Google Ads Seasonality Adjustments and Promotions

Last updated: October 12, 2026

1. Executive Summary: Five Key Principles for Google Ads Seasonality in 2026

Managing Google Ads through seasonal peaks and promotional periods in 2026 requires disciplined preparation, not reactive spending. The five principles below govern every recommendation in this article.

• Prepare weeks, not hours, in advance. Campaign structure, creative, tracking, feeds, landing pages, and budgets must be stable before demand rises. Changes made on the peak day disrupt Smart Bidding at the worst possible moment.
• Ramp budgets gradually and early. Budget headroom should be in place before auction pressure and CPCs rise. Google’s retail guidance suggests up to three times expected spend for major holidays as a capacity ceiling, not a spending target.^[1]
• Let Smart Bidding handle normal seasonality; intervene only for exceptional spikes. Seasonality adjustments are a narrow tool for short, atypical conversion-rate changes of one to seven days. They are not a general seasonal control, and misuse can double CPC inflation without improving ROAS.^[2][3]
• Protect tracking integrity above all else. Seasonal periods amplify every data error. A broken tag during Black Friday corrupts months of Smart Bidding training data. Use data exclusions—not seasonality adjustments—when data is unreliable.^[4]
• Wind down deliberately. Post-event budgets, targets, and creative should be reduced in stages over one to two weeks, after conversion lag has been accounted for. An abrupt reset immediately after a peak destroys momentum and distorts bidding signals.^[5]

2. Benchmarks and Numbers at a Glance

Metric	Typical range or threshold	Applies when	Source
Google Ads CPC, general 2026	$2–$4 per click	Broad cross-industry average; vendor claim, not independently audited	[6]
Google Ads conversion rate, general 2026	3%–5%	Broad cross-industry average; vendor claim, not independently audited	[6]
Black Friday / Cyber Monday conversion rate	6.05%	Study across 7,000+ ad accounts; retail-weighted dataset	[7]
BFCM conversion-rate lift vs. prior month	+32.68%	Study across 7,000+ ad accounts; reflects genuine promotional demand	[7]
BFCM CPC increase vs. prior month	+22.22% to +26%	Study across 7,000+ ad accounts; higher end reflects extreme auction pressure	[7]
BFCM CPM increase vs. prior month	+24.66%	Study across 7,000+ ad accounts; applies to display and Shopping inventory	[7]
Extreme CPC spike during BFCM period	Up to +100%	Study across 7,000+ accounts; observed in highly competitive retail categories	[7]
BFCM ROAS change vs. prior month	+12.06%	Study across 7,000+ ad accounts; net of CPC increases	[7]
Standard Shopping conversion rate during BFCM	6.7% (vs. 6.2% pre-BFCM)	Study across 4,200+ accounts; Shopping-specific dataset	[3]
Post-BFCM conversion-rate change vs. pre-BFCM	−7.3%	Study across 4,200+ accounts; applies in the two weeks following BFCM	[3]
Post-BFCM CPC change vs. pre-BFCM	+10.2%	Study across 4,200+ accounts; elevated CPCs persist after event ends	[3]
Effect of manual seasonality adjustment on CPC inflation	2× the normal BFCM CPC increase	Study across 6,000 advertisers; accounts using adjustments vs. those that did not	[3]
Google Ads CPM during BFCM (vendor figure)	$20.58 CPM	Vendor claim; not independently audited; useful as an order-of-magnitude ceiling	[8]
Recommended initial Target CPA / ROAS change increment	±20%	Google vendor guidance; applies when adjusting Smart Bidding targets	[9]
Recommended minimum time between target changes	At least one conversion cycle	Google vendor guidance; prevents bidding instability from compounding changes	[9]
Seasonality adjustment recommended event duration	1–7 days (max 14 days)	Google documentation; adjustments beyond 14 days may be less effective	[2]
Smart Bidding recommended learning period	2–4 weeks	Google vendor guidance; required before reliable performance evaluation	[9]
Budget headroom recommended for major retail holidays	Up to 3× expected spend	Google vendor guidance; treat as a capacity ceiling, not a spending mandate	[1]

3. Planning Around Seasonal Demand

Effective seasonal planning begins with understanding that demand curves are rarely symmetric. For most US retail accounts, search interest starts rising materially two to four weeks before a peak event, plateaus during the event window, and then drops steeply in the days immediately following.^[10] Non-retail businesses—HVAC, tax services, landscaping, home services—experience their own distinct curves that must be mapped from account-level data rather than assumed from retail benchmarks.

Identifying your true seasonal window

Use at least two years of account history to identify when impression volume, click volume, and conversion rate each begin their seasonal move. These three metrics frequently diverge: impressions may rise first as consumers research, conversion rate rises when purchase intent crystallizes, and average order value may spike only in the final days before a deadline. Plan campaign changes around the conversion-rate curve, not just the impression curve.^[11]

Layer in external signals from Google Trends, Keyword Planner, and Merchant Center demand insights to detect year-over-year shifts in when demand arrives. A category that historically peaked in the second week of November may have moved earlier due to retailer behavior, so update your calendar annually.^[11]

Segmenting campaigns by seasonal profile

Not every campaign in an account follows the same seasonal curve. Separate campaigns by their behavioral profile: evergreen campaigns that run year-round at a stable CPA, seasonal campaigns that run only during defined windows, and promotional campaigns that align with specific offers. Keeping these separate prevents a short promotional budget spike from distorting the Smart Bidding signals of a year-round campaign.^[5]

Building a phase calendar

Map every major seasonal event to a four-phase calendar: preparation (tracking, creative, feeds, landing pages), ramp-up (gradual budget increases as demand signals rise), peak (full budget availability with frequent monitoring), and wind-down (controlled reductions after the event).^[10] Assign specific dates, budget levels, and responsible owners to each phase before the season begins, not after demand has already arrived.

4. Forecasting and Lead Times

A seasonal forecast that only projects clicks and spend is incomplete. A usable forecast must also project conversion volume, CPA or ROAS, revenue or lead value, impression share, and whether operational capacity—inventory, fulfillment, sales response time, or call center volume—can absorb the incremental demand.^[12] Campaigns should not receive additional spend if the business cannot convert or fulfill the resulting demand profitably.

Choosing a forecast baseline

For accounts with stable year-over-year patterns, use the same seasonal period from the prior two years, adjusted for any changes in tracking, promotions, competitor set, or product range. For accounts with sustained growth or decline, weight the most recent 12-week trend more heavily than the prior-year absolute figures.^[13] Where a significant competitor entered or exited the market, or where tracking was broken for a period, remove those distorted windows from the baseline before projecting forward.

Building three scenarios

Prepare a conservative scenario (lower demand, higher CPCs, weaker conversion rate), a base scenario (current trends and planned promotions continue), and an upside scenario (demand and conversion improvements materialize with available inventory). The conservative scenario determines the minimum budget commitment. The upside scenario determines the maximum budget the business should be prepared to deploy—constrained by margin, inventory, and lead capacity.^[10]

Lead-time framework for 2026

Google recommends creating seasonal campaigns in advance because ad approval can take several days; campaigns can be built and held in a paused state until launch.^[5] The following framework reflects combined Google guidance and best practices for US accounts:^[1]

• 8–12 weeks before: Confirm business objectives, promotional dates, margins, inventory levels, measurement plan, and forecast scenarios.
• 4–8 weeks before: Finalize campaign structure, feeds, landing pages, creative, tracking tests, and audience segments.
• 2–4 weeks before: Begin the budget ramp based on observed demand signals; confirm campaigns can spend efficiently at the higher rate.
• Several days before: Complete final approvals, verify promotion assets are approved, apply any necessary bidding changes in a single gradual step.
• During the event: Monitor pacing, impression share, conversion lag, and site health; avoid constant bid edits.
• Afterward: Return targets and budgets in stages after conversion data has matured.

5. Ramping Budgets Before Peaks

Budget ramps serve two purposes: they give Smart Bidding time to calibrate at higher spend levels before the critical window arrives, and they prevent campaigns from hitting budget caps on the day demand is highest. An account that doubles its budget on Black Friday morning is asking Smart Bidding to learn a new spend rate, compete in a more expensive auction, and optimize toward a conversion goal—all simultaneously.^[1]

Ramp structure and increment size

Google’s guidance references increments of approximately 30% as an example of a gradual budget change, with time between major changes.^[1] The Smart Bidding guide recommends initial target changes of ±20% and waiting at least one conversion cycle between changes.^[9] These figures are consistent: small, staged increments with pauses between them are preferable to a single large jump. A practical ramp for a campaign with a 7-day conversion cycle might involve three budget increases over 21 days, each approximately 30% above the prior level.

Setting peak-period budget headroom

Google’s retail guidance recommends setting budget at up to three times expected spend for major retail holidays, with two times as a starting point where historical benchmarks are unavailable.^[1] These are capacity ceilings, not spending instructions. The actual spend will be constrained by demand, bid competition, and the campaign’s efficiency targets. An account that sets a $30,000 daily budget cap but is running Target ROAS of 500% will not spend $30,000 unless the auction volume and conversion economics support it.

Prioritizing which campaigns to ramp first

Not all campaigns deserve equal ramp priority. Increase budgets first for campaigns with proven seasonal conversion quality, healthy impression share loss to budget (rather than rank), and sufficient inventory or lead-handling capacity behind them. Campaigns already losing impression share to rank—indicating bids are too low relative to quality—need bid or target adjustments, not budget increases alone.

6. Seasonality Adjustments vs. Data Exclusions

These two tools solve different problems and are frequently confused. Using the wrong tool can actively worsen performance: a seasonality adjustment applied to bad data will train Smart Bidding on a false signal; a data exclusion applied to a genuine promotional lift will discard valuable training data.^[4][2]

Seasonality adjustments: the narrow use case

A seasonality adjustment tells Smart Bidding to expect a short-term change in conversion rate during a defined future window. It is appropriate when a specific, exceptional event—a three-day flash sale, a product launch, a single-day promotion—is expected to produce a conversion-rate change that Smart Bidding’s own historical model cannot predict because it has no comparable prior data.^[2] It does not increase budget, raise bids independently, or override Target ROAS or Target CPA constraints.^[2]

Google’s documentation recommends use for events of one to seven days and warns that adjustments lasting more than 14 days may be less effective.^[2] A critical finding from a 2026 study across 6,000 advertisers shows that accounts using manual seasonality adjustments during BFCM experienced 2× the CPC inflation of accounts that did not, and their ROAS declined year-over-year.^[3] This strongly supports the conservative approach: apply adjustments only when historical data genuinely cannot predict the conversion-rate change, not as a routine BFCM practice.

Data exclusions: when to use them

A data exclusion prevents Smart Bidding from using a defined period for model training. It is appropriate only when conversion data was materially unreliable—due to a tag failure, a checkout outage, a broken CRM import, or a consent-management error that caused significant undercounting or overcounting of conversions.^[4] It does not change how Smart Bidding bids during the excluded period; it retroactively removes that period from training data.

Do not exclude data simply because performance was disappointing, spend was higher than planned, or a promotion underperformed. Excluding genuine performance data—even bad performance—removes legitimate signal from Smart Bidding’s training set and can make future seasonal predictions less accurate.^[4]

Decision table

Situation	Correct tool	Incorrect tool	Reason
3-day flash sale with expected +40% conversion rate lift, no prior history	Seasonality adjustment	Data exclusion	Future anticipated conversion-rate change, not a data quality problem[2]
Checkout tag fired twice for 48 hours, doubling reported conversions	Data exclusion	Seasonality adjustment	Historical data is unreliable; exclusion prevents training on false conversions[4]
Black Friday—account has 3 years of BFCM history	Neither; rely on Smart Bidding	Seasonality adjustment	Smart Bidding can learn from prior years; manual adjustment risks 2× CPC inflation[3]
First-ever BFCM promotion with no comparable history	Seasonality adjustment (1–7 days)	Data exclusion	No historical data for Smart Bidding to reference; adjustment provides forward signal[2]
CRM import failure caused 5 days of zero offline conversions	Data exclusion	Seasonality adjustment	Conversion data was absent, not genuinely low; exclusion prevents a false performance trough in training[4]

7. Protecting Smart Bidding Through Peaks

Smart Bidding is most vulnerable to instability at peak periods because multiple conditions change simultaneously: CPCs rise, conversion rates change, budgets increase, and creative may be updated. Each change individually is manageable; compounding all of them at once can put bidding into a prolonged adjustment period precisely when stable delivery matters most.^[9]

What actually triggers a learning period

Google does not always label changes as causing a “learning” status, but the following actions are known to alter Smart Bidding’s optimization conditions and should be treated as potential reset triggers: changing the bid strategy type, changing the primary conversion action, making large Target CPA or Target ROAS changes (beyond approximately ±20%^[9]), switching attribution models, making mass edits to campaign structure, and pausing or re-enabling campaigns for extended periods. Budget changes alone are generally less disruptive than target changes, but large rapid budget increases combined with target changes can compound instability.

Target change sequencing

Google’s Smart Bidding guide recommends making target adjustments in increments of approximately ±20% and waiting at least one conversion cycle between changes.^[9] For a campaign with a 30-day conversion window, one conversion cycle is 30 days—making rapid pre-peak target adjustments practically impossible unless they are planned many weeks ahead. For campaigns with shorter conversion windows (7–14 days for most retail), there is more flexibility, but the principle of sequencing changes with pauses remains. Google also recommends evaluating Performance Max campaigns after one to two weeks of ramp time before drawing conclusions.^[1]

Holding strategy during the event

If a campaign enters the peak window with a stable bid strategy, an appropriate Target ROAS or Target CPA, and sufficient budget headroom, the correct action during the event is usually to hold the strategy steady and monitor pacing, impression share lost to budget, and CPA or ROAS trends. Avoid making intraday bid target changes in response to hourly volatility. Conversion lag means that peak-day data will look artificially weak for several days after the event; judging performance before the conversion window closes leads to premature and counterproductive adjustments.^[1]

8. Promotion Assets and Countdown Customizers

Promotion assets are the primary mechanism for communicating a discount offer within a Google ad without consuming the headline or description character limits allocated to core messaging.^[13] They can display a percentage or monetary discount, a promotional code, a minimum spend requirement, and a final URL, and they can be applied at the account, campaign, or ad-group level. Google AI determines when and where they appear across supported placements, including Display and YouTube for App campaigns.^[14]

Building an effective promotion asset

The most common failure in promotion asset setup is a mismatch between the asset and the landing page. The discount percentage, eligibility requirements, promo code, minimum spend, and offer end date must be identical across the ad, the promotion asset, the product feed, and the landing page. Any discrepancy risks disapproval, a poor user experience, or a conversion rate drop when users arrive at a page that does not match the promised offer.^[5]

Schedule assets with exact start and end times so expired offers do not continue serving. For major US retail events, Google’s platform supports Black Friday as an occasion label with a broad date range of October 15 through December 15, but the asset should specify the exact dates of the advertiser’s specific offer rather than relying on that window.^[5] Create a non-sale evergreen asset as a fallback in case the event is extended, stock sells out, or the offer terms change.

Countdown customizers: use and limits

Countdown customizers dynamically display remaining time until a sale ends. They accept an end date and time, a start point, and a time zone, and they transition from days to hours and minutes as the deadline approaches.^[15] They are most effective in the final 48–72 hours of an offer, when genuine scarcity messaging is accurate and motivating. Using “sale ends soon” language throughout a two-week pre-sale period undermines credibility and may violate advertising standards.

Verify the time zone setting carefully, including daylight saving time implications. A sale that ends at midnight ET on November 30 should be set in the account’s correct time zone—a Pacific Time account that sets midnight Pacific will serve the countdown three hours longer than intended for Eastern Time shoppers. Always test the rendered ad on mobile and desktop before launch and keep a non-countdown fallback ad available, because not every impression will render the customizer and ads may serve outside the intended context.^[15]

Coordinating promotion assets with Shopping feeds

For Shopping campaigns and Performance Max, the product feed is the primary source of promotional annotation. Sale prices must be reflected in the feed’s sale_price and sale_price_effective_date attributes. Merchant Center promotions require review and approval, and submission queues lengthen near major retail events—submit at least two weeks before the intended launch date.^[5] Monitor for disapproved products or promotions in the days following submission and resolve issues before the event window opens.

9. Major Events: Black Friday, EOFY, and the Holiday Season

Each major US promotional period has distinct auction dynamics, planning timelines, and bidding considerations. Treating them as interchangeable “peak periods” and applying the same playbook to each is a common planning error.

Black Friday and Cyber Monday

BFCM remains the most competitive paid search period in the US retail calendar. A study across 7,000+ ad accounts found a +22.22% to +26% CPC increase and a +24.66% CPM increase during BFCM relative to the prior month, with CPCs in some competitive categories rising up to 100%.^[7] At the same time, conversion rates rose +32.68% and ROAS improved +12.06%, meaning the event is genuinely profitable for well-prepared accounts—but the margin for error is narrow.^[7]

A critical 2026 finding from a study across 6,000 advertisers shows that accounts using manual seasonality adjustments during BFCM experienced 2× the CPC inflation of accounts that did not, and their ROAS declined year-over-year.^[3] This is the single strongest evidence-based argument for letting Smart Bidding handle BFCM organically for accounts with prior BFCM history, and reserving seasonality adjustments only for genuinely novel promotional structures.

Standard Shopping conversion rates during BFCM reached 6.7% across 4,200+ accounts, up from a 6.2% pre-BFCM baseline—a +8.1% lift.^[3] The post-BFCM period is harder: conversion rates drop −7.3% below pre-BFCM levels and CPCs remain +10.2% elevated, compressing margins in early December.^[3]

End of Financial Year (EOFY)

EOFY is primarily a B2B and professional services event in the US context, driven by budget utilization, procurement deadlines, and tax-related purchasing before December 31. Consumer retail may see some EOFY activity in clearance and tax-advantaged purchases (HSA spending, business equipment deductions), but the intent profile is fundamentally different from BFCM. No published US-specific CPC or CPM benchmark for EOFY Google Ads spend was identified in the available research; apply the general BFCM cost-pressure framework directionally but do not assume the same magnitude.

For EOFY campaigns, use custom date ranges in promotion assets rather than relying on Google’s standard occasion labels. Create separate messaging for “order by December 31,” “delivery before year-end,” and “invoice this fiscal year” where those deadlines differ. Landing pages must explain applicable year-end requirements, geographic eligibility, and invoicing terms clearly.^[5]

Holiday season (November–December)

The holiday shopping season in the US now begins materially before Thanksgiving, with search volume for gift categories rising as early as late October in many verticals.^[11] Google’s platform supports Black Friday as a promotion-asset occasion with a date range of October 15 through December 15, reflecting the extended commercial season.^[5] Planning should account for the full November–December window rather than concentrating all budget on BFCM weekend.

For Performance Max during the holiday season, Google recommends creating holiday-specific asset groups within existing campaigns rather than disrupting evergreen asset groups, and uploading seasonal assets at least two weeks before launch to allow review time.^[14] Use asset-group scheduling to activate and deactivate seasonal creative around the relevant dates rather than manually toggling asset groups.^[14]

10. Post-Event Wind-Down

The period immediately following a peak promotional event is one of the most mismanaged phases in Google Ads seasonal planning. Two common errors occur in opposite directions: either budgets and targets are left unchanged for weeks (wasting spend on a collapsed conversion rate), or everything is reset simultaneously the day after the event ends (causing a bidding instability shock at a moment when conversion lag means performance data is still incomplete).

Understanding the post-event conversion rate drop

A 2026 study across 4,200+ accounts found that post-BFCM conversion rates fall −7.3% below pre-BFCM levels in the weeks following the event, while CPCs remain +10.2% elevated.^[3] This means the post-event period has both lower conversion rates and higher costs than the pre-event baseline—the worst possible combination for an account that has not prepared a deliberate wind-down plan. The correct response is a staged budget reduction over one to two weeks, not an immediate return to pre-event levels.

Conversion lag and delayed attribution

For accounts with conversion windows of 14–30 days, a significant proportion of conversions attributed to BFCM traffic will not be recorded in the platform until several days or even weeks after the event. Evaluating ROAS or CPA on November 28 data using figures visible on December 2 will understate true performance and may trigger unnecessary target tightening. Allow the full conversion window to mature before making data-driven post-event decisions.^[1]

Post-event creative and asset management

Remove or pause expired sale copy, promotion assets, and countdown ads at the exact moment the offer ends—not the following week. An ad that continues serving “Black Friday—30% off” on December 3 is not only inaccurate but risks disapproval and user trust damage. Switch to a clearance, “new year” or evergreen offer immediately. Ensure the product feed, site prices, and Merchant Center promotions are all updated simultaneously to maintain consistency.^[5]

Retargeting post-event visitors

Recent site visitors who did not convert during the promotional window represent a warm audience for post-event remarketing. Use post-event messaging for complementary products, replenishment, loyalty offers, or delivery-related communications. Do not repeat an expired discount to this audience; doing so creates expectation problems and may attract low-quality purchasers who only buy at the promotional price.^[5]

11. Common Mistakes to Avoid

Even experienced teams repeat the same seasonal errors year after year. The mistakes below are not theoretical edge cases—they are the decisions most likely to erode margin, destabilize Smart Bidding, or leave budget stranded during the highest-value days of the year. Each one has a concrete corrective action.

11.1 Waiting Until the Peak Day to Raise Budgets

Campaigns that are budget-constrained when demand spikes cannot recover lost impression share mid-day. By the time a manual budget increase processes and Smart Bidding recalibrates, the highest-intent window may have passed. Google’s guidance recommends making budget changes before the peak, using a staged ramp rather than a single large jump on the event day.^[1] For major retail holidays, the recommended headroom is up to three times expected spend; for accounts without historical benchmarks, two times target spend is the suggested starting point.^[1]

11.2 Using a Seasonality Adjustment for Normal, Recurring Seasonal Patterns

Seasonality adjustments are designed for short, exceptional conversion-rate events — a three-day flash sale, a product launch with a credible conversion-rate lift — not for predictable annual patterns that Smart Bidding already prices into its model.^[2] Applying a manual adjustment to an event the system already recognizes can cause bid inflation without a corresponding conversion benefit. Research across 6,000 advertisers found that accounts using manual seasonality adjustments during Black Friday/Cyber Monday experienced 2× CPC inflation and declining ROAS on an annual basis, compared with accounts that allowed Smart Bidding to manage the period without manual intervention.^[3]

Use an adjustment only when you have historical evidence of a conversion-rate lift that Smart Bidding’s training data cannot fully anticipate — for example, a brand-new promotional format, a first-ever flash sale, or a sale with an entirely new audience segment. Base the percentage on observed historical lift, not an aspirational estimate.^[2]

11.3 Making Multiple Simultaneous Major Changes

Changing budget, bid strategy, Target ROAS, campaign structure, conversion actions, and creative at the same time — even with good intentions — makes it impossible to distinguish genuine seasonal performance from algorithmic disruption. Google’s Smart Bidding guide recommends adjustments of approximately ±20% and waiting at least one conversion cycle between changes.^[9] Stacking changes collapses that diagnostic space entirely.

The corrective rule is sequential staging: make structural changes (conversion actions, campaign structure) at least four weeks before the peak; make bidding-target changes two to three weeks before; make budget changes one to two weeks before; leave creative as the only variable during the event itself.^[10]

11.4 Leaving Expired Promotion Assets and Countdown Ads Running

An expired promotion asset that continues to serve communicates a discount that no longer exists. This creates a mismatch between the ad and the landing page, damages Quality Score, and can generate policy issues if the gap between the advertised and actual price is material. Countdown customizer ads that have passed their end time either stop rendering the countdown or display a zero-day counter — neither of which is acceptable messaging.

Schedule promotion assets with exact start and end times, including the correct time zone. Create a corresponding evergreen asset as a fallback so that when the promotion asset expires, a valid non-sale ad is immediately available to serve.^[5]

11.5 Evaluating Peak Performance Before Conversion Lag Resolves

Conversion windows of 7, 14, or 30 days mean that transactions made on Black Friday may not appear in the Google Ads interface until well into December. Cutting budgets or raising Target ROAS targets on December 1 based on an “underperforming” Black Friday is a common and costly error: the campaign may be performing exactly as planned, with conversions simply not yet attributed.^[1]

Before making any post-peak target changes, confirm the conversion window length for each campaign, add that number of days to the last event date, and wait until that date before treating performance data as final.^[1]

11.6 Ignoring Impression Share Lost to Budget During the Ramp Period

Impression share lost to budget is the most direct signal that a campaign is leaving money on the table due to insufficient spend capacity. During the ramp period — typically two to four weeks before peak — teams should check Search Impression Share Lost to Budget at least weekly and treat any figure above 15% as a trigger to increase budget, provided incremental conversions remain within the target CPA or ROAS.^[10]

Impression share data should be read alongside conversion rate and CPA trends. A campaign losing 20% of impression share to budget while maintaining a CPA well below target is a clear signal to expand spend. A campaign losing impression share to budget while CPA is already at or above target requires a different intervention — improving Quality Score, tightening keyword targeting, or adjusting bids — before simply adding budget.

11.7 Applying Data Exclusions to Genuine Peak Performance Data

A data exclusion should be used only when conversion tracking itself was broken — a tag outage, a payment-processor failure, a CRM import error — not because performance was disappointing or CPAs were elevated.^[16] Excluding valid Black Friday or holiday data from Smart Bidding’s training set removes the most valuable seasonal signal the system has. The following year’s seasonal model will be weaker as a result.

If conversion tracking is verified as intact and the peak produced high-CPA conversions, the correct response is to evaluate whether the Target ROAS or Target CPA was set appropriately for the auction environment — not to erase the period from the model. Reserve data exclusions strictly for periods where the underlying data is known to be inaccurate.^[16]

11.8 Failing to Separate Promotional and Evergreen Campaigns

Running sale and non-sale messaging in the same campaign or asset group creates conflicts: the system may serve an expired discount headline alongside a standard product ad, and budget pacing is impossible to control at the offer level. Google recommends creating seasonal asset groups within existing Performance Max campaigns — or separate seasonal campaigns for Search and Shopping — with asset-group scheduling to activate and deactivate time-limited creative independently of evergreen assets.^[14]

11.9 Setting Target ROAS Too High During Elevated-CPC Periods

A Target ROAS calibrated against a normal-season CPC of $2.50 becomes structurally unachievable when Black Friday CPCs rise by 22%–26%.^[7] Smart Bidding will reduce bids to protect the ROAS constraint, shrinking impression share precisely when demand is highest. The correct approach is to plan a ROAS target that accounts for the expected CPC increase — or to switch to Maximize Conversion Value with a defined budget cap during the peak window — and to make that change gradually at least several days before the event.^[1]

11.10 Overlooking Mobile and Site-Speed Issues Before the Peak

A landing page that loads in 6 seconds on mobile during a normal week will experience magnified abandonment when traffic spikes three-fold during Black Friday. Load-testing, checkout validation, promo-code functionality, and CRM lead-routing must be completed before the ramp begins — not during the peak when engineering teams are unavailable and every failed conversion carries a materially higher CPL.^[12]

12. What Changed Recently: Last 30 Days to October 2026

This section covers confirmed changes and clarifications in Google Ads seasonal and promotional functionality in the 30-day window ending October 12, 2026. Where official documentation does not confirm a change, that is stated explicitly rather than inferred from third-party commentary.

12.1 Seasonality Adjustments: No Material New Features

Google’s official documentation indicates no material new capability was added to seasonality adjustments in the 30 days through October 12, 2026.^[2] The Google Ads API documentation was updated on October 4, 2026, and continues to describe seasonality adjustments as short-event signals for anticipated conversion-rate changes — not as budget controls or ROAS-target overrides.^[17] The current confirmed scope remains unchanged:

• Supported campaign types: Search, Standard Shopping, and Display campaigns using Target CPA or Target ROAS; Performance Max and App campaigns using all supported bid strategies.^[2]
• Not supported: Travel campaigns remain excluded from seasonality-adjustment eligibility.^[2]
• Recommended duration: 1–7 days; Google warns that adjustments exceeding 14 days may be less effective.^[2]
• Operational lead time: Create the adjustment at least two business days before the promotion begins.^[18]
• No post-event negative adjustment required: Smart Bidding is designed to normalize after the adjustment window expires without a manual reversal adjustment.^[2]

12.2 Promotion Assets: No Format or Eligibility Changes

The most recent Google promotion-asset documentation was updated October 8, 2026, and describes existing functionality rather than announcing a new format, eligibility rule, or deadline change.^[18] The following confirmed current-state details apply to US advertisers planning Q4 2026 promotions:

Feature	Current confirmed state (October 2026)	Source
Promotion asset campaign-level availability	Account, campaign, and ad-group level	[18]
App campaign support	Confirmed available; Google AI determines placement	[18]
Display and YouTube placements	Supported; Google AI selects when and where assets appear	[18]
Black Friday occasion date range in Google’s system	October 15–December 15 (use actual offer dates within this window)	[5]
Format change in last 30 days	None confirmed in official documentation	[18]
Recommended submission lead time	At least 2 weeks before launch for review and approval	[14]

12.3 Performance Max: Holiday Asset-Group Guidance Reaffirmed

Google’s Performance Max seasonal guidance, most recently updated in the documentation refreshed through October 2026, continues to recommend creating holiday-specific asset groups within existing Performance Max campaigns rather than building separate campaigns for seasonal periods, which would reset campaign learning.^[14] Key confirmed practices:

• Use asset-group scheduling to activate seasonal creative on the exact start date and deactivate it on the exact end date, leaving evergreen asset groups running continuously.^[14]
• Submit seasonal assets at least two weeks before launch to allow sufficient review time, given that approval queues lengthen near major retail events.^[14]
• Keep the promotion asset and landing page offer consistent: discount amount, eligibility, dates, promo codes, and available inventory must match across all surfaces.^[18]

12.4 Smart Bidding Exploration: Confirmed Availability

Smart Bidding Exploration remains available as of October 2026 for eligible Search campaigns. Google’s published data indicates that using Smart Bidding Exploration — which allows the system to pursue incremental conversion volume beyond the current ROAS constraint — can deliver approximately +10% additional conversions compared with simply lowering the Target ROAS manually.^[19] This figure is a vendor claim based on Google’s own data and should be treated as directional rather than a guaranteed outcome.

For seasonal planning, Smart Bidding Exploration is most relevant during the ramp period when the objective is to expand reach before the peak without manually loosening ROAS targets campaign by campaign. No change to its eligibility criteria or interface was announced in the 30 days through October 12, 2026.^[19]

12.5 No Changes to Data Exclusion Functionality

Data exclusions for Smart Bidding remain unchanged in scope and behavior. The tool continues to serve one function: preventing Smart Bidding from training on or evaluating periods where conversion tracking was materially inaccurate due to a technical failure.^[4] No update to eligibility, interface, or API behavior was confirmed in the 30-day window. The separation of use cases — seasonality adjustment for anticipated conversion-rate changes, data exclusion for broken tracking — remains the operative framework.^[16]

12.6 Practical Implications for Q4 2026 Planning

Given the absence of material product changes in the last 30 days, Q4 2026 seasonal planning should proceed on the basis of the established framework with the following confirmed current-state parameters:

Decision point	Confirmed current guidance	Timing for BFCM 2026	Source
Submit seasonal assets for review	At least 2 weeks before launch	By November 13, 2026	[14]
Create seasonality adjustment (if warranted)	At least 2 business days before event	By November 24, 2026	[18]
Begin budget ramp	Several days to 2 weeks before peak	November 17–23, 2026	[1]
Make Target ROAS adjustments	Gradually, in ~20%–30% increments, days before peak	November 17–24, 2026	[9]
Maximum seasonality adjustment duration	1–7 days; over 14 days may be ineffective	November 27–December 1 (5 days)	[2]
Budget headroom for major retail holiday	Up to 3× expected spend; 2× if no historical benchmark	Set by November 23, 2026	[1]
Post-event wind-down period	Staged over approximately 2–3 weeks	December 2–16, 2026	[5]
Evaluate BFCM performance (30-day conversion window)	After conversion window closes	December 27, 2026 (earliest)	[1]

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References

1. [1] https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/15624876?hl=en support.google.com
2. [2] https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/10369906?hl=en support.google.com
3. [3] https://www.optmyzr.com/blog/google-ads-bfcm-2026/ www.optmyzr.com
4. [4] https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/9352512 support.google.com
5. [5] https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/2880335?hl=en support.google.com
6. [6] https://www.webfx.com/blog/ppc/google-ads-benchmarks/ www.webfx.com
7. [7] https://www.rockingweb.com.au/google-ads-benchmarks-by-industry-2025/ www.rockingweb.com.au
8. [8] https://www.triplewhale.com/blog/google-ads-black-friday www.triplewhale.com
9. [9] https://services.google.com/fh/files/misc/gda_smart_bidding_guide.pdf services.google.com
10. [10] https://ceohangout.com/seasonal-ppc-forecasting-budget-models-compared/ ceohangout.com
11. [11] https://hawksem.com/blog/seasonal-ad-strategies/ hawksem.com
12. [12] https://www.marketingsystems.com.au/blog/preparing-google-ads-for-peak-season www.marketingsystems.com.au
13. [13] https://databox.com/google-ads-forecasting databox.com
14. [14] https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/11546049?hl=en support.google.com
15. [15] https://www.practicalecommerce.com/time-sensitive-offers-in-google-ads www.practicalecommerce.com
16. [16] https://www.quantumadslab.com/seasonality-smart-bidding www.quantumadslab.com
17. [17] https://developers.google.com/google-ads/api/docs/campaigns/bidding/seasonality-adjustment… developers.google.com
18. [18] https://business.google.com/us/accelerate/resources/articles/supercharge-business-growth/ business.google.com
19. [19] https://business.google.com/us/accelerate/podcasts/ads-decoded-s1e4/ business.google.com