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Google Import enhancements and other key April product updates

Spring is now in the air, and it’s time for your latest roundup of product updates from Microsoft Advertising! This month, we have a slew of announcements built to help you scale your business with the right automation technology. Let’s dive in!

This month’s top story: Google Import for the application programming interface (API)

Google Import is the most powerful lever at your disposal to scale your advertising across platforms. We’ve made continuous updates to make Google Import valuable for all Microsoft Advertising users, from small businesses to multi-account managers. Now, we’re excited to extend that value to those who leverage the Microsoft Advertising API.

Now, API users can not only bring over and sync their Google Ads campaigns, but also lighten their workload so they don’t have to always be up to date on coding to support new features. So even if you’re not providing your own support for, say, Responsive Search Ads (RSA), you can let the Google Import API take care of that and allow your customers to bring their RSA campaigns from Google Ads to Microsoft Advertising. Read the Google Import API global release post to learn more.

On that note about Responsive Search Ads…

Countdown customizers now available for Responsive Search Ads (RSA)

Countdown customizers let you easily add a countdown — by day, hour, and then minute — to an event in your ads. The countdown, which automatically updates as the event draws nearer, is eye-catching and gives potential customers greater incentive to click your ad.

Product view of event countdown calendar.
Here’s when your ad would run and examples of how it would look.

As of this month, these customizers are available not only for Expanded Text Ads and Dynamic Search Ads, but also Responsive Search Ads! Learn more about creating countdown customizers.

Finally, you may notice that Responsive Search Ads are also now the default type for new ad copy creation. While you still have the option to also create Expanded Text Ads, we recommend including RSA in the ad copy mix to improve performance.

Universal Event Tracking (UET) Tag Helper to help validate your Dynamic Remarketing setup

You may have taken advantage of our UET Tag Helper extension in the past. It helps validate your implementation of the UET (and the functionality of conversion goals) on any given webpage. Now, you can leverage this useful tool to test your tags for Dynamic Remarketing lists as well!

UET Tag Helper icon in Chrome bar
The UET Tag Helper icon in your browser.

Simply show it which Dynamic Remarketing lists you want to test, navigate your website, and it’ll tell you what events it records and what problems it encounters so you can ensure your conversion goals are set the way you want them.

New seasonal segments available for In-market Audiences

Microsoft Advertising continues to invest in expanding our In-market Audience segments for you to reach the right customers who are ready to buy. This month, we have 60 new segments available for both search and audience campaigns in the United States, including two new seasonal audiences: Mother’s Day and Back to School. Check out the full segment list to see what’s new.

Multi-factor authentication migration delayed

To ensure a high-quality migration experience for multi-factor authentication, we’re giving developers and partners some extra time to get ready. Our new target date for migration is August 1, 2021, instead of the previously set April 1 deadline. See the API blog post for more details.

In case you missed it: static headlines for Dynamic Search Ads and ad suggestion updates

As far as other announcements we published earlier this month, static headlines are now available for Dynamic Search Ads, which grant you full control over all the text in your Dynamic Search Ads. Additionally, we just introduced updates to ad suggestions so they now have an option for auto-apply, allowing you to save time in creating ads with different variations and get help with your ad optimization.

Product view of Dynamic Search Ad feed, with custom label and ad title columns.
Column C is where you can add a static headline for your dynamic search ads page feed.

What’s coming soon:

There’s always something more cooking to make Microsoft Advertising even better. There are still some enhancements being made to the bidding strategies we’ve mentioned in previous posts, but here are a few other things to be on the lookout for:

Flyer extensions - Unique to Microsoft Advertising (United States only), this is an additional way to add more of your product promotions to your ads.

Product view of ad with a flyer extension image.
Add your flyers to ads and drive more engagement to your products and promotions.

New verticals for Dynamic Remarketing - We mentioned Dynamic Remarketing above, but now we’ll soon be able to provide these capabilities for other industries supplying feeds to Microsoft Advertising: retail, automotive advertisers providing listings, entertainment advertisers showcasing events, and travel advertisers offering various experiences.

Customer Match - Arriving in the coming months, Customer Match will allow you to use the email addresses that your customers have shared with you to reengage with them across the Microsoft Search Network and Microsoft Audience Network.

Stay tuned for updates on these three items and much more! We wish you all a safe start to your spring season.

Help us improve Microsoft Advertising

Your comments and feedback are integral to our ongoing efforts to shape and improve our products. For any questions or feedback, please reach out to your Microsoft Advertising account manager, or send us an email at advertising-feedback@microsoft.com. You can also interact with us on Twitter or suggest a feature on Microsoft Advertising Feature Suggestions.