The Latest & Greatest in Digital Marketing
#1 Google Announces “Purchases On Google” For Buying Straight From PLAs
The much-anticipated buy button in Google search ads is finally here. Called Purchases On Google, it turns out the new feature isn’t a button at all.
When consumers click on Purchases On Google-enabled ads, they’ll be taken to a page hosted by Google where they can make a purchase using payment criteria stored with Google. The orders are then passed through to the retailer for fulfillment and any customer service follow up.
#2 Google Search Console to Send Fewer Messages to Site Owners
Google Search Console, formerly known as Google Webmaster Tools, will now only send messages only to the direct owners of a particular site. Owners of parent properties will no longer be sent messages for their child properties, Illyes says.
Critical messages, such as those notifying webmasters of a hacked site, might still be sent to all parent site owners following this change.
#3 CPC Growth Is Down – But Not on Smartphones
Composed of aggregated, anonymized data over three years, Adobe looked at more than 489 billion digital ad impressions. CTR growth has been increasing consistently, while CPC growth has taken a nosedive over the last year, particularly between Q4 and Q1. There is currently a 33-point gap between the two, despite being fairly equal last year.
When it comes to smartphones, that gap is reversed. CPC growth is up 16 percent and smartphone CTR is down 9 percent YOY, resulting in a 25-point gap. Adobe research cited that “Mobilegeddon” was a big factor in the rise of mobile paid search.
#4 Email Marketing Campaigns Should Be Developed for Mobile First, Desktop Second
With more people reading emails on mobile devices than desktop, it’s imperative for email marketers to think mobile-first, or risk missing out on a lot of possible transactional value.
From a sample size of more than 35 billion emails sent by more than 750 brands and publishers, we found that increasingly, email is majority consumed on mobile. The study counted 7.2 billion ad impressions overall, desktop and mobile/tablet combined. Of these impressions, 3.8 billion were served on smartphone or tablet. That’s more than half.
This trend is not new, nor is it isolated. Over the last four years, we have seen a steady rise in the percentage of email consumed on non-desktop devices.
Join the Conversation
What do you think of Google’s new purchasing features? Are your email campaigns optimized for mobile, then desktop?
