Google Data

In the coming quarters, all major browsers, including Chrome, are phasing out the use of Flash technologies in favor of HTML5. HTML5 is not only available on more devices, but also offers improved security, reduced power consumption and faster page load times for users.

We began our transition to HTML5 with display ads across Google and DoubleClick back in 2015. We are now continuing that transition by shifting video ads in DoubleClick Digital Marketing, DoubleClick for Publishers, DoubleClick Ad Exchange and the Google Display Network to HTML5 over the next few quarters as follows:

• Starting April 3rd, 2017, new Flash video ads will no longer be able to be uploaded into DoubleClick Studio, DoubleClick Campaign Manager, DoubleClick Bid Manager, DoubleClick for Publishers or AdWords.
• Starting July 3rd, 2017, Flash video ads will no longer be able to run through DoubleClick Campaign Manager, DoubleClick Bid Manager, DoubleClick Ad Exchange, DoubleClick for Publishers or AdWords. Additionally, our Active View and Verification tools for video will no longer use Flash.

Transition timeline for HTML5 Video

It’s important to begin updating your ads and websites to HTML5 technologies in preparation for these dates. We fully support HTML5 Video across DoubleClick and AdWords and provide the tools to ensure advertisers and publishers can easily migrate all video ads to HTML5.

For guidance and best practices to help your team with this transition, see this Chrome one-sheeter, visit the DoubleClick help center or contact your DoubleClick sales representative.

Posted by Peentoo Patel and Sunil Gupta

We all have that friend – the one who somehow knows the latest brands, the season’s must-have products, and where to find the best deals at the snap of a finger. In years past, this friend was an enigma, making us wonder how does he (she?) do it?

Today, we can all be that friend. With the ability to instantly discover, research, and purchase, shoppers around the world are more informed and more efficient than ever before – they’ve transformed into supershoppers seemingly overnight.

But what defines supershoppers? And what does this mean for retailers trying to win them over this holiday season? Let’s find out.

They Keep Their Options Open

Last year, more than 50% of holiday shoppers said they were open to purchasing from new retailers¹. This is especially true online. More than three-quarters of smartphone shoppers who usually go to the same physical stores when they shop for products are very open to new retailers and brands online². Why? Mobile makes it easy to explore all of your options no matter when or where you’re shopping. In fact, after searching on Google, 76% of mobile shoppers have changed their mind about which retailer or brand to purchase³.

Mobile is Their Muse

It used to be that shoppers would thumb through catalogues or stare longingly at the holiday window displays, but mobile is now the super shopper’s go-to source for inspiration. Sixty-four percent of smartphone shoppers turn to mobile search for ideas about what to buy before heading into store⁴. And 1 in 4 mobile video viewers in the U.S. have visited YouTube for help with a purchase decision while they were at a store or visiting a store’s website⁵.

But shoppers aren’t only making purchase decisions, they’re discovering new brands and products along the way: more than half of smartphone users have discovered a new company or product when conducting a search on their phones⁶.

They Want the Best – Not the Cheapest

In July we learned that shoppers are on the quest for the best – and this still rings true more than ever today. Last holiday, mobile searches related to “best gift” grew 70% year over year while mobile searches related to cheap or inexpensive gifts grew about 35%⁷. They’re also willing to do the research to the make the best decision: on YouTube, mobile watch time for product review videos has grown 60% year over year⁸.

But supershoppers don’t only want the best – they want personalized, unique, cool gifts. Mobile searches related to “unique gifts” grew more than 65% while mobile searches related to “cool gifts” grew a whopping 80%⁹.

Mobile is Their Door to the Store

Although more and more people are willing to buy on mobile, we know that mobile is still used predominantly as a door to the store. In fact, 76% of people who search for something nearby on their smartphone visit a related business within a day, and 28% of those searches result in a purchase¹⁰.

Once they’re inside your store, they expect the experience to be a seamless one: more than 40% of smartphone shoppers want retailers to automatically surface relevant information such as the location of the item in the store, a special deal or related products¹¹.

They Shop ‘Til they Drop

Supershoppers live up to their name as the holiday season progresses. From November through mid-December we see online conversion rates increase across devices. Last year, on mobile alone, they jumped 30% on Black Friday and 50% on Cyber Monday when compared to November 1¹².

Here Are a Few Tips to Reach Today’s Supershopper

1. Get your holiday campaigns in shape: Use a combination of search and video ads to reach shoppers across all their digital touchpoints. Ensure your products stand out by reading our list of optimization do’s and don’ts as well as our best practices for TrueView video ads.
2. Be Present on Mobile: use mobile bid adjustments to ensure your brand is present no matter when people are shopping. For search campaigns, you can send mobile users to the right pages on your site by using mobile URLs in expanded text ads.
3. Manage Your Bids Efficiently and Effectively: Use Smart Bidding in AdWords or DoubleClick Search to maximize your performance. Improve your bidding for sales and promotions by using Business Events in DoubleClick Search.
4. Bring your Brand into the Consideration Set: as shoppers are more open to new brands online, help shoppers discover your brand and products through category keywords and audience targeting formats like TrueView for shopping. You can use TrueView video discovery ads to target YouTube search pages relevant for your brand.
5. Don’t Miss Out on People Who are Willing to Buy Your Products: Monitor your budgets and review your click-share daily to make sure you’re not losing out on shoppers ready to buy. Increase bids and budgets as conversion rates rise, and don’t forget to keep the lights on even after the holiday season ends! Finally, don’t forget to use store visits or store sales to make sure offline sales are accounted for.

Julie Krueger, Retail Managing Director, Google

Search marketers know the pain of trying to make their campaigns speak the language of their business. Campaigns optimized for your business depend on specific insights, but it’s difficult to find those insights in standardized reporting and automation.

We’re introducing business data in DoubleClick Search so you can report on and automate search marketing in a way that’s unique to your needs — and learn if they’re being met. Whether for products, flights, hotels, marketing strategies or other aspects, you can incorporate business data tables to generate custom reports and manage your ads.

Focus on the metrics that matter most to your business

Business data in DoubleClick Search gives you the flexibility to view campaign data from the angles that align most with your business goals.

For example, if you’re a search marketer for an airline, you could use business data in DoubleClick Search to view your reports by region, airport or seating class to learn where — and among whom — your campaigns are succeeding, and which campaigns need adjustments.

Seeing your search marketing data in a business context can uncover deeper insights about where to invest search budgets. Your business dimensions can also help you understand how search fits into your broader marketing strategy.

Use your business data to automate campaign management

Business data in DoubleClick Search can also be used to automate campaign management. For example, if you’re building search campaigns for hotels, you can upload room availability data for each property. You can then use rules to pause campaigns with no vacancy and raise bids on hotels with empty rooms. Many other types of data, like inventory levels, competitive metrics and prices, can be used to change ad copy, bids, budgets, status and other properties of your campaigns.

Over the next few months, business data feeds will let you automatically update business data tables from a regularly fetched file. Rather than manually uploading a spreadsheet every time information changes, DoubleClick Search can automatically read data from your server and seamlessly incorporate updated information into your account. This data can be applied in rules and reporting, just like the business data you upload yourself.

See how this works:

Leverage sales and promotional events as signals for Smart Bidding

We’re also introducing the ability for you to upload data about product launches, promotions and other frequently recurring business events to your search campaigns. This data supplements your existing campaign metrics with extra information, providing additional context for DoubleClick Search Smart Bidding to use as it evaluates the effect of these events on conversions. With this information in hand, bid strategies set smarter bids that help you win more conversions while hitting your CPA or ROI targets.

For example, an e-commerce retailer may offer a free shipping promotion every few weeks. By uploading this promotional schedule into DoubleClick Search, Smart Bidding can analyze the effect of the free shipping offer on conversion rates before, during and after each sale. Over time, it will detect patterns in conversion rates driven by these events. Then, Smart Bidding will automatically raise or lower bids in order to achieve optimal results.

How will you get search marketing in sync with your business?

Advertisers like Cadillac are already using business data in DoubleClick Search for time savings and improved performance. They’ve thought through the numerous possibilities of business data and updated their accounts. Now it’s your turn to do the same.

“With business data in DoubleClick Search we can better leverage our search marketing investments through customized reports that allow us to differentiate between conquest customers and existing owners. We are committed to putting customers at the center of all that we do and this enables us to provide the right information to the right customer.” -Dan Han, Digital Advertising Assistant Manager, Cadillac

To learn more about business data in DoubleClick Search, visit our Help Center and reach out to your DoubleClick representative to bring better insights and automation into your campaigns.

Posted by Henry Tappen Product Manager, DoubleClick Search

If you’re inviting a friend to dinner or asking them about the best hotels in New York City, you’re probably doing it through mobile messaging. Nearly two thirds of smartphone owners use messaging more than five times a day to communicate with others.¹ And people aren’t limiting their use of messaging to social communications – 65% of consumers say they’d consider using messaging to connect with a business to get information about a product or service, or to schedule an in-person appointment.²

In the coming weeks, we’re introducing click-to-message ads to bring the efficiency and effectiveness of messaging to search ads. By setting up a message extension, you’ll give users an easy way to text you to start a conversation and continue it whenever is most convenient for them.

Tapping on the texting option launches a user’s SMS app with a pre-written message tailored to the product or service they’re interested in. For example, if you’re a travel advertiser and someone messages you after searching for New York City hotels, they can send or edit your pre-written message text, “I’m interested in a reservation. Please text me back with more information.”

Many advertisers are already using click-to-message ads to take advantage of a new and faster way to connect with consumers on mobile to increase conversion rates:

“Click-to-message ads have proven to be a great way to help prequalified customers start the hotel reservation process in a way that is convenient and easy for them. They can text an agent to get questions answered, continue the conversation on their own timetable, and trade booking information before completing the final checkout over the phone or on our website. It’s a seamless and streamlined process that helps increase brand trust. The conversion rate on message extensions is 41% higher compared to other ad extensions. Paired with customer support software, they’ve also allowed our agents to respond to requests in a more efficient and cost-effective way. ”

- Gabe Thayn, Director of Search Marketing, TravelPASS Group

“Click-to-message is a useful tool that allows consumers to engage with our business in a way that’s comfortable and efficient for them. They could be on their commute or in a rush, so they can text us quickly through click-to-message. It’s also a good medium to get questions answered that aren’t addressed on our website, or to reach us during hours when our office is closed. Our main performance objective is to help customers as much as possible – when we take care of their questions and needs in a helpful, relevant way, that leads to better business results.”
- Gavin Chan, Digital Marketing Manager, AnyVan

“The results from click-to-message have been phenomenal and we’ve seen a 80% higher conversion rate when compared to other similar channels. We can now tap into an important consumer base that prefers to use SMS to learn more about our insurance products. Besides giving users a new way to get in touch with us, we feel this is by far the fastest and most cost-effective way to connect with them.”
- Gavin Parker, Paid Search Manager, Auto & General 

“We started testing click-to-message as soon as we heard about it. Text messaging is a popular medium of communication among young professionals and the opportunity to engage them through SMS is very exciting. We sell industrial equipment and supplies, which can be very technical. Sometimes customers don’t have time to talk over a web chat or phone conversation, but still need more information. Messaging helps simplify these exchanges and the customer response has been very positive since they can post a question and follow up in their own time.”
- Ashar Mairaj, VP of Marketing, Global Industrial

Mobile users have more flexibility than ever to choose how they want to connect with businesses. Through messaging, you can initiate valuable conversations with them by tapping into one of their most preferred modes of communication. Learn more about click-to-message ads by visiting the Help Center. Also read our new best practices to learn how to use click-to-message ads to build a faster consumer experience on mobile and deliver useful information that gets customers closer to purchasing.

Posted by Amit Agarwal, Senior Product Manager, Mobile Search Ads

When it comes to attracting customers over the busy holiday season, showcasing your products online can help you get in front of more people, and many retailers already use ecommerce platforms to upload and promote their products online. Today, we’re excited to announce partnerships with three major ecommerce platforms — BigCommerce, PrestaShop, and Magento — to make it easier than ever before to get started on Google Shopping for the holidays, and beyond. If you’re using any one of these platforms (or if you’re thinking of using one of these platforms), our new partnerships let you easily submit your product information to Google Shopping and quickly reach millions of new customers searching for what you sell.

Get up and running on Google in just a few clicks

With this direct integration, you can save time and extra work by using your existing BigCommerce, Prestashop, or Magento account to easily submit your product data to fuel a new Google Shopping campaign.

With just a few clicks, your product information is populated in your Merchant Center account, helping you reach new shoppers on Google.com and other Google properties. This integration lets you:

• Find new customers, right where they’re searching. Connect your products to the customers who matter most — the ones searching for what you sell.
• Easily display your rich product imagery and details. Put your product images, price, and other differentiators front and center, so that searching shoppers can easily find you.
• Get up and running quickly, minimizing your holiday workload. Use the product information you’ve already entered in your ecommerce platform without needing to submit this information separately to Google.
• Showcase your newest inventory. Roll out new products to Google Shopping, simply by adding products to your ecommerce store.

Early successes

We’ve been testing this technical integration with our ecommerce platform partners, and have already seen impressive results from small businesses, brand new to Google Shopping.

Peter Baseio, founder and CEO of baby product company Organic Munchkin, connected his BigCommerce account to Google Shopping to reach new customers with rich, visual ads. “Google Shopping allows our products to be listed in a visual format, increasing brand awareness for our niche market, as well as revenue,” said Baseio. “It has tripled our revenue stream, bringing in customers we never knew we had access to.”

Sam Gong, co-founder of Man Crates, used the integration to help tens of thousands of new customers find their unique assortment of gifts. “Google Shopping is an incredibly cost-effective way for us to reach new customers on long-tail search terms and recapture visitors that have found Man Crates through one of our primary marketing campaigns,” said Gong. “It’s well integrated with BigCommerce, incredibly easy to setup, and easy to measure and manage on an ongoing basis. It’s an absolute no-brainer for just about any ecommerce business.”

Ready to get started?

If you’re not using an ecommerce platform today, find out how to sign up for one by checking out the BigCommerce, PrestaShop, or Magento website. If you’re already using one of these platforms, visit our Help Center or the BigCommerce, PrestaShop, and Magento help pages to learn more.

Posted by James Summerfield, Senior Software Engineer, Google Shopping

Today we’re introducing a new API that allows you to securely connect offline conversion events to your digital advertising programs, allowing you to measure the full impact of your digital spend. In addition to gaining a more comprehensive view on campaign performance, you’ll also be able to use these insights to better refine your audience lists.

Take the auto industry, for example. Consumers in the market looking to buy a new sedan might start by watching video reviews of popular models. When they’ve narrowed down a few options that fit their needs, they’re likely to search for local dealers and make calls to schedule test drives. Finally, after all of this research, they’ll make their decision and buy directly from one dealer.

If you’re a car maker trying to reach consumers in this journey, you’re probably looking at proxy metrics (i.e. lead forms, time on site, video completion rates, etc.) to measure the success of your digital campaigns, leaving you with a partial understanding of their impact. With the Conversions API you’re able to measure offline activities as well — such as calls, visits or transactions happening in the dealership — giving you a complete view of the customer journey.

Some industry-specific examples

Enabling better decisions

By considering offline actions such as store visits, call activities and in-store transactions you can gain insights that will allow you to make your ads more relevant for consumers and perform better. For example:

• Exclude existing customers from your new acquisition program and focus on retention and loyalty
• Re-market to consumers who have called your call center but didn’t purchase
• Cross-sell new products to frequent visitors of your stores

Getting started with the Conversions API

You can use one of the approved partners to securely integrate with DoubleClick. Approved partners span various use cases including CRM onboarding, call tracking and foot traffic attribution:

                               

Conversions API is now available to all DoubleClick accounts. To get started, review the technical documentation in our Help Center, talk to your sales representative or contact one of the partners directly.

Posted by Luke Hedrick
Product Manager, DoubleClick

The shift to mobile has happened. And as marketers on the frontline, you need tools that help you build mobile-first experiences at scale. AdWords Editor is here to help — and just in time for the holidays. The latest version (11.6) includes support for universal app campaigns, Gmail ad templates, and much more.

Universal app campaigns

Developers and marketers know it’s not just about driving app installs, it’s about delivering valuable actions within your apps. AdWords Editor now supports universal app campaigns (UAC), which help you find the customers that matter most to you, based on your defined business goals. With UAC, you can find valuable users for your app across Google Search, Play, YouTube, and within apps and mobile websites on the Display Network. Create and edit universal app campaigns in AdWords Editor today.

Gmail ad templates

With Gmail ads, you can reach the 1B+ Gmail users around the world. Gmail ads provide a relevant way for you to connect with them as they’re browsing promotional emails. AdWords Editor now supports Gmail image templates and Gmail single promotion templates so you can easily create, manage, and edit your Gmail ads, in bulk, alongside the rest of your ads.

Expanded text ads

As a reminder, support for expanded text ads is also available in AdWords Editor. Expanded text ads provide more ad space so you can showcase additional details about your brand, products, and services. Check out our best practices guide for tips and tricks on writing compelling ads.

Responsive ads

Responsive ads adapt to the increasingly diverse mix of content types and screen sizes across the Google Display Network. You can now create and edit responsive ads in AdWord Editor.

And more…

The latest version of AdWords Editor also includes:

• Device bid adjustments allow you to maintain the efficiency of managing a consolidated campaign that reaches consumers across devices, while giving you more control to set individual bid adjustments for each device type.
• Enhancements to advanced search, including an easier way to create filters.
• Scheduled downloads to help you stay on top of recent changes and performance statistics

Learn more about these updates in the AdWords Editor Help Center or download AdWords Editor here.

Posted by Blake Reese, Senior Product Manager, AdWords Editor

With the holiday season fast approaching, DoubleClick Search customers get an early gift: new features to make their holiday campaigns more successful.

This year, new DoubleClick Search features will save you time and help you measure campaigns more effectively.

Improved workflows for finding and creating keywords

We’ve made a few adjustments to workflows in DoubleClick Search, making the management of your campaigns more efficient and productive.

First, we’ve made editing positive and negative keywords in DoubleClick Search as simple as entering data in an online spreadsheet. Each keyword gets a row, and column headings such as “Ad group,” “Match type” and “Max CPC” let you easily adjust these important settings for each keyword.

It’s also easier now to add keywords. You can combine new the keyword experience with the search terms report available in DoubleClick Search, to find and build new keywords to include in your campaign in a matter of a few clicks. When you identify a positive or negative keyword that better matches the customer intent, you no longer have to leave the report to add it. New enhancements allow you to add new keywords to your campaigns directly from the search terms report, and more advanced filters check to see if the keywords already exist in the ad group, campaign or account.

To help you get started, we’ve added tips for using the keyword editor and how to use the search terms report to harvest keywords in the DoubleClick Search Help Center.

Greater control and flexibility for bid optimization

DoubleClick Search now supports device bid adjustments for AdWords. You can use these to set individual bid adjustments for each device type — mobile devices, computers and tablets. DoubleClick Search reports provide critical insights into performance by device type, allowing you to set these device bid adjustments to maximize performance.

While device bid adjustments enable you to optimize with greater precision, you still need to factor in other signals which impact performance, like location, day of week and audience. To optimize at scale across this wider range of contextual signals, you should take advantage of automated bidding. DoubleClick Search Smart Bidding utilizes the power of Google’s machine learning to set more informed bids and help you get the most out of your marketing budget. Bid strategies with cost per acquisition (CPA), effective revenue share (ERS) or return on ad spend (ROAS) goals can all be optimized through Smart Bidding by device, location, remarketing lists and other factors.

And, to measure bid strategies more effectively, DoubleClick Search customers have new options to customize the data that appears in bid strategy reports. You can now segment bid strategy reports and add Floodlight activity columns.

Review our Best practices for setting up Smart Bidding strategies to develop the best possible approach to bid adjustments.

Additional transparency for measuring performance

DoubleClick Search executive reports now enable you to quickly see what can be optimized by displaying the top or bottom performers. They also enable you to filter reports using predefined or custom metrics, so you can choose to only see the data you want.

For example, if you’re a retailer and want to see the top 20 keywords that lead to a purchase, you can easily do so in an executive report that looks like this:

And, so you can ensure your top performing keywords are being seen, DoubleClick Search can now report on impression share for AdWords keywords, in addition to AdWords and Bing Ads accounts, campaigns and ad groups. We’ve also added Bing Ads quality score in DoubleClick Search.

Lastly, we’re rolling out the full launch of hourly reporting later this month. Hourly reporting can provide insightful data during special sales, where conversion behaviors are less predictable. Or, you can use these reports to quickly detect outages or problems with your conversion tags.

Review account activities more effectively

With all hands on deck during this busy period, the revamped change history report makes it easier for you to see who’s changing an ad account, when they’re making changes and details about the changes they made. These reports are fast and offer powerful filters to view and download activity by user email, change type, system and entity changed. Learn who your most active users are and implement reports to better manage your team.

If you’d like to learn more about any of these new features for your upcoming holiday search campaigns, contact your DoubleClick Search account manager.

Posted by Bashar Kachachi
Product Management Lead, DoubleClick Search

Becoming a digital advertising expert takes time, and it’s important to get off to a good start. Only 50 percent of marketers say they’re confident in their knowledge of digital advertising,¹ despite the wide range of educational materials available. Sometimes “more” isn’t the same as “better.” Many advertisers start learning about AdWords in our help centers, which offer an enormous trove of product information. But you’ve told us that you want quick, bite-sized training in more interactive formats. And we heard you.

We’re pleased to announce Academy for Ads, a new digital training platform designed to help you learn how to use Google’s ad products in a mobile-first world. We built Academy for Ads to promote learning on-the-go, whether you’re on a laptop, a desktop, or a mobile device.

Grow your Google product know-how

Guided by input from our team of product experts, Academy for Ads courses cover the topics that matter most to DoubleClick and Google advertisers – from Bid Manager and AdWords basics and the essentials of campaign management to bid strategies, reporting, optimization and more ways to successfully advertise with Google. We’re adding new content all the time, including a DoubleClick Campaign Manager Learning path in just a few weeks.

Learning paths, Assessments and Achievements

We’ve organized the courses into “Learning paths” that you can walk through at your own pace. At the end of each path, take an Assessment and earn an Achievement to show that you know your stuff. Earning an Achievement for Bid Manager or Ad Exchange helps you prepare for the more advanced training in the Help Center.

A few example Learning paths:

• Digital concepts: Learn the essentials of online ads — from third-party ad-serving to real-time bidding, programmatic media buying and remarketing.
• Get started with DoubleClick Bid Manager*: Learn your way around Bid Manager, what it offers and how you can use it to manage your online marketing campaigns.
• DoubleClick Ad Exchange: Learn how real-time bidding works in an open auction sale on the DoubleClick Ad Exchange. This learning path also covers the available programmatic deal types, along with the types of inventory available for mobile, video, display and television buys.

*Only accessible to DoubleClick Bid Manager clients

Academy for Ads is useful for anyone getting started with Google or DoubleClick training, and can help pave the way for the AdWords Certification program offered by Google Partners, as well as the Google Best Practices program, which offers more advanced AdWords education. DoubleClick users may also find additional training in DoubleClick’s help centers.

Get started

If you already use Google Partners, you can sign in through the Partner portal at g.co/learnwithpartners — or, you can go directly to g.co/AcademyforAds to sign up and start sampling courses and Learning paths. We’re constantly adding content, including advanced DoubleClick training. So if you like what you learn, keep coming back for more.

Posted by Tracy Bizelli
Head of Academy for Ads

^{1 6 Fundamentals to Managing Digital Marketing in 2015, TFM Insights (January 2015)}

As part of our Advertising Week announcements, we’re introducing new digital innovations to help advertisers close the loop between television and digital, online and offline, and mobile and desktop.

Consumers make purchase decisions across many different moments, and over 75% of people¹ switch from one device to another while shopping. This makes reaching consumers with the right message — in the right moment — more complex. Today we’re introducing new cross-device capabilities in DoubleClick, including cross-device remarketing, to make it easier to close the loop across screens and reach people where they are, on whatever device they’re using.

Connect moments across devices

In July 2015, we introduced the ability to measure cross-device conversions (when a consumer purchase journey starts on one device but is completed on another). These metrics are helping advertisers like American Express and Ringling Bros. better understand consumer behavior and make better decisions about allocating budgets.

The insights have proven to be useful, but we’re excited to help you put them into action. Today we are announcing that you can automatically optimize your bids based on how users are interacting with your ads and converting across devices. This capability will be available as an option for automated bidding² in DoubleClick Bid Manager, helping you to drive greater impact from cross-screen campaigns.

Re-engage with consumers across devices

As consumers make purchase decisions, they may interact with your business multiple times along the journey. For example, when they’re shopping for their next car, they might download a brochure on their laptop while at work, watch videos while commuting home and read reviews on their tablet on the couch — all before booking a test drive. As an automotive marketer, you could use remarketing to re-engage with consumers who downloaded the brochure and encourage them to book a test drive — but in the past you could only reach them on their laptop.

Today we’re announcing cross-device remarketing in DoubleClick Bid Manager, allowing you to reach consumers across all of their devices, in the moments when they’re most receptive and your ads are most relevant. Cross-device remarketing will be rolled out as a beta early next year. You can contact your DoubleClick team to learn more.

To reach people in real time across all of the moments that shape their decisions, you need a platform that makes it easier to connect with them on all of their devices. DoubleClick surfaces the right cross-device insights while also allowing you to take the right actions to reach your marketing goals.

Posted by Payam Shodjai
Product Management Director, DoubleClick

^{1 Google/IPSOS Connect, March 2016, Digital Devices Bridge the Physical World, n=2013 US online respondents 18+
2 Only accessible to DoubleClick Bid Manager accounts.}

Earlier this year, we introduced expanded text ads so advertisers can provide more information about your business right in your search ad. While many have seen great results with the new, longer ad format, some advertisers are still learning how to use it effectively.

To make sure you have ample time to test and iterate your expanded text ads for the holidays, we are giving advertisers more time to upgrade your creatives.

You now have until January 31, 2017, to make the transition to expanded text ads (instead of the original date of October 26, 2016). This means starting on January 31, 2017, you’ll no longer be able to create or edit standard text ads — you’ll only be able to create and edit text ads using the expanded text ads format. Existing standard text ads will continue to serve alongside expanded text ads.

 Expanded text ads can deliver great results, particularly for those who have invested in writing and testing new creatives. Please use this additional time to experiment with new expanded text ads of your own.

Focus on quality through testing

Over the last few months, we reviewed a lot of text ads data. It confirmed what we already know to be true: the quality of your ads matters. Extra characters don’t solve any performance problems on their own. It’s very important to be thoughtful and compelling with your additional headline and characters.

To that end, consider these best practices as you move forward with expanded text ad optimization:

• Test multiple versions of your expanded text ads. Try different approaches with the new space your ads now have. Shoot for 3-5 new ads per ad group. Advertisers who test multiple creatives see better performance.
• Focus your testing on headlines. Headlines are the most important parts of your ads, and you now have an extra line to experiment with.
• Replicate what works in standard text ads in your expanded text ads. For example, if you mention pricing or use keyword insertion in a successful standard text ad, carry those over to expanded text ads.
• Consider shorter headlines on brand terms. Sometimes “Your Company’s Name – Official Site” might be all you need. You aren’t required to use all of your available characters. Test shorter ad copy, especially on terms where someone might not need a lot of additional info.
• Leave your standard text ads running until the new versions are consistently outperforming them. An expanded text ad isn’t guaranteed to be a winner simply because you have more characters. Leave your top performing ads running, regardless of their length.
• Review your pre-existing ads for previous success with longer headlines. Consider promoting description line 1 in a standard text ad to you new headline 2, especially if that ad performed well in the past.

Making a smooth transition to expanded text ads

In addition to those tips, here are a couple of things that you should avoid:

• Don’t implement the same expanded text ad across many different ad groups. Your ads should be tailored to users’ searches.
• Don’t blindly insert a new second headline without changing the rest of the ad. Add content that is relevant to the query and fits well with the rest of the creative.
• Don’t write expanded text ads that lose their relevance to a user’s query. Remember that user query in your text.

Example query: articles about college financing

Ad not aligned to user’s query (even though it may be better written)	Ad focusing on a user’s query

• Don’t leave out specific benefits or attributes of your product that had proven to be enticing in the past. Test all of your benefits to find what works in the new format. 

Additional resources

Mobile has forever changed the way people shop. A shopper’s smartphone is there for them anytime, anywhere in countless micro-moments. The question for retailers is: are you prepared to meet these shoppers in the moments that matter most?
Learn how best in class retailers are looking to be there and be useful to shoppers no matter where they’re discovering, researching or purchasing.

Best Buy

For much of Best Buy’s 50-year history, what its customer really cared about was “Do you have the product and is it at the right price?” But today, customers want to know much more than that. They want to understand how products work together to make their lives better. For example, ‘how can I stream photos from my SLR camera onto my television?’
To reach shoppers as they’re researching, Best Buy added all of their product information into mobile buying guides. They also worked with Google to surface their local store inventory within search so that customers know exactly which products are available in-store.
Hear Greg Revelle, Best Buy’s Chief Marketing Officer, discuss how this mobile-first strategy helped Best Buy drive over one million store visits with Google last holiday season.

Williams-Sonoma Inc.

Lifestyle icon Williams-Sonoma Inc. has always been a visual brand. But the brand has had to rethink the way it tells its story. Its catalog used to be the cornerstone of its relationship with consumers, but mobile phones are increasingly the new starting point for kitchen connoisseurs (especially millennials).
In fact, the brand learned that 60% of millennials use their smartphone as a “sous-chef” for help in the kitchen, so Williams-Sonoma Inc. began creating videos to help customers’ in their most important cooking moments, such as ‘how to use a spiralizer.’
Hear how Williams-Sonoma Inc.’s Chief Marketing Officer, Felix Carbullido, has developed customer-first strategies to increase the company’s mobile sales by 70% year over year.

Swarovski

Swarovski has always been a go-to destination for holiday gift giving, but the brand learned through search data that there was a huge opportunity in connecting with consumers in more everyday moments when they’re wondering what to wear on a date or how to accessorize an outfit for work.
Since 50% of Swarovski’s site traffic comes from mobile, the brand focused on developing mobile content that’s visually rich and easy to navigate. The company’s fun and interactive Style Finder offers ideas for how to accessorize an outfit for work or that special date night. It also allows the customer to dial-up or dial-down a look, depending on her mood.
Since a large percentage of purchases still happen in-store, Swarovski uses Google’s local inventory ads to drive those inspired customers into their stores where they can try on a necklace or bracelet and complete the sale. In fact, local inventory ads are driving a 75% higher click-through rate than its standard Shopping ads.
Learn how Swarovski’s team is using mobile to inspire and draw customers in-store store.

As we head into the biggest shopping season of the year, are you ready to give your shoppers everything they’ll be looking for in their mobile micro-moments?

• Read our Shopping Micro-Moments Guide, which has more stories of how all types of retailers and brands are reaching consumers with useful information in the moments that matter.
• Then, head to our official Holiday Planning Guide for tips on how to get your product data and campaigns in tip-top shape for the holiday season.

Posted by Emily Eberhard Pereira, Head of Shopping B2B Marketing