This October Google has brought a major new proposition to the table alongside 'Search' & 'Performance Max'. Launched this month 'Demand Gen' brings a powerful new top-mid funnel approach which leverages look-a-like methodogies to drive brand awareness and consideration in an increasingly focussed and optimisable direction.
Following the sunsetting of 'Similar Audiences' in August this year the industry has been eagerly anticipating Google's next move in the look-a-like audience driven campaign space. 'Demand Gen' pushes the envelope in both how advertisers can leverage 1st party data assets in building audiences but also packages a high quality range of inventory. Whilst 'Search' remains the ultimate intent-driven estate marketers now can build brand awareness and consideration with 'Demand Gen' driving prospects and customers down the funnel.
'Demand Gen' enables advertisers to leverage the top-mid funnel in powerful new ways:
Interestingly Google also positions 'Demand Gen' as the successor to 'Descovery ads' with a straight forward upgrade path available and a final replacement in Q1 2024. Our take is that the impact of 'Demand Gen' reaches far beyond what Google has previously offered in the top-mid funnel arena and represents a powerful new weapon in the modern 1st party data driven marketers toolkit.
Here are our immediate hot takes on Google's 'Demand Gen' proposition:
Separation from Search - A key characteristic of Demand Gen campaigns is that they do not include Search inventory. Crucially, this allows for different strategies to be applied across upper & lower funnel placements
Lookalike methodology - Google have embraced the need to target lookalikes of specific customer groups rather than relying on audience signals. Advertisers can create and target lookalike audiences based on their existing customers, with lookalike sizing similar to that of TikTok & Snapchat (Narrow, Balanced & Broad)
Lookalike build - An interesting new feature Google have announced, the ability for advertisers to include multiple seed lists in the lookalike build. On top of this, the lookalikes are refreshed every 1-2 days based on the available customer data
Reporting & attribution - Google seem to have addressed some of the previous complaints on the lack of reporting for PMax campaigns. Demand Gen campaigns not only offer insights and reporting metrics for all individual assets/formats, but also Brand Lift, Search Lift, and Conversion Lift measurement
High quality inventory - The campaigns will be shown across YouTube, Discovery & Gmail, in Google’s words their most ‘immersive, visual surfaces’
Vidhya Srinivasan, VP & GM in Google Ads (Search Ads & Ads on Google Experiences), said in a statement:
“The way consumers discover products is shifting — decisions are made throughout the funnel. To keep up with this evolving media landscape, social advertisers need to adapt their strategies to deliver results. Demand Gen campaigns can help you capture the interest of billions of users as they spend time on YouTube and Google’s visually immersive touchpoints. The engaging creatives can spur action while our audience and bidding solutions help you nurture interest with more potential customers.”
Source: Google
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