I. Google Enhanced Campaigns

90% of multi-device users move sequentially between several screens to accomplish a task, providing evidence that as people search the web, they are increasingly doing so across a growing number of devices (Google 2013). As a result, it has become imperative for advertisers to engage their customers with the right ad, based on their device, location and time of day. In the past, advertisers managed and optimized multiple campaigns segmented by device, to reach users at this level of granularity. With enhanced campaigns, targeting by device is now possible within a single campaign. To simplify the way search marketers manage their campaigns, Google introduced the following enhancements to AdWords’ features and functionality:

• Required desktop and tablet device targeting
• Campaign- and group-level mobile bid adjustments
• Mobile preferred creative
• ValueTrack parameters for device-specific landing pages and tracking performance by device
• Upgraded ad extensions, including advanced sitelinks management and reporting, and group-level sitelinks
• Call and app download tracking and reporting

II. Preparing to Migrate

Before migrating to enhanced campaigns and merging campaign objects, it is important to prepare your campaigns and understand the requirements for a successful migration. This section will define how each campaign fits in the migration process, how to identify these campaigns, and how the migration will impact Quality Score. We’ll also examine the URL migration process to ensure that each campaign is ready for migration.

a. Campaign Categorization

Mixed campaigns – If you have campaigns that target all devices (desktop, tablet, and mobile) then no merging is required. However, these mixed campaigns must still be migrated to enhanced campaigns.

Mobile-only campaigns – If you have campaigns that target only mobile devices, they will be required to target desktop and tablet devices as well. Once these campaigns have been migrated, you can set an adjustment for mobile bids as a percentage of desktop and tablet bids at the campaign or group level.

Matching campaigns – These campaigns target separate devices, but contain the same or similar groups, keywords, creative, and other campaign objects.

• Parent campaigns – Within a set of matching campaigns, select a parent campaign that will be migrated to an enhanced campaign. For most advertisers, the campaign targeting desktop devices will represent the parent campaign. Other criteria for selecting a parent campaign include: largest keyword list, most groups, longest history, and largest daily budget.
• Sibling campaigns – Once a parent campaign has been selected, the remaining campaigns within the set of matching campaigns represent the sibling campaigns. For most advertisers, these will be the campaigns targeting tablet and mobile devices. Groups, keywords, creative, and other objects will be merged from these campaigns into the parent campaign during migration.

b. Identifying Matching Campaigns

Naming Convention – If your campaign naming convention includes the targeted device, use this cue to identify matching campaigns. For example, the campaign “PowPow Sports Desktop” and “PowPow Sports Mobile” are likely matching campaigns.

Overlapping Keywords – Use a keyword-level report to identify the campaigns that contain the same keywords. For example, both of the matching campaigns in the example above contain the keyword “pow pow sports.”

Overlapping Creative – Use a creative-level report to identify the campaigns that contain the same creative.

c. Historical Quality Score

Since Quality Score takes device into account, migrating to enhanced campaign does not result in a loss of historical Quality Score information as long as keyword, creative, landing page, and device combinations remain the same. However, Quality Score estimates reflect a keyword’s overall performance across all devices. Therefore, the Quality Scores of keywords after merging matching campaigns will be an average of those keywords’ Quality Scores from their original campaigns, weighted by search volume. Consider the following when migrating campaigns:

• Once the parent campaign has been migrated to an enhanced campaign and the sibling campaign objects have been merged, the historical Quality Score information for all devices will remain intact as long as keyword, creative, landing page, and device combinations remain the same.
• Historical Quality Score information for desktop devices will remain intact if desktop-only campaigns are migrated without any other changes. After the migration, keywords will begin to accrue Quality Score information for mobile devices based on mobile performance, if any.

d. Migrating URLs

Google’s new {device} ValueTrack parameter enables advertisers to track paid search performance by device. If destination URLs are tagged with this parameter, a “c”, “t”, or “m” will be inserted, based on the device the user clicked and converted from. However, if not properly accounted for, the {device} parameter can potentially cause issues, depending on your tracking system and revenue integrations.

Prior to campaign migration and merging, ensure you have a system or process in place for migrating destination URLs. It is critical to migrate your URLs correctly and confirm they function properly under your revenue integration(s) and other business requirements.

URL migration can take place before or after campaign migration and merging depending on your advertising management platform’s level of support for enhanced campaigns. If you choose to migrate and merge campaigns now, it is recommended URL migration take place after sibling campaigns are merged with parent campaigns, as this will result in fewer required URL changes.

III. The Migration Process

To streamline the migration workflow, this section will highlight the five key stages of the enhanced campaign migration process. For every set of matching campaigns, each of the following stages should be completed in order:

1. Select the parent campaign – Select the campaign that will be migrated to an enhanced campaign. This will also be the campaign that sibling campaign objects will be merged into.
2. Merge campaign settings – Evaluate the settings for both the parent and sibling campaigns during this stage. Ensure the parent campaign settings align with your expectations and business needs.
3. Migrate the parent campaigns – This stage represents the actual migration of a legacy campaign to an enhanced campaign. Select the parent campaign and migrate it to an enhanced campaign. Keep the following in mind when migrating parent campaigns:

   Once a parent campaign is migrated, it cannot be undone.

   Campaigns do not need to be migrated all at once. However, the migration deadline is July 22nd, 2013, at which point legacy campaigns will automatically be migrated to enhanced campaigns.

4. Merge sibling campaign objects – Groups, keywords, creative, and other sibling campaign objects will be merged into the parent campaign during this stage. Once you have started a merge, it is recommended you complete it, as partially merged campaigns will still be eligible to serve ads. Sibling campaigns will be paused or deleted once they are merged with their matching parent campaign.
5. Review the enhanced campaign – Review newly migrated enhanced campaigns to ensure quality and post-migration success.

IV. Merging Campaign Objects

When merging a sibling campaign into its parent campaign, it is critical to account for each of the following campaign objects. Keep in mind that some objects will not apply to all matching campaigns. This section will carefully review the approach to each campaign object and provide paid search best practices for successfully executing a merge.

a. Campaign Settings

For matching campaigns, compare settings between the parent and sibling campaigns. Ensure the parent campaign settings are properly configured and they align with your business needs. Review the following settings: Status, Language, Networks, Ad Schedule, Bid Type, Delivery Method, Ad rotation, Campaign Start and End Dates. Advanced settings include: Demographic, Social settings, Keyword matching options, IP Exclusions and Tracking URL. Note that Devices for targeting specific devices has been removed from the campaign settings page.

Location Targeting

At this time, advertisers are not required to merge separate, location-targeted campaigns.

Without a Google ValueTrack parameter for location targets, paid search management platforms will be unable to report on and optimize campaigns based on location target. For advertisers that have separate matching campaigns targeting specific locations, continue to separate campaigns by location target. This will enable you to calculate optimal bids based on performance by location, rather than relying on campaign-level location bid adjustments. Once a location target ValueTrack parameter becomes available, updated best practices will be provided.

Want more like this?

Want more like this?

Insight delivered to your inbox

Keep up to date with our free email. Hand picked whitepapers and posts from our blog, as well as exclusive videos and webinar invitations keep our Users one step ahead.

sign up

By clicking 'SIGN UP', you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy

SIGN UP

By clicking 'SIGN UP', you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy

Campaign Budgets

Upon merging your matching campaigns, your enhanced campaign daily budgets will likely need to be increased due to the additional click volume from expanded device targeting. Add the daily budget of the sibling campaigns to the parent campaign. Review the budget of the parent campaign and ensure it meets your business requirements.

For parent campaigns that use shared budgets:

• No action is required if the budget is shared between the parent campaign and sibling campaigns.
• Add the budget of the sibling campaigns to the parent campaign if the parent campaign shares a budget with campaigns other than the sibling campaigns.
• If the sibling campaigns share a budget with campaigns other than the parent campaign, calculate the amount of the shared budget the sibling campaigns use and add it to the budget of the parent campaign.

Mobile Bid Adjustments

For advertisers that separated their campaigns by device target, a mobile bid adjustment can now be set at the campaign or group level to bid on mobile devices separately from desktop and tablet devices. Mobile bid adjustments are set as a percentage of the keyword-level (desktop and tablet) bid.

The approach to bidding for the following types of legacy campaigns will be unaffected when migrating to enhanced campaigns:

• If the campaign used to target all devices, (or desktop and mobile) set the mobile bid adjustment to 0%. Your mobile bids will be the same as your desktop and tablet bids.
• If the campaign used to target desktop and tablet devices and has no matching mobile campaign, set the mobile bid adjustment to -100%. This will prevent your creative from being delivered on mobile devices.
• If the campaign used to target desktop devices only, or tablet devices only, and has no matching sibling campaigns, set the mobile bid adjustment to -100%. Keep in mind bids and performance may be impacted now that desktop and tablet device targeting and search traffic is combined.

b. Ad Extensions

There are seven types of ad extensions that need to be addressed during a campaign merge. These include: Location Extensions, Call Extensions, Sitelinks Extensions, Product Extensions, Social Extensions, Dynamic Search Ad Extensions, and Mobile App Extensions. Ensure all the extensions in sibling campaigns are present in the parent campaign.

If your mobile sitelink or call extensions are unique from your desktop ad extensions, leverage Upgraded extensions. Specify “Mobile” next to device preferences to customize your extensions for a mobile-optimized experience. Mobile-optimized extensions will be triggered more frequently over standard extensions for searches on mobile devices.

c. Ad Groups

For matching campaigns, ensure all the groups in the sibling campaigns exist in the parent campaign. Copy any missing groups from the sibling campaigns to the parent campaign.

d. Keywords

For matching campaigns, ensure all the keywords in the sibling campaigns exist in the parent campaign. If matching keywords have different bids, set the bid in the parent campaign to the keyword bid set within the campaign targeting desktop and tablet devices. A mobile bid adjustment can be set at the campaign or group level to bid on mobile devices separately from desktop and tablet devices. Mobile bid adjustments are set as a percentage of the keyword-level (desktop and tablet) bid.

If matching keywords leverage different destination URLs that direct users to device-optimized landing pages, use the {ifmobile} and {ifnotmobile} ValueTrack parameters. (E.g.{ifmobile:m. powpowsports.com}{ifnotmobile:www.powpowsports.com}, {ifmobile:m}{ifnotmobile:www}. powpowsports.com)

e. Creative

For matching campaigns, ensure all the creative in the sibling campaigns exist in the parent campaign. If you have creative that specifically target mobile devices, set the device preference to “Mobile” for these creative in the parent campaign. Note if you have only mobile-optimized creative, these creative can also be delivered on desktop and tablet devices. If you copy over groups from a sibling campaign that only contain mobile-optimized creative, be sure create separate desktop- and tablet-optimized creative in the parent campaign.

To preserve historical Quality Score information for mobile-targeted sibling campaigns that contain unique creative, copy those creative into the parent campaign and set their device preference to “Mobile”. Remember, historical Quality Score information for all devices will remain intact as long as keyword, creative, landing page, and device combinations remain the same.

Keep the following in mind when merging creative:

• Creative that contain phone numbers in the text will be disapproved. Use call extensions to include your phone number with your creative.
• Mobile-preferred creative will be delivered more frequently than other creative for searches on mobile devices. Other creative will be delivered more frequently than mobile-preferred creative for searches on desktop and tablet devices.
• If you leverage creative-level destination URLs that direct users to device-optimized landing pages, use the {ifmobile} and {ifnotmobile} ValueTrack parameters. (E.g. {ifmobile:m. powpowsports.com}{ifnotmobile:www.powpowsports.com}, {ifmobile:m}{ifnotmobile:www}. powpowsports.com).

f. Negative Keywords

For matching campaigns, ensure all the negative keywords in the sibling campaigns exist in the parent campaign. Keep in mind as you add or remove groups and keywords during the merging process, your negative keyword lists may require adjustment. Add or delete negative keywords from the parent campaign as needed.

g. The Display Network

At this time, advertisers are not required to merge separate, network-targeted campaigns. For advertisers that separate campaigns by search and display, continue to separate search campaigns from display campaigns. This will enable you to calculate optimal display mobile bid adjustments based on display performance.

For matching campaigns targeting the display network, compare the placements, audience categories, and Remarketing lists between the parent and sibling campaigns. Add any missing placements to the parent campaign. Copy all audience settings from the sibling campaigns to the parent campaign. Add any missing Remarketing lists to the parent campaign.

Note that “Display Network only” campaigns can still target creative by device models and operating systems.

V. Completing the Migration

It is recommended you rename your sibling campaigns to indicate its matched parent campaign and the date it was merged. For example, “PowPow Sports Main 6-3-13”. Once this has been completed, pause or delete the sibling campaign. Deleted campaigns will remain available for historical reference and historical data will remain available for all parent and sibling campaigns.

Once you have migrated your destination URLs, migrated your parent campaigns, and merged your sibling campaigns, you will have successfully completed the migration to enhanced campaigns.

Be sure to monitor the performance of your new enhanced campaigns and ensure they are achieving your performance goals and satisfying your business requirements. Generate recurring reports segmented by device for your top campaigns, groups, keywords, and creative, and create alerts to identify significant shifts in key performance metrics.

VI. Final Thoughts

Remain agile and efficient in your management and optimization of enhanced campaigns. As more and more advertisers complete their migration, anticipate continuous shifts in competition and the auction environment. Search marketers will need to continue investing in technology and new best practices to successfully drive media and acquire revenue in a redefined multidevice paid search landscape.

If you are a search marketer investing more than $150,000 a month in search marketing and have concerns about migrating to enhanced campaigns, Marin can help you with the transition. With more than $4.7 billion managed on the Marin platform and many of the world’s largest agencies and brands relying on us every day, we have partnered with Google and created a process to help our clients make the switch with minimal interruption to their campaigns.