A lot of interesting things happened at Google this week with new dimensions and metrics in Google Analytics 4, a big drop in Google’s ‘People Also Ask’ SERP, Google Ads’ new ‘Ads Creative Studio’, Google Cloud’s first Arm-based VMs, and more.
ICYMI, here’s what happened at Google This Week.
- New Improved Google Ads Location Targeting Options
- Web Data Support for Google Ad Manager Integration
- New Dimensions and Metrics in Google Analytics 4
- Google Search Console Video Indexing Report Now Available
- Big Drop in Google’s ‘People Also Ask’ SERP
- Four New Performance Max Campaigns Features
- Google Business Profile Posts Expires After 6 Months
- Google My Business Mobile App No Longer Available
- Google Cloud’s First Arm-based VMs
- New Google Business Profile Toggle Feature for Hiding Address
- Google’s New Ads Creative Studio
New Improved Google Ads Location Targeting Options
Google Ads has added new location targeting options for your campaigns that let you better control who is seeing your search ads in Google. The new Google Ads location targeting options let you set who sees the ads and who is excluded from the ads.
With advanced location targeting controls, you can target based on physical “Presence” or “Presence or interest”. If you’re using a product feed, you can exclude by “Presence” or “Presence or interest,” similar to Smart Shopping.
Web Data Support for Google Ad Manager Integration
Web data reporting in Google Analytics 4 is now supported through links established to Google Ad Manager publisher networks.
With this addition, publishers will now be able to report on Google Ad Manager web and app ad monetisation in GA4 and will be able to report on GA4 behavioural data across web and app in Google Ad Manager Analytics reports.
New Dimensions and Metrics in Google Analytics 4
Google Analytics 4 has announced new dimensions and metrics, enabling users to see bounce rate, additional UTM parameter values, and conversion rate across various surfaces, including explorations, segments, audiences, reports, and the Google Analytics Data API.
The bounce rate is calculated in Google Analytics 4 differently from how it’s calculated in Universal Analytics.
Google Search Console Video Indexing Report Now Available
Google has added a new report to Search Console that will help you understand how your videos perform in search results. Google said the video indexing report is rolling out “gradually over the next few months, so you might not see any changes for now”.
In addition to the new video indexing report, Google has updated the URL Inspection tool with the ability to check the video indexing status of a specific page.
Big Drop in Google’s ‘People Also Ask’ SERP
Multiple sources have confirmed that Google seems to be showing the ‘people also ask’ feature a lot less often now on desktop.
RankRanger:
SEMrush:
Tool provider SEMrush and RankRanger said that the decline was isolated to desktop devices, which started last Thursday.
Four New Performance Max Campaigns Features
Google has added four new features for Performance Max campaigns to help advertisers understand and diagnose issues, plus to improve performance. The new features are seasonality adjustments, data exclusions, optimisation scores, and explanations.
With these four new features, Google is giving advertisers more control and transparency over their Performance Max campaigns.
Google Business Profile Posts Expires After 6 Months
Google has sent out email notifications to users utilising Google Posts that their posts will now expire after six months and will not be highlighted on their Google Business Profile.
Google mentioned, “to keep attracting customers, get into the habit of sharing updates, exclusive events, and more“.
Google My Business Mobile App No Longer Available
The Google My Business mobile app has officially stopped functioning for iOS and Android. The mobile app no longer allows users to manage their business profile, communicate with customers, or see insights.
When Google rebranded from Google My Business to Google Business Profile last November, Google mentioned they will retire the Google My Business app completely in 2022. Now, when you try to access it, the app says “the Google My Business app is no longer available”.
Google Cloud’s First Arm-based VMs
Google Cloud has announced the preview availability of new Arm-based VMs, as well as a fully-managed job scheduling system called Batch. Google said that the latest Tau T2A virtual machines are powered by Ampere Altra Arm-based processors.
The Arm-based VMs will form a new part of Google’s top-end Tau VM lineup, which is designed for scale-out workloads like large Java applications, web servers and media transcoding.
New Google Business Profile Toggle Feature for Hiding Address
Google Business Profile has added an option to hide business addresses to its customers using a “show business address to customers” toggle.
Now, business owners can toggle the “show business address to customers” off to hide their addresses from showing in Google Maps or Google Search.
Google’s New Ads Creative Studio
Google has announced that its Ads Creative Studio tool is now available to all businesses to provide a streamlined way of constructing new ad content from existing assets. With Ads Creative Studio, advertisers can create multiple versions of a single display or video ad.
The feature is now available for video and will soon be launched for display as well.
Thank You for Reading
Have you noticed any news about Google Cloud’s First Arm-based VMs or any other changes from Google this week?
Check back next Friday for the latest from Google This Week.
More Google-related articles? In Marketing We Trust got you covered:
