AdWords Updates Combined Search And Display Campaign Type: Who Should Use It?

This week, Google introduced a new campaign type called “Search Network with Display Select.” This replaces the former “Search & Display Networks” option.

Both enable ads to run on Google search, Google search partners and the Google Display Network (GDN), but Google says the new option offers better results on the GDN with 35 percent higher average click-through rates and 35 percent lower average cost-per-order:

Search Network with Display Select uses improved signals and methods of predicting when and where your ads are likely to perform best, and sets a higher bar for when to show them. That means your ads are more likely to be shown to a smaller number of prospective customers, who are more likely to be interested in your offerings.

Separating search and display campaigns has long been a best practice. Despite this update, Google recommends advertisers continue to run separate campaigns “for greater bidding, budgeting and targeting flexibility”. 
So who should use this updated campaign type and run a combined search and display campaign?
Google suggests the combined option  for those already doing so with the  Search & Display Networks campaign type and for those who aren’t running any display campaigns. Presumably the combined option is designed to make it easy for small advertisers to test the GDN waters. Still, I am finding it hard to think of a scenario where an advertiser already running search campaigns wouldn’t be better served by setting up a separate display campaign, if only for budgeting control at the very least

Google Testing Huge Banner Ads For Branded Queries

Google has confirmed that they are testing incredibly large banner ads for specific branded queries.
@SynrgyHQ posted an image on Twitter showing for the query [southwest airlines a huge “sponsored” ad at the top of the search results.
A Google spokesperson confirmed this is a “small experiment” running currently in the U.S. market.
The ad seems to take up the majority of the screen real estate. I assume since it is a very branded query, Google finds this ad to be relevant and they are testing to see the click-through on this ad.

The No Banner Ads Ever Promise

In 2005, Google promised that banner ads would never come to web search, saying:

There will be no banner ads on the Google homepage or web search results pages. There will not be crazy, flashy, graphical doodads flying and popping up all over the Google site. Ever.

Eight years later, it seems Google may be ready to break that promise.

Improving Ad Rank to show more relevant ad extensions and formats

When people use Google to research and buy things, they're interested in the most relevant and useful results. Ad extensions help by providing more information to potential customers and additional ways for them to respond. For example, they can call your business number, see your business location on a map, or choose an even more relevant landing page that you're promoting with sitelinks. Ad extensions typically improve clickthrough rate and overall campaign performance because they make ads more useful.

Today, Google announced improvements in the AdWords auction that let us more consistently show more relevant ad extensions and formats.

Ad Rank improvements

 Google system for ordering ads on search results pages uses a calculation called Ad Rank. Previously, Ad Rank was calculated using max CPC bid and your Quality Score. With this update, Ad Rank will also take into account a third component: the expected impact from your ad extensions and formats. In addition, Google have increased the importance of Ad Rank in determining whether your ad is eligible to be displayed with extensions and formats.

Here are some more details and implications of these changes:

• Ad extensions and formats can now influence the position of your ad on the search results page. If two competing ads have the same bid and quality, then the ad with the more positive expected impact from extensions will generally appear in a higher position than the other.
• When estimating the expected impact of extensions and ad formats, we consider such factors as the relevance, clickthrough rates, and the prominence of the extensions or formats on the search results page.
• Because Ad Rank is now more important in determining whether your ad is shown with extensions and formats, you might need to increase your Quality Score, bid, or both for extensions and formats to appear. 
• In each auction, we'll generally show your highest performing and most useful combination of extensions and formats among those eligible. So there's no need to try to guess which extensions will help improve your clickthrough rate the most. 
• You may see lower or higher average CPCs in your account. You may see lower CPCs if your extensions and formats are highly relevant, and we expect a large positive performance impact relative to other competitors in the auction. In other cases, you may see higher CPCs because of an improvement in ad position or increased competition from other ads with a high expected impact from formats.
• For now, this update only affects search ads appearing on Google Search.

Recommendations for using extensions

Extensions make your ads more useful and can improve your campaign performance. So you should add extensions that make sense for your business type and campaign goals. With these improvements to AdRank, Google systems will do even more to automatically serve extensions in the contexts when they're most beneficial.

For example, consider someone downtown searching on a mobile phone for "auto repair." In this example, the user might be most likely to respond to your ad when they can click to call a phone number or tap a link to get directions to visit in person. So Google may show a combination of call and location extensions with your mobile search ad.

Now imagine if someone were searching for "auto repair" on a laptop computer in the suburbs. Say your ad earned the 3rd ad position above the organic results in this auction. Google might show your seller rating and sitelinks because that's the highest performing and most useful combination of extensions that could be shown with your ad in this particular auction and ad position.