We’ve just got back from Google Marketing Live and it was an honour to be there.

There were some huge new product announcements which will simplify the consumer journey and make it easier for advertisers to reach users when they’re most willing to buy.

Here’s what we learnt.

Discovery Ads: Get Found In More Places

The first keynote: Discovery Ads. Advertisers can push their brand across Google’s feeds on YouTube, within Gmail and on the Google App. It’s a rebrand of Google Feed, where users could keep up to date with their interests and stay in the know about the things that matter to them.

Now, with a brand new design, it offers ad placements in a swipeable image carousel, providing rich content that will inspire consumers to buy. It has ultimately been designed to help users discover products they weren’t actively looking for, including engaging, evergreen content.

Essentially, advertisers will be able to reach millions of people using a single campaign.

Gallery Ads: Be More Visual & Interactive

The second announcement was for Gallery Ads — a new, interactive format to show off your images as they appear at the top of mobile search results. Advertisers can now promote their brand using four to eight images, including a 70 character description and up to three headlines. This enables them to display a gallery of images such as several products or a wider ad split into sections.

In a nutshell, Gallery Ads allow you to create more effective ad campaigns and drive higher click-through rates with interactive images, tabs and videos.

Smart Bidding: Reach Your Goals Faster

A new automated bidding strategy: Maximise Conversion Value. This smart bidding strategy uses advanced machine learning to automatically optimise and set bids for your Google Ads campaigns.

Smart bidding has been around for a while, but Google announced three big improvements to the property, including:

• Campaign-level conversion goals – Advertisers can now set up campaigns that have bids optimised towards one conversion goal.
• Conversion action sets – Optimise bids across multiple campaigns.
• Seasonality adjustments – Inform the algorithm of anticipated seasonal changes in conversions, such as a sale, so they’re taken into account and don’t affect the bidding longer-term.

Expect to see a focus on automated Smart Bidding this year and beyond!

Google Shopping: Connect With Your Consumers

Users will be able to purchase directly within Google Shopping, Image Search and YouTube, all backed by a no-fuss returns guarantee. They’ll still be able to click through to brand websites, but this new feature allows them to buy quickly, easily and worry-free. As well as that, orders will be shipped as soon as they’re confirmed, reducing shipping delays and friction within the consumer journey. Google will also be expanding Showcase Shopping ads to Google Images, Discover and YouTube.

Local Campaigns: Promote Your Business Location

Local Campaigns will become available to everyone, bringing Ads to Google Maps and in-car directions. As well as showing up when users search for relevant places in Google Maps, you’ll also show up when they’re browsing or following directions on a day-to-day basis. Local ads will be displayed on Search, Display, YouTube and competitor’s business profiles, allowing advertisers to showcase their products across multiple channels. Users can also browse products in a ‘window shopping’ manner, meaning more flexibility for them, and a wider reach for you.

YouTube Bumper Ads: Easily Create Engaging Video

Google introduces the Bumper Machine, YouTube’s brand new tool for advertisers who don’t want to spend time or money producing their own video content. It harnesses machine learning to identify elements such as a brand logo, human faces and motion to auto-generate 6-second ads. Advertisers can also upload images themselves, and Google will optimise them across Gmail, Google Discover and the YouTube homepage. The ad format, which was originally launched in 2016, is unskippable and predominantly targets mobile users.

Custom Audiences: Expand Your Reach

Custom affinity and custom intent will be merged into one platform — Custom Audiences. This means advertisers will be able to target users based on their interests and behaviours. They’ll also be able to expand the reach of their campaigns to include users who have similar attributes.

The new feature can be used across Google, YouTube, Gmail and Discovery campaigns.

Audience Expansion: Increase Your Conversion Rate

A new audience expansion tool will allow marketers to expand their reach and drive more conversions at the same average cost-per-acquisition (CPA). It does this by looking for high performing audiences similar to your target, bringing you more highly qualified users. As an advertiser, you can also increase or decrease your reach and view weekly impression estimates based on your selection.

Deep Linking: Provide A Frictionless Experience

Google Ads will now support app deep linking from Google Search to direct more traffic and help boost conversion rates. Just like the new updates to Google shopping, it’ll be used to reduce friction and provide a more personalised, accelerated shopping experience. It’s beneficial for both Google customers and advertisers, as users will be directed towards potentially better content and those with successful apps will be able to expand their reach. Advertisers can also expect better reporting from Google’s Firebase.

Expect Big Changes Coming To Google Ads

Overall, Google Marketing Live was an excellent experience. It was inspiring to be surrounded by so many advertisers and we’re looking forward to the new Google Ads updates coming towards the end of this year. We’re excited to have learnt about all the upcoming features, so we can bring you all the best practices before anyone else! Check the gallery below for more photos from the event.