Creating and Deploying Responsive Ads

Digital Marketing - Study Notes:

Guidelines

Responsive display ads are ads that automatically adjust their size, appearance, and format to fit available ad spaces on the Google Display Network. You simply upload your assets, such as images, headlines, logos, videos, and descriptions, and then Google puts them together in different combinations.

To create effective responsive display ads, keep these guidelines in mind:

• Use clear, concise messaging.
• Consider how the headlines, body copy, and images work across all formats.
• Check how your responsive ads look in different ad placements via the preview window on the right of your screen. And
• Aim to create three or four unique responsive display ads per ad group.

We’ll dig deeper into these guidelines as we proceed through the topic.

Focus on quality

From the outset, keep in mind that it’s important to focus on quality when you’re designing responsive ads. This not only helps improve campaign performance, but it also affects how the platform algorithms work. Higher quality ads perform better in ad auction, as platforms like Google and Meta want to create high quality experiences for their users.

So don’t rush the ad-making process. Taking time to produce quality assets for your responsive ads will positively impact performance and increase ad quality scores, which can reduce CPCs (or cost per clicks) and CPAs (or average cost per actions) over time compared to your competitors.

There are also as number of AI enhancements in Google Ads campaigns which can assist in image and video creation. Also, partnerships with Canva, Smartly, and Pencil Pro can seamlessly integrate your creative production with the Google Ads Asset Library (where all of your creative is stored).

Visual assets

Let’s start with images.

Choose images that will engage your audience in a meaningful way by demonstrating the product or the positive outcomes of using it. For example, a travel ad could show images of people enjoying a meal during a vacation or a subscription TV ad might show people relaxing on a sofa.

The images you create should be fresh and interesting, not clichéd or forgettable. Take some time to think about how the product impacts the end user and look for additional insights from your creative brief, media brief, or other documents to help you generate captivating ideas for your ads.

Be sure to check any AI-created ads to ensure they align to your brand guidelines. Also, sense-check the messaging. By uploading a sample image to Google Ads, you can also add brand standard guidelines to Google Ads to help the generative AI create assets using your preferred font types and brand colors.

When it comes to images and videos for responsive ads, you can create your own images with the help of a photographer or graphic designer, use existing images and logos from your website, or select from the range of stock images available in Google Ads, as well as the AI-powered creative production options from Google Ads or your Product feed. You can also choose videos from your YouTube channel to include as part of your responsive display ad options.

You should be aware of the guidelines regarding file sizes, aspect ratios, and dimensions when creating responsive ads and make sure you meet the various specifications. If you don’t meet the requirements, your ad may not be shown in your preferred placements.

Tips

Here are some tips to help you choose or create high-impact image and video assets:

• Ensure all assets are unique for maximum performance.
• Use interesting and attractive, branded, high-quality imagery and videos.
• Where possible, avoid images that are skewed, unclear, color-inverted, or overly filtered.
• Unless part of the creative execution, avoid using upside-down images, images with borders, or blurry images.
• Avoid excessive text overlays that block the focus on the image.
• Ensure logo overlays don't block the focus on the image.
• Ensure CTA buttons are clickable and truthful. For example, video play buttons should play a video rather than opening a webpage. And
• Be mindful that blank space shouldn't take up more than 80% of the image. Collages and digital composite backgrounds are also not recommended.

Text

A responsive display ad has several different text elements. These include short headlines, long headlines, descriptions, and calls to action. Let’s examine each of these elements.

Short headlines

You can add up to five short headlines to your responsive display ads, up to 30 characters each. Stay within the character limits and be aware that headlines sometimes get truncated on some websites even when they fall within the limits.

When writing short headlines:

• Include prices, promotions, and exclusive offers.
• Don’t punctuate the end of a short headline.
• Don’t use the exact same text in a headline and description. And
• Don’t use your business name as a short headline.

Long headline

Responsive display ads let you add a single long headline up to 90 characters in length. Use the long headline to clearly state your brand or product’s value proposition in a way that’s interesting and useful to users.

When writing long headlines:

• Don’t punctuate the end of your long headline.
• Don’t use the exact same text in the long headline and short headlines. And
• Ensure the long headline can stand alone because it might be shown without description text.

Descriptions

Responsive display ads allow you to add several longer text descriptions. You can add five descriptions at 90 characters each and one business description up to 25 characters.

When writing descriptions, remember that:

• Descriptions are shown alongside short headlines, not long headlines. And
• Description copy should be written to complement short headlines.

Calls to action (CTAs)

You can set a CTA manually, based on the action you want people to take, or let Google choose it automatically for you.

Don’t exclude websites that only allow text ads. It is best to always include one text ad for the GDN in your ad group, as many display partners do not allow image ads on their websites but do allow text ads. This way, you make yourself more eligible to be shown on the GDN.

Demand generation ads

Demand gen is a specific campaign type that shows ads on Google properties to show a breadth of products or services using native ad formats immersive and engaging ad formats to target audiences

This is particularly useful to allow your audiences to target customers with a range of items that they might be interested in based on your campaign targeting choices and Merchant Center product feed data.

Take advantage of the AI-powered creative formats where animations, videos, images, and other assets can be created from your product feed. The AI functionality for creative production will allow you to create new images, and edit existing images from sources such as your product feed. You can also add or remove objects, extend backgrounds, and adjust image sizes. Much of this functionality is available on all product feed, image, or video-based campaign types in Google.