Other Segmentation

Under other segmentation, we classify five different audience segments

1. Audience Expansion
2. Optimised Targeting
3. Combined Segments
4. Geographic Segmentation
5. Language Segmentation

Audience Expansion

The information on Google’s support pages is limited, but when you run a “Product and Brand consideration” OR a “Brand Awareness and Reach” campaign, Google audience expansion will find more users like your selected audience to broaden your reach – which is very vague.

Audience expansion will increase your costs. This is because Google will be showing your ads to a wider audience, which means that there is a greater chance that your ads will be seen by people who are not interested in your products or services.

Think of it like using a broad match instead of an exact match.  You will get your ads shown more broadly, but as you do, your CTR will fall, and your ROI will fall.

If you’re considering using audience expansion, it’s important to set a budget that you’re comfortable with. You should also monitor your results closely to make sure that audience expansion is actually helping you to reach your marketing goals.

How to turn Audience Expansion on

To turn audience expansion on for a campaign, follow these steps:

1. Sign in to your Google Ads account.
2. Click on the “Campaigns” tab.
3. Select the campaign that you want to enable audience expansion for.
4. Click on the “Settings” tab.
5. Under the “Targeting” section, click on the “Audiences” tab.
6. Click on the “Edit audience segments” button.
7. Select the audience segments that you want to use for audience expansion.
8. Click on the “Checkbox” next to the “Audience expansion” option.
9. Click on the “Save” button.

Once you have enabled audience expansion, Google Ads will use your selected audience segments to find similar users who are likely to be interested in your products or services. Your ads will then be shown to these users on Google Search, YouTube, and other Google properties.

Here are some things to keep in mind when using audience expansion:

• Audience expansion is only available for campaigns with the following goals:

  • Product and brand consideration
  • Brand awareness and reach

• Audience expansion may increase your campaign’s reach, but it may also increase your cost per click (CPC).
• You can control how much you spend on audience expansion by setting a daily budget.
• You can track the performance of audience expansion by reviewing your campaign’s reports.

Benefits and Negatives of Audience Expansion

Here are some of the benefits of using audience expansion:

• Reach more people with your marketing messages
• Increase brand awareness
• Generate more leads and sales when no budget is in place

Here are some of the negatives of using audience expansion:

• Increased costs with no budget control and increased the cost per conversion
• If you do use a budget, you will likely get fewer conversions for that budget
• Will drive ROI lower
• Can reach people who are not interested in your products or services
• Can be difficult to track the results of audience expansion

Based on how Google explains it, unless you are running “Product and Brand consideration” OR a “Brand Awareness and Reach” campaigns, then it should not impact your other campaigns, so if you have it on (as most will be given, it is automatically turned on) in theory, it should not be impacting your campaigns other than “Product and Brand consideration” OR “Brand Awareness and Reach” campaigns.

In our opinion, there is little argument to leave this turned on.  We think the negatives outweigh the positives unless you’re really trying to expand your reach and have an unlimited budget. 

Tips for using Audience Expansion

Here are a few tips for using Audience Expansion effectively:

• Use a clear targeting strategy. Before you start using Audience Expansion, it’s important to have a clear targeting strategy. This will help you ensure that your ads are seen by the right people. Start your campaign without audience expansion and get a baseline of data over a 4 to 6-week period so you know what results your audience will provide.  Then turn it on.
• Start with a small budget. When you do first turn Audience expansion on, it’s a good idea to start with a small budget. This will help you understand how well the feature works and how much you need to spend to reach your target audience.
• Track your results and tweak. It’s important to track your results so you can see how well Audience Expansion is working for you. This will help you make adjustments to your campaigns as needed.  Tracking beyond the 4 to 6 weeks when you turn it on will be crucial to ensure your getting the best results.  Compare before and after turning on and make decisions around tweaking your campaign.

Ensuring your campaigns using similar audiences are not impacted bin 1 August 2023

As we have outlined above, similar audiences are being replaced with Audience expansion and Optimised targeting on 1 August 2023.  You can ensure these are not impacted by turning on Audience Expansion and Optimised Targeting.

As you can see from the image below, turning these on for your campaigns using similar audiences from 1 August 2023 is very easy. Actually, they are turned ON by default.  

To check this and get to this setting, simply click the “tools and settings” at the top of the page, then go to “shared library”, and then click “Audience Manager”

Once there, click “settings” on the left-hand side of the page, and you should see the box below.

Note that the above also applies to ensure optimised targeting is turned on for the switch 1 August 2023 when similar audiences is turned off.

Optimised Targeting

Optimized targeting is a feature that allows you to reach more people similar to your existing audience segment and uses machine learning to identify people likely to be interested in your products or services based on their demographics, interests, and online behaviour.

Here are the steps involved in how optimised targeting works:

1. Google collects data about people who have visited your website or interacted with your ads. This data includes information about their demographics, interests, and online behaviour.
2. Google uses this data to create a profile of your target audience. This profile includes information about the types of people who are most likely to be interested in your products or services.
3. When someone visits a website that is part of the Google Display Network, Google uses their data to determine if they are a good fit for your target audience. If they are, Google may show them your ad.

It’s important to note that optimised targeting is not a guarantee that your ads will be seen by everyone in the expanded audience. Google will only show your ads to people likely interested in your products or services.

Here are some factors that can affect whether or not your ad is shown to someone:

• The person’s demographics. This includes their age, gender, location, and income.
• The person’s interests. This includes the types of websites they visit, the things they search for, and the things they like on social media.
• The person’s online behaviour. This includes the types of ads they have clicked on in the past, the websites they have visited, and the things they have searched for.

How to turn on Optimised Targeting

If you want to use optimised targeting, you can enable it in your Google Ads account. To do this, follow these steps:

1. Go to your Google Ads account.
2. Click on the “Campaigns” tab.
3. Select the campaign that you want to use optimised targeting for.
4. Click on the “Settings” tab.
5. Under the “Targeting” section, click on the “Optimized targeting” checkbox.
6. Click on the “Save” button.

Here are some of the positives of optimised targeting:

• Reach more people: Optimized targeting can help you reach more people who are interested in your products or services. This is because Google Ads will use your campaign’s goals and settings to find the best places to show your ads.
• Improve your ROI: Optimized targeting can help you improve your return on investment (ROI). The theory is that Google Ads will show your ads to people who are more likely to click on them and convert.

Here are some of the negatives of optimised targeting:

• You may not be able to control where your ads appear: When you use optimised targeting, Google Ads will use your campaign’s goals and settings to find the best places to show your ads. This means you may be unable to control exactly where your ads appear.
• Your ads may not appear on all devices: Optimized targeting may not allow your ads to appear on all devices. For example, your ads may not appear on mobile devices if your campaign’s goals are focused on desktop users.
• Your ads may not appear on all websites: Optimized targeting may not allow your ads to appear on all websites. For example, your ads may not appear on websites not part of the Google Display Network.

You could argue these negatives as positives because you are allowing the algorithm not to show your ad when it thinks it will not get a click or conversion on a site or device.  It will depend on the campaign you are running.  If you want brand awareness, then these will be negatives, but if you just want sales or leads, then they will be positives.

Overall, optimised targeting can be a helpful tool for reaching more people and improving your ROI. However, it’s important to understand the limitations of optimised targeting before you use it.

Here are some tips for using optimised targeting effectively (similar list for most Google Ads campaigns but worth reiterating):

• Use negative keywords: Negative keywords are words or phrases that you don’t want your ads to show up for. For example, if you sell shoes, you might want to add the negative keyword “free” to your campaign so that your ads don’t appear for searches like “free shoes.”
• Use ad extensions: Ad extensions are information that can be added to your ads, such as your phone number, address, or hours of operation. Ad extensions can help your ads stand out and make it easier for people to contact you.
• Use location targeting: Location targeting allows you to show your ads to people in specific locations. For example, if you only sell products in the United States, you might want to use location targeting to show your ads to people in the United States.
• Use demographic targeting: Demographic targeting allows you to show your ads to people based on age, gender, interests, and other demographics. For example, if you sell children’s clothing, you might want to use demographic targeting to show your ads to parents of young children.
• Use audience targeting: Audience targeting allows you to show your ads to people who have already shown an interest in your products or services. For example, if you sell running shoes, you might want to use audience targeting to show your ads to people who have visited websites about running or who have clicked on ads for running shoes in the past.
• Start with a small budget: When starting out with optimised targeting, it’s a good idea to start with a small budget. This will help you avoid overspending and will give you time to see how your campaigns are performing.
• Be patient: It takes time for optimised targeting to learn about your target audience and to start showing your ads to the right people. Don’t expect to see results overnight.
• Keep testing: Testing different settings and strategies to see what works best for your campaigns. There is no one-size-fits-all approach to optimised targeting.

Combined Segment

A combined segment in Google Ads is a type of audience segment that is created by combining two or more other audience segments. This allows you to target your ads to a more specific audience by combining different interests, demographics, and other factors.

To create a combined segment, follow these steps:

1. Sign in to your Google Ads account.
2. Click on the “Audiences” tab.
3. Click on the “Create Audience” button.
4. Select the “Combined segment” option.
5. Enter a name for your combined segment.
6. Select the audience segments that you want to combine.
7. Click on the “Create” button.

Once you have created a combined segment, you can use it to target your ads in the same way you would any other audience segment.

Here are some benefits of using combined segments:

• Improved targeting: By targeting your ads to a more specific audience, you can improve your return on investment (ROI).
• More effective campaigns: Using combined segments, you can create more effective campaigns that are more likely to reach your target audience and generate leads or sales.

Here are some examples of how you can use combined segments to target your ads:

• You can target people who have visited your website or who have shown an interest in your products or services on social media.
• You can target people who live in a specific geographic area or who have a specific income level.
• You can target people who have certain interests, such as sports, music, or travel.

By combining different audience segments, you can create a more specific target audience for your ads.

Ton finish off audiences i want to cover two other features that are often forgotten or neglected.  These are geographical segmentation and language segmentation.

Geographical Segmentation 

Performance Max Campaigns – audience targeting is only a guide

Now that we have covered audience segments, let’s discuss how these are used with performance max campaigns as it is a little different.

Performance Max campaigns are a campaign type that allows advertisers to reach potential customers across the Google Network with one easy-to-manage campaign. 

They use Smart Bidding and automation to optimise performance across channels like YouTube, Display, Search, Discover, Gmail, and Maps. They are meant to complement keyword-based Search campaigns and help advertisers find more converting customers.

What are Audience Signals

Audience Signals is a feature that lets advertisers suggest customer segments to guide Google’s learning algorithms for optimised conversions. Audience signals are NOT audience targets. They are, however, audience suggestions. 

Google uses audience signals as the starting point for optimising your Performance Max campaigns based on your goals.

The benefits of using Audience Signals to inform Google who you think the ads would be best suited for are:

• You can leverage your own insights and data to influence Google’s bidding and targeting decisions.
• You can reach more relevant and interested customers across the Google Network.
• You can improve your click-through rate and conversion rate and ultimately lower your costs.

Audience Signals differ from audience targeting in that they do not restrict where your ads are shown or who sees them. Instead, they provide Google with information to help them find the best customers for your ads based on your goals.

To set up audience signals for a Performance Max campaign, follow these steps:

1. Sign in to your Google Ads account.
2. Click on the “Campaigns” tab.
3. Select the Performance Max campaign that you want to add audience signals to.
4. Click on the “Settings” tab.
5. Under the “Targeting” section, click on the “Audiences” tab.
6. Click on the “Add audience signals” button.
7. Select the audience signals that you want to add to your campaign.
8. Click on the “Save” button.

Here are some of the audience signals that you can add to your Performance Max campaign:

• In-market audiences: These are audiences of people who have shown an interest in your products or services by searching for them on Google or by visiting websites that are related to your business.
• Customer match audiences: These are audiences of people who have already purchased from your business.
• Similar audiences: These are audiences of people who are similar to your existing customers.
• Demographics: These are audiences of people based on their age, gender, interests, and other demographic information.
• Geographic targeting: You can target your ads to specific locations.

By adding audience signals to your Performance Max campaign, you can help Google Ads to find more relevant people to show your ads to. This can help you to improve your campaign’s performance and achieve your marketing goals.

Here are some tips for setting up audience signals for a Performance Max campaign:

• Using multiple audience signals: The more you use, the more relevant people Google Ads can find to show your ads to. However, by doing this, you will muddy your insights data.  We tend to set up individual audience signals in separate Performance Max campaigns so we can see how each individually performs.  Then we combine audience signals and compare and contrast with our individual audience segments to ensure they improve on initial one audience tests.
• Target your audience signals to your specific goals: If you are trying to increase brand awareness, you may want to target your audience signals to people interested in your industry. If you are trying to generate leads, you may want to target your audience signals to people who have visited your website or who have shown an interest in your products or services on social media.
• Track the performance of your audience signals: Once you have added them to your campaign, be sure to track their performance. This will help you to determine which audience signals are most effective and which ones you may want to remove from your campaign.

Using Chat GPT to provide some audience ideas

If your stuck when trying to come up with audience ideas you can use Chat GPT to help get some ideas for audiences.

For example we have clients that manage rental properties on Airbnb so we came up with the following prompt.

“I want to build a Google ad audience. The target URL is an “Airbnb management company” they want to find more properties to manage through running ads on Google ads. Can you recommend the ideal audience for this website.”

Here was the response from Chat GPT.

Example of Chat GPT creating Google Ads Audience

Tips for using Chat GPT.

• If your website or web page your looking to target was published before 2021 then include the URL as chat GPT will have a record of the page and should provide even more insight into the audience when it can see the actual URL and content.
• If you have a newer page (URL or page published in 2021 or later) then you can copy the content into the prompt to give Chat GPT more context.
• Only take the response as a guide.  Only testing and time will help your refine the audience but it will provide a good guide for starting.
• Your audience suggestions will only be as good as your prompt.  So take some time to refine your prompt.

History of Audiences on Google Ads

We thought it might be useful to map out the changes to audiences on Google.  So below, we developed a timeline showing these changes.

Timeline of audiences in Google ads

• 2001: Google Ads launched with the ability to target audiences based on keywords and location. This was a major innovation at the time, as it allowed advertisers to reach people who were actively searching for their products or services.
• 2005: Google introduced the ability to target audiences based on interests. This was done by using data from Google’s search engine and other properties to create a profile of each user’s interests. Advertisers could then target their ads to people who were interested in specific topics, such as travel, fashion, or sports.
• 2007: Google introduced the ability to target audiences based on demographics. This allowed advertisers to target their ads to people based on their age, gender, income, and other demographic factors.
• 2009: Google introduced the ability to target audiences based on remarketing. This allowed advertisers to show their ads to people who had already visited their website or used their app. This was a great way to reach people already familiar with the advertiser’s brand and products.
• 2011: Google introduced the ability to target audiences based on custom audiences. This allowed advertisers to create their own custom audiences based on their own data, such as customer lists or email subscribers. This was a powerful way to reach people already interested in the advertiser’s products or services.
• 2012: Google introduced the ability to target audiences based on similar audiences. This allowed advertisers to target their ads to people who were similar to their existing customers or website visitors. This was a great way to reach people likely to be interested in the advertiser’s products or services.
• 2013: Google introduced the ability to target audiences based on in-market audiences. This allowed advertisers to target their ads to people actively researching products or services like theirs. This was a great way to reach people who were ready to buy.
• 2014: Google introduced the ability to target audiences based on life events. This allowed advertisers to target their ads to people going through life events, such as buying a new home or having a baby. This was a great way to reach people in the market for new products or services.
• 2015: Google introduced the ability to target audiences based on app audiences. This allowed advertisers to target their ads to people who had installed or used their app. This was a great way to reach people familiar with the advertiser’s brand and products.
• 2016: Google introduced the ability to target audiences based on audience match types. This allowed advertisers to control how closely their ads match the interests of their target audiences. This was a great way to improve the performance of audience-targeting campaigns.
• 2017: Google introduced the ability to target audiences across multiple devices. This allowed advertisers to reach people on the devices they were using, whether it was a desktop computer, a mobile phone, or a tablet. This was a great way to reach people wherever they were.
• 2018: Google introduced the ability to target audiences based on contextual targeting. This allowed advertisers to target their ads to people who were viewing content that was relevant to their products or services. This was a great way to reach people already interested in the advertiser’s products or services.
• 2019: Google introduced the ability to target audiences based on YouTube viewership. This allowed advertisers to target their ads to people who were watching videos on YouTube. This was a great way to reach people who were interested in a variety of topics.
• 2020: Google introduced the ability to target audiences based on interests and demographics from third-party data providers. This allowed advertisers to reach people who were interested in products or services that were not directly related to their own businesses.
• 2021: Google introduced the ability to target audiences based on custom intent signals. This allowed advertisers to target their ads to people showing signs of interest in their products or services, even if they had not explicitly searched for them.
• 2022: Google introduced the ability to target audiences based on Google’s privacy-preserving FLoC technology. This allowed advertisers to target their ads to people who were part of a group of people with similar interests without having to track individual users.