22
2015
Sep

Playing the “What Did Google Change today?” Game

There’s a game we occasionally play in the office on who could find the change Google has made for the day. We have seen some minor changes to the Google AdWords interface that have varying degrees of helpfulness. While some accounts have seen these changes roll out, there are other accounts that have yet to see these changes roll out

One of the changes was the relocation of Search Terms and Ad Group/Campaign Negative Keywords. The Search Terms used to be found under the Details tab but has been moved to a button near the top. To look at the search term for an individual keyword or a few selected ones, there is another Search Term button near the Details tab that is only selectable when one or more keywords are selected.

Google Changes

Similarly, the Negatives can now be found in a button instead of scrolling down to the end of the page. Where moving the Search Terms was neither an improvement nor a hindrance, moving the Negatives was an improvement. This will be an improvement as the negative keywords will be easier to find and once this rollout is implemented, you will no longer have to scroll through all your keywords to see your negatives.

One of the more recent changes was adding Interactions and Interaction Rate to the available data. According to the documentation, “an interaction is the main action people take with your format – such as clicks for text and shopping ads, views for video ads, and engagements for Lightbox ads” and the “Interaction rate is used to measure how often people interact with your ad after it’s shown to them”. While this change is not game changing in itself, it plays a role in keeping advertisers on their toes and could set the stage for bigger changes down the road.

Another interface update could be a game changer for those of you running video ads. Previously you would need to go to a separate section within your AdWords account to view performance related to Video Campaigns. Google has also recently announced that the management for Video Campaigns will be integrated into the primary account management interface. This will make life easier if you manage video Campaigns because there will be one less required step for reviewing and analyzing this data.