A few weeks ago I was fortunate to attend Google’s 2017 Masterclass, an event reserved for Google Premier Partners and Google Partners. I will skip the play-by-play of keynote speakers and presentation slides and go straight to the good stuff - a few of the event’s takeaways that can affect your business.Features we once took for add-ons are now the standardRemarketing Lists for Search AdsRemarketing lists for search ads (RLSA) is a feature that lets you customise your search ads for people who have previously visited your website when they're searching on Google. While they have been around since 2013, RSLAs are hugely underutilised, maybe because our brains our conditioned to think remarketing = display, who knows? The takeaway here is that RSLAs aren’t an add-on to your search campaigns, they are a standard.Search works a little differently to Display when we’re talking remarketing - while display remarketing delivers ads to users when they are browsing on the Google Display Network, RLSAs don’t just automatically show text ads to users just because they are on your remarketing list. The users still need to be actively searching on Google using the keywords you are bidding on within your search campaigns.Here at Bang, we’re all about qualified traffic and getting the most value out of your AdWords budget. These are two ticks in the RSLAs box.Expanded Text AdsWhen was the last time you saw one of these? They look a little naked right?

Google has now completely ceased these semi clad standard text ads. In January came the beginning of the roll out of expended text ads (ETAs), with Google only allowing us to create and edit text ads using the ETA format. These ads were a fantastic upgrade on standard text ads and allowed for a significant amount of characters and thus ad space.

At the start of the year, 2 ETAs per ad group were the common practise. A mere 9 months later, upwards of 3 ETAs per ad group are now the recommended norm. With 3 ETAs per ad group, you can expect an uptick in clicks or conversions of 15%* compared to ad groups with only 1 or 2 ETAs.Oldies can still be goodiesDynamic Search ads15% of searches on Google (3.5 billion of them happen each day) are unique. That’s a whopping 525 million first time, never happened before, never dared to be typed into Google before, search queries.While we think of ourselves here at Bang as skilled search executives, how on earth can we strategise and optimise for things that haven’t happened yet? For 525 million of them? (A bit of an exaggeration, but you get the gist). Unfortunately we can’t see into the future, no matter how painfully hard we stare into our crystal balls whilst wearing our finest search executive suits. But thankfully there are dynamic search ads.Dynamic search ads are most applicable for online retailers or websites with large inventories. When someone searches on Google with terms closely related to the titles and phrases on your website, AdWords will use these titles and phrases to select a landing page and generate a clear, relevant headline for your ad. What you get is broader exposure of your products or inventory without having to look into your crystal ball for 525 million potential searches, then add them to your keywords list, then create ETAs for them.Existing features are most definitely on steroidsAd Customisers Customisers have been around for a few years yes, but they are another underused AdWords feature. Customisers have also come a long way over this time and let’s just say that they allow for creepy levels of customisation based on a user's intent, device, location, interests and time. Spare 1 minute and 21 seconds and check out this video.With our attention spans getting shorter and shorter and our laziness increasing (tapping and scrolling on multiple pages on our smartphones is hard work right?), we as consumers want to be presented with a solution to our problem (or an ad) that is 100% spot on. If it’s not, you as a business owner, sadly, don’t stand much of a chance in capturing our business.We call this “creepy” but what we really mean is hyper-targeted and there is no doubt that your customers demand it.No matter the exciting innovations happening in the digital landscape, two core components remain unchanged:Your client and THEIR context.Finally, Dave BoothThis man could sell you a heavily discounted tour of the jungle, save you in an underwear emergency situation, spark your enthusiasm for becoming a finger puppet champion and have you rethinking your stance on vegetarianism - those Chupacabra breakfast tacos had me.Thanks MasterClass 2017! If you want to get a little bit creepy with us, let’s have a conversation about your business today.