Optimize spend by making adjustments to your campaigns in a plan. You can change individual budgets, bids, and bid adjustments. Or, set up a budget bid strategy (also referred to as a budget strategy) to automatically set and adjust spend.
The primary focus of a budget strategy is to spend the amount specified in a plan. This means that you can anticipate variations in daily or weekly spend as the budget bid strategy makes changes to optimize how the entire budget is spent.
New campaigns with no previous performance data will not be able to have budgets properly set after placed in a budget bid strategy. New campaigns will need to first actively run on another bid strategy to gain the necessary performance data before being added to a budget bid strategy.
Similar to a Search Ads 360 bid strategy
Search Ads 360 budget strategies are very similar to Search Ads 360 bid strategies. Both use performance history to set bid adjustments. Both can set bids for biddable items. Both can include some limits. As with a bid strategy, a manually set bid overrides a budget strategy for 24 hours.
Budget bid strategy campaign budgets and bids can be overridden for 24 hours
Manually set campaign budgets and manually set bids for biddable items override a budget bid strategy for 24 hours.
A budget can be overridden only in the Search Ads 360 user interface. For example, if you set a different daily budget for a campaign using the Google Ads user interface, the change is ignored.
Note that we don't recommend manually setting a budget or bids when a budget bid strategy is managing spend in a plan.
The primary differences are that a budget strategy optimizes a budget by allocating spend and changing bids, and can only be configured as part of a plan.
A Search Ads 360 bid strategy doesn’t manage budgets and sets default bids.
Here’s a list of the similarities and differences.
| Feature | Budget bid strategy | Bid strategy |
|---|---|---|
| Included in a plan |
Yes A budget strategy is an optionally enabled component of a plan that you can turn on or off before or during a plan. One budget bid strategy is created for a campaign, even if each plan for the campaign includes a different goal and different budget strategy settings. A budget strategy is automatically enabled in a plan only if it was used in the previous plan. |
No Search Ads 360 bid strategies stand alone. You can set up a Search Ads 360 bid strategy and apply it to individual campaigns. (You can also create a bid strategy and then not use it. That is, you can create a bid strategy and not apply it to a campaign.) |
|
Optimize using a conversion or a conversion value |
Yes If a conversion value is selected, the budget bid strategy uses the plan’s conversion and attribution model. |
No Set targets in the bid strategy. |
| Set custom time frame for the bid strategy to operate |
Yes Use the date range to select start and end dates in a plan. |
No |
| Name of the strategy |
Yes A budget bid strategy's name matches the name of the campaign, with the addition of the Greek letter Δ. The letter lets you identify a budget strategy in bid strategy reports. You can't rename a budget bid strategy. |
Yes (Required) You specify the name of a bid strategy. |
| Automatically optimize campaign budgets and allocations to maximize goal |
Yes (Required) A budget bid strategy evaluates day-of-week seasonality in performance history to allocate budget.
|
No
|
| Automatically set bids for biddable items | Yes (Required) | Yes (Optional) |
| Set bid adjustments |
Yes (Optional) A budget bid strategy can set device bid adjustments (for mobile, tablet, and desktop), location target, and audience targets.
|
Yes (Optional) A bid strategy can set device bid adjustments (for mobile, tablet, and desktop), location target, and remarketing targets.
|
| Set limits |
Yes (Optional) |
Yes (Optional) |
| Set performance targets |
Yes Set a spend target, choose an automatic or custom allocation, and an optional reporting flag, and additional metrics that you want to track. |
Yes (Required) Bid strategies include more performance options for which you can specify target amounts. In addition to conversions or revenue, a bid strategy can set bids to achieve clicks or a specified ad (keyword) position. |
| Report on individual strategy performance |
Yes Budget strategy metrics are included in the bid strategy report. |
Yes Metrics are reported in the bid strategy report. |
How campaign Bidding and Planning options work with budget strategies
Campaign budgets can be managed by using any of the following methods. Some methods work with a budget strategy, while others are replaced by a budget strategy. For example, manually managed budgets can be automatically managed by a budget bid strategy. A Search Ads 360 bid strategy can be replaced by a budget strategy.
- Manual campaign budget. The campaign daily budget is specified in campaign settings. Manually set campaign budgets can be switched to an automatically adjusted budget if a budget strategy is applied.
- Shared budget (automated Bidding and Planning type in Google Ads and Microsoft Advertising). The advertising platform automatically adjusts how your budget is spent across its campaigns to optimize performance. Note that a budget bid strategy that doesn't have Google Ads auction-time bidding enabled can't manage shared budgets. To allow a budget bid strategy without Google Ads auction-time bidding to manage the budgets, the campaigns must be removed from the shared budget.
How total plan spend is calculated
In budget bid strategies, the spend of each campaign in your plan is recorded and used to calculate your total plan spend. When you remove a campaign from your plan before your plan’s end date, the spend for the removed campaign is still included in the calculation of your total plan spend.
The recorded total plan spend is taken into consideration in the calculation of budgets for the remaining days of your plan.
Example
- Campaign A: $10,000 USD spend (removed prior to the end date of the plan)
- Campaign B: $10,000 USD spend
- Total plan spend: $20,000 USD
Important details about budget bid strategies
- Google Ads Search
- Google Ads Shopping
- Google Ads Performance Max
- Microsoft Search
- Microsoft Shopping
- Baidu Search
- Yahoo! JAPAN Search
- For optimal performance, enable a budget bid strategy when you create a plan or near the beginning of a plan.
- A budget strategy will manage campaign budgets and bids for keywords and other biddable items for every campaign to optimize spend. In the budget bid strategy settings, the "Campaign daily budgets" and "Keywords and other biddable items" checkboxes are selected and unavailable to indicate this requirement.
- A budget strategy applies to all items in the campaign. That is, if you enable a budget bid strategy for multiple campaigns, the budget bid strategy removes any Search Ads 360 bid strategies from the campaigns, ad groups, keywords, and product groups and manages the budgets and bids for all biddable items in the campaigns.
- For your first plan for a campaign, the budget bid strategy needs at least 3 weeks of data to analyze. When there's a sufficient amount of data, the budget bid strategy requires a week to analyze the data. A budget strategy may also enter learning mode if the following types of changes occur:
- Transition to a new plan.
- Campaigns are added or removed.
- Budget changes by more than 30% in a new plan. Or, changes to the target spend in a running plan.
- A budget bid strategy uses the most recent budget, bids, and bid adjustments before making changes.
- Although a budget bid strategy can't adjust the budgets of Google Ads and Microsoft Advertising campaigns that use a shared budget, the strategy does set bids for campaigns in shared budgets. For a budget bid strategy with Google Ads auction-time bidding enabled, Google Ads campaigns can be in shared budgets. Search Ads 360 automatically creates a shared budget for the active Google Ads campaigns, except for Google Ads Performance Max. Search Ads 360 also doesn't create a shared budget for Microsoft Advertising, Yahoo! Japan Ads, or Baidu campaigns.
- If a budget strategy is managing spend, only specify custom allocations for major sales events for holidays such as Singles Day. Don't set a custom allocation for the last week of a plan when a budget bid strategy is managing spend.
Next steps
- Bid adjustments supported in a budget bid strategy
- Set boundaries for a budget bid strategy
- Configure a budget bid strategy