Why Enhanced Conversions Are More Important Than Ever For Google Ads

Screenshot from Google Ads Help, July 2023

Setting up enhanced conversions is a pretty straightforward process and can be done in multiple ways, depending on which type you are implementing.

Consequently, governments and regulatory bodies worldwide have tightened their grip on data protection, enacting stringent laws to safeguard individual privacy.

Introduced by Google in May 2021, enhanced conversions supplement existing conversion tags with first-party, user-provided data.

Embracing this paradigm shift, organizations are investing in transparent data collection practices, fostering stronger customer relationships, and leveraging advanced technologies to harness the power of first-party data.

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This adaptability ensures that your ad spend is allocated most efficiently, reaching the right audience with the right message at the optimal moment.

Does It Work? Our Case Study

For leads, it can also be done via Google Tag Manager or Google tag.

My answer is that, whilst success might vary case by case, yes, it is absolutely worth it.

Conversion rates from leads to conversions improved by over 25%, and the average cost-per-lead decreased by nearly 40%.

Conclusions

Enhanced conversions allow websites to send encrypted and anonymous conversion data to Google, safeguarding users’ privacy and adhering to stringent data protection regulations.

For web, this can be done either via Google Tag Manager, Google tag, or the Google Ads API.

However, with the adoption of enhanced conversions, these ads now receive their due credit, allowing for a more accurate assessment of their true value.

Before implementing enhanced conversions, the campaign’s main goal was to drive leads. The system and automated bid strategies were doing a good job of achieving that within the target cost-per-lead.

Even more so as we shift towards a fast-approaching cookie-less future, which is already transforming the digital landscape, and we move towards reliance on first-party data.

As mentioned, enhanced conversions can play a crucial role in optimizing your bid strategies within the realm of Google Ads.

The system can allocate budgets and bid more effectively for the keywords driving valuable actions.

With the increased precision and insights offered by enhanced conversions, your bid strategy can adapt more intelligently and dynamically in response to evolving market trends, user behavior, and campaign performance.

In particular with one client whose efforts and focus are to generate leads and referrals to a number of partners.

In the past, certain ads might not have been properly attributed with conversion credit, resulting in their undervaluation.

By harnessing this hashed data, advertisers gain deeper insights into customer behavior, enabling them to optimize their campaigns and improve targeting accuracy.

As a result, the marketing industry is witnessing a paradigm shift, with a greater emphasis on transparent data collection, consent-based marketing strategies, and the use of emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence, to ensure privacy-centric practices.

Like how the British Cycling Team’s extraordinary success (a few years ago) could be attributed in large part to their philosophy of “incremental gains” and relentless pursuit of 1% improvements, identifying even the smallest areas for enhancement and consistently making marginal yet cumulative progress can lead to unimaginable results and help to un-level the playing field.

At our agency, we have generally seen positive changes after implementing enhanced conversions for all clients – and for some, that has led to great results.

When the conversion measurements are precise, the algorithm can make better-informed decisions about how much to bid for ad placements.

Detailed steps can be found on Google’s support page here.

How Enhanced Conversions Can Help Optimize Your Bid Strategies

In conclusion, embracing enhanced conversions can significantly elevate your Google Ads performance, unleashing the full potential of your bidding strategies.

But that changed once we implemented enhanced conversions for leads.

Example:

• A user lands on your site after clicking your ad.
• They browse your site and decide to fill out a form – becoming a lead.
• Lead details are stored in your customer relationship management (CRM) database.
• You may upload first-party data to Google once the lead converts.
• Google may cross-check the uploaded first-party data with the hashed user data.
• A conversion may then be attributed to your ad.

How To Set Up Enhanced Conversions For Google Ads

This paradigm shift can be likened to what Frederick Vallaeys describes in his book, Unlevel The Playing Field, when he talks about “how to combine the best of human creativity and machine efficiency to create winning digital marketing programs.”

What Are Enhanced Conversions?

By taking into account a broader set of ads with enhanced conversions, your bid strategy gains access to a wider pool of valuable data. As a result, your bids can be better calibrated to match the actual impact of each ad, maximizing the effectiveness of your advertising budget.

Being able to “educate” the system and train it, feeding back which leads resulted in an external conversion, improved the quality of the data available, and therefore improved the automated bidding significantly.

The result? For this particular client, it was quite dramatic.

By implementing improved conversion measurements, you can significantly enhance the overall performance of your ads.

The ability to strike a balance between personalized marketing and respecting user privacy will undoubtedly shape the future of successful marketing endeavors.

First, it is important to distinguish between the two types of enhanced conversions, since we have enhanced conversions for web and enhanced conversions for leads.

Enhanced Conversions For Web

By harnessing first-party data directly obtained from their own platforms and interactions with customers, companies gain a deeper understanding of their audience, leading to more personalized and relevant campaigns.

This, in turn, can lead to better ROI and overall campaign success.

How Do Enhanced Conversions Work?

In this dynamic landscape, marketers are compelled to adopt innovative and ethical practices to navigate the complexities of compliance while still delivering effective campaigns.

However, the only downside was that the system could not discern between good and not-so-good leads; ultimately, there was no way to qualify the leads that would convert once referred to the client’s partners.

Accurate conversion data is essential for Google Ads bidding.

Advertisers reap additional benefits from this as it advertently also positively impacts their automated bid strategies.

Improved Accuracy

The true advantage of this lies in the fact that these previously overlooked ads can now actively contribute to the refinement of your Google Ads bid strategy as your campaign progresses.

The upside to enabling enhanced conversions is improved accuracy.

By now, you are probably thinking, “Yes, this all sounds good, but is it worth the effort?”

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