Our Les Hostetler, Search Insights Director at Ebiquity North America, provides an expert perspective on Google’s latest transparency and control updates in Performance Max, while also outlining three essential steps advertisers should take when managing search investments.
Google’s announcement on enhancing transparency and control in Performance Max is certainly a step in the right direction, yet it is important to recognize its limitations. This development seems more like a measured response to the frustration voiced by advertisers following the Adalytics report, rather than a comprehensive solution.
Google declared two updates:
- Impression level placement reporting for Search Partners, YouTube and display
- Permanent opt-outs for these at the account level
While these sound great, they are not game-changing. For instance, impression level placement reporting does NOT include crucial performance metrics like Clicks, Cost, Conv. Value, etc. It tells you where and how many times your ad appeared, but not how well it performed or what it cost.
Second, this is only for Search Partner Networks, YouTube and Display within Performance Max, which is where Google has been found to be making placements that violated advertiser’s brand safety exclusions.
Further, it is rare that Search Partners provides value to advertisers at all. Our consistent advice to clients has been to opt out of Search Partners in traditional search, and this stance extends to Performance Max as well.
