How to Leverage Google's AI Revolution to Upgrade Digital Advertising
The new search experience on Google, which now includes AI Overviews and AI Mode features, allows for an interactive conversation with the search engine. The AI era is not only changing the way we search on Google, but also how we advertise. Here’s how to adapt your advertising strategy to the AI revolution
AI is changing the world of digital advertising from beginning to end. Marketing professionals in organizations are at the forefront of this revolution, and to succeed, they must understand how it is changing the way we all search for and consume information. The new search experience on Google opens up unprecedented opportunities for business growth and efficiency. It's time to get to know the new tips and tools for advertising on the search engine and the web in the age of the AI revolution.
The Big Change: From Searching for Information to Searching for Solutions
The search experience on Google is undergoing a fundamental change, from presenting information to being a tool with smarter understanding and response capabilities. Today, people come to the search engine with more complex and longer questions, and more and more people are also searching using voice and images. "Our search behavior has changed", says Ohad Touati, Product Specialist at Google Israel. "If we once searched for 'Italian restaurant in Tel Aviv,' today we ask 'what is a recommended Italian restaurant for a romantic date in Tel Aviv with vegan options"? According to Touati, "we are no longer satisfied with dry answers, but expect comprehensive solutions, ideas, and inspiration. AI allows us to do just that: to move from an informative search to a real conversation with the search engine".
According to him, "out of more than 5 trillion searches a year, 15% of the search queries asked daily on Google are completely new. This is an amazing statistic that shows how creative people are". In addition, "we are seeing more and more long searches, instead of single keywords." Other data shared by Touati: "Among young users, visual search is particularly popular, with 1 in 5 searches on Google Lens being with the intention of purchasing a product or service".
Meet the New Search Experience on Google
The most significant innovations in the world of search are already transforming our search habits. As marketers, it's essential to understand them.
The first is AI Overviews, which has become one of the most important and successful launches in the search field in the last decade. "You've probably already come across the search feature that recently made its way to Israel", says Touati. "AI Overviews presents a smart and quick summary of information on the results page, with links to expand on the sources, in response to relevant search terms."
AI Overviews
The positive impact of this feature is evident. In the US and India, we saw an increase of over 10% in the use of Google for the types of queries that display an AI overview. AI Overviews encourages users to visit a wider range of sites, and users are more likely to click on links included within the AI overview rather than the traditional search results, creating new opportunities for content discovery and presentation.
In addition, "clicks from results pages with an AI overview are considered higher quality for sites, meaning that users tend to spend more time on the sites they visit", notes Touati. Currently, ads exist as usual above and below the AI Overviews, and in the US, are integrated into the AI overviews themselves to allow advertisers to meet consumers at critical moments of decision-making.
The second innovation is AI Mode, which has not yet been launched in Israel and is currently relevant to those searching and advertising in the US. "If AI Overviews is an upgrade, AI Mode offers an interactive conversation with Google, with questions in natural language and AI-based answers, including links for further reading. AI Mode is excellent for questions that require in-depth investigation, comparisons, or analysis. For example, instead of searching separately for 'flights to Rome,' 'hotels in Rome,' and 'things to do in Rome,' we can ask: 'Plan a 5-day trip to Rome at the end of September, with an emphasis on historical sites and trendy restaurants, on a budget of up to $1500 for flights and hotels.' AI Mode will provide us with a detailed plan that includes recommendations for flights, hotels, daily itineraries, and even tips for restaurants from various sources", explains Touati.
In addition, AI Mode can generate data-based graphs in real time and provide comprehensive textual analysis. In the future, users will be able to share data between our various platforms to enable a personalized experience. This means that if a user searches for a recommendation, the system will understand their specific preferences and know how to provide the most suitable answer.
AI MODE RESEARCH
How to streamline your business's advertising so you can continue to succeed and grow?
1. Maximize your AI performance - data is the fuel
"The basis of any successful AI strategy starts with strong and reliable data", says Touati.
To obtain reliable data, it is important to build a reliable decision-making engine: Start by connecting your Google Ads account with your first-party data, which includes information from your website, CRM systems, and any other data you own. In addition, update the tags in your data manager to ensure accurate and efficient data collection that will reveal new signals.
Then, it's important to measure the right data to reach the desired conclusions. "It's not enough just to collect data; you also need to know how to measure its impact", says Touati. Use experiments to test the added value of your campaigns. The budget tool in Google Analytics and advanced measurement tools for advertisers like Meridian will help optimize your marketing budget and understand exactly what works.
2. Improve content with AI - creating creative with superpowers
"Quality content and tailored creatives are critical to the success of AI-based campaigns," says Touati. "AI-based campaigns can reach wider audiences, but the message needs to be engaging and personalized".
To help turn your creative vision into reality faster and at no cost, Google is making its advanced AI models, Veo and Imagen, available directly within its advertising platforms, enabling the creation of videos and images, respectively. "This means that you can easily create impressive visual assets, such as turning a static product image into a short, dynamic video", explains Touati. These tools will soon be integrated into Google Ads and Merchant Center for easy image and video creation.
In addition, it is important to adapt the content for search engine optimization (SEO): "Even in the age of AI, and perhaps especially so - SEO remains important", emphasizes Touati. "It's important to try to think about how your content will be most useful and relevant to the users themselves. AI can help you identify hot trends and topics for creating content that will serve you".
3. Adopt advanced marketing strategies - like Performance Max and AI Max for search campaigns
After you've learned about the relevant tools, data measurement, and the importance of great creatives, it's time to actively use AI-based advertising tools in your Google Ads campaigns and see results.
Touati recommends, "Adopt the smart combination of Performance Max, designed to reach across all of Google's digital assets like Search, YouTube, and Display, in addition to your dedicated search network campaigns". He explains that AI Max for search campaigns "prepares your search campaign for the future, improves performance, and helps capture new search terms, so that the number of impressions of your ads will increase. In addition, the campaign will be able to generate personalized creatives, which helps improve the click-through rate (CTR) of your ads, and provides the most suitable landing page, so that the conversion rate after the click (CVR) is also expected to improve". All of these together create a perfect user experience.
The future is already here - it's worth joining it
"AI understands our search intent, and that's how it helps us find the information we are looking for in a better way", Touati explains. "Google is building an intelligent and personalized search that can handle the toughest questions and assist in performing tasks". For businesses and organizations, Google Search continues to be a powerful way to turn user curiosity into new discoveries and informed decisions. "The artificial intelligence revolution opens up enormous business opportunities for organizations. Understanding the changes and preparing properly will allow you to leverage the power of AI to reach new audiences, create more meaningful customer experiences, and lead the organization to growth".
