

It is always a good idea to use the exact documents that Google recommends for tasks that deal with tedious data.

Set up your template with the information you want to use to customize your ad.

There are three types of data that you can use in the template:

Attribution Types

Screenshot from Google Ads, July 2022

Attribute Type Examples

Screenshot from Author, July 2022

Ad Content

This is the exact text that will be placed in your ad.

The different types of content that you can customize are number (i.e., number of items available in your inventory), text (i.e., the color of an item), time and date (i.e., when a sale ends), or price.

You can name these columns whatever you want, but you have to ensure the corresponding Attribute Type is in parentheses in the column’s name.

Duration And Device

Use these columns to schedule when your ad runs, what devices they show on, and other additional preferences (see chart below for more options).

When naming the column of your spreadsheet, you must use the name exactly as it appears in the Attribute column in the chart below.

And don’t forget to add the Attribute Type in parentheses at the end of the name.

Standard Attributes

Screenshot from Google Ads, July 2022

Targeting

Targeting allows you to choose what triggers an optimizer, what campaign/ad groups are involved, and how keywords play a part in the ad.

If you want to use any or all targeting options, you must use the name exactly as it appears in the Attribute column in the chart below.

However, you do not need to include an Attribute Type at the end of the column name.

Targeting Attributes

Screenshot from Google Ads, July 2022

Create Data Feed

Once you have your business data set up, organized, and formatted, you need to connect it to your Google Ads account.

As long as there are no issues with the formatting of your business data, this is a pretty straightforward process.

Click the tools icon in the top menu.
Under Setup, click Business data.
Click Data feeds on the left-hand side.
Click the plus button and click “Ad customizer data for text ads.”
Name your feed.
Click Select source and then click Upload a file.
Click Apply.

Setting Up The Ad

If you have made it this far, then congratulations!

The hard part is over.

Setting up the actual ad in Google Ads is much more straightforward than setting up the business data, especially if you are familiar with setting up other types of campaigns.

Navigate to the ad group where you want to create your new ad that utilizes the ad customizer business data.
Click the icon and select Responsive search ad.
Fill out the headlines and descriptions using the ad customizers you would like to utilize. Enter the text you would like, and when you come to the point that you would like to use a customizer, add a curly bracket ( { ). That will bring up the dropdown menu where you can choose Ad customizer. Now, select the customizer you would like to use, and it will be inserted into your text.
Repeat this process to place customizers in your ad copy.

Screenshot from Google Ads, July 2022

Like many automations, adding customizers to ads in your Google Ads campaigns may seem a bit tricky and complicated.

On this point, you’re not wrong!

However, automations are quick and easy to set up after the learning curve.

You will also realize that they are the key to maximizing output, gaining efficiency, and lowering conversion costs.

So, give ad customizers a shot. I know they will become a part of your everyday arsenal, and you will come to love them!

Hungry For More?

Ad customizers are a huge topic, and we could not possibly fit all the information around this topic into a single article.

Luckily, SEJ has another great post about ad customizers by Andrea Atzori.

In his article, “4 Ad Customizers to Improve Google Ads Campaign Performance,” Andrea dives deeper into why you would want to use ad customizers, how they work, and four great ways to use them in your daily campaigns.

Together, these two pieces should give you a good foundation into what ad customizers are, how to use them, why to use them, and how to set them up.

Enjoy!

More resources:

Featured Image: Prostock-studio/Shutterstock

SEO

Google March 2024 Core Update Officially Completed A Week Ago

Published

16 hours ago

April 27, 2024

Max

Google has officially completed its March 2024 Core Update, ending over a month of ranking volatility across the web.

However, Google didn’t confirm the rollout’s conclusion on its data anomaly page until April 26—a whole week after the update was completed on April 19.

Many in the SEO community had been speculating for days about whether the turbulent update had wrapped up.

The delayed transparency exemplifies Google’s communication issues with publishers and the need for clarity during core updates

Google March 2024 Core Update Timeline & Status

First announced on March 5, the core algorithm update is complete as of April 19. It took 45 days to complete.

Unlike more routine core refreshes, Google warned this one was more complex.

Google’s documentation reads:

“As this is a complex update, the rollout may take up to a month. It’s likely there will be more fluctuations in rankings than with a regular core update, as different systems get fully updated and reinforce each other.”

The aftershocks were tangible, with some websites reporting losses of over 60% of their organic search traffic, according to data from industry observers.

The ripple effects also led to the deindexing of hundreds of sites that were allegedly violating Google’s guidelines.

Addressing Manipulation Attempts

In its official guidance, Google highlighted the criteria it looks for when targeting link spam and manipulation attempts:

Creating “low-value content” purely to garner manipulative links and inflate rankings.
Links intended to boost sites’ rankings artificially, including manipulative outgoing links.
The “repurposing” of expired domains with radically different content to game search visibility.

The updated guidelines warn:

“Any links that are intended to manipulate rankings in Google Search results may be considered link spam. This includes any behavior that manipulates links to your site or outgoing links from your site.”

John Mueller, a Search Advocate at Google, responded to the turbulence by advising publishers not to make rash changes while the core update was ongoing.

However, he suggested sites could proactively fix issues like unnatural paid links.

Mueller stated on Reddit:

“If you have noticed things that are worth improving on your site, I’d go ahead and get things done. The idea is not to make changes just for search engines, right? Your users will be happy if you can make things better even if search engines haven’t updated their view of your site yet.”

Emphasizing Quality Over Links

The core update made notable changes to how Google ranks websites.

Most significantly, Google reduced the importance of links in determining a website’s ranking.

In contrast to the description of links as “an important factor in determining relevancy,” Google’s updated spam policies stripped away the “important” designation, simply calling links “a factor.”

This change aligns with Google’s Gary Illyes’ statements that links aren’t among the top three most influential ranking signals.

Instead, Google is giving more weight to quality, credibility, and substantive content.

Consequently, long-running campaigns favoring low-quality link acquisition and keyword optimizations have been demoted.

With the update complete, SEOs and publishers are left to audit their strategies and websites to ensure alignment with Google’s new perspective on ranking.

Core Update Feedback

Google has opened a ranking feedback form related to this core update.

You can use this form until May 31 to provide feedback to Google’s Search team about any issues noticed after the core update.

While the feedback provided won’t be used to make changes for specific queries or websites, Google says it may help inform general improvements to its search ranking systems for future updates.

Google also updated its help documentation on “Debugging drops in Google Search traffic” to help people understand ranking changes after a core update.

Featured Image: Rohit-Tripathi/Shutterstock

FAQ

After the update, what steps should websites take to align with Google’s new ranking criteria?

After Google’s March 2024 Core Update, websites should:

Improve the quality, trustworthiness, and depth of their website content.
Stop heavily focusing on getting as many links as possible and prioritize relevant, high-quality links instead.
Fix any shady or spam-like SEO tactics on their sites.
Carefully review their SEO strategies to ensure they follow Google’s new guidelines.

SEO

Google Declares It The “Gemini Era” As Revenue Grows 15%

Published

2 days ago

April 26, 2024

Max

Alphabet Inc., Google’s parent company, announced its first quarter 2024 financial results today.

While Google reported double-digit growth in key revenue areas, the focus was on its AI developments, dubbed the “Gemini era” by CEO Sundar Pichai.

The Numbers: 15% Revenue Growth, Operating Margins Expand

Alphabet reported Q1 revenues of $80.5 billion, a 15% increase year-over-year, exceeding Wall Street’s projections.

Net income was $23.7 billion, with diluted earnings per share of $1.89. Operating margins expanded to 32%, up from 25% in the prior year.

Ruth Porat, Alphabet’s President and CFO, stated:

“Our strong financial results reflect revenue strength across the company and ongoing efforts to durably reengineer our cost base.”

Google’s core advertising units, such as Search and YouTube, drove growth. Google advertising revenues hit $61.7 billion for the quarter.

The Cloud division also maintained momentum, with revenues of $9.6 billion, up 28% year-over-year.

Pichai highlighted that YouTube and Cloud are expected to exit 2024 at a combined $100 billion annual revenue run rate.

Generative AI Integration in Search

Google experimented with AI-powered features in Search Labs before recently introducing AI overviews into the main search results page.

Regarding the gradual rollout, Pichai states:

“We are being measured in how we do this, focusing on areas where gen AI can improve the Search experience, while also prioritizing traffic to websites and merchants.”

Pichai reports that Google’s generative AI features have answered over a billion queries already:

“We’ve already served billions of queries with our generative AI features. It’s enabling people to access new information, to ask questions in new ways, and to ask more complex questions.”

Google reports increased Search usage and user satisfaction among those interacting with the new AI overview results.

The company also highlighted its “Circle to Search” feature on Android, which allows users to circle objects on their screen or in videos to get instant AI-powered answers via Google Lens.

Reorganizing For The “Gemini Era”

As part of the AI roadmap, Alphabet is consolidating all teams building AI models under the Google DeepMind umbrella.

Pichai revealed that, through hardware and software improvements, the company has reduced machine costs associated with its generative AI search results by 80% over the past year.

He states:

“Our data centers are some of the most high-performing, secure, reliable and efficient in the world. We’ve developed new AI models and algorithms that are more than one hundred times more efficient than they were 18 months ago.

How Will Google Make Money With AI?

Alphabet sees opportunities to monetize AI through its advertising products, Cloud offerings, and subscription services.

Google is integrating Gemini into ad products like Performance Max. The company’s Cloud division is bringing “the best of Google AI” to enterprise customers worldwide.

Google One, the company’s subscription service, surpassed 100 million paid subscribers in Q1 and introduced a new premium plan featuring advanced generative AI capabilities powered by Gemini models.

Future Outlook

Pichai outlined six key advantages positioning Alphabet to lead the “next wave of AI innovation”:

Research leadership in AI breakthroughs like the multimodal Gemini model
Robust AI infrastructure and custom TPU chips
Integrating generative AI into Search to enhance the user experience
A global product footprint reaching billions
Streamlined teams and improved execution velocity
Multiple revenue streams to monetize AI through advertising and cloud

With upcoming events like Google I/O and Google Marketing Live, the company is expected to share further updates on its AI initiatives and product roadmap.

Featured Image: Sergei Elagin/Shutterstock

SEO

brightonSEO Live Blog

Published

2 days ago

April 25, 2024

Entireweb News Bot

Hello everyone. It’s April again, so I’m back in Brighton for another two days of ~~sun~~, sea, and SEO!

Being the introvert I am, my idea of fun isn’t hanging around our booth all day explaining we’ve run out of t-shirts (seriously, you need to be fast if you want swag!). So I decided to do something useful and live-blog the event instead.

Follow below for talk takeaways and (very) mildly humorous commentary.