Google Game Changer. Google is currently introducing a very important feature in their search results: Product Listing Ads (PLA). This will probably be quite a game changer in AdWords marketing for many industries, and we are currently testing it for one of our customers by invitation from Google.
What is PLA?
Product listing ads shows images, prices and links to the actual products that users are searching for – showing up in the right hand corner of the search result as you can see on the screen dump below. The visual representation fo the product and the actual price makes this result much more interesting than most traditional AdWords ads, that generally does not include images and often are less specific.
How does it work?
For now, the new ads are only being shown to a small percentage of searches. In order for this to work, the advertisers need to upload a feed of their product database to Google – preferably on a daily basis with an automatic setup. When the product feed is correctly setup, a connection to AdWords is made and you can start bidding a maximum Cost Per Click, almost similar to how AdWords search bidding works.
How do you get started?
We believe that especially advertisers that have a large product portfolio and are in very competitive industries should be prepared for this change as soon as possible. So if you are selling for example clothes, shoes, electronics, auto equipment, bikes and bike parts, you should get ready for when PLA is available for all advertisers. Preparing the product feed would be an important milestone, that can be done now – and then you will be ready whenever Google open the gates!
Contact us if you would like to hear more about Product Listing Ads, and discuss how important this change is for your business.