Google Ads gives advertisers information about the number of clicks, conversions, and leads or sales. But these figures don’t always indicate that the ads are attracting new customers to a company or that they are reaching customers who were already intending to buy.
Google Ads Conversion Lift studies can help advertisers better understand this difference. They conduct experiments to this end to try to estimate the number of extra conversions that the ad will bring, allowing businesses another means of measuring their ads.
An individual is, for instance, already in the practice of scheduling an appointment at a dental clinic. Sees a Google ad, clicks a link for an appointment – may be credited to the Google ad based on tracking and attribution settings. The person may have made an appointment even if they did not see the ad. The advantage of it is that it allows advertisers to make an estimate of the lift that their advertising has generated by comparing the results of different groups of ads.
What Is Google Ads Conversion Lift?
Google Ads Conversion Lift is an experiment that estimates the additional conversions generated by advertising. It helps advertisers understand whether their campaigns are creating extra sales or leads instead of looking only at the conversions attributed to their ads.
For instance, a business could get 100 website conversions from Google Ads campaigns. Some customers may have come across the company through advertising; others may have had an intention to buy the company’s products and services.
Conversion Lift applies a controlled experiment to compare eligible-to-see ads with a group that is not eligible to see ads. The difference in their conversion rates gives a good idea of the impact of the ads.
It provides businesses with another method of assessing the value of their advertising, especially if they want to know if their campaigns are producing extra sales or enquiries.
Why Are Google Ads Conversion Lift Studies Getting More Attention?
Clicks, conversions, cost per conversion, and return on ad spend are the most popular metrics used to assess the effectiveness of any advertising campaign. These are quantifiable, but not necessarily representative of the additional impact of advertising.
For example, if the customers are already familiar with the business, or close to the conversion point, then a campaign might generate a lot of conversions. By measuring conversions, Conversion Lift provides marketers with insight into whether their ads actually generate more conversions when they are shown or not.
This can be beneficial when deciding the budget for a campaign or whether to continue a particular advertising campaign. Businesses can also look at the estimated incremental results in addition to attributed conversions when considering their current campaigns.
This can also prove helpful when multiple Google Ads accounts are in use, and the advertiser wants to let the client know how the ads are doing, in order to help them understand the value of their investment.
How Does Google Ads Conversion Lift Work?
Google Ads Conversion Lift works by measuring the conversions for a group exposed to ads and comparing it to another group that wasn’t exposed to ads during the experiment.
It begins by picking ad campaigns and the conversion actions that are relevant to the business. They can be purchases, submission of leads, or other conversion activities that are supported.
Google tracks the outcomes of these two groups and makes a comparison in terms of conversions. The difference in conversion rates between the two groups can be used to approximate the potential increase in conversions from the ad campaign.
If the ad group makes 60 bookings and the control group makes 40 bookings, for instance, the difference could be the result of advertising, and therefore be considered an incremental effect. It is a simplified illustration and experimental results take into account the experimental design, group sizes, and statistical uncertainty.
Google Ads advertisers can leverage the results with their typical Google Ads reporting to better inform their budget and performance decisions.
Google Ads Conversion Lift Metrics Advertisers Should Know
Conversion Lift has metrics to allow advertisers to measure the additional outcomes of their campaigns.
Incremental conversions are the estimated number of additional conversions caused by advertising. The incremental cost per action (iCPA) is the cost of each additional conversion, and incremental return on ad spend (iROAS) is the additional value of each conversion relative to advertising costs.
For instance, if the campaign generates 200 additional conversions on a $10,000 budget, then the incremental cost per conversion would be $50.
This is in addition to other metrics that need to be taken into account, including lead quality, closed sales, and profit margins.
Is Google Ads Conversion Lift Available to All Advertisers?
Google Ads Conversion Lift will provide valuable insights, but it’s not available for all advertisers. Advertisers must verify that their account, campaigns, and conversion actions meet Google’s eligibility criteria.
According to Google, there should be at least 1000 conversions and at least $5000 of the campaign budget for user-based study. It has to be an active campaign, and it doesn’t apply to all studies.
Here are a few things that advertisers must take into consideration: the campaign types that support conversion are Search, Display, Video, Demand Gen, App Campaigns, and Performance Max, but the App campaign for iOS and Travel Ads are not supported.
This type of measurement for conversion lift would be more useful for the advertisers, but note that accounts must be eligible for this requirement.
Conversion lift vs Standard Google Ads conversion tracking
Google Ads conversion tracking measures actions like phone calls, purchases, and form fills based on the setup of the account. This allows the advertiser to measure the performance of the campaign and know which conversions are from their ads.
Conversion Lift works differently because it measures the extra conversions that result from an experiment. In addition to clicks, conversions, and cost per conversion, advertisers can use incrementality testing to see whether their campaigns create incremental conversions.
Final Thoughts
Advertisers should be watching Conversion Lift in Google Ads, which can help advertisers figure out if their ads are making sales or just getting credit for making the sales.
However, there are certain requirements for this feature, and it might not work for some businesses. The results need to be analyzed along with other conversion results, lead quality, sales, and ad cost.
Conversion Lift gives another way for businesses and advertisers to measure the performance of their Google Ads campaign. It can be used along with conversion tracking to have a detailed view of the campaign performance.
