Welcome to our eleventh episode of our “Fortnightly Digital Marketing News Roundups”.

We know it can be difficult to keep up with all the changes in the Digital Marketing industry. Many of us work in busy offices, sometimes barely having time to grab a sandwich or a coffee. So, we wanted to make it easier for all of you to know what’s going on.

Learn about the changes to Google Ads’ Delivery, Moz Free Tools and much more…

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    Transcript: 

    Martin: Hi everyone and welcome to episode 11 of the Blue Thirst Digital Brief. Today we have news to share about Instagram Reminders, Google Ad Delivery, Facebook Seasonal Marketing and much much more… Keep watching to be in the know…

    Emily: Instagram Creating Product Launch Reminders For Customers

    Katy: Google Ads’ switch all campaigns to standard delivery from 7th of October

     

    Katy: Microsoft Advertising will also deprecate accelerated delivery

    Martin: URLs Not Showing In Google Search Results

    Martin: Google Search Ad 360 Getting Auction-Time Bidding

    Katy: Moz launches Domain Analysis, a free tool for SEO metrics

    Martin: Machine Learning Will Be Used By Google Ads To Manage Ad Frequency When Cookies Are Missing

    Emily: New Facebook Tools to Help With Holiday Season Marketing

    Lucy: Location targeting is now available in Google Smart Shopping campaigns

    Lucy: Google have released a new Recorder App for the Pixel 4

    Emily: Instagram Creating Product Launch Reminders For Customers. Instagram is testing product launch reminders for customers. Customers can set reminders about products they’re interested in by including a new product launch sticker in their story or the product launch tag in their post. This is only available for a select number of brands while in the testing phase.This new feature, if fully rolled out, could help generate buzz around new products and encourage users to buy the new products on their launch when reminded – all generating revenue for brands.

    Katy: Google Ads’ switch all campaigns to standard delivery from 7th of October. On 7th of October, Google Ads removed the accelerated delivery option and automatically switched all campaigns to standard delivery. This change was applicable for search and shopping campaigns and shared budgets.Google announced back in August that they would be phasing out this delivery setting in a bid to move towards more machine learning. Google said the update has been made to “better optimise ad delivery based on advertiser’s goals and query contextual signals.” If you were running campaigns on accelerated delivery, you may notice a change in the way they spend and perform throughout the day. You may want to adjust your ad schedule accordingly.

    Katy: Microsoft Advertising will also deprecate accelerated delivery. Following Google’s change on the 7th of October of removing the accelerated delivery option. Microsoft Ads has announced they will also be removing this feature come 1st of November. This means that on this day, all Search, DSA and Shopping campaigns will automatically be switched to standard delivery. On announcement, Bing said “Standard budget strategy is a ‘smarter instrument,’ as it picks and chooses the right time to serve with the intent of optimising your performance based on multiple factors”. So if you are currently running your campaigns on accelerated delivery, be aware of this change coming up.

    Martin: URLs Not Showing In Google Search Results. Google seems to be testing removing URLs from the search result pages, instead the website name is shown. This change could impact the perceived authenticity of sites, resulting in a lower CTR for sites. Alternatively, it might benefit new sites/brands that cannot rely on the value of their domain. It’s suggested that this change wouldn’t change the SEO value of sites.

    Martin: Google Search Ads 360 Getting Auction-Time Bidding.The auction-time bidding which uses machine learning to set bids by taking into account multiple factors to predict performance is coming to Search ads 360. This is available in Google Search ads 360 now. During the beta trial for auction-time bidding in Search Ads 360 there was an average of 15-30% in conversions.

    Katy: Moz launches Domain Analysis, a free tool for SEO metrics.Earlier this month, Moz launched a new free SEO tool, called Domain Analysis. This new tool gives users an overview of a domain’s SEO data, reportedly ‘beyond-the-basics data’. This includes relevant keywords, top mined questions and top featured snippets.This tool is not only great for seeing how your site is doing, but for keeping an eye on competitor sites. Users are able to upgrade to the paid version of Moz to get more detailed reports, however this free tool is a great place to start.

    Martin: Machine Learning Will Be Used By Google Ads To Manage Ad Frequency When Cookies Are Missing. Google will use machine learning to manage ad frequency when third-party cookies are blocked. This will come to Google Display & Video 360 in the next few weeks, with plans to bring this to display in Google Ads. This can help reduce ad fatigue, as it can reduce the number of times users see the same ad.

    Emily: New Facebook Tools to Help With Holiday Season Marketing. Facebook has released new tools to help with holiday marketing. These include: customisable story templates, enhancements to Messenger and Instagram Direct and tips on holiday marketing. These new features are rolling out in the coming weeks to be ready for the holiday season. These new tools will help improve ads and ad experience and make it easier for companies to respond to clients.

    Lucy: Location targeting is now available in Google Smart Shopping campaigns. A recent update to Google Smart Shopping campaigns gives advertisers access to more specific location targeting for smart shopping campaigns. To review your location targeting, go to the settings tab in your smart shopping campaigns and targeting. Here you have the option to target and exclude specific locations. Previously, smart shopping campaigns would target all countries and territories. However, Google usually did a good job of only targeting the Merchant country of sale. This update gives you more control and granular targeting options for your campaigns.

    Lucy: Google have released a new Recorder App for the Pixel 4. The new Pixel Recorder app is heavily linked to Google’s voice AI. The new recorder can identify words, sounds and it can produce a searchable transcript with or without internet. Users can then search for words, phrases or sounds within recordings.At the 2017 Google I/O, Google’s CEO declared that the company would be shifting from mobile first to AI first. This new recorder app clearly supports these intentions. As Google continue to develop uses for voice recognition and AI, the way users are searching and interacting with brands is undoubtedly going to change.

    Martin: Thank you for tuning in to this episode. We hope you’ve learnt something interesting today and tune in again in 2 weeks for more top news.