Why the New AdWords Features & Products are Important to your Business

Francis Shovlin, a SEM expert at SEER Interactive shares his opinion on Google Adwords new features announcement this April 22nd. This included a new addition to its Estimated Total Conversions (in-store sales), new ways to market mobile apps, and some shiny new reporting & experiment tools. He will be reviewing a few of these features and explaining their importance to your business. 

AdWords Impact on In-Store Purchases

This will be an amazing metric to measure once it’s available, and somewhat accurate, for all advertisers with brick-and-mortar locations. Clients with physical locations often (ok, always) wonder what impact our PPC campaigns have on their in-stores sales. With this new factor in AdWords’ Estimated Total Conversions, you’ll now have more insight than in the past. I’ve heard some negative feedback on Estimated Total Conversions since they’re exactly what they say they are: estimates. However, I’d rather spend my time wisely and focus on how to use the data to grow and inform than waste it complaining. Everyone else can have fun not engaging and educating your customers at critical moments and losing budget.

Promoting Mobile Apps

For advertisers that have mobile apps, this is a big win. Google released some incredible stats saying that 80% of apps are used only once, and that 60% of apps are never even installed! That sounds like a horrible investment and easy way to make the case for not creating one. With their new capabilities though, you’ll now be able to reach users in a way you couldn’t before and attribute value back to your mobile app.

I believe the most impactful new feature for mobile apps announced today was what they’re calling app re-engagement. These new campaigns/ads allow advertisers to send users directly to their app. So you might know of some companies that have a great app experience, but a poor mobile one. Now, I can easily send a user to a specific page in my app and ensure they’re getting the service they deserve.

In addition, you can also now track in-app purchases and downloads – a huge plus for advertisers that already have strong engagement.

Advanced Reporting & Experiment Tools

Ever get sick of creating Pivot Tables? Or, ever create a Pivot Table only to realize you didn’t download all the data you need, then have to go through the entire process again? Oh, and then you still have to analyze the data once you’re done? That could be a thing of the past with AdWords shiny new “advanced reporting”. While they’re not available yet, I’m excited to get my hands dirty. This new feature looks very user-friendly and allows advertisers to analyze data through multiple dimensions. In other words, it’s a richer, more fluid version of the current Dimension’s tab. Happy data exploring!

And last, but not least, a feature I thought was very interesting and impactful: experiments and drafts. Similar to “advanced reporting”, parts of this feature is already available (Experiments betas in Campaign settings). The new version goes above and beyond; allowing advertisers to see the impact a change would make, such as a bid adjustment or campaign settings (new & awesome!), without ever pushing it live. Then, like with the current Experiments, you can test the impact with a specific percentage of traffic to mitigate any risk involve. If you like what you see, you can apply the changes with a simple click of a button. Happy A/B testing!

Now that you’ve had at least a day to think about the new changes coming to AdWords, how do you think these new features will help advertisers?

fshovlin

fshovlin

Francis Shovlin has been in the search industry since 2007, most of that time has been spent at Seer Interactive located in Philadelphia and San Diego, where he helps companies achieve their business goals. You can follow his unpredictable thoughts on life, music, beer and PPC on Twitter: @fmshovlin

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