Marketers are constantly searching for the solution to the common problem: “How do I increase productivity output without increasing my workload at the same rate?” Google’s newest answer is AI Max for search campaigns. In this blog post, we’ll explore what AI Max is, how to enable it, best practices for testing and implementation and the results you might expect from using it.
What Is AI Max?
Google describes AI Max as an “AI-powered suite of settings to enhance your existing search campaigns.” It offers increased transparency and control, helping you drive higher performance and tailor ad serving at scale. In short, AI Max increases your ability to find potential customers and engage with them by delivering the right ads at the right time.
There are three main components to this new product: Search Term Matching (STM), Text Customization (formerly automatically created assets) and Final URL Expansion/optimization:
- STM serves ads based on the user’s search intent, not exclusively the exact query itself.
- Text Customization creates variations of your ad copy in real time, similar to how Auction Time Bidding updates your bids in real time during the auction.
- Final URL Expansion/optimization can direct users to the most useful landing page within your domain based on their search intent. This should make you eligible for more auctions, generate more actions on ads and provide a better landing page experience.
Along with these functions, AI Max gives marketers greater control and more safeguards than they had in the early days of PMax and other automated solutions, including:
- Negative keyword lists
- Serving high-strength headlines and descriptions that are present in the account
- Removals for assets that don’t align with your messaging
- URL exclusions for landing pages you do not want to serve on
- Brand exclusions to negate your own brand, competitors or another domain
- The ability to opt out of Text Customization for increased control
- Location targeting at the ad group level
How Do I Implement AI Max?
Enabling AI Max is relatively easy. When you’re ready to begin, simply identify the search campaign you’d like to use, navigate to the Campaign settings and toggle on “AI Max for Search campaign.” There are some additional caveats and functions, but at its core, it’s simple to implement.
Key Considerations and Tips
Before you get started, remember that you must select a search campaign that has Smart Bidding enabled. When you toggle on the main AI Max switch, this will enable all three of its elements: Search Term Matching, as well as the Asset Optimization settings: Text Customization and Final URL Expansion.
While you'll still have control over Search Term Matching at the ad group level, it becomes a default component when you enable AI Max. You can then choose whether to enable Final URL Expansion and Text Customization. However, keep in mind that Final URL Expansion is only available if you also opt in to Text Customization.
As a workaround, if you only want to exclude specific URLs, you can select “+Add URL exclusions” below the opt-in settings rather than disabling Final URL Expansion completely.
Best Practices for Implementation and Testing
Google’s recommended AI Max guidelines and testing plans are fairly straightforward. The biggest takeaway is that only enabling part of AI Max for Search campaigns is likely to reduce the performance you see from applying these settings.
This isn’t different from many other best practices (i.e., staying away from headline pinning, allowing for full URL expansions with PMax, etc.), but, of course, each account is nuanced and sometimes not all features are usable and applicable based on industry regulations. With that in mind, it’s worth noting that if you enable the Final URL setting, AI Max won’t respect “pinning”.. So if you have regulatory reasons for having ad copy pinned, you shouldn’t use final URL mode.
Once you’re comfortable with the best practices, you can start to identify the campaigns you’d like to test.
Testing Tips
Below are some common pre-test, during-test and post-test tips to keep in mind:
| Pre-test: |
During Test: |
Post Test: |
| Pick campaigns with a daily budget of at least $50/day |
Avoid major changes to the campaigns you’re testing
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Exclude the first two weeks of data while your campaigns were in the learning period
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| Ensure the campaign doesn’t have a 'limited by budget' flag |
At two weeks (when learning is complete), if your performance is off track, you can review for negative keywords, URL exclusions and asset optimization |
Acknowledge that tests can be influenced by periods of seasonality |
| Avoid testing with newly created campaigns |
Conduct your test for a minimum of four weeks |
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| Remove your selected campaigns from portfolio bidding and shared budgets for the duration of the test |
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Other Considerations:
- If you’re testing non-brand campaigns, use brand exclusions upon launch to ensure you’re not serving on searches that include your brand name, which would have you competing against your brand campaigns in the auction.
- If you’re testing brand campaigns, ensure you have broad match enabled to amplify your reach, unless you have very specific requirements for brand performance.
Expected Results and Measurement
Results of any test will vary based on industry, seasonality and the campaigns you choose to test, but Google has stated confidently that the long-term impact of AI Max would “typically give advertisers 14% more conversions or conversion value at a similar CPA/ROAS,” which is roughly the the same expected performance uplift on search campaigns as they would see from PMax campaigns.
Similarly, Google has said that enabling AI Max would “typically give advertisers 27% more conversions or conversion value at a similar CPA/ROAS compared to campaigns that are still mostly using exact and phrase match keywords.” In general, it seems that most users can expect a 10-30% increase in conversions and/or conversion value with this new tool.
Once you complete your initial testing, you can use some common reporting functions to validate your performance and assess your success. Using the basic search terms report and keyword report will allow you to assess your search queries and keyword-level performance. You can use an asset report to check your automatically created assets and a landing page report to check what Final URL changes were made during your test.
AI Max offers more of what marketers have been asking for: easy implementation, tighter control, better transparency and historically common reports to validate performance. Testing it for four to six weeks can help you see for yourself just how much of an impact it can make on your campaigns.
Feel free to reach out with any AI Max questions. We're here to help!
