- \n
- Setting up conversion tracking so you feed the machine good data<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Campaign and asset group structure and targeting<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- A pre-optimisation checklist for the learning period<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
Why can you trust this guide? <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n
Because it was written by me… Ed Leake. 👋<\/p>\n\n\n\n
- \n
- I was co-founded in 1982<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- I’ve run my digital agency for over 13 years now<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Managed over $250 million in ad spend (keeps going up)<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Operate the Agency Forge for high performing PPC agency owners<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Created the highly rated God Tier Ads training product<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Invested in ad tech with AdEvolver<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- And other stuff besides…<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
But before diving in, ask yourself: Are my search campaigns performing?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If not, then I recommend you stop here and fix them before even attempting Performance Max. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
If the fundamentals aren\u2019t right, Performance Max is probably not going to work for your account.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Otherwise, let\u2019s proceed. Or if you\u2019re already comfortable with this part, jump to my guide on Performance Max optimisation techniques<\/a> to scale revenue and conversion volume.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Performance Max: The good, the bad, and the ugly<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Performance Max is a prediction engine, so it\u2019s only as good as the inputs that it\u2019s given, so you have to feed it good information. That means accurate conversion tracking, as well as first- and third-party data.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Then, give it some money\u2014lots of money. The complex bit is in the middle (not the ads), and then you profit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If only it were that simple.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Alas, Performance Max is no magic bullet. It\u2019s more like a .50 barreled shotgun that you aim blindfolded with one arm tied behind your back. If your search volumes are low, PMax is just going to blow through your budget.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So what’s good about Performance Max<\/strong> (before we kick it in the netherregions)?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
- \n
- It performs well, especially in an existing account\u2014provided you\u2019ve already got data and conversions.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- It\u2019s simplified. There\u2019s not a lot to do in terms of campaign management, particularly for lead generation campaigns.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- It allows you to cover a wider variety of Google Ads inventory. You\u2019ll get yourself on Display, Gmail, Discovery, and other networks.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
And now, the aforementioned kick. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The bad bits about Performance Max are:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n
- \n
- Reporting is pretty awful. There\u2019s no reporting on inventory or split between networks. If I want to know how much is being spent on YouTube, I can\u2019t see that without an API connection.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- It cannibalises brand search\u2014which is annoying, but Smart Shopping did that as well.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- There are issues with the quality of leads that come through Performance Max.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- It can overspend like mad. Display is a big network, for example.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- It\u2019s prone to spikes in ad spend and bidding. This is essentially a machine and sometimes, it will chase a rabbit down a hole.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- There\u2019s always a learning phase; Google calls it the ramping phase. There\u2019s a lot of chop initially, particularly on a newer campaign or younger accounts.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- If you\u2019ve got a low amount of data, it doesn\u2019t perform very well. If you get five conversions a month, Performance Max probably won\u2019t work for you.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- RIP Smart Shopping.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
If you can live with that, I\u2019ve got just what you need.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Common questions about setting up Performance Max campaigns<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
How do I manage Performance Max campaigns?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n
Performance Max is a black box. Your biggest levers are the data you feed into the system a.k.a. financial and conversion data. Your next biggest levers are budget, bidding, the way you group things and, to a much lesser degree, audiences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Where can I find accurate conversion data?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Analytics imports have lost their edge over time, so no more until we know how good Google Analytics 4 can become. You want the Google Tag, enhanced conversions, and primary and secondary conversions\u2014primary to bid against, secondary for monitoring and analysis. You may migrate some of those secondaries to primaries, or you may just test them on certain campaigns.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When should I avoid using Performance Max?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Don\u2019t replace your existing campaigns with Performance Max if they\u2019re working \u2014 with the exception of Smart Shopping, which has been deprecated in favour of Performance Max. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
If your Search campaigns are delivering value and they\u2019re gravy, why would you replace them with Performance Max? <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Performance Max is not designed to replace Search campaigns<\/strong>, particularly for small accounts and budgets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What do I need for Performance Max to work?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Google recommends\u2014it\u2019s not a prerequisite\u2014that you have conversion tracking. I suggest that if you don\u2019t have conversion tracking set up, you don\u2019t go anywhere near Performance Max.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For shopping-focused accounts, you need a merchant feed and conversion tracking. It helps to also have a few responsive search ads, image ads, and video ads\u2014Google will create awful videos for you without this.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Also, if you can\u2019t hit the minimum conversion threshold\u2014around 30 per month\u2014you certainly shouldn\u2019t be going all in on Performance Max but instead, trusting your tried and true search campaigns.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What\u2019s the best Performance Max campaign structure?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
The perfect Performance Max campaign structure doesn\u2019t exist (you probably saw that answer coming). Keep it simple to start, especially if you don\u2019t have a lot of data split by campaign, if you need budget and bidding control.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For asset groups, just think of ad groups and ad relevance. And answer these questions about the images and text ads you\u2019re putting together, or the information you provide to Google to put ads together on your behalf:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
- \n
- Does this ad make sense for every single thing in this asset group?<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Does the ad fit what the audience needs?<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Is it the best ad to serve for everything in this asset group?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
If the answers are not \u201cyes, yes, yes\u201d, then split the asset group.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
With audiences, less is more. Two is fine, but don\u2019t add more until Google figures it out (and ignores what you tell it to do anyway). More audiences equals wider targeting. And layering audiences really does work if you\u2019ve got the data.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
How do I use audience signals in Performance Max?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
When you start out, you want a specific custom segment. Take your top 15-30 keywords from research campaigns and put those in a custom segment. That\u2019s effectively your in-market audience, and you apply that as your audience signal. You could also blend another segment on top of it; competitive URLs or category terms, for example. I\u2019d stick to the specific search terms that have been working for you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If yours is a newer account and you don\u2019t have that search term data, should you even be doing Performance Max at this stage? No. But if you really want to, you have to do the keyword research, put them in a custom segment, add competitor names and URLs, and just keep it relatively simple.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So that would be one or two audiences and it\u2019s really enough.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This is not hearsay or best practices pulled from my backside. I\u2019ve seen this work in real accounts with real ad spend.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Can you run with no audiences? I wouldn\u2019t recommend it, but you can. Technically, you don\u2019t need an audience. They\u2019re used as signals, so they steer Google. \u201cCan you try going in this direction first?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But Google quickly moves beyond those signals, and you will see this in the reporting tab under the insights area of your asset groups. Inside the campaign, it shows you the different audiences that are triggering, and you\u2019ll see quite quickly that those are not audiences that you necessarily added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
How do I use Performance Max for new customer acquisition?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
As with Smart Shopping, you can run new customer acquisition bidding strategies for both lead gen and ecommerce. You can use this feature to instruct Performance Max to go after \u201cnew\u201d customers only.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Remember, the tracking isn\u2019t perfect. What Google sees as a new customer might not actually be \u201cnew\u201d e.g. their cookies expired. Don\u2019t expect 100% accuracy, but this bidding strategy is heavily biassed towards new customers and new users for your website.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For ecommerce, lifetime values are typically higher, particularly if you have a rate of repeat customers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For lead generation, it\u2019s less important. Mid-size to larger accounts will certainly benefit from testing. If you\u2019re a local plumber servicing the neighbourhood, it\u2019s probably not that important (and you probably won\u2019t want to be using Performance Max anyway).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
New customer campaigns have to be separate because it\u2019s a separate bidding strategy. You should expect the ROAS to be lower for ecommerce and cost per acquisition (CPA) to be a bit higher for lead generation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.godtierads.com\/articles\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/06\/image.png\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\nSo what about that first option? It\u2019s essentially bidding higher with additional value, which you have to see in your reporting and add manually. So if you had a conversion that was worth \u00a3100, whatever you add here will be added to your conversion value metrics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This inflates your ROAS, but it also has a requirement: You\u2019ve got to upload a list of at least 1,000 active members for any given network. That\u2019s why it\u2019s worth testing the adjusted, recommended, and pure new customer bidding.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Reporting is pretty basic, quite frankly. Under your conversion segments, there\u2019s \u201cnew versus returning\u201d for a look at how Google is tracking these different customers. Be prepared to see quite a discrepancy. You might be as low as 20-30% of new customers being tracked and a large chunk of them unknown, but it\u2019s still worth testing. At the very least, you can monitor incremental gains.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Just be sure to keep updating the customer list you upload to keep the data fresh as new customers come in. Once every week or two is ideal, depending on the size of your business.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Finally, there\u2019s your unspent budget. A higher daily budget gives Performance Max some wiggle room to expand. This is particularly important for ecommerce where you might have a bit of flux and seasonality, where you want some headroom to spend more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I\u2019d also avoid being budget limited, unless you\u2019ve got a very good reason for it. When you review your spend, if it\u2019s 80% of your current budget, see that excess budget as some room for Performance Max to expand into. Don\u2019t go overboard, because Performance Max is on Display and there can be some sharp, shocking spends on that network if you\u2019re not too careful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
How does Performance Max affect other Google Ads campaigns?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
It\u2019s a mixed bag. Generally speaking, Performance Max is given priority about half the time. One good thing is that keywords still hold their own. It\u2019s nice to see they\u2019re not dead (yet).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
- \n
- Search: Exact Match still rules the roost, and that will de facto take over. Broad and Phrase Match are a little bit different; they\u2019re based on ad rank. So if Performance Max outranks your Broad and Phrase matches, it will appear instead.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
- \n
- Standard Shopping: Performance Max will eat Standard Shopping, sadly.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
- \n
- YouTube In-stream: Again, it\u2019s based on ad rank.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
- \n
- Display: Performance Max takes over by default.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
- \n
- Discovery: Also based on ad rank.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
- \n
- Static vs. Dynamic Product Ads: Some advertisers don\u2019t know about this. Google tailors dynamic remarketing ads to people who visit your website. What they can do with the assets you provide is show a category-level image or advert, or show specific products that people browse. This depends on cookie tracking and buyer behaviour.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
- \n
- Remarketing: It\u2019s not true remarketing in Performance Max. Your audiences are nothing but signals, and as we discussed Google quickly expands past them. That means you can\u2019t do dedicated, targeted remarketing with Performance Max.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.godtierads.com\/articles\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/06\/image-1-1024x262.png\")
<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\nFinal checks before optimising new Performance Max campaigns<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Minimum ad spend<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
- \n
- Lead generation<\/a> accounts should be spending much more than a couple of thousand dollars\/pounds\/euros a month.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
- \n
- For ecommerce accounts<\/a> in a similar range or less, expect a lot of choppiness with Performance Max. You\u2019ve pretty much got to use it unless you want to heavily (and manually) optimise Standard Shopping.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
- \n
- For B2B specifically, I\u2019d typically avoid it altogether. If you\u2019re tapped out on all networks, you can\u2019t spend more, you can\u2019t get more convergence, you\u2019re just struggling to expand, but you\u2019ve got your conversion stages and qualification in place\u2014then and only then would I consider testing Performance Max.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
Location targeting<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.godtierads.com\/articles\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/06\/image-2.png\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\nGo to your location options and look for where you\u2019re opting people in from. The one recommended by Google is probably not ideal for most people, because it pulls in people from all over the place. This is a hidden setting, so remember to adjust it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Final URL expansion: on or off?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Google recommends you leave this on, but not many people realise that means Google can create entirely dynamic (read: less than ideal) ad content. This acts a bit like dynamic search ads in that it\u2019s pulled from the page\u2019s content.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.godtierads.com\/articles\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/06\/image-3.png\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\nIf you\u2019re absolutely not sure, turn it off to start with and you can always turn it back on. As a bare minimum, exclude your less important pages and ones that simply don\u2019t convert.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If you use final URL expansion, also include the new page feed to improve matching. Don\u2019t be lazy and skip this. But also know that Google can still expand beyond your page feed. Still, it\u2019s better than not having one at all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Don\u2019t fiddle with changes<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Once you\u2019ve created a new campaign, avoid big changes; keep bidding and budget tweaks to a minimum.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If you\u2019ve got less than 30 conversions per month, start with a higher CPA target. If you\u2019ve got 30-50 conversions per month, start with a lower ROAS target. It\u2019s not ideal, but it gives the bidding engine<\/a> a bit more room to pull in conversions and get that data in. Then you can adjust your CPA down or ROAS up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You\u2019ll want a few weeks of data or at least 30 conversions before raising bids. The exact window depends on the volume of impressions, cost, and conversions you get. But expect the first couple of weeks to be a bit choppy; even the first month. If you\u2019re really lucky, the first week is choppy and then it levels out quite quickly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Upload all your assets<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Add the minimum number of headlines and descriptions, your logo, videos if you\u2019ve got them, images, and tailored extensions. Anyone can write five decent headlines. It\u2019s not like responsive search ads where you write 15 headlines that don\u2019t really make sense together or aren\u2019t unique, but five is doable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.godtierads.com\/articles\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/06\/image-4.png\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\nIf you need inspiration, here\u2019s a freebie. This will scrape the search results for you, and there\u2019s also free competitor reconnaissance training. You\u2019ll get a . I can\u2019t say more than that. Review your competitors\u2019 offers and positioning, and write better adverts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If you need inspiration for your imagery and video, Google has developed the Creative Studio. It\u2019s okay; if you\u2019re really in a rut, you can use some of their templates. They\u2019re not awful. The video templates are certainly better than the automated things that Performance Max puts together. Give that a whirl; it\u2019s completely free.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Exclude unsuitable content<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.godtierads.com\/articles\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/06\/image-5.png\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\nNeed to exclude content keywords across the account? This works on Display and YouTube. Stop your ads from showing on sensitive topic content, parked domains, YouTube live streams, and so on. By default, I would exclude live streaming and parked domains. They\u2019re just wasteful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Respect the learning period<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
You\u2019ve created your campaign, set your budgets and bidding strategy, uploaded your assets, and gone live.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Stop.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It\u2019s not time to optimise yet\u2014this is the patience game. Google recommends six weeks of time and ad spend to allow the machine to learn, which is easy to recommend when it\u2019s not their money.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Is six weeks accurate? You can\u2019t predict this, so don\u2019t try.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It can be half that (or more), but let\u2019s be cynical and assume it is six weeks. There\u2019s no point setting up a Performance Max campaign and one week in saying, \u201cOh, it\u2019s not converting. It\u2019s spending too much money. Pause it, scrap it, game over.\u201d You\u2019ll just be wasting your time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Set aside a budget that you can comfortably live with for those six weeks, even if the campaign doesn\u2019t perform as well as you\u2019d hoped. Obviously, if you\u2019re in week two or three and it\u2019s absolutely going tits up, overspending with zero conversions, nuke it and rethink it. But patience is super important.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You can tweak it, but the more you touch it in the early days, the worse it will perform. You can also artificially delay gratification by overcomplicating your setup with too little budget. If you\u2019ve only got $50-100 to spend a day, rein it in. You want a single campaign with an asset group or two. For ecommerce, that should be a specific category that you know sells and will get volume through it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There\u2019s no point trying to stretch a tiny budget across 50 things. You won\u2019t accumulate enough data to make an informed decision in six months, let alone six weeks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Next steps: Follow my Performance Max review timeline<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
I know I said not to predict the timeline, but I can\u2019t let you go empty-handed. So here\u2019s my process to review new Performance Max campaigns.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You go live in week 1, and weeks 2-4 are for your learning and ramp-up phase. Now you\u2019re a month in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At week 5, apply your conversion lag when you review this period. Ignore week one, but you want 3-4 weeks of data plus conversion lag. If you go to attribution and path metrics, look for your average data conversion to see your lag. Some people have a few days, some have weeks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.godtierads.com\/articles\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/06\/image-6.png\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\nLet\u2019s say your conversion lag is a week; a nice, round seven days. You review weeks 2-5 and then optimise. Don\u2019t just review an arbitrary month, including that first week; exclude that first week of chop. If it\u2019s not too messy, you might be able to include it (this is rare).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If you\u2019re comparing Performance Max to another campaign, keep this chop and learning period in mind for a fair comparison. You might want to cut out that first week or two.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
- For B2B specifically, I\u2019d typically avoid it altogether. If you\u2019re tapped out on all networks, you can\u2019t spend more, you can\u2019t get more convergence, you\u2019re just struggling to expand, but you\u2019ve got your conversion stages and qualification in place\u2014then and only then would I consider testing Performance Max.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
- For ecommerce accounts<\/a> in a similar range or less, expect a lot of choppiness with Performance Max. You\u2019ve pretty much got to use it unless you want to heavily (and manually) optimise Standard Shopping.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
- Lead generation<\/a> accounts should be spending much more than a couple of thousand dollars\/pounds\/euros a month.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
- Remarketing: It\u2019s not true remarketing in Performance Max. Your audiences are nothing but signals, and as we discussed Google quickly expands past them. That means you can\u2019t do dedicated, targeted remarketing with Performance Max.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
- Static vs. Dynamic Product Ads: Some advertisers don\u2019t know about this. Google tailors dynamic remarketing ads to people who visit your website. What they can do with the assets you provide is show a category-level image or advert, or show specific products that people browse. This depends on cookie tracking and buyer behaviour.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
- Discovery: Also based on ad rank.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
- Display: Performance Max takes over by default.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
- YouTube In-stream: Again, it\u2019s based on ad rank.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
- Standard Shopping: Performance Max will eat Standard Shopping, sadly.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
- Search: Exact Match still rules the roost, and that will de facto take over. Broad and Phrase Match are a little bit different; they\u2019re based on ad rank. So if Performance Max outranks your Broad and Phrase matches, it will appear instead.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n