The “How to set up Display campaigns in Google Ads(Formerly Adwords)” will cover the following:
- A brief introduction to Google Display Network
- An overview of formats available on GDN.
- Step-by-Step tutorial for setting up a display campaign(part 1)
- Conclusion with Reporting Metrics.
Let us get started…
What is a Google Display Network?
Google Display Network commonly called as GDN among advertisers, is one of the biggest ad networks spanning over 90% of all the websites available on the internet. Google uses this collection of millions of websites, mobile apps, or video sites to show the ads. GoogleAds use GDN as a display network and the advertisers have access to the pool of inventories released by the publishers.
The ads can be bought on the Google Display Network using direct buying or programmatic. Even though the targeting capability of GDN is limited as compared to other demand-side platforms like DoubleClick, it still works for small to medium-sized campaigns. For more info on GDN, click here. Now let us have a look at supported display formats.
How does Google Ads work?
As a user, you must have encountered thousands of display ads while surfing on the web. Let us see how it works from the other end. Google ads use Ad Exchange, a marketplace for buying and selling display ads. It makes use of the Google display network as its inventory source to display the ads based on the targeting strategy set by the advertisers. There are two major types of targeting that you can use on GDN: Audience targeting and contextual targeting.
Acceptable Formats on Google Display Ads
Although responsive ad formats is a default format on Google Display Ads, there are some formats that are frequently used by the advertisers. Here is a nonexhaustive list:
300×250: MPU Ad format
320×50: Mobile Leaderboard
320×100: Mobile Ad Unit
250×250: Square format
200×200: Small Square
336×280: Rectangle
728×90: Leaderboard
300×600: Half Page Ad
160×600: Skyscraper
970×90: Super Leaderboard
If you would like to know more about different sizes and formats available for display campaigns in general, check out this article. Also on another hand, it is a good idea to know how to create creatives for your display campaigns. Read more about creative design strategy here.
After dwelling into basic info, it is now time for the action. Let us see the step by step tutorial to set up a display campaign on Google Ads(Google AdWords).
How to Set up a Display Campaign on Google Ads – 3 Part Series
In this post, we are going to look at how to set up a display campaign using audiences. Before we get started on the setup, we recommend you to read targeting strategies post so that you are well aware of the terms used in the post. Now let us get started:
Add a New Campaign
From the homepage of Google Ads, navigate to Campaigns and Click on the plus icon on the extreme left of the interface. After you click on the icon, a tab with 2 options opens up like the image below. Choose + New Campaign.
Choose a Campaign Goal
It is very important to have a distinct campaign goal in mind before the campaign set up. Google has the following inbuilt options:
- Sales
- Leads
- Website Traffic
- Product and Brand Consideration
- Brand Awareness and Reach
- App Promotion
Although you could create a campaign without a goal it is not recommended. We are going to click “Sales” as the objective for the demo campaign.
Choosing the Campaign Type
As we are running a demo campaign to show how to set up a display campaign, we will obviously choose “Display” as a campaign type. By choosing this option, your ads will run across the Google display network which spans over 90% of the available sites on the web.
Once you click on a display, a tab with 2 options show up: standard display campaign and a Gmail campaign. Gmail ads are interactive ads that appear like an email or directly leads to the advertiser’s landing page. For now, let us choose the standard display campaign.
Google Ads have the ability to provide customized suggestions for your website. Hence, ensure that you enter your business website during the campaign set up for personalized services.
Here is how your interface should look after your inputs:
Display Campaign Settings
Once you have clicked continue, you will be redirected to a new interface. Here are the subsections you need to take care of:
Campaign Name
The campaign name should reflect the campaign goal and must have a good naming template so that anyone in your team should be able to decipher the goal. It is easy to analyze the campaign later even when you export it into .csv or excel file. For this demo campaign, we are naming it: Display-Sales-CyberMondaySale-Accessories.
Locations
Depending on your business, choose your target locations. For example, we are choosing the United Kingdom.
Bidding
Budget
You need to set a budget for this campaign. Although in some instances, the daily budget may be exceeded but the monthly remains constant. There are 2 ways your budget could be spent: Accelerated or Standard. It is recommended to choose standard as the budget will be spread evenly over time.
Additional Campaign Settings
Unless specified, Google will run the campaign in its default state. Though some defaults like optimizing the best performing ads are preferred, ensure that the settings are customized. Here is a checklist
✓ Add end dates to your campaign or else the campaigns will run indefinitely.
✓ If you are a local business, run ads only during your opening hours. You can set it up using Ad schedule options
✓ By default, the campaigns run on the multidevice platform. If you would like to run a mobile-only campaign, you could change it in the Devices tab
✓ Set the frequency cap to 3-5 depending on the performance history of your users. If this is not set up, then your ad could be shown to the same users more than 10 times. This would annoy the users and have a negative feeling associated with your brand.
✓ Content Exclusions: By default, your ads could show up on all content. Prevent your ads from showing on sensitive content.
Ad Groups for Display Campaign: Audience
This is the reason why we have created 3 part series for creating a display campaign. We will walk you through how to create the first ad group using audiences. First name your ad group appropriately. Here is the favored template:
Primary Campaign Name – Targeting Strategy.
So we will be using: CyberMondaySale-Audience. On the same note, refresh your knowledge on targeting strategies using this article before you go ahead with the implementation.
Choosing Audiences
If you have identified the predefined target group that works well with your brand, then you could add custom audiences. However, we recommend using in-market audiences and custom intent audiences which are comprised of people who are actively researching your products or product categories. They are in the market for planning and buying the product. Add all the related categories to expand your reach. Use keywords and custom URL to add intent audiences. Once you navigate, make use of the idea tab to add multiple keywords to your intent-audience. Here is an example of shoes:
P.S If you have men’s and women’s shoes: It is recommended to group them into 2 different ad groups though. We are grouping them in one ad group as it is a demo campaign.
Adding Display Ad Copies to Your Campaign
This is the last step and the cardinal step as the campaign won’t run without ad copies. By default, the display Ad copies are responsive but you could also upload ad copies using the “Upload display ads” options. Here are some points to note:
- Add at least 3 formats for desktop and 2 formats for mobile
- Preferred formats are: 300×250, 728×90, 970×250, 300×50, 320×100, and 120×600
- Make slight variations in the ad copies and test them for a week depending on your budget to make any changes.
- Use a combination of responsive ads and inbuilt standard performing ads.
Demographics
If you have chic shoes for younger audiences, make sure to remove the old ones from your target group.
Ad Group Bid
Divide your campaign bid by 3 and assign it to this ad group. In further parts of the 3 part series, we will be creating 2 more ad groups for the same campaign using content targeting.
TO BE CONTINUED…
Conclusion
You have successfully set up your first display campaign with the first ad group. No matter what kind of campaign it is, it is a good idea to track conversions. Here is a simple video guide on How to Setup conversion tracking on Google Ads using Google Tag Manager.
No matter what kind of campaigns you have set up, it is best-practice to monitor your campaigns on a regular basis. There are some important metrics that you must check to evaluate your display campaign performance.
- Impressions and CPM
- Reach
- Clicks and CTR
- Viewability (Viewable Impressions/Measurable Impressions)
- Conversions and Conversion rate.
Don’t forget to check the detailed guide on tracking metrics here.