Google Dispels Rumors About Bid Strategy Changes

Last month, a post on Google’s Developer blog about bid strategy updates spurred some controversy when it was misinterpreted to indicate that two smart bidding strategies were going away.

This morning, Google confirmed what many PPCers had speculated: that the bid strategies aren’t going away, rather the Google Ads UI is getting a small face lift.

With this change, what advertisers have known as Target CPA and Target ROAS will be grouped under the Maximize Conversions and Maximize Conversion value bid strategies, respectively.

Google confirmed in an email exchange that the machine learning that powers the Target CPA and Target ROAS bid strategies will not change. The bid strategies will continue to function in the same way that they had but the way that advertisers set them up will be slightly different.

How to Set Up Target CPA Bid Strategies

Once the interface update has rolled out, advertisers setting up Target CPA, advertisers will need to choose Maximize Conversions. After having selected Maximize Conversions, advertisers will have the ability to set a Target CPA.

If a target CPA is in place, the bidding strategy will function the same as Target CPA currently does.  The Target CPA will be optional and those campaigns that do not employ a target CPA. Will leverage the same Maximize Conversions bid strategy that advertisers currently have access to.

How to Set Up Target ROAS Bid Strategies

Advertisers setting up the Target ROAS bid strategy should select Maximize Conversion Value. There will be an optional target ROAS setting.

Advertisers that employ the target ROAS setting can expect the bidding strategy to function the same way that it currently does. Advertisers that forego the target ROAS setting will effectively be using the same Maximize Value bidding strategy that already exists.

Why the Change?

Google shared that the goal of this change was to provide more clarity for advertisers. Google received feedback that advertisers weren’t always clear which bidding strategy that they should use and the hope is that this change will simplify that decision.

What’s Next?

Google plans to begin rolling out these updates over the next weeks and months. Advertisers can still select Target CPA and Target ROAS bid strategies in the meantime but, once the change has rolled out, those options won’t appear in the interface. At that point, advertisers will need to follow the steps listed above to set up those strategies.

Google will eventually migrate existing Target CPA and Target ROAS to Maximize Conversions and Maximize ROAS bid strategies, effectively. Google has confirmed that they will provide advance notice to advertisers before automatically migrating campaigns to the new strategies.

For more information, visit the support page.