Google Ads Target Frequency

If your goal with YouTube ads is to really try and gain the highest viewership possible, then you’re in the right place. We’re going to talk about the newest campaign subtype for video campaigns and that is target frequency. We are really going to optimize towards brand awareness and getting the most people possible seeing your YouTube ads. So, we’ll show you which campaign goal you will need to select. We will show you which video ads are eligible to use this campaign subtype and then we’ll show you a few best practices that you would want to consider when setting up a target frequency campaign.

We’re going to first start off by creating a new campaign and while we’re going through the campaign, I will tell you what you can and cannot do with the target frequency campaign. So, to create a new campaign, let’s head on over to the blue plus button and after we open it, let’s just create a new campaign. As always, when we are creating a new campaign, Google’s going to ask what is the campaign objective. For a target frequency campaign as of right now, there are only two campaign objectives that allow you to run a target frequency campaign. The first one is going to be brand awareness and reach and the second option is going to be to create a campaign without a goals guidance. I’m first going to select this one, show you where to find the target frequency subtype but then I’m going to hop back, switch over to brand awareness and reach and run with that option instead.

So, after you choose your objective, we’re going to want to select video and then here are the campaign subtypes available for the video objective when you’re creating a campaign without a goals guidance and there, we have target frequency. If I scroll back, up, change my objective to brand awareness and reach. The only two options are display and video, of course, we have to select video. Leave your campaign subtype as video reach campaign and then for the ways that you want to reach your goal with this campaign objective, there is target frequency. So, for this demo, I’m going to stick with this campaign objective. Scroll down a little bit and then we can continue. Once you get to your general settings, go ahead and name the campaign whatever you want it to be but the first important thing that we hit is the target frequency. And if you look to the wording off to the right, the options that you will see within the drop down will be the average number of times that you want ads within this campaign to show to the same user over 7 days.

Now, it says target frequency. Doesn’t mean it’s always going to hit that number but that is the number that you are trying to reach or the number that you are telling Google to try to reach. So, if I head to the drop down and open it, the options I have are two times within a week, three times within a week, or four. Now, the funny thing is if you find the target frequency, campaign section in Google Ads help online, they say that you can select a target frequency between two and five but I’ve never seen the five options. In this case, I’m going to pick the largest one possible and for me, that’s four.

Next, my mouse is already highlighted over the bid strategy and if I try to move my mouse to change the option, not only is it grade over but we get the red no symbol telling us that we cannot change our bid strategy. We are going to be focusing purely on target CPM. If you’re pretty new within the paid media space, CPM is cost per 1,000 impressions. Pretty much what is the most that you would like to pay for every 1,000 impressions. Now, maybe you’re thinking, if I choose a different goal and not brand awareness and reach and instead, select the option where I create a campaign without a goals guidance, maybe I can change my bid strategy. No, you can’t. It’s going to be target CPM for both campaign objective options and if I go down a little bit, there we can select our budgets. If you want to choose a daily budget or a campaign total, just going to leave it as is Choose your start date.

Since I did campaign total, I would have to select an end date. So, I’ll just pick one option, so we can keep on moving and then next, we get to networks. YouTube videos is going to be automatic. There’s the no symbol again, so I cannot uncheck this box. Even if I want to go up to YouTube search results, this ad work is not available. Once we get to the video ad options, you will really see why. You probably wouldn’t want the search results anyway, but the more surprising thing with this is that video partners on the display network also not an option that you can check. No matter how you’re running these campaigns, you cannot add Google Video Partners into the mix. And you’re going to find out when we get to the targeting section that most of the options that we get are Google owned and curated. You’ll see why. So again, no YouTube search results, no video partners, purely just YouTube videos, and channel pages.

So next, we can scroll down, pick your locations, choose your language. Next, you will see content exclusions now live in a different section. In this area could be important if trying to get your videos in front of more users. As it states in the blue box, you can find it under content suitability and I already created a video about the content suitability controls and you can watch that video right here. Underneath content exclusions, you have related videos. Here’s where you can try to stretch out your dollar a little bit more and while someone is watching your video ad, they could see additional videos that you have entered from your channel to get them to continue engaging with your brand and watch additional videos besides the ad that you showed them.

I also have a video related video extensions and yes, I know extensions are now called assets, but you can check out that video here. If you head down to your additional settings, here you can control your devices, your ad schedule, and any third-party measurement but we’re going to move on to the ad group portion. Here’s another big thing that you should be aware of. When creating a target frequency campaign, you are only allowed one ad group per campaign and as we all know by now, targeting options are chosen at the ad group level. So, if you want to test out different options for your target frequency campaign, you will have to create a new campaign every time.

I’m going to leave the name as is but then you can look at the targeting options that you have for YouTube. We already have a video about YouTube targeting options. You could watch that one here but here’s another big difference with this particular campaign type. If I move down, you may notice that certain targeting options are missing. We still have all the main demographics so I’m not going to open up that window, but let’s look at audience segments. If I choose browse, a lot of the options are missing. The biggest one is your custom segments formerly known as the custom intent audiences. Custom segments are not supported for target frequency campaigns. Google wants you to use the Google Built audiences that will be detailed demographics, affinity audiences, in-market audiences, and life events.

We do have separate videos about these targeting options. You probably just have to head back to the channel and look for yourself. I can’t put links to all these videos at the same time on the screen. Go search for them if you’re not familiar with these targeting options. Besides custom segment we also notice that your data audiences are not allowed. So, we do not get the options for remarketing as well as customer list which are options that we can use for other video campaigns within Google Ads. This does make sense because we’re focusing on reach here. Getting in front of a new larger audience. Honing it down and making it very specific kind of defeats the purpose of that. And most likely, if you are trying to use some sort of remarketing with a website or customer list, probably want some sort of action in a video action campaign is going to be more in line with those goals. I just clicked on the in-market option but I’m going to search for something instead and Google knows what we’re about.

So, I’m just going to select these in market audiences. Going down a little bit. You do have the option to choose audience expansion. I pretty much never do that. So, then we can get down to our video ads. I’m just going to head to the Paid Media Pros channel. Pull in an option here and paste it. Please don’t focus too much on the video I’m using for this example. I would never ever recommend a 12-minute video to be used for target frequency campaigns. Long-form videos are best suited for in-feed video ads which coincidentally, that’s what this video is about. For target frequency, you will want to keep to the videos that are much shorter in length. So, you could pick skippable in-stream ads. This gives the viewer the option to skip after 5 seconds. Normally, that’s the ideal ad option I like to use for someone just starting YouTube ads, because they can be more cost effective. However, in this campaign subtype, it’s target CPM. So, you’re not going to get the free advertising if the user skips after the five sec.

Next is a bumper ad. These are non-skippable ads and they must be 6 seconds. I’m not going to click on this because it’s going to change my view but if I did, Google will yell at me saying, this video I entered will not be supported for bumper ads and I would have to replace it. But then we also have non-skippable in-stream ads. Non-skippable ads need to be 15 seconds or less and just to clarify, I clicked on this option. It’s yelling at me for the video. I’d have to choose another one that’s 7 to 15 seconds. So, let me X out and re-paste it in and then I’m going to stick with skippable in-stream ad.

Again, ignore this warning. I know I didn’t pick the best video but Michelle and I don’t have any commercial style videos in our channel. Like most in-stream ads, we get the option to send users to our website or a landing page and then compliment that with a call-to-action button. You could choose some optional ones that Google provides or type in your own. Right now, our headline is the name of the YouTube channel that host this particular ad, but you can change it to be something else. I’m going to leave it as is, choose your companion manner, name your ad, but next we have the option to add more ads within the ad group before you launch. Simple enough just to click on the new video ad, you’re going to get the exact same experience up here.

So, test out a bunch of different video creatives, test out different headlines and calls to action. I may have said this in previous videos. I definitely say this all the time in webinars or speaking events that I do that I personally hate to see the same TV commercial multiple times in the same day. So, I never expect a user to want to see my same YouTube ads over and over again for a long period of time. So, the biggest part of this campaign is to test many different video creatives within your ad group. I want to have at least the same amount of creative options as the target frequency I am going after and up above in the settings, that was four. If you have more, even better. So, I’m going to skip these options for now, not going to create a different ad and then the last thing before we create a campaign is to choose our target CPM bid.

Now, this recommended $12.1 may seem high, but get out of the cost-per-view mindset. This is target 1,000 impressions. This number is going to change depending on the budget settings, so we chose overall campaign budget. So, Google is also going to look at the duration and how long this campaign is going to be. Google will also look at how specific or broad you are getting with your targeting options as well as the ad format you are choosing. For example, bumper ads versus skippable in-stream. You may want to look at your average CPS in other campaigns or you can test out applying what Google recommends. This is something you can always go back and adjust. So, start off with whatever you feel the most comfortable using, and that’s the last thing we need to do before we can go and create the campaign. Then, let’s continue to the campaign.

As I stated earlier, I cannot create another ad group. If I already have a target frequency campaign live. One ad group per target frequency campaign. If I don’t like the two in-market audiences I’ve selected, it’s not performing well, I can either change them here or I’d have to create a new campaign. The columns I have selected are just video column options that I typically use. It is a saved columns option I have within my Google Ads account. But you can go and modify your columns, and if I open up the viewability section, you may want to add much more of these to the mix as well as some additional performance options. If the goal is really to build brand awareness and expand your reach and then for now, I’m just going to close out.

There are other ad channels like Facebook or if you’re running a reach campaign that kind of lock you into an amount and you can’t go in and easily change your ads. Google is not like that. With the target frequency campaign within Google Ads, you can always go within your ad group, swap out your creatives, make new ads at any point. You will not be locked in. You can also go up and pause your ad groups in the campaigns at any moment. This is not a reservation-based campaign. And just like any other video campaign within Google Ads, once you’ve selected a campaign goal and launch the campaign, you cannot go back and change the campaign goal or an objective.

So, I will not be able to make this campaign into a video action campaign and you will not be able to go and make, let’s say, one of your video action campaigns into a target frequency campaign. Not sure why you’d want to do either those but just saying, that is probably the only thing that you will be locked into. That is how you can build a target frequency campaign within Google Ads. There are some additional features coming down the line. Google has said that topic targeting as well as dynamic lineups will be available at some point. We’ll keep an eye out if any other additional features are announced and make sure that you’re aware of those but if you have any other questions on how target frequency campaigns work within Google ads, please let us know in the comments below.

Written by Joe Martinez