Google Launches New “Callout” Ad Extensions
Ad extensions have become a common sight when looking at Google’s paid search results. Less of an option and more of a “must have” when building a campaign, these extensions (including site links, call, location, social, review, and app extensions) give businesses an array of options to complement their ads. Recently, Google introduced another ad extension to the mix named “callout” extensions. This new extension allows you to include an additional two to four, 25-character lines of text along with your ad to highlight services, features, and benefits of your products. As with other ad extensions, there is no additional cost to use callouts. An example of the new extension is shown in red below:
Although this text is not clickable, it still provides major benefits to the ad. First, the extra line of text captures an increased amount of real estate on the page. This pushes competitors’ ads further down the page and helps attract the searcher’s eyes to your ad. Second, Google includes ad extensions in its quality score calculation, one factor that helps determine an ad’s position on the page. Including as many ad extensions as possible only helps boost the ad’s quality score. Finally, the callout extension allows you to include an extra line of persuasion that may not have otherwise fit within the ad’s text. When combined with other extensions, callouts can help create a very compelling ad.
Search Optics was quick to jump onto the new extension’s bandwagon, implementing it for a trial run the day it was released. Not only were our account managers happy with the overall effect of highlighting additional features and benefits, but the statistics were even better. Early results showed that callout extensions increased clickthrough rate by as much as 8 percentage points when they were present in an ad.
Cosmetically, callout extensions add to the overall appeal of an ad, giving advertisers more options to highlight their products and make their ad stand out. From a statistics standpoint, callouts have proven to be effective in driving more clicks so far. Overall, callouts are a win for advertisers and should become a staple in all AdWords accounts.
- Matt Ganey, SEM Manager
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