A recent change by Google Ads could increase impressions by 3 to 10 percent for advertisers that use Shopping campaigns but opt out of the Search Partners network. Search Partner Performance The default setting for Google Ad campaigns is to include Search Partners. Advertisers can then segment performance by network to see how their clicks perform on Google Search versus Search Partners. Search Partners Mystery What sites are Search Partners? Search Partners come and go. Core Search In the past, Google Images results have been part of the Search Partners bucket. This is because Google Images was previously a part of the Search Partner Network. If your campaigns are not currently opted into the Search Partner Network — your ads will start showing on Google Images and as a result there may be a 3-10 percent increase in traffic at lower cost-per-click and comparable conversion rates. Sincerely, The Google Ads Team Since these results pages are all images, the only ads that fit have been Shopping ads. If you opted into Search Partners, then impressions will shift slightly from Search Partners to Search if you’re segmenting your data by network.
A recent change by Google Ads could increase impressions by 3 to 10 percent for advertisers that use Shopping campaigns but opt out of the Search Partners network.
Here’s what you need to know.
Google Versus Partners
Google is a search engine. You go to Google.com, type in a search, and almost instantly receive a page of relevant search results.
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However, many other sites use the Google search platform, too, when people search on those sites. These sites are called Search Partners. For example, here is the same search for “auto insurance quote” performed on Ask.com.
Looking at the first ad from Progressive, we can see that Ask.com is using Google to produce these results because the ad text is identical. Ask.com is serving many more extensions on the ad, but the H1, H2, and Description 1 lines are identical. The four sitelinks are also identical but in a different order.
This arrangement is presumably beneficial for Search Partners because they don’t have to maintain an enormous index or operate an ad exchange. They just tie into Google and then split the revenue from ad clicks.
Search Partner Performance
The default setting for Google Ad campaigns is to include Search Partners. Advertisers can then segment performance by network to see how their clicks perform on Google Search versus Search Partners. To do this, click on the Segment icon (three horizontal lines next to the Filter icon which is a funnel) and select Network (with search partners).
Click image to enlarge.
You will then have multiple rows of data for each campaign. I’ve seen accounts where performance was better with Google Search. For others, Search Partners was better or roughly the same.
Search Partners Mystery
What sites are Search Partners? You won’t get a straight answer from Google. Search Partners come and go.
Fortunately, Google provides advertisers the option of opting out of Search Partners. Under Settings in any campaign is Network option. Once expanded you can enable or disable the…
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