In order to create a more personalised experience for people searching online, Google Ads has added two new audience segments – Affinity Audiences and Seasonal Event Segments for In-Market Audiences. For affinity audiences Google Ads has innovated a number of new features that help sharpen targeting and improve the service’s value for money. Along with seasonal event segments, they’re an indication of where Google envisions digital marketing going in the future.
But what do they actually do?
Affinity Audiences
An affinity audience is a collection of people who are passionate about a particular subject. This audience is based on information gathered on their lifestyles, interests and habits, with Google Ads’ categories including: Banking & Finance, Beauty & Wellness and Home & Garden. Affinity audiences have been available to use in display campaigns for some time but are now also included for search campaigns. The best search campaigns in which to use Affinity Audiences are upper-funnel campaigns, to create awareness of your brand, product or service.
Seasonal Event Segment for In-Market Audiences
Advertisers can find various Seasonal Event Segments within the In-Market Audiences category in Google Ads. Events include Black Friday and Christmas, and using these segments will help advertisers to focus their ads on those people who are actively searching for related products during different times of the year. The best campaigns in which to use In-Market Audiences are lower-funnel campaigns, when people are close to conversion and the point of purchase.
What are the benefits of these new audiences for advertisers?
There are three main advantages to Google Ads introducing the new audience segments, with the overriding theme being that they will enable advertisers to create more targeted ads for users, which should lead to better performance.
You will have more information in order to create more focused ads
With more detailed information now available about users, advertisers can ensure that this intelligence is utilised when creating copy for adverts and landing pages and deciding how much to bid. This in turn should improve performance.
You will reach more people
When a new audience is introduced by Google Ads, one of the key benefits is that your reach is improved in your campaigns. New customers are driven to your website, which helps remarketing campaigns perform better as they reach even more users.
You can devise a better Audience Strategy
With more audience options available in Google Ads enabling you to customise and optimise ads to target the people most likely to convert, now is the time to amend your business’ audience strategy for 2020. Your improved reach and ad relevance, combined with a customer’s search intent, are the key ingredients required for a very effective audience strategy.
Curious about what else is changing with Google Ads? Why not find out what’s going on with PPC trends in 2024?