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While Google is a mainstay for advertising campaigns, its increasingly opaque “black box” approach presents some unwelcome challenges for agencies, from reduced visibility into click data and automated management options to diminished support for advertisers seeking to optimize campaigns. Consequently, some agencies have shifted their processes and capabilities to compensate for having less control over optimization levers.
To navigate this murkier digital landscape, a strategic mindset and innovative tactics are crucial. Below, 17 members of Forbes Agency Council share their best insights into how agencies can navigate Google’s ad campaign options, get the best out of the platform and achieve the results clients are counting on them to deliver.
1. Create Strategies For Detailed Audiences
One tip to navigate Google’s “black box” is to focus on detailed audience segmentation and personalized creative strategies. By understanding and targeting specific audience groups and continuously testing your ad creatives, you can create highly engaging and effective campaigns. This approach helps to compensate for the reduced visibility into click data and limited optimization control. - Seth Geoffrion, Vrrb
2. Collect First-Party Data From Multiple Sources
One tip for navigating Google’s “black box” in healthcare marketing is to leverage first-party data. Collect data through your website, contact forms, customer relationship management systems and patient surveys, with consent, to create precise audience segments. This compensates for the lack of click data visibility and enhances compliance with healthcare regulations. - Christy Saia-Owenby, MOXY Company
3. Set Your Campaigns To Run Manually
Managing ad campaigns on Google these days is like playing whack-a-mole. To turn off its automated management, you must find Advanced Settings, then look for hidden checkboxes, or else Google will change your ad copy and budget without notification. Google has become an advertiser’s biggest competitor, not a partner. I recommend declining all Google recommendations. Set your campaigns to run manually. - T. Maxwell, eMaximize
4. Integrate Additional Tracking Solutions
In order for “black box” automations to work effectively, the client’s conversion tracking must be tight. Automated algorithms use conversion rate and price plus target return on ad spend in order to determine cost per click. With first-party cookie tracking diminishing on mobile phones, we have had to integrate additional tracking solutions and feed the data back into Google to improve attribution. Otherwise—fewer sales! - Michael Fox, Corberry Digital
Forbes Agency Council is an invitation-only community for executives in successful public relations, media strategy, creative and advertising agencies. Do I qualify?
5. Expand Your Toolbox
Don’t rely on just one tactic. Even if Google is your go-to option, continue to test other products and experiment with other practices. Each tactic will yield slightly different results depending on the objective, but that will only enhance the precision of your insights. Expanding your toolbox beyond Google enables you to make more informed decisions for your clients. - Robin Clayton, Fifty-Five
6. Maintain Full Transparency
While I strongly advise continuing to work to research, test and build deep expertise in Google Ads to navigate the changes, I think all of that is a given for a great pay-per-click agency or brand team. My biggest advice is to make sure that there’s full transparency on how things are going, what we can and can’t see happening, and what we’re doing to figure it out. Don’t give excuses; bring stakeholders in. - Corey Morris, Voltage
7. Complement Automated Processes With Client Data
Leverage first-party data. When you use the data you collect directly from your client interactions, you are able to improve your targeting precision and gain valuable insights that complement Google’s automated processes. - Arian Ghotbi, Cyrus Digital
8. Leverage Automated Bidding
Leveraging Google’s automated bidding through accurate enhanced conversion data helps you to focus on the fundamentals. Essentially, the product-to-market fit, relevancy of creatives and landing page experience can always be improved. Top-line revenue is now a larger part of the conversation between business owners and digital marketers. - William Polson, Australian Internet Advertising
9. Use Third-Party Reporting And Optimization Tools
Divest from reliance on Google’s proprietary tools. Remember, Google’s goal is to make as much ad revenue as possible; their optimizations have shifted from better targeting to how to get the most spend out of a campaign through optimizations that tilt toward higher CPC spends. Marketers will still need to place ads on the Google ad networks, but use third-party tools for reporting and optimizations. - Tyler Back, Mitosis
10. Deep-Dive Into User Behavior
Prioritize context, content and CRM by leveraging analytics tools to deep-dive into user behavior on your website and social media. Learn about interactions and preferences to connect the dots between the content presented and the context in which it’s consumed. By discerning patterns and trends, you’re empowered to optimize campaigns with precision. - Christina Mendel, EYUKO
11. Provide High-Quality Creative Assets And Clear Goals
To navigate the “black box,” we should focus on providing high-quality creative assets and clear campaign goals. Trust the machine learning algorithms to allocate budgets and bids effectively, as they are trained to refer to historical data to make the bids. Regular monitoring and analysis of campaign data remains crucial for us to make informed adjustments and maintain transparency with clients. - Prashanthi Kolluru, KLOUDPORTAL
12. Establish Accurate And Quality Data Optimization Signals
Everything starts with data—quality in, quality out. Establishing accurate and quality data signals for optimization that align with business objectives is paramount for life in a “black box.” It is only from there that you can attempt to appropriately test and optimize whatever remaining levers exist, given which black box you are tapping into (such as creative, bid strategies, audiences or keywords). - Alex Yastrebenetsky, InfoTrust
13. Partner With Influencers To Test Ad Content
One effective way to combat Google’s “black box” approach is by leveraging brand-specific influencers and tracking conversions using first-party tracking links for each influencer. This will not only tap into the influencers’ relevant audiences that match the brand, but it will also provide the brand with an abundance of content to A/B test for boosted advertisements outside of Google. - Mark Cunha, My People Know
14. Measure Results Using Meaningful Business Goals
Marketers who relied on Google click data were fundamentally lazy. They were relying on data that provided little insight into the outcome of campaigns, using what are termed “vanity metrics” instead. The best marketers understand what they are trying to achieve with each campaign and measure the results using meaningful business goals. Google is right to discourage advertisers to use simplistic click data. - Mike Maynard, Napier Partnership Limited
15. Boost Your Website’s DA With Brand Mentions
Nowadays, optimization is also about mentioning your brand’s name in reputable sources, driving the website’s domain authority higher. Collaborations with influencers, mentions in outlets, strong social media presence boost the brand’s ranking on search engine results pages by mentioning the brand name, placing backlinks and raising awareness among the audience, prompting them to use search engines to find the business. - Michael Kuzminov, HypeFactory
16. Closely Evaluate Business Results
We are evaluating the platform not based on its transparency in optimizations, but on the business results it delivers. While Google provides distinct advantages, today, every platform enables a full-funnel experience coupled with AI-based search, diminishing the exclusivity of Google. Shifting from optimization to closely evaluating business results will define our approach to evaluating Google. - Oksana Matviichuk, OM Strategic Forecasting
17. Focus On Defining Specific Audience Signals
Focusing on audience signals is key. We put a lot of effort into defining our ideal customer profile, including demographics, interests and pain points. The more specific our audience targeting, the better Google’s algorithms can optimize ad delivery and show our messaging to the most relevant people. - Frederik Bussler, Bussler & Co
