Google’s recent Performance Summit has come and passed. You probably heard or read about some of the changes company officials said would come to AdWords, including the new expanded text ads that are set to hit the advertising platform later this year. You will want to be prepared for this coming revolution in the way you can build and display your business.
Although Google’s push for mobile and its response – an allowance for more prominent headlines and longer description lines – could seem simple enough to handle, these basic changes to the display network could have you rethinking your ads for weeks or months. It will pay to get a handle on the new format before its lands for commercial use. For the rest of this brief preparation, let’s consider an ad with the following headline and two description lines:
Headline: Custom Linux Desktops (21 characters) Description Line 1: Break Into Ubuntu Today. (24 characters) Description Line 2: Personalize Your Tower. (23 characters)
Longer Headlines
Concerning your allowance for headline characters, soon you’ll be able to move from the current limit of one 25-character headline to two 30-character headlines. This will give you more room to attract potential customers and will even increase space for the professionals who make use of extended headlines available in today’s AdWords.
Extended headlines are those that grab the first description line and move it into the headline. For our sample ad, this results in, “Custom Linux Desktops – Break Into Ubuntu Today.” These types of users may have an easier time adjusting to the new rules because that example of an extended headline already fulfills the requirements of what the new AdWords will accept.
Users with normal headlines may want to consider moving the first description lines into the headline. Assuming the description is short enough and makes sense in the flow of text, this type of transition could make marketers lives a lot easier.
Longer Description Lines
Google will soon also make the switch from two 35-character description lines to a single 80-character line. If you follow the advice above with our sample headline, the only description left will be “Personalize Your Tower.” You can do much better than that single statement by offering users information about the type of operating system versions, personalized graphic cards, or monitors offered at the desktop shop.
No matter your market, this increased description space means to give you a better chance to gain new customers. Google’s push for mobile means that it wants you to offer more to the consumer up front (more information in your headlines) that will lead interested buyers to even more content below the fold. A space of 80 characters means you have 10 more characters than before, and if you look at the broader picture, a movement of the most salient description to the new second headline gives you even more room to be creative.
To recap: you will soon have two headlines and a single, bigger description area to describe your business. You can begin to prepare your existing ads for the coming changes by moving the most important information into the two headlines and saving your details for later. Mobile users appear to brighten to the idea (Google showed a 20 percent clickthrough rate increase in early testing), and the desktop/laptop dedicated will have access to your best content as well. Start brainstorming now and contact Atria for all your PPC management needs.