Google Ads automations are going to win, no matter what how much we protest.
We have seen many Google Ads features come and go. Do you remember when Text Ads were replaced by Expanded Text Ads? Where are those ETAs now? Wherever the Text Ads disappeared to, I suppose. Next, we got Responsive Search Ads (RSA), and who knows how long those will last.
At Google Marketing Live in 2022, automatically created assets (ACA) was announced as an opt-in, campaign-level setting. The setting is promised to generate additional headlines and descriptions for responsive search ads, by drawing context and content from landing pages, existing ads and keywords.
The automatically created assets setting is currently in open beta for English, and will appear in campaign level settings as accounts are added to the open beta. Then we may opt in to use the feature.
If history is anything to go on, then we may likely see that the automatically created assets will have higher engagement rates and overall better results. Some of us will argue that the results are artificially skewed by Google giving priority to its newer features. We will be encouraged to rely more on these. Then we may find that RSAs, as we know them, are fazed out and all new ads will be automatically generated. This is an educated guess. After all, we have done this dance before.
For some advertisers, automatically created assets will be a relief. Some businesses do not have the resources to refresh their ad copy often. Some PPC marketers do not enjoy composing fresh ad copy regularly. Also, let's be real: people want to achieve more with less effort.
The automatically created assets are not completely new per se. When creating and editing RSAs, we already see suggested headlines and descriptions. Some suggestions are taken from other ad variations, and some are based on general context. Furthermore, advertisers who use auto-applied recommendations (AAR) could have already opted in to Google introducing its own new ad variations. We may have approved or rejected a few ad suggestions before, or happened upon an unexpected new ad that auto-applied because we did not reject it fast enough.
If you want better ACAs, then you may need to improve your landing page content and your keywords.
You may be wondering: What if we change the landing page content? What if we change the keywords in
the ad set?
Well, first of all... just as you should review your manually created assets, you better have the good sense to look at theautomatically creates assets. Still, Google seems to have a contingency plan: The system will know when the ACAs are no longer suitable. It will eventually remove the ACAs which have low performance ratings, but it will respond quickest when the ad-level final URL changes.
On the upside, if you like some of the auto-created assets (headlines and descriptions), you can reuse them in other RSAs. On the downside, you cannot edit the ACAs. Google directs us to contact them to remove an individual asset which is not suitable.
As usual, if we apply enough pressure, a few updates will be released to ease the growing pains but eventually we will become accustomed to the new ways (even if with some bitterness).
There is no stopping progress.
It begs the questions: What destination are we progressing towards? Will AI replace digital marketers?
Yeah... that just got deep and we're not even discussing Bard AI or ChatGPT.
The truth is that lots of manual work will be automated, so digital marketers are in a crucial adapt-or-perish era. We would like to think that we are still needed for a dash of imagination and creativity, My thought is that having long adopted instant text conversations, we have already stripped away an emotional layer of communication, and given AI about two decades of chat data to learn from, so there is a good chance that copywriting can be completely AI-generated and no one notices the difference.
“Adapt or perish, now as ever, is nature's inexorable imperative.” --- H.G. Wells
Have you tested out automatically created assets? Share your experience or questions in the comments below.
For those of you who need help understanding the implications of Google Ads' automatically created assets, or improving the inputs (keywords, landing page content) that impact your campaign success, reach out to me. I can audit your ad account and revamp your marketing strategy or coach you to be self-sufficient.
Cheers!
-- Sade UZB
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