The Fake Digital Ads Taking Over Social Media

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In This Issue:

🛠️ Jyll Saskin Gales on Google's Responsive Search Ads and how their new updates document might affect your campaigns.

👀 Fake “immersive city” videos are taking over TikTok, and brands are scrambling to join

🎁 Google Ads launches new features to help advertisers prepare for the holiday season

📈 Yelp ad revenue rises 14% as advertisers shift towards performance marketing

🛍️ TikTok tries to kickstart its commerce program by replacing top shopping executive with retail veterans

🏠 YouTube will now show a blank homepage if you don’t have watch history on

📺 YouTube tests recommended viewing shelf in channel display

🐶 Google Business Profiles now let you say if you let pets in your store

This Week in Google Ads: Responsive Search Ads and More

Every Wednesday, our Google ads correspondent Jyll Saskin Gales walks us through the latest platform changes.

✅ This week: Responsive Search Ads, “Ad Strength” vs “Quality Score,” auto-generated campaign assets, and much more!

📺 WATCH NOW

Say Hello to 'FOOH': Your Next Ad Buy?

From giant Barbies to mascara-applying trains, city streets, and online feeds are getting taken over by a new ad format: FOOH.

👁️ All Aboard the Eyelash-Flaunting Ad Train

By now, you may have seen the viral campaign featuring an underground train in London flaunting eyelashes that get coated with Maybelline’s “Lash Sensational” mascara as it rolls into the station. In just a few days, the video had more than 46 million views and 2 million likes.

@maybelline

📣 All aboard the Sky High Mascara Express ✨🚄 After hitting the NYC Streets, we’re taking over London💂🇬🇧 We are on the move with #SkyHighMa... See more

But it's not a real ad, it's a CGI creation. Adweek reported today that a Californian digital artist was behind the Maybelline campaign. He has now coined the term "faux out of home" or "FOOH" to describe this new medium: a video format showing a concept that could exist in real life, but instead is enhanced by CGI.

Quoting the report:

"FOOH offers advertisers and agencies the chance to explore the ambiguity between reality and digital manipulation, along with a shot at internet virality in the process. However, with the creation of fake content comes a responsibility to disclose it, and questions about the value it drives for brands."

🚂 Big Brands Hop On the FOOH Express

Several major brands are already on board. The digital artist has worked on commercial stunts for a luxury label featuring 3D handbags racing through Paris streets.

Other advertisers are also seeing results from FOOH.

Adidas made a splash in December, projecting a computer-generated billboard onto the Dubai Frame, garnering 100 million organic views within two days. While a social media agency brought a colossal CGI Barbie breaking free from her toy packaging to the streets in the same market.

Despite its triumphs, some anticipate a limited lifespan for the CGI trend, with several design agencies currently scouting CGI artists to join their ranks.

Images: TikTok / Instagram via Ian Padgham / Adweek

Google Ads Tweaks Its Platform Ahead of Holiday Spending

With only 19 Mondays left until Christmas Day, brands and advertisers are working on their marketing checklists. On that front, Google Ads launched several new features yesterday ahead of the holiday season, including:

Enhanced Insights: the platform is providing more product-related data now, such as:

• Stock inventory

• Missing feed information

• High bidding targets like ROAS

Inventory Ads Update: Google Ads has reduced the average onboarding time for local inventory ads and introduced a new local store unit ad format. This new format combines available inventory data from your local product feeds with imagery and information from your business profile to showcase your store to potential customers.

New A/B Experiments: You can now quantify the impact of online-only bidding vs. Smart Bidding for store visits and store sales by running A/B experiments. This feature is currently available for Standard Shipping campaigns but will soon expand to search campaigns.

Expanded Search Top Slot Access: this interactive ad format displays business information, such as operating hours, and prompts customers who have shown local shopping intent (like searching “near me”) with the right business actions, such as directions or calls.

Image: Google

Yelp’s Sees Strong Ad Demand with Shift to Performance-Based Buys

Yelp recently reported better-than-expected ad revenue in its second quarter of 2023 as advertisers shifted towards performance marketing.

Advertising revenue increased 15% from the second quarter of 2022, reaching $322 million. This also contributed to a 13% year-over-year boost in total income, reaching $337 million, exceeding expectations of $325 million.

The success was driven by a rise in average cost per click which was up 15% year-over-year, and increased revenue per location across services and Retail & Other categories

Company executives noted a pivot away from brand advertising and towards performance marketing, citing the latter's ability to provide marketers with a more effective means of monitoring and tracking ROI.

TikTok: Top Shopping Exec Out, Amazon/eBay Alumni In

TikTok's latest push for its upcoming e-commerce platform has claimed an executive victim — the company replaced its top shopping executive this week with two retail veterans from its online shopping competitors.

Reports say the company has hired two new e-commerce executives who worked at Amazon and eBay as well as Meta to lead its U.S. e-commerce division.

Meanwhile, sources say TikTok’s U.S. e-commerce general manager is leaving the company. The move marks the departure of the second senior executive within two months, following the Chief Operating Officer's exit in late June, who allegedly left due to tensions with the CEO.

The restructuring comes as TikTok's CEO tries to build a U.S. e-commerce business through a new service called Shop. The company has been developing its own supply chain and fulfillment operations with logistics partners and preparing to sell its own products, as well as recruiting brands to sell through the platform.

YouTube: You Give Us No Data, We Give You Blank Screen

YouTube is changing how users see content recommendations on the app based on their Watch History settings — which could mean less reach for your brand's content.

Now, if users have YouTube watch history turned off, their YouTube home page will literally be empty. YouTube says it's because they lack prior watch history data, so they wouldn't know what to put there, which is nonsense, of course — they've been filling it with suggested videos since the start of the platform, regardless of whether they have watch history data.

But no, instead of showing suggested videos, a vacant homepage will appear. Users will only see the search bar, along with the Shorts, Subscriptions, and Library buttons.

Yesterday, Google said it’s rolling out this feature “over the next few months,” but several users are already seeing the change.

👀 New "For You" Section

So while YouTube is giving users an all-or-nothing ultimatum when it comes to their watch history settings, it is also testing a new way to make the homepages of individual channels more personalized for viewers through a new “For You” section that recommends videos based on their viewing history.

Users cannot opt out of the test. But once the feature is rolled out to everyone, YouTube says brands and creators will be able to control whether the recommended section will be shown on their channels and which content types will be displayed.

Images: YouTube

Google Business Profile Adds New 'Pets' Attribute

Google has unleashed a new pet-friendly attribute to Business Profiles. Now businesses can specify if dogs are allowed inside and/or outside their brick-and-mortar locations.

It looks like the feline overlords will have to wait for a cat-friendly attribute.

Image: Google

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