Audiences For Search Campaigns
How Can Audiences Help?
When it comes to search campaigns there are many different ways you can get your ads in front of users. Relying on keyword match types and location is a crucial aspect of running a basic campaign. Still, utilizing the different kinds of audiences your ads can reach will help you yield results that feel higher quality and more aligned with the service or product you are advertising.
Audiences in a search campaign are built upon your knowledge of the types of users (or consumers) you are targeting. They help guide the campaign by either setting standards or giving hints about where and who your ads are showing up for.
Different types of audiences can help build a better campaign, and they can all be used to their own unique advantage. Demographics will help you get down to the basics of the people you want your ads in front of. Affinity and in-market audiences are extra steps you can enable in the campaign to either help Google narrow down or expand the visibility of your campaign.
Not all audiences offered as affinity and in-market are compatible with a search campaign, so it's important to research what audiences are offered, how they align with your business or service, and what the user behavior/intent is behind each audience you want to target.
Observation vs. Targeting Audiences
There are two main ways you can use detailed demographics, affinity, and in-market audiences within your search campaign.
Observation:
This basically gives Google the ability to know which audiences you want your ads to show up for without limiting the campaign to just those audiences. It’s like telling the campaign that you want to gather data about how these audiences interact with your ads, who is converting more, and who is more expensive to run for while keeping your options open for new users who don’t fall under the categories to still have the chance to see your ads.
Targeting:
Using target audiences will give you the opportunity to really hone in on who you believe will be the most compatible with your ads. This method tells Google that you only want to show up in front of the users who fall under the category without room for others to come through. This works especially well when you have a consumer based in an in-market audience already pre-established by Google.
Different Types of Audience Targeting
Demographics targeting:
Demographic targeting is the basis of audience building within a search campaign. These can be considered the fundamentals of who you are trying to reach with your ads. The best rule of thumb for a more specific approach is to exclude any of the unknown audiences from the list below. This will help to filter out any unwanted traffic from bots, spam, or otherwise unlikely leads who won’t follow through with a conversion.
General demographic targeting options include:
Household income targeting
Gender
Age ranges
Detailed Demographics:
Detailed demographics are some of the more specific categories of users that Google has segmented out. These can include whether a user is married, if they are parents to children of different ages, whether they have obtained a high school education or higher, etc. If used comparatively, these demographics can give great insight into how your campaign is showing up and where the engagement is most valuable.
In-Market audiences:
In-market audiences reach out to potential customers who are actively researching or looking to buy products and services. It helps target potential customers who are actively searching for a specific product or service like plumbing companies or bakeries in their area.
Affinity Audiences:
Affinity audiences should be viewed as individuals/users who have a general, long-standing interest aligned with a specific Affinity Segment. This specific type of audience segmentation can be useful when trying to reach specific kinds of users based on their search history or user behavior online. It isn't an exact science, but it can help you get an idea of what kinds of audiences are engaging with your ads.
Audiences within a search campaign can make a huge difference when trying to figure out user behavior, intent, and ultimately what your conversion funnel might look like to different people and their searching habits. You may find that parents of teens are more likely to convert for services faster than parents of toddlers. People in relationships are more inclined to ask about certain services, and married couples go all in from the get-go.
These are all observations that can come with applying audience types to your ads, paying attention to how they perform on an ad group and campaign level, and investing in the people who want to invest in your business.
