AdWords in 2016 – Google Updates Their Advertising Platform

Updated January 12, 2023

In the words of Sam Cooke ‘A change is gonna come’… Yes, it’s the news everyone’s been waiting for. AdWords updates! Google is giving their advertising platform a new interface, and a big update to reflect the changes that have happened in the world of online advertising over the last few years.

AdWords has been running for 15 years, and in that last decade and a half, the world of online advertising has changed dramatically. Back in 2001 pop ups we’re king and Gmail didn’t even exist, so it isn’t surprising that AdWords has had to evolve a lot along the way.

The Rise of Mobile & AdWords Updates

People’s internet viewing habits have changed drastically in the last few years. In 2014 the amount of time spent on the internet, on a mobile device, surpassed the amount spent online on a desktop computer for the first time. Obviously this has had a knock on effect on businesses, and the way they speak to their customers.

Having a mobile friendly website is now the norm, not an exception. So the same goes for advertising. Now AdWords lets you choose between mobile and non mobile ads, but as mobile technology (and perhaps mobile size size) continues to increase the differences will become smaller.

Micro Moments

How people browse the internet has changed more than just the device they use. Google have
coined the term micro moments to help describe the more typical habit of dipping in and out of the internet, rather than sitting down for an extended session accessing it. We recapped ways to capitalize on micro moments as they relate to your website and advertising efforts.

Again this has a knock on effect on advertisers. People don’t save up a shopping list of tasks that they want to do on the internet, but will sort them out as and when they pop up. The average browsing session has decreased in time, but happen much more frequently, which means advertisers have to work that much harder to get someone’s attention if they want to distract them from their task at hand.

Met the New Boss, Same As The Old One

To reflect these changes, and many others, Google will soon be introducing major updates to the AdWords platform, hopefully keeping it at the top of the online advertising world. Over 2016 and 2017 new tools and interfaces will be rolled out to different users, with the focus from Google being on:

• Your business, not their product
• Making data easier to access
• Simple and powerful tools

Coupling this with a revamp to the design, following Google’s Material Design aesthetics, you could soon be looking at a whole ‘new’ AdWords. (Struggling to find out where all the menus are hidden now…).

Photo credit – Top: Joe the Goat Farmer
Photo credit – Bottom: Johan Larsson