Google Introduces New Conversion By Time Reporting
Google has released six new conversion columns that can be used to track conversions and conversion value based on the day of the conversion occurs.
This allows advertisers the ability to see a more accurate picture of what days are generating the most leads in real-time instead of having leads/value assigned to days in the past.
Here’s how the conversion by time reporting columns work and how to use the reporting to make optimizations to your account.
Six New Conversion Columns Based on Time
Google has introduced six new conversion columns which record conversions and conversion value on the day of the sale/lead.
These are an alternative to assigning conversions and conversion value to the day of the last ad click/interaction.
The new conversion columns which have been added to Google Ads are listed below:
- Conversions (by conv. time)
- Conv. Value (by conv. time)
- Value/Conv (by conv. time)
- All Conv (by conv. time)
- All Conv. Value (by conv. time)
- Value/all conv. (by conv. time)
The traditional conversion columns will continue recording conversion data based on the date of the last ad interaction.
Note: Google has backfilled the data for these columns in all accounts up to March 2, 2019.
Why Conversion By Time Reporting Matters
The introduction of these new columns will help advertisers and clients more accurately align PPC data with their internal sales numbers and learn which campaigns generate sales/leads more quickly than others.
This is yet another addition from Google that encourages users to think outside of the typical PPC mindset of last-click attribution and more about when conversions actually happen, as opposed to when the last interaction took place.
For clients with longer conversion cycles, it can be difficult to analyze performance and adjust intraday bids and budgets due to the way in which conversions have historically been assigned.
With these new columns, we’re now able to see the performance for specific days which we’re looking at data for instead of data that is retroactively assigned.
A Solution to Conversion Lag Problems
Some clients close out their reporting months early when there is still an opportunity for PPC lag conversions to accumulate.
This means that there are a lot of PPC-influenced conversions that are never assigned the credit which they deserve since there was not enough time left for lags to be assigned.
By utilizing a combination of the old conversion columns and new columns, you can develop a strategy to help bridge the gap between lag conversions and the activity which is taking place in your account each day.
More Insights for Making Intraday Adjustments
These new columns are giving us as practitioners more information to leverage when making intraday adjustments within our accounts.
If we spot specific campaigns having strong success during the day, we can quickly adjust budgets and bids in order to keep on generating volume from those campaigns.
In the Q4 holiday season, this will be crucial as we’re able to see how today’s spend is affecting today’s order volume and pivot our strategy accordingly.
If we see a campaign that generally looks strong when looking at “last 7 days” is not doing well for today’s performance, we can now re-evaluate budgets and fund campaigns that are doing well today.
How to Use Conversion By Time Reporting
We recommend search and shopping marketers to check these new columns out as you’re optimizing the next few weeks into the holiday season.
Get ahead of your data now and start learning which of your campaigns are generating conversions faster than others (as signified by higher conv. by time) so that you can prepare for Black Friday and Cyber Monday.
We also recommend sharing these new metrics with your client and discussing how you can incorporate them into your reports and analyses to help prove more value for your client.
You may end up learning that your clients care more about daily performance than they do larger lookbacks at performance such as daily/weekly due to the way lag conversions are assigned.
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