Getting your message in front of buyers has never been easier with paid advertising. Google Ads, as a leading pay-per-click (PPC) platform for B2B and B2C digital marketing, provides abundant campaign models and bidding strategies to help brands achieve their marketing goals.
To help brands maximise their campaign performance, Google Ads has introduced a new type of paid search campaign: Performance Max.
Performance Max campaigns work across all of Google's inventory (search engine results pages [SERPs], Gmail, Youtube, etc.) with different materials like ad copy, graphics and videos, known as asset groups. Performance Max is driven by machine learning to help you identify the best keywords, images, videos and ad copy combinations for your target audience.
With the help of machine learning and AI, Performance Max is a new campaign type introduced by Google Ads that help you make your website visible on Google, and increase website traffic and conversions.
Follow our lead and learn more about Performance Max campaigns and how to set them up to boost your business’s success.
Who we are: With over 25 years of experience, SnellMedia has created thousands of successful B2B Google Ads campaigns for clients primarily in SaaS, manufacturing automation and health tech. Book a 30-minute consultation with a senior, Google-certified member of our team today. During the call, we’ll answer any Google Ads-related questions you have and audit your account to provide your marketing team with valuable feedback they can implement to double or maybe even triple your lead generation.
Performance Max is an automated campaign type that is similar to (but still slightly distinct from) a Smart campaign.
Google automates ad creation based on multiple assets supplied (images, logos, videos and ad copy). It’s like a responsive display advertisement but broader in scale and scope.
Performance Max and social advertising share some similarities. They both use dynamic ad formats across multiple channels and report performance by audience and placement where it is triggered. By analysing the user's patterns, Performance Max determines which channels and what frequency are most effective at converting the audience.
The primary difference between Performance Max and other campaigns is that Google automates the targeting and delivery of the campaign based on the information that the advertiser provides. As for Performance Max, Google Ads uses the information brands provide and the information collected through search engines to identify the best opportunity for higher conversion ads.
This type of campaign is a great way to get your message in front of a large number of people or expand your target market. Google's AI and machine learning help you identify customer segments you may otherwise have overlooked and opportunities you might have missed. By combining Google's Performance Max with traditional search campaigns and video campaigns, you can expect a boost in lower-cost conversions.
A feature of Performance Max is automated keyword research. Unlike other digital advertising campaigns that require expertise with keyword research for PPC, Google's Performance Max can self-generate keywords with Google technology based on the customer type of your choice. Google collects the search term from general search results pages and matches your ad groups with high intention buyers.
Automatic keyword generation is a time-saving innovation for businesses. Saving the valuable hours spent researching and brainstorming which keywords would be most advantageous for your product or service means companies have more time to make strategic, game-changing plans for their brands. This is also a good function to avoid manual mistakes or gaps.
Google's real-time understanding of finding high-intent audiences allows it to create the best combination of ads and then, with Performance Max, present these over Google’s entire inventory. AI not only helps identify the best ad combination but also automatically tests and optimises your campaigns for you. You don't need to worry about A/B testing or manually changing your ads.
Additionally, the AI of Performance Max can identify the buyer activity of your target audience in different channels and map out their buying journey. With this feature, Performance Max can show your ads in the channel where they are most effective at a frequency that converts your audience.
Performance Max campaigns are also a good way to test and collect business data for future marketing objectives. This advertising strategy can help you decide the next move for your PPC B2B lead generation strategy, whether it be to run local campaigns or responsive display ads, or any other campaign type available on Google.
Initially, after you set up your Google Ads account, you need to choose the type of campaigns from search campaigns to display campaigns, shopping campaigns, etc. After, you have to set up every single campaign one by one if you want to run ads in different formats.
With a Performance Max campaign, you only need to set up one campaign, asset group, one target cost and your target customers. Performance Max campaigns calculate which combination can perform best and show your ads with it. You don't need to worry about which ad copy is the most suitable for your product or service.
This advantage is also implied in the choice of Google channels. Performance Max detects your audience signals and places your ads in the channels that can maximise conversions. It is a smart way to reach your conversion goals in one ad spend, and you can also avoid the task of scheduling ads in campaign planning.
Lastly, Performance Max also helps increase brand awareness by delivering ads on multiple platforms, including Gmail and YouTube. Google Ads and Pmax are the only paid media channels that have been able to support this function. The more people see your product or service, the more likely they are to remember and use it in the future.
To run a Performance Max campaign, businesses need to provide Google with different types of assets to create a competitive ad. These assets include headlines, descriptions, images and videos. Using multimedia materials in one single campaign offers advantages where other campaigns may fall short.
Using videos and images can help your ad stand out from the rest on the SERPs or social media platforms. Studies show that people are more likely to remember your product when they see both pictures and videos rather than just one type of asset.
If you find yourself struggling with creating videos for your ads, Google is here to help. For the Performance Max campaign, Google collects all the visual content available for your brand and makes auto-generated videos for you. As the biggest search engine in the world, Google can even utilise your brand's competitors’ content to create assets with its machine learning technology.
Performance Max helps new customer acquisition and lead generation with its ability to find audiences in similar customer segments. With the customer data offered by businesses, AI identifies and locates the potential customers that have a high intent to convert.
Google's real-time understanding of consumer intents and preferences, paired with your input using audience signals, can help Performance Max to unlock new customer segments you may not have expected. This information can be used to improve your customer targeting and help you identify new growth opportunities.
By utilising customer segmentation, you can ensure that your marketing efforts are better focused and more effective, leading to improved return on investment (ROI).
This automated campaign type allows you to focus on strategic performance drivers like creative optimisation, campaign planning and collecting insights.
To set up a Performance Max campaign, you need to create an ad asset that includes text, graphics and video. Google will then use AI and machine learning to identify the best keywords and ad copy for your audience.
.jpg)
Performance Max serves both search and display networks. Google Search, Image Search and Shopping Ads belong to search networks. Gmail, YouTube and websites in the Display Network are all examples of display networks.
By serving on both search and display networks, advertisers have the opportunity to reach potential customers on a variety of platforms. A PPC creative agency can also maximise the creativities of their clients to reach the full potential of a paid campaign with Pmax.
Additionally, Performance Max offers the ability to customise campaigns for different types of devices, making it easy to reach potential customers no matter where they are. As a result, it is the ideal solution for businesses that want to reach a wide audience with their advertising campaigns.
There are a few key metrics you can use to measure success:
By monitoring these metrics, you can get an idea of how effective your campaign is and make any necessary adjustments. This data is crucial when it comes to PPC analysis. We strongly suggest you set up your Google Analytics account and track your campaign performance from the very first day to get a full picture of your campaign.
What do you expect to see when you start a Performance Max campaign and what kind of B2B marketing campaign examples can you take from it?
One example is Allianz Spain, an insurance industry leader that tries to get the most out of its marketing budget and has successfully increased efficiency and profits through Performance Max campaigns by 15 percent.
Another example in manufacturing is LJ Welding. Google Ads is always an effective marketing strategy for LJ Welding in creating quality B2B leads, with rewarding results from search campaigns. However, by adding a Performance Max campaign to these, LJ Welding has been able to lower its CPR by 67% and generates 3.7 times more clicks than the traditional search campaign.
Performance Max also helps with categorising and identifying the high potential materials from LJ Welding’s multiple asset groups. This information is valuable for further strategic planning and future campaign design.
Adnami is another PPC for SaaS success story with Performance Max. As a company that provides a SaaS service of rich media ads for B2B, Adnami relies on outbound marketing for lead generation. To shift to a demand generation approach, Adnami tried a PPC service with both inbound search campaigns and Performance Max campaigns.
Both campaigns brought new leads with high conversion value, but Performance Max recorded superior results with 72% lower cost-per-contact and three times more new contacts generated.
Are you curious about how Performance Max could change your business and boost your revenue? Book a 30-minute call with our senior expert and find out more.
Are you excited about how PPC and Google Ads can change your business? Are you intrigued by Performance Max campaigns but not sure they’re suitable for you? As an experienced PPC agency, we have some insight to share with you and help you make the best choice for your campaign.
If you are a company that is looking for a fast and effective way to generate new leads, PPC is the solution for you. But which PPC campaign should you start with? From our experience, every product and service has a different approach to setting a PPC ad, including choosing from different campaign types (search, display, YouTube, etc.), setting a budget and preparing ad assets.
From our point of view as a PPC management company, for brands that want to start their first campaign with Google Ads, we recommend that you spend 80% of your budget on setting up a Performance Max campaign and 20% on a campaign type of your choice.
The idea behind this strategy is to use the machine learning, multimedia approach and cross-inventory features of Performance Max to find out the highest converting campaign for your product/service. You can test your market quickly and thoroughly with Performance Max by going through data like best ad combination, best engaging channel and ad scheduling.
Once you’ve collected enough data on your customers’ preferences and found out which combination can achieve higher conversions, you can adjust your campaign budget immediately (a great feature Google Ads supports) to set up the campaign that performs best for your brand.
For brands that have already worked with Google Ads for a certain period of time and are satisfied with the positive improvement it brings to your marketing campaign, we suggest you spend 20% of your budget on setting up a Performance Max campaign.
The purpose of this strategy is to use the AI of Performance Max and find new customer segments and opportunities for your business. The machine learning function of Performance Max has the ability to examine customer behaviour across multiple channels and identify which ad type has the best effect in each place. With this technology, companies can get a thorough overview of their buyer pattern and spot new opportunities to generate leads.
Another reason why Performance Max is good for companies with Google Ads experience, especially for B2B brands, is because it exposes your brand multiple times in different channels to build deeper connections with audiences.
B2B sales cycles are long. Decision-makers require a deeper understanding of what you sell and a greater level of trust in your brand than B2C. Performance Max helps you build a relationship with B2B clients effectively and efficiently by exposing your brand multiple times across various channels.
Although Performance Max is a powerful tool for increasing online sales and generating leads, there are still some points you need to keep in mind to start an optimal campaign.
Although Performance Max has the power to auto-generate visual content, as an experienced PPC management agency, we recommend brands make some effort in creating custom high-quality assets for their campaign.
The reason for this is that custom assets usually result in a higher CTR and conversion rate, as well as lower cost-per-click.
Moreover, by creating custom assets, you will have more control over the message your brand is trying to deliver. This is essential for building a strong relationship with potential customers.
Another suggestion to help start a successful campaign is to create a high-quality, goal-orientated PPC landing page.
A PPC landing page is a standalone web page created specifically for your ad campaign. It should have a clear and concise message that matches the ad copy, as well as a strong call-to-action that encourages users to take the desired action.
The quality of your PPC landing page will affect the performance of your campaigns. A well-designed and effective landing page can improve your conversion rate and make sure all the traffic brought by the Performance Max campaign can convert.
Before starting your high-converting PPC ads, check out some PPC landing page examples and tips to create one that works for your business.
You can change any setting in Google Ads instantly. Each time an optimisation change is made, we suggest you wait for 1-2 weeks to have enough data to determine how that change impacted the campaign.
Google's search ads are shown above the organic results. They are the first thing people encounter when conducting searches. For a good Google search ad, you should expect a CTR of 2% and over.
Who we are: With over 25 years of experience, SnellMedia has created thousands of successful B2B Google Ads campaigns for clients primarily in SaaS, Manufacturing Automation and Healthtech. Book a 30-minute consultation with a senior, Google-certified member of our team today. During the call, we’ll answer any Google Ads-related questions you have and audit your account to provide your marketing team with valuable feedback they can implement to double or maybe even triple your lead generation.
