Answering Your Top Questions About Performance Max

The AI Essentials help you get the most out of your AI-powered marketing campaigns. One essential is using Performance Max to multiply your results and conversions across all of Google’s advertising channels and inventory. Since Performance Max’s launch, we’ve heard your questions about it from various webinars, feedback you’ve shared with your account teams, advertiser roundtables, and more. Here are some answers. Check back as we will continue adding responses to new FAQs.
 

Question: Performance Max campaigns can feel like a black box. Why doesn't it offer channel-level reporting?

Question: I’m looking for lead quality and not just volume. How can I make sure I’m getting high-quality leads from Performance Max?

Question: I don’t want Performance Max to serve on my branded queries. What can I do to stop this?

Question: Can I use assets created using generative AI outside of my Performance Max campaign and Google Ads?

Question: I don’t have a big creative budget. Why do I need to include a video in my Performance Max campaigns?

Question: I need to win new customers to grow my business. Is Performance Max just remarketing to existing customers?

Question: My business has strict brand guidelines. Is Performance Max brand-safe?

Question: I’m already targeting store locations in my Performance Max campaign for store goals. Should I also apply geo targets?

Question: What's the ideal campaign structure for Performance Max campaigns?
 

Question: Performance Max campaigns can feel like a black box. Why doesn't it offer channel-level reporting?
 

For advertisers who are well-versed in mining raw data to analyze and understand campaign performance, we know Performance Max is a change from what you’re used to. Performance Max optimizes your results across all of Google’s advertising channels rather than in single-channel silos. It intentionally doesn’t show channel-specific KPIs because looking at aggregate ROAS or CPA for a single channel within Performance Max can actually be misleading and doesn’t accurately represent the value of a given channel. 

One channel may seem better than another with stronger ROI on average. However, this doesn’t account for the marginal cost of the next conversion on that channel. The “best” channel in one auction isn’t the best option in another auction. Performance Max makes a real-time decision about where to place your ad based on which inventory it predicts will deliver the most cost-efficient, high-ROI conversion at that moment.  

Because of this, Performance Max provides higher-level campaign and asset group reporting. These reports center on whether you’re achieving your conversion goals over time at your ROAS or CPA target. It also focuses on surfacing AI-powered insights and explanations to help you identify performance trends and opportunities more quickly. 

To understand what’s driving your results, check out these other reports and insights that are available. And stay tuned as we continue adding new ways to increase transparency into how Performance Max is working for your business. 

• Asset group reporting: See conversions, conversion value, cost, and other metrics broken down at the asset group level. 
• Asset performance labels: Check performance for your text, image, logo, and video assets, including their status to see if they’re eligible to serve. Use the Combinations tab to view the top-performing asset combinations for each asset group. 
• Explanations: Understand the reasons behind performance fluctuations and recommended actions to fix issues and improve results. 
• Bid strategy reporting: Identify the top signals that are influencing performance like device type, location, day of week, time of day, search queries, and Customer Match lists.
• Search terms insights: See what search queries your customers are using, organized into categories. 
• Audience insights: Dive into the top interests and behaviors of customers who convert. Use the 'Optimized' label to learn the new audience segments Google AI helped discover that you may not have known about previously.
• Other insights: Get a wide variety of other insight types on the Insights page like demand forecasts, diagnostic insights, and performance shift insights.
• Landing pages: See a performance breakdown for the pages on your website that you’re sending traffic to from your ads. This is especially helpful if you’re using the final URL expansion feature in Performance Max.
• Placement reporting: Get impression-level data for the owned and operated and Display Network placements that your Performance Max campaigns served on. Starting in March, Search Partner sites will also be included in this reporting.

Question: I’m looking for lead quality and not just volume. How can I make sure I’m getting high-quality leads from Performance Max?
 

1. Improve your conversion measurement: AI is only as good as the data you put into it. That’s why better conversion measurement is the fastest way to fuel Google AI to deliver higher quality leads for your campaigns. There are two main ways to achieve this:
   • Use enhanced conversions for leads: Enhanced conversions for leads bridges the gap between offline transactions and their online origins, which helps Google AI better identify high-quality leads likely to convert. It’s a more durable way to measure performance and prevent data gaps because it relies on consented, first-party customer data rather than third-party, cookie-based tracking, and connects hashed lead information from your CRM back to Google Ads.

     Case Study

     

     Eng Breaking, an English-language learning program in South East Asia, saw a 4.3x increase in conversion rate and 27% reduction in cost-per-lead within the first month of using enhanced conversions with their Performance Max campaigns.

     “Enhanced Conversions for Leads has helped us a lot in improving lead quality - a problem that we spent years trying to solve. Now we can confidently deploy campaigns to other markets with a variety of campaign types.”
     — Trang Tran, COO, Eng Breaking

     Enhanced conversions for leads is easy to set up - you can configure it straight from your Google Ads account. For a detailed guide on how to get started, take a look at this handy article. 

   • Define clear conversion categories: By defining conversion categories, you can tailor your campaigns to optimize towards specific lead generation goals, such as "qualified lead," "converted lead," "book appointment," or "request quote." When you pick these campaign goals, you'll automatically trigger invalid traffic protections built specifically for lead generation campaigns, helping to safeguard campaign quality.
      

2. Use Value-Based Bidding: Use "Maximize conversion value" bidding to attract higher-quality leads and achieve greater value from your budget. This value-based bidding strategy prioritizes leads with the strongest potential for high-value sales by factoring in data you share about what different leads and conversions are worth to you. On average, advertisers that switch their bid strategy from having a target CPA to a target ROAS can see 14% more conversion value at a similar return on ad spend.¹ It’s key to remember that the more conversion data that you have, the faster Google AI is able to deliver the results you’re looking for. So, strike a balance: you should prioritize conversion actions close to the final sale to signal quality leads, but ensure enough volume for optimization. Start by mapping your lead to sale journey, including micro-conversions at first, and then gradually optimize towards higher-value actions as your data grows.
    
3. Share audience signals, especially your first-party data: Help Google AI understand your ideal new customer profile by sharing existing customer data through Customer Match lists. This fuels Performance Max to reach other potential, high-value customers with similar characteristics. You can also steer your campaigns by better expressing the value of conversions based on geographic location, device and audiences using conversion value rules. 
    
4. Prevent invalid traffic and invalid leads: There are a number of additional steps you can take to reduce invalid traffic and leads.
   • Verify leads: Combat automated bots and ensure authentic leads by adding frictionless verification steps like ReCaptcha to your lead forms. 
   • Use a double-opt in approach: When customers provide their contact information (such as email addresses), ensure they confirm these are valid, for example by sending a confirmation link via email, before adding them to your CRM or mailing lists to check that you’re engaging with high-intent customers. 
   • Add server-side validation to validate web forms: Server-side validation is a website security feature that your web developer can set up to double-check all visitor information on the server. It’s an additional safeguard, ensuring accuracy and preventing issues if someone tries to submit invalid or harmful data.

Question: I don’t want Performance Max to serve on my branded queries. What can I do to stop this?
 

Performance Max campaigns serve across all of Google’s advertising channels, including Search. If you don’t want Performance Max to serve on your branded queries on Search, you can implement either account-level negative keywords—which will also prevent those queries from serving on any of your other campaigns—or campaign-level brand exclusions. You can also use these solutions for branded queries beyond your own, such as competitors’ brands or sub-brands of your business.  

Campaign-level brand exclusions are a better option for blocking brand traffic than account-level negative keywords due to their ability to block misspellings and foreign scripts of the brands you want to exclude, including your own. Keep in mind that you should watch out for how exclusions impact your reach and performance to make sure you’re not missing out on valuable conversion opportunities.

If any brands or business names are missing from the list, you’ll see an option in Google Ads to request additions.

Question: Can I use assets created using generative AI outside of my Performance Max campaign and Google Ads?

Yes! Images that you generate in Performance Max will be unique to you as Performance Max never generates the same asset twice. Subject to our policies and terms, you can use assets generated by Performance Max in places outside of your Google Ads account if you like them, including on your website. All images created with generative AI in Google Ads, including Performance Max, will be identified as such. We’re using SynthID to invisibly watermark these images and they will include open standard metadata to indicate the image was generated by AI.

Question: I don’t have a big creative budget. Why do I need to include a video in my Performance Max campaigns? 
 

Today’s average consumer switches between different search, shopping, and video platforms, and browses multiple websites and apps during their purchase journeys. To capture their attention and drive results, video ads are no longer optional—they're table stakes. Advertisers that included at least one video in their Performance Max campaigns saw an average 12% uplift in conversions.²

There are two ways to add video to your Performance Max campaign:

1. Upload your own video: you can upload existing video assets you have, or use the video creation tool. To make it easier to provide high-quality video ads, video creation tools are integrated directly into Performance Max campaign setup and editing workflows. You can select from various templates, customize your content with text, music, animated images, and voiceovers, and then preview your video before applying it to your campaign. For a detailed demo on how to use the video creation tool, watch this video.

If you’re uploading your own video assets to your campaign, here are two key tips for success:

• Use diverse aspect ratios: Include vertical, horizontal and square assets. This gives Google AI more options to match the right video ad to the right audience and context. Advertisers that included at least one video of each orientation (horizontal, vertical, and square) to their Performance Max campaigns delivered 20% more conversions in YouTube compared to horizontal videos alone.³ 
• Follow best practices for action-driving video: Learn your ABCDs—Attention, Branding, Connection, and Direction—to craft compelling video ads that motivate viewers to take action.

2. Automatically generated video: Short on time or creative resources? No problem. If you don’t upload your own video assets, Performance Max uses video generation technology powered by Google AI to create and serve videos in multiple orientations using your other assets such as images, text, or Google Merchant Center product listings. These videos are created at the asset group level, meaning that the ingredients used will be selected from the given asset group. You can help direct the content of these videos by adding relevant assets and grouping your asset groups into meaningful themes for different product categories.

Auto-generated video ensures your brand can show up when it matters. Google AI automatically selects the right mix of template, colors, fonts, and music to resonate with your audience and boost campaign performance. Like a video production team, on call. 

Question: I need to win new customers to grow my business. Is Performance Max just remarketing to existing customers?  
 

Performance Max campaigns can help you maximize total sales and revenue from both new and existing customers. Engaging existing customers can be highly profitable as they already know and trust your brand, often leading to repeat conversions at a lower cost or higher average-order-value.  

If your primary focus is new customer acquisition, focus on the new customer acquisition goal and brand exclusions.  

New customer acquisition goal: Using data from Customer Match lists and the Google Tag, Google AI effectively identifies new prospects and prioritizes bidding towards them.

The new customer acquisition goal offers 2 bidding modes:

• New Customer Value mode (recommended): We recommend New Customer Value mode for all advertisers with online sales goals. It prioritizes bidding towards new customers, while maintaining your engagement with potential repeat customers. Advertisers using this mode have seen strong results, including a 9% ROAS increase, 5% higher new customer ratio, and 7% reduced new customer acquisition cost.⁴ 
  • [Beta] New Customer Acquisition with High-Value Optimization: Use this mode if you have campaigns with purchase goals and can upload high-value customer segments via Customer Match. This advanced strategy lets you set different bidding priorities for high-value new prospects, regular new customers and existing ones. 

• New Customer Only mode: Use this strategy if you have strict budgets for new customer acquisition, or have non-purchase goals like lead generation. This mode focuses exclusively on acquiring new customers, so we recommend setting up a separate Performance Max campaign to connect with potential repeat customers. 

So, how do you get started? If you’ve already got Customer Match and the Google Tag in place, using the goal is straightforward: select "Customer Acquisition" in your campaign objectives and goals, identify your pre-existing customer lists, and provide an estimated average revenue from new customers. 

If Customer Match isn't configured yet, make setting it up a priority. When third-party cookies are phased out, previous auto-detection methods (which are cookie-based) will become ineffective. Your first-party data is the most durable foundation for your campaigns with new customer acquisition goals. Customer Match isn’t just a future-proofing measure, it can have an immediate positive impact on your campaigns. In fact, advertisers who apply Customer Match list signals see an average of 5.3% conversion uplift.⁵

For a detailed walkthrough on how to set up new customer acquisition in Performance Max, and to learn different ways to calculate the value of a new customer, watch this video. 

Brand exclusions: You can prevent your Performance Max campaign from serving on specific brand terms (your own, competitor, or partner brands) in Search & Shopping inventory to gain a clearer view of your campaign’s true prospecting potential. Monitor your campaign's reach and performance after implementing exclusions to make sure you're not missing out on valuable opportunities.

Question: My business has strict brand guidelines. Is Performance Max brand-safe? 
 

There are several brand suitability controls you can use to make sure ads from your Performance Max campaigns are in line with your brand safety requirements. 

These various tools help you exclude types of content that, while in compliance with Google Ads policies, may not fit your brand or business. 

• Content suitability settings which let you exclude or filter unsuitable content. At the account level, you can utilize content and placement exclusions. 
  • For example, if you want to prevent ads from serving on certain types of content in your Performance Max campaign, such as tragedy and conflict or sensitive social issues, you can exclude sensitive content categories in the content suitability center. 
  • Placement exclusions stop your ads from showing on specific YouTube and Display content. Performance Max respects all your account and MCC-level placement exclusions. Starting in March, you’ll also be able to include Search Partner sites in your account-level placement exclusions.
• Account-level negative keywords let you set negative keywords at an account-level and exclude specific queries across your whole account for brand suitability. 

Question: I’m already targeting store locations in my Performance Max campaign for store goals. Should I also apply geo targets? 
 

No! During campaign construction, you will select the specific store locations that you want to target and Performance Max for store goals will automatically apply a dynamic radius target in the back-end. This will ensure you accurately target specific stores and show ads to customers who are most likely to visit your store. 

Dynamic radius targeting uses a range of signals to reach the right audience. These include:

• Location
• Distance to location
• Search query 
• Device
• Likelihood to visit    

After you set up your campaign, we do not recommend using the campaign settings tab to manually apply geo targets. You also should not apply any additional radius targets. The additional targeting could cause you to target more stores than intended and can cause ads to be shown to users further from your store locations.

However, you can still use the campaigns setting tab to exclude specific locations and not show ads in a specific zip code, state or country without impacting the store locations you chose earlier during campaign construction. 

Question: What's the ideal campaign structure for Performance Max campaigns?
 

Advertisers will have different campaign structures based on their business and performance goals. Here are three key principles to keep in mind: 

1. Streamline and consolidate your campaign structure, where possible. AI learns faster and makes better predictions with more data and performance history. It also optimizes more effectively when it can allocate spend flexibly to where the highest-ROI opportunity exists in each auction. Avoid creating separate campaigns unless they require different budgets, CPA/ROAS targets, or settings for business reasons. 

   Note

   Upgrading your DSA and Display campaigns into new Performance Max campaigns allows for easier “before” and “after” comparisons since the settings will be equivalent to help you evaluate the impact on results. You can always merge and consolidate Performance Max campaigns later if they have overlapping goals, bid targets, and other settings.  

2. Match your campaign structure to your business needs. For example, you may need to create different Performance Max campaigns if you want to: 
   • Customize assets for different countries or languages. 
   • Dedicate different budgets and CPA/ROAS targets to different marketing objectives or goals (e.g. a store-centric budget). That being said, you can also create a Performance Max campaign that supports multiple conversion goals. For example, you may have a shared budget across your website and stores with the goal of maximizing total revenue.  
   • Allocate specific budgets and CPA/ROAS targets for seasonal moments like holidays, new store openings, promotions and events, etc.
   • Set different ROAS targets for certain product categories. 

3. Segment asset groups based on meaningful themes that require different creative assets. For example, an online university may have different campaigns for different degree programs. And then split their asset groups by the different types of classes offered.

   Tip

   If you have the same budget across evergreen and seasonal moments, we recommend having one unified Performance Max campaign and using asset groups to segment by different occasions.

1. Google Internal Data, Global, Feb 2023
2.  Google data, Global, November 2022
3. Google data, Global, November 2022
4. *Average uplift in performance based on internal studies. Individual results may vary according to campaign details. Google Internal Data, Global, All Verticals A/B Test, Oct 2022 - April 2023.
5. Google Data, Global, Ads, Jan 2021 - Dec 2022