Search Ads 360 bid strategies that target conversions or revenue automatically recommend bid adjustments for each type of device (mobile, desktop, and tablet) based on the bid strategy’s goal. A bid adjustment increases or decreases the base bid for biddable items such as keywords.
Once the bid strategy has gathered enough performance data, you can view and manually apply the recommendation.
You can also set a bid strategy to automatically apply bid adjustments.
Changes to bid adjustments are also viewable in the change history report.
Important details
Device bid adjustments available only for certain types of accounts
Search Ads 360 bid strategies that are applied to campaigns, ad groups, or keywords will recommend or set bid adjustments for different devices depending on the type of search engine account.
| Engine account | Bid adjustments |
|---|---|
| Google Ads | desktop, mobile, and tablet |
| Microsoft Advertising | desktop, mobile, and tablet |
| Yahoo! Japan | mobile |
| Yahoo! Gemini | not supported |
| Baidu | not supported |
Campaigns and ad groups use device bid adjustments from the bid strategy that is applied to keywords
If you apply a Search Ads 360 bid strategy that sets device bid adjustments directly to a keyword or other biddable item, the bid strategy will set the device bid adjustments for the entire ad group even if a different bid strategy is applied to the ad group or campaign. At the campaign level, the keyword's bid strategy will only recommend the bid adjustments.
- You create a bid strategy that optimizes bids and adjusts device bids.
- You apply the bid strategy to CampaignA and directly to 30 of 50 keywords in AdgroupB in CampaignB.
The bid strategy will:
-
Optimize bids for all keywords in CampaignA and the 30 keywords in CampaignB.
-
Set device bid adjustments for the keywords in CampaignA and for all 50 keywords in AdgroupB. For all other keywords in CampaignB, the bid strategy will recommend device bid adjustments.
If you apply a bid strategy to a campaign or ad group and then change a biddable item to never use a bid strategy, the bid strategy will still consider the biddable item's performance when adjusting or recommending device bids for the other biddable items in the campaign or ad group.
Setting the device bid adjustment to -100% overrides a bid strategy
If you manually set a campaign or ad group's mobile, desktop, or tablet bid adjustment to -100%, a bid strategy will no longer automatically set bid adjustments for that device in the campaign or ad group. (A setting of -100% indicates that you don't want the device's bid adjustments.) The bid strategy will continue to recommend bid adjustments, but it will not automatically set bid adjustments until you manually change the setting to something higher than -100%.
Override a bid strategy for 24 hours
If you want to override a bid strategy's bid adjustment for about 24 hours, you can manually set a mobile, desktop, or tablet bid adjustment from -90% to 900% in a campaign or ad group that is managed by a bid strategy. After 24 hours, the bid strategy will resume setting the bid adjustments.
Ad groups, campaigns, and conflicting bid strategies
Because you can apply a bid strategy to a campaign, ad group, or to a specific biddable item, a biddable item can be managed by one bid strategy while its parent campaign or ad group is managed by a different bid strategy.
If a campaign or ad group’s bid strategy optimizes bids while a specific biddable item's bid strategy recommends or sets device bid adjustments (and does not optimize bids), make sure that both bid strategies have the same or compatible goals. If the goals are not compatible (for example, if the bid strategies optimize for different Floodlight activities), you could be getting conflicting advice or adjustments from the ad group’s bid strategy.
The converse is true as well: if a biddable item’s bid strategy automatically optimizes bids and the campaign or ad group’s bid strategy only recommends or applies device bid adjustments, make sure both bid strategies are compatible.
Ready to get started?
- Create and apply a bid strategy for device bid adjustments.
- View and apply the bid strategy's recommendation.
No matter which way you start (recommending or adjusting), you can change this setting for the bid strategy later on.