Episode Transcript
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SPEAKER_01 (00:00):
Google swears Performance Max works best when
paired with a search campaign.
We're about to ignore thatentirely.
In 2026, we're running a P Maxonly experiment to see what
really happens when you take thesafety wheels off and let
Google's AI figure things out onits own.
(00:22):
Alright, we're we're we'restarting an episode.
This is gonna be a littledifferent this week.
Uh I'm joined by Riley Collins,digital specialist, digital
marketing specialist at Anadus71instead of Rich.
Rich is in Europe, I think, um,probably enjoying his time.
Uh, as you saw in the hook,we're doing something a little
different with our format too.
(00:42):
Uh, we're focusing on anexperiment we're gonna run.
We haven't ran this experimentyet.
It's something we're gonna do in2026, but Riley's here to help
me talk about it and kind ofexplain what the experiment is.
This was kind of his idea.
So uh yeah, welcome, Riley.
Hi, hi.
Thank you for having me.
Of course, of course.
Uh so as I said, for those whodon't know what a PMAX campaign
(01:05):
is, we'll talk about that alittle later.
Um it's kind of like anautomated AI, right, kind of
thing where Google's likebasically like running a
campaign on its own.
SPEAKER_00 (01:16):
Yeah, it really is a um Google has the wheel in terms
of the campaign.
You don't really have uh muchcontrol over it.
They've given you incrementalcontrol over the past like year,
I would say, but really when itfirst launched, you really
didn't have much control overit.
Um, it's really just anautomated campaign um where it
(01:38):
just does a ton of outreach onits own.
And um you're just there in thepassenger seat.
SPEAKER_01 (01:44):
So Google take the wheel.
All right.
Um, so they recommend pairing itwith a search campaign, and the
reason that we're paying itwithout is because what can it
do on its own, right?
And we'll get more into that inthe actual episode because right
now I'm gonna share a cocktail.
So, Riley, you're gonna have tolet me know your thoughts on
this.
Uh, the cocktail is the AnnaBanana.
(02:06):
This was found on a Forbes listfor cocktails for adventurous
drinkers.
All right.
So this was like 16 differentcocktails, and this one was the
one that stood out the most forme.
So there's a little bit ofbackground on this drink.
It was created by oh man, whatis the name?
Anna Maines.
(02:27):
So Anna Banana, Anna Maines, andshe is a brand ambassador for
Monkey Shoulder, which I'mpretty sure is a whiskey, a
banana whiskey, that I'vepersonally had.
My brother had a bottle and Itried it and I loved it.
But this was born from thosesilly what cocktail are you
quizzes.
The ones that are supposed todefine your entire personality
(02:49):
using three questions and a Zoehex sign.
So she was having a little bitof fun with uh creating a drink
that she says is supposed to beuh kind of based on her
personality that she would geton those cocktail quizzes.
Pretty creative concept.
Um, so this is dark, fruitforward sherry meets the bright,
(03:10):
full fruit banana character ofmucky shoulder, and then they
also add creme de banana, whichyou know adds even more uh
banana flavor.
There's also honey and vanillathat smooth everything out, but
uh this is one andthree-quarters parts mucky
shoulder, uh three-quarters ofan ounce of sherry.
(03:33):
There's a specific type ofsherry that they recommend you
use, but I'm gonna say anythingthat's uh fruit forward.
Uh half an ounce of tempest foodtempest, I mean it's a specific
creme de banana, but I think anycreme de banana will work, so
I'm not even gonna try and saythat word.
And then a bar spoon of drambuyand lemon twist.
And the directions are prettysimple.
(03:54):
Stir, pour over large rock,express lemon over top of drink,
drop twists into garnish.
Uh so it basically wants you tostir everything together and
pour over a large ice rock,probably into a rock's glass, if
I had to guess, since they'reasking you to put a large rock
in.
And uh, expressing the lemonpeel, as Rich says, gets a lot
(04:15):
of those oils out and kind ofgives you more lemon flavor.
That's why a lot of them rub thelemon twist around the rim of
the glass, and then once youdrop that in, it just makes the
lemon really come out.
And uh yeah, personally, I lovebanana drinks, so I think I'd
love this.
Curious to see what you think,Riley.
SPEAKER_00 (04:36):
Honestly, if it tastes anything like a banana
laffy taffy, I'm in for it.
Um but when I heard Anna Banana,I kind of loosely thought of the
Savannah bananas like baseballteam.
So I thought that I was curiousif there was like any sort of
tie-in with that.
Unfortunately, there's not, butstill funny enough.
SPEAKER_01 (04:55):
They have their own uh banana cream soda and they
sell it here.
Oh, really?
For those that don't know, Ilive in North Carolina, so I'm
not that far from Georgia.
But uh Chloe went out, who's mywife, went out and like found it
and tried it, and she loved it.
Also, I looked up monkeyshoulder.
I apologize for saying it's abanana whiskey, it's actually a
scotch, and uh, you know me, Ilove scotch, that nice smoky
(05:18):
flavor.
It has hints of vanilla, orange.
So it says monkey in your name,doesn't have banana.
All the banana comes from thecreme de banana, which I'm sure
is a lot of banana.
But uh yeah, it's probably anice smoky cocktail.
So awesome.
All right, let's talk about someP Max campaigns, and we'll be
(05:38):
right back after this littledance break.
We are back.
We just got done drinking ourmonkey shoulders.
Uh, just kidding, it's like 9:30a.m.
for me.
Oh no, it's like 10 a.m.
for me right now, and probablyeven earlier for Riley.
(05:58):
Time difference.
So we're definitely not drinkingany monkey shoulder.
But what we are doing is talkingabout our P Max campaign
experiment.
So, Riley, uh the first thingI'm gonna talk about is why
we're running this PMAX onlyexperiment.
I think uh we kind of talkedabout this before the episode
when we learned that Rich wasgonna be gone.
(06:19):
We wanted to do something alittle different, you know, uh
try something new, see if itsticks.
But we wanted to something thatwe're gonna be focusing on with
our content in 2026 is runningthese kind of experiments to
give you guys, our audience, alittle bit of an inside look of
some of the stuff that we tryand things that we're looking
out for and trying to stay ontop of.
(06:40):
Um, so yeah, I wanted to talkabout why we're running this.
That's a little bit of a whywe're running marketing
experiments, but why PMAXspecifically?
SPEAKER_00 (06:48):
Honestly, PMAX is kind of a mysterious campaign,
at least it was in the verybeginning.
Um it's just something worthtrying, I guess, for me.
Um, I hear a lot of differentstuff about PMAX that like you
need a search campaign with it.
Then I hear other stuff that'slike, well, you don't really
need a search campaign.
I mean, some of our own clientwork, we've had a client portal
(07:10):
that has a PMAX campaign runningwithout a search campaign.
And for those that know, uh PMAXcampaigns work off of conversion
data.
So if you do have enoughconversion data built up in your
account, it is possible for itto run by itself.
Um, but I don't know how muchthey had previously before
(07:31):
running the PMAX.
And it runs totally fine withouthaving an active search
campaign.
So this is the biggest thingthat kind of like sparked it for
me was kind of like, do youactually need it?
And does it matter like whetheryou're service oriented or if
you're product oriented?
SPEAKER_01 (07:47):
Right.
And I knew that we talked abouta client doing it by itself
before, but I don't think that'senough of a use case to really
come to a conclusion.
And the more control, andobviously, like we're running
that campaign for them, butdoing it for us in a controlled
environment is another uh is ais it gives us a deeper look,
right?
(08:07):
We're not necessarily we're ableto test things, we're able to
see how it runs with a searchcampaign, see how it runs
without, and we're able to lookat like the data that we give
it.
So um they say PMAX is a blackbox, which basically means you
don't have control over it,right?
And 100%.
Kind of how you said in intro,they give you control, they're
giving you us more and morecontrol, but when it first came
(08:30):
out, you didn't have control.
How much do you think a searchcampaign actually matters in it?
Do you think it if the PMAXcampaign for our client is
performing well by itself, doyou think it could perform
better with a search campaign?
Or do you what do you thinkabout that?
Because I think that's one ofthe things this experiment is
really going to take a look atis maybe you can run it without.
(08:52):
And Google even says you can runit without, but it highly
recommends you don't.
So, I mean, how much of animpact does that search campaign
actually have?
And if running it by itselfperforms better than having it
with a search campaign, that's awhole nother thing, right?
And I think this is somethingthat we're really trying to do
in 2026, is think outside thebox.
SPEAKER_00 (09:12):
So yeah, definitely.
I'm gonna pull it back a littlebit.
Um, we didn't really give like ahuge, like clear define or a
definition of like what a PMEXis.
Just for like those who arearen't aware of like what an
actual PMEX is, we like kind oftouched on it in the beginning,
but ultimately it's just anautomatic, uh an automated
campaign type that uses machinelearning.
(09:34):
Um and using that machinelearning, it can optimize for
conversions, um, spreading outto different um channels within
Google.
And it touches all of thedifferent advertising channels.
So that being search, display,YouTube, Gmail, and even maps.
Um, and the way that kind ofworks is that instead of like
when you're setting up a searchcampaign, you're setting up ads
(09:58):
and you're setting up uhkeywords that you're gonna use
and all this different stuff.
Um I mean, those are like themain two things.
You have other stuff that youcan throw into it, but those are
the main two things on a searchcampaign.
For a PMEX campaign, you createasset groups, which are just a
huge group of pictures, videos,um, even headlines, all these
(10:19):
different things that thecampaign can take and then use
to build its own ads insidethese different channels.
Um you can let it create its owncampaign, or not campaign, but
asset types within the campaign.
We usually don't do that.
That's a little bit, let'sthat's really letting it take
the wheel and uh, you know,drive off the highway a little
(10:40):
bit.
Um, so at least we like to giveit um we like to have some sort
of control over it.
Um, you know, establishing veryclear, like these are the
assets, you do not go beyondthose assets.
SPEAKER_01 (10:53):
Um is it like creating the assets like through
like AI, or is it just likechoosing like stock imagery?
SPEAKER_00 (10:59):
It's like there, so it does stock imagery, um, but I
think it does have somegenerative AI pieces, especially
with like headlines and all thatkind of stuff.
Um, it tries to stay within thebounds of what you give it.
It's almost like giving um an AIum, you know, 10 different
headlines and you tell it togenerate 10 more off the 10 that
(11:22):
you gave it.
So it's kind of rehashing whatit's doing, but you still don't
know what it's doing unless youreally go in there and look at
it.
Um honestly, my recommendationis just turn that off, that
automated stuff.
Um that's not only in PMAX, theyalso do it for search and other
campaign types where you canjust let it automate for itself.
(11:43):
Um, they really only want you todo that, so then it can just
spend more money going off onits own tangent, but that's a
different tangent for anotherepisode.
Um but kind of getting back intouh your question before, um does
it need a search campaign?
SPEAKER_01 (12:02):
Well, how much yeah, how much of an impact do you
think it's going to have, right?
Because it highly recommends it.
And you kind of touched on thisa little bit where it takes
intent data right from youraccount already.
But and if if we're running thataccount by itself, is it
performing the best through itsbest of abilities?
And we know it's doing good, buthow much better could it do with
(12:25):
search campaign?
Or does it even matter, right?
And that's kind of what we'retrying to figure out in this
experiment.
I guess my main question is whatdo you think we're going to
learn from taking search out?
Or what do you think we'rehoping to figure out by taking
out of the equation?
SPEAKER_00 (12:38):
I think the biggest thing is that PMEX campaigns run
off of conversion data, whetherthat is like historical
conversion data inside your umGoogle Ads account or conversion
data that you're generating.
So that being said, I think whatwe're gonna learn here is that
service-oriented um campaigns,so like stuff that we do, we're
(13:01):
providing a service withmarketing.
You're not gonna get a ton ofnatural conversions just based
off of service, like you would aproduct, like if we're selling a
t-shirt or anything like that.
Um I think it's going tostruggle more because it's based
off that conversion data.
If you can't generate enoughconversions quick enough without
(13:22):
that search campaign, becausethat's why they recommend you
running a search campaignalongside it.
The search campaign is there togenerate those kind of base uh
conversions so then it can umtake that data and then outreach
based off of what you're givingit.
Um I think that's really whatwe're gonna learn is that like
without the search campaign,service uh-oriented campaigns
(13:46):
are going to hurt.
Whereas like product, I feellike might generate enough
conversions to where it can runitself on its own.
Or at least that's my likeexplanation, seeing the other
campaign from one of our clientsum running without a search
campaign.
That's what I like to think.
I like that it's journ it'screating enough um conversions
(14:07):
that it can just kind of runitself.
Um but I think that's the wholedetriment is that if you don't
run a search campaign next to itand you're not generating enough
conversions, then will it reallywork?
You know, that's the bigquestion.
SPEAKER_01 (14:20):
So and we're kind of still in the beginning stages of
planning out how we're gonna dothis experiment.
So I would say if there'ssomething that you in the
audience want to see us try outwith a PMAX campaign, we're
definitely open to doing that.
Uh I mean, it have to be before2026.
Uh so if you're listening tothis in 2026 and you might want
(14:42):
to check out the experiment likefinal product, we'll probably
have a video or a blog orprobably both.
As I said earlier, we're stillplanning this.
So there's probably gonna besome things that we're gonna try
out.
Like, as Riley touched on, likehe thinks a product's gonna
perform better than a service.
While we're still working outexactly what account we want to
use to run this, so there'd bedifferent things we look at.
(15:05):
I mean, we have access toproduct, a product, uh, an
account that sells andadvertises different products,
and we also have you know ourown account that we might test
out with some of our B2Bmarketing like service-based
content, like ads that we'll putout.
So there's things we're gonna belooking at.
None of this is exactly final,but this is an experiment where
we are for sure going to run in2026.
(15:27):
But uh, you're getting in on theground level, you're hearing
what we're going what we'rethinking about running this
experiment.
And hopefully it sparks some uhinterest in like learning more
about PMAX campaigns and alsoseeing how this experiment will
turn out.
So uh stay tuned for thatupdate.
But uh the second point we wantto talk about is how we're gonna
(15:49):
set this up, right?
So some of the things we'rethinking about when we're
setting this up.
So things like what assets,signals, and conversion goals
we're giving this.
So if you want to touch on that,Riley.
SPEAKER_00 (16:00):
I think the biggest thing is controlling as many
variables as you can.
Um, it is at the very end of theday, it's not just a campaign.
We're running an experiment tosee how it works.
Um so kind of our likefoundational thoughts right now
is we want to run aservice-oriented campaign, we
want to run a product-orientedcampaign.
(16:20):
We want to test the two becausethose are the two main ones that
you're gonna have across nomatter what business you're
gonna have.
Um so we have two um two ad uhtypes or like what we're
advertising for.
Well, yeah, we have two, we havetwo different um ad types.
We also have two different umaccounts that we're gonna run it
(16:41):
in.
That's the word I'm trying tolook for.
Um one that's product and onethat's service.
Um how we're gonna set it up.
What I would like to do is wewant to try the PMAX first.
Because then you're not givingjust by itself.
SPEAKER_01 (16:57):
So we have the control of it.
SPEAKER_00 (17:00):
Definitely.
So you have control of the PMAX.
You let the PMAX run becauseit's it it doesn't really make
sense to run the search firstbecause you're giving it the
outlet to have the conversiondata.
We want to see how it runswithout it.
Like we're throwing it in thefire.
We want to see like, can you canyou make this work without the
search campaign?
You know?
SPEAKER_01 (17:19):
And are we gonna give it are we gonna give it
like assets in like stuff too?
Or are we gonna like, are wejust gonna be like, we're never
gonna we're not gonna go crazywith the assets.
I think that's too much.
Because this is a real account,you know?
Yes.
SPEAKER_00 (17:33):
It is a real account.
SPEAKER_01 (17:35):
I w I wonder what would happen though, if you can
give it anything.
SPEAKER_00 (17:39):
You do have to give it some sort of assets.
And it is kind of like a searchcampaign where if you don't give
it enough assets, you just get alow quality score.
It will run, but it would likestruggle to run against
everything else.
Okay.
Um because it is like a livebid.
SPEAKER_01 (17:54):
So we're gonna give it its best chance at performing
on its own.
SPEAKER_00 (17:58):
Yeah.
Basically, the biggest thing tocontrol the variables is that if
one can't like if we have avideo for one campaign type and
we don't have a video for theother, or I should say, um for
one channel.
Like if we have a video for theproduct side and we don't have a
video for the service side,we're not going to use video
(18:18):
because one will have anadvantage over the other.
We want to have the exact amountof um assets and different
assets types from each other.
So maxing out the headlines,maxing out the images, like all
of those different things.
If we don't have a video forone, we don't have a video for
both.
Like we want to make surethey're on the same uh level of
(18:41):
playing and all that kind ofstuff, on the same field, I
guess.
Um, we don't want to give to,right?
Exactly.
Same budget across both.
Um, basically leveling theplaying field for both of them.
Uh no campaign type is gonnahave the advantage in the
beginning, at least.
Um, whatever can generate thefastest amount of conversions
will then build up thatadvantage over time.
(19:02):
But that's the that's the wholeexperiment.
We're gonna see if it actuallycan do that, um, or if it will
just struggle.
Because one of the things thatI've heard is that like if you
don't give it a solid umconversion foundation kind of,
you know, if you don't have alot of uh conversions built up
in the account, or you don'thave something that's like
building up the conversions, itwill just kind of spiral itself.
(19:26):
It won't know where to gobecause it doesn't have that
data to then train itself on,right?
So that's gonna be the biggestthing we can't really control
for that.
Um what conversion data isalready in the account.
We kind of just have to rollwith it.
Um so we're basically justcontrolling the actual campaign
um and the actual asset typesthat are in there.
You can't really control forwhat conversion data is in the
(19:49):
account already, unfortunately.
The only way that you would dothat is if you started up a
fresh new account.
I don't know if we're gonna dothat with this.
Um we might, who knows?
We might, who knows?
I mean, it could be interestingbecause then you're starting
completely fresh.
There is no conversion data inthere.
Um, so that might be somethingworth looking at in the future
as well.
Like, does it even work with afresh new account?
SPEAKER_01 (20:09):
And all these variables that we're talking
about won't be up in the airwhen we actually run the
experiment, obviously.
So we'll dive deeper into uh thereasoning behind everything when
we actually do this experiment.
Uh depending on how it goes, itmight be a blog, it'll probably
be a video no matter what, butit'll also be uh it could also
(20:30):
be like a one sheet if it's likereally in-depth and it does
really well.
Definitely we can kind of talkdeeper about uh some of these
variables.
At the end of the day, I thinkkind of what I'm hearing is that
we'll give it both campaignstheir best shot of performing
well, kind of how we would dofor a client.
Because at the end of the day,if this if a PMAX campaign can
(20:50):
perform well in multipleinstances, not just for one
client, but also for thisexperiment that we're running,
and we can figure out how itdoes perform well about stuff
and how it can, so you don'thave to run two campaigns.
That might be something that youknow we can help other those of
you in the audience with.
But if it performs better with asearch campaign, then that's
(21:12):
something we can go back to aclient with and be like, hey, we
probably should run a searchcampaign with this, even though
that your campaign's doing well.
There's a higher potential ifyou use the search campaign.
So that's what we're gonnafigure out.
Um, PMAX is pretty new, so Ithink people need to be testing
this stuff out, and we are goingto be those people.
So what give me your boldestprediction, Riley?
(21:35):
What do you think P Max will doon its own?
We've kind of seen some successwith that client, but we don't
know if we'll necessarily havethe same conversion data that
they'll have.
So what do you think about it?
SPEAKER_00 (21:47):
That's the biggest thing.
Honestly, that's the biggestthing with the one client that
we've mentioned.
Um, there's a lot of differentvariables that like we aren't
aware of or that we haven'tconsidered.
Like, do they have a strong likebase, like conversion database
and that kind of stuff?
Um and if they do, like thereyou go.
That's the reason.
You know, it's just running offof that and it can generate
(22:07):
more.
I think honestly, my theory isthat um because they're so
dependent on conversion data,that we're gonna see product
campaigns that can generate fastconversions succeed over like a
service-oriented.
So I think like if um whateverproduct campaign that we're
(22:30):
gonna start to run, I think thatone's probably gonna take the
winner over this um the uhservice-oriented campaign.
Because I just thinkservice-oriented campaigns like
that B2B kind of situation, umyou just don't generate enough
leads or enough conversion datadata fast enough to fuel a
conversion or a PMAX campaign.
(22:53):
So that's really what I think isgonna happen.
I think the um product campaignis probably gonna take the win
over it.
Either way, I think it's it'sgonna win, it's gonna win uh by
itself with a PMAX.
And then even when you introducethe search campaign to it, I
still think that it's gonna havethat lead that the
service-oriented one won't beable to make up for in the end.
SPEAKER_01 (23:16):
I'm wondering, so I'm wondering if Google just
recommends that you do it with asearch campaign.
I mean, one, you need the data,but I'm wondering if it's just
so that you run two campaigns.
You know what I mean?
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (23:29):
Like, I mean, I'm kind of just wondering that I
mean, there's a lot that youcould say about Google that kind
of backs up that theory becauseif you're running campaigns and
you get like Google reps thatwant to contact you, everything
that they try to tell you isreally based around like
spending more in there.
(23:50):
Yes, if you spend more, you'remost likely going to get more
out of it.
Yeah.
But that really depends on yourbudget.
Do you have the budget to spendmore?
SPEAKER_01 (23:58):
You don't necessarily need to run like
they're trying at the end of theday, they're help a lot of them
are helpful, right?
But they're also trying to sellyou on doing more within your
account, right?
Like you said.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (24:11):
So I don't blame them.
They're just a lot of the timesthey're just contracted to
Google and Google's giving themlike the talking points.
So like it's not really theirfault.
SPEAKER_01 (24:20):
Um but and they want to help you with but also you
need to know what works best foryou.
And honestly, we'll help you.
We're we're here to help youfigure this out, right?
Like, we're going to be lookingand we're kind we're kind of
like mythbusters, right?
Like, do you actually need asearch campaign to be successful
at PMAX?
Are my gut's telling me no,because we've already done it
(24:43):
for a client and they're doingpretty well.
But I mean, just because we haveone client that it's doing well
for doesn't mean that'll do wellfor everyone, right?
And this experiment's gonna lookat the variables and kind of the
why this performed well and whyit didn't.
And we'll we'll have some thesome of those answers for you,
right?
And this this is the reasonwe're doing these experiments,
(25:03):
so that we are on top of all ofthis new stuff and you don't
have to worry about it.
So third and final point is uhhow are we gonna judge this
experiment worked, right?
So what success looks like lookslike.
We've kind of talked about whatit looks like, but to you,
Riley, uh what would you see asuccess?
(25:24):
Like what's like a benchmark,right?
Because a PMAX campaignperforming on its own, like what
does success with that looklike?
Like what do we if it does if itgets some results, like I guess
how much how how higher resultsdo we need to see this as a
success, right?
SPEAKER_00 (25:42):
I think that's hard um to answer right away, just
because we don't have all of thevariables in line currently.
I think it's gotta besignificant though, in order to
show one between the twodifferent campaign types and two
whether you need a searchcampaign or not.
Um it's kind of like atwo-parter test a little bit,
(26:03):
like which one does it run bestfor?
Does it run best for like ane-commerce like product kind of
campaign, or does it run bestfor like a um, you know, like a
pro or a service-oriented B2Bkind of kind of campaign?
Um I've seen it work well wellfor both, honestly.
Um but for the variables to likekind of test for what success
(26:26):
looks like, honestly, it's gonnabe really up to just uh
comparing the two differentcampaign types and then
comparing the campaign typesagainst themselves when they do
and when they don't have asearch campaign running
alongside them.
I again I think it's gotta besignificant.
Um something that I'm probablygonna look out for is obviously
how many conversions it'sgenerating, what the conversion
(26:47):
rate looks like, um maybe likeCPAs, uh which are cost per
acquisition.
So like how much you're spendingto get those conversions on
average.
Um it's really gonna be around alot of the conversion data that
we're getting or the conversionnumbers.
SPEAKER_01 (27:04):
So yeah, no, that's that's a great answer.
I think first the experiment asa whole, right?
So if we get results and if weget positive results from I mean
what happens when we get if bothcampaigns just perform like the
same, right?
That'll be interesting to see.
But I think I think the goal ofthis experiment is to at the end
(27:29):
of the day, is to learn moreabout how PMAX campaigns perform
when put into differentsituations and with different
variables, right?
So we're gonna look at them bythemselves, which is the main
part of the experiment, becausewe want to see if they actually
need a search campaign, but wealso want to see what success
looks like and how we can findthe most success with PMAX
(27:51):
campaigns.
So maybe they perform wellalone, but they need these
specific asset types or theyneed these specific, like
targeting, like they need this,these specific things, right?
Not targeting, it does on itsown, but um I think that's
what's gonna be reallysuccessful, right?
Is we're gonna learn so muchabout PMAX campaigns, and we're
gonna be able to say, okay, likethis performed well because of
(28:14):
this, this didn't perform wellbecause of this, and we're gonna
be able to find the bestsolution for PMAX campaigns for
all of our clients.
And if you in the audience wantto learn more about PMAX
campaigns, um, obviously we haveexperience with them, we do them
for other clients, but uh we'realso we can help you with that,
right?
And we're gonna be experts onthem by the time we run this
experiment.
(28:34):
But uh yeah, I think uh I thinkit's gonna be awesome.
I think it's gonna help us withlike future campaigns and
strategies, and I think, ohyeah, I'm just really excited
about this.
SPEAKER_00 (28:50):
It's it's a really interesting test because you
hear a lot of different things,which up about the PMAX
campaign, and if you're indigital space long enough, you
hear people who are really highon them and who are really
negative on them.
So it's like, what's the truth?
You know, like if you give itnothing and let it run, will it
run?
You know, like and will it dowell?
(29:10):
So yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (29:12):
Well, I think that's that's an episode, Riley.
I think we covered everythingthere.
Um again, uh we told you whywe're running this PMAX
campaign.
Um, we want to see if PMAXactually needs a search
campaign, and we want to see howPMAX performs under different
environments and differentservices, product products and
services.
(29:32):
And if it honestly, we're gonnawe're gonna try a bunch of
different stuff.
So just stay tuned for that.
Uh we talked about how we'resetting it up, and we talked
about like what success lookslike for that.
So that's a great episode.
Um, as always, you can find ouragency at antidote71.com, and
all of our socials are there aswell.
Uh, so stay tuned to thosesocials because we're definitely
(29:55):
gonna be posting more about thisexperiment as we get into 2026.
Again, this is kind of a behind.
The scenes before we even do it.
So you're getting in on theground floor.
Definitely invest in it.
SPEAKER_00 (30:05):
Just kidding.
SPEAKER_01 (30:06):
Head to CTA Podcast.live to shoot us an
email.
We always take like questions.
You can always comment on theactual like episode, like social
post too, if you don't want tosend us a voicemail or email.
I'd be curious to see whatpeople think of this experiment,
especially other marketers.
So feel free to feel free toreach out.
(30:26):
Even better, you can alwaysleave us a voice message on our
hotline at 402-718-9971.
As Rich always says, we do getcalls there, but it's just spam.
So maybe you could be the firstcall that's not spam, and that'd
be a really awesome.
Your question will make it intoa future episode.
And honestly, if you ask aquestion, it's going to be its
(30:48):
own episode.
We're going to roll out the bedquite.
So uh as always, we'll see younext week.
Thank you for being here, Riley.
Uh, next week we'll probably dosomething similar to this, which
is still going to be out.
So stay tuned for something newand different.
And uh yeah, we'll see you nextweek.
Google swears Performance Max works best when
paired with a search campaign.
We're about to ignore thatentirely.
In 2026, we're running a P Maxonly experiment to see what
really happens when you take thesafety wheels off and let
Google's AI figure things out onits own.
(00:22):
Alright, we're we're we'restarting an episode.
This is gonna be a littledifferent this week.
Uh I'm joined by Riley Collins,digital specialist, digital
marketing specialist at Anadus71instead of Rich.
Rich is in Europe, I think, um,probably enjoying his time.
Uh, as you saw in the hook,we're doing something a little
different with our format too.
(00:42):
Uh, we're focusing on anexperiment we're gonna run.
We haven't ran this experimentyet.
It's something we're gonna do in2026, but Riley's here to help
me talk about it and kind ofexplain what the experiment is.
This was kind of his idea.
So uh yeah, welcome, Riley.
Hi, hi.
Thank you for having me.
Of course, of course.
Uh so as I said, for those whodon't know what a PMAX campaign
(01:05):
is, we'll talk about that alittle later.
Um it's kind of like anautomated AI, right, kind of
thing where Google's likebasically like running a
campaign on its own.
SPEAKER_00 (01:16):
Yeah, it really is a um Google has the wheel in terms
of the campaign.
You don't really have uh muchcontrol over it.
They've given you incrementalcontrol over the past like year,
I would say, but really when itfirst launched, you really
didn't have much control overit.
Um, it's really just anautomated campaign um where it
(01:38):
just does a ton of outreach onits own.
And um you're just there in thepassenger seat.
SPEAKER_01 (01:44):
So Google take the wheel.
All right.
Um, so they recommend pairing itwith a search campaign, and the
reason that we're paying itwithout is because what can it
do on its own, right?
And we'll get more into that inthe actual episode because right
now I'm gonna share a cocktail.
So, Riley, you're gonna have tolet me know your thoughts on
this.
Uh, the cocktail is the AnnaBanana.
(02:06):
This was found on a Forbes listfor cocktails for adventurous
drinkers.
All right.
So this was like 16 differentcocktails, and this one was the
one that stood out the most forme.
So there's a little bit ofbackground on this drink.
It was created by oh man, whatis the name?
Anna Maines.
(02:27):
So Anna Banana, Anna Maines, andshe is a brand ambassador for
Monkey Shoulder, which I'mpretty sure is a whiskey, a
banana whiskey, that I'vepersonally had.
My brother had a bottle and Itried it and I loved it.
But this was born from thosesilly what cocktail are you
quizzes.
The ones that are supposed todefine your entire personality
(02:49):
using three questions and a Zoehex sign.
So she was having a little bitof fun with uh creating a drink
that she says is supposed to beuh kind of based on her
personality that she would geton those cocktail quizzes.
Pretty creative concept.
Um, so this is dark, fruitforward sherry meets the bright,
(03:10):
full fruit banana character ofmucky shoulder, and then they
also add creme de banana, whichyou know adds even more uh
banana flavor.
There's also honey and vanillathat smooth everything out, but
uh this is one andthree-quarters parts mucky
shoulder, uh three-quarters ofan ounce of sherry.
(03:33):
There's a specific type ofsherry that they recommend you
use, but I'm gonna say anythingthat's uh fruit forward.
Uh half an ounce of tempest foodtempest, I mean it's a specific
creme de banana, but I think anycreme de banana will work, so
I'm not even gonna try and saythat word.
And then a bar spoon of drambuyand lemon twist.
And the directions are prettysimple.
(03:54):
Stir, pour over large rock,express lemon over top of drink,
drop twists into garnish.
Uh so it basically wants you tostir everything together and
pour over a large ice rock,probably into a rock's glass, if
I had to guess, since they'reasking you to put a large rock
in.
And uh, expressing the lemonpeel, as Rich says, gets a lot
(04:15):
of those oils out and kind ofgives you more lemon flavor.
That's why a lot of them rub thelemon twist around the rim of
the glass, and then once youdrop that in, it just makes the
lemon really come out.
And uh yeah, personally, I lovebanana drinks, so I think I'd
love this.
Curious to see what you think,Riley.
SPEAKER_00 (04:36):
Honestly, if it tastes anything like a banana
laffy taffy, I'm in for it.
Um but when I heard Anna Banana,I kind of loosely thought of the
Savannah bananas like baseballteam.
So I thought that I was curiousif there was like any sort of
tie-in with that.
Unfortunately, there's not, butstill funny enough.
SPEAKER_01 (04:55):
They have their own uh banana cream soda and they
sell it here.
Oh, really?
For those that don't know, Ilive in North Carolina, so I'm
not that far from Georgia.
But uh Chloe went out, who's mywife, went out and like found it
and tried it, and she loved it.
Also, I looked up monkeyshoulder.
I apologize for saying it's abanana whiskey, it's actually a
scotch, and uh, you know me, Ilove scotch, that nice smoky
(05:18):
flavor.
It has hints of vanilla, orange.
So it says monkey in your name,doesn't have banana.
All the banana comes from thecreme de banana, which I'm sure
is a lot of banana.
But uh yeah, it's probably anice smoky cocktail.
So awesome.
All right, let's talk about someP Max campaigns, and we'll be
(05:38):
right back after this littledance break.
We are back.
We just got done drinking ourmonkey shoulders.
Uh, just kidding, it's like 9:30a.m.
for me.
Oh no, it's like 10 a.m.
for me right now, and probablyeven earlier for Riley.
(05:58):
Time difference.
So we're definitely not drinkingany monkey shoulder.
But what we are doing is talkingabout our P Max campaign
experiment.
So, Riley, uh the first thingI'm gonna talk about is why
we're running this PMAX onlyexperiment.
I think uh we kind of talkedabout this before the episode
when we learned that Rich wasgonna be gone.
(06:19):
We wanted to do something alittle different, you know, uh
try something new, see if itsticks.
But we wanted to something thatwe're gonna be focusing on with
our content in 2026 is runningthese kind of experiments to
give you guys, our audience, alittle bit of an inside look of
some of the stuff that we tryand things that we're looking
out for and trying to stay ontop of.
(06:40):
Um, so yeah, I wanted to talkabout why we're running this.
That's a little bit of a whywe're running marketing
experiments, but why PMAXspecifically?
SPEAKER_00 (06:48):
Honestly, PMAX is kind of a mysterious campaign,
at least it was in the verybeginning.
Um it's just something worthtrying, I guess, for me.
Um, I hear a lot of differentstuff about PMAX that like you
need a search campaign with it.
Then I hear other stuff that'slike, well, you don't really
need a search campaign.
I mean, some of our own clientwork, we've had a client portal
(07:10):
that has a PMAX campaign runningwithout a search campaign.
And for those that know, uh PMAXcampaigns work off of conversion
data.
So if you do have enoughconversion data built up in your
account, it is possible for itto run by itself.
Um, but I don't know how muchthey had previously before
(07:31):
running the PMAX.
And it runs totally fine withouthaving an active search
campaign.
So this is the biggest thingthat kind of like sparked it for
me was kind of like, do youactually need it?
And does it matter like whetheryou're service oriented or if
you're product oriented?
SPEAKER_01 (07:47):
Right.
And I knew that we talked abouta client doing it by itself
before, but I don't think that'senough of a use case to really
come to a conclusion.
And the more control, andobviously, like we're running
that campaign for them, butdoing it for us in a controlled
environment is another uh is ais it gives us a deeper look,
right?
(08:07):
We're not necessarily we're ableto test things, we're able to
see how it runs with a searchcampaign, see how it runs
without, and we're able to lookat like the data that we give
it.
So um they say PMAX is a blackbox, which basically means you
don't have control over it,right?
And 100%.
Kind of how you said in intro,they give you control, they're
giving you us more and morecontrol, but when it first came
(08:30):
out, you didn't have control.
How much do you think a searchcampaign actually matters in it?
Do you think it if the PMAXcampaign for our client is
performing well by itself, doyou think it could perform
better with a search campaign?
Or do you what do you thinkabout that?
Because I think that's one ofthe things this experiment is
really going to take a look atis maybe you can run it without.
(08:52):
And Google even says you can runit without, but it highly
recommends you don't.
So, I mean, how much of animpact does that search campaign
actually have?
And if running it by itselfperforms better than having it
with a search campaign, that's awhole nother thing, right?
And I think this is somethingthat we're really trying to do
in 2026, is think outside thebox.
SPEAKER_00 (09:12):
So yeah, definitely.
I'm gonna pull it back a littlebit.
Um, we didn't really give like ahuge, like clear define or a
definition of like what a PMEXis.
Just for like those who arearen't aware of like what an
actual PMEX is, we like kind oftouched on it in the beginning,
but ultimately it's just anautomatic, uh an automated
campaign type that uses machinelearning.
(09:34):
Um and using that machinelearning, it can optimize for
conversions, um, spreading outto different um channels within
Google.
And it touches all of thedifferent advertising channels.
So that being search, display,YouTube, Gmail, and even maps.
Um, and the way that kind ofworks is that instead of like
when you're setting up a searchcampaign, you're setting up ads
(09:58):
and you're setting up uhkeywords that you're gonna use
and all this different stuff.
Um I mean, those are like themain two things.
You have other stuff that youcan throw into it, but those are
the main two things on a searchcampaign.
For a PMEX campaign, you createasset groups, which are just a
huge group of pictures, videos,um, even headlines, all these
(10:19):
different things that thecampaign can take and then use
to build its own ads insidethese different channels.
Um you can let it create its owncampaign, or not campaign, but
asset types within the campaign.
We usually don't do that.
That's a little bit, let'sthat's really letting it take
the wheel and uh, you know,drive off the highway a little
(10:40):
bit.
Um, so at least we like to giveit um we like to have some sort
of control over it.
Um, you know, establishing veryclear, like these are the
assets, you do not go beyondthose assets.
SPEAKER_01 (10:53):
Um is it like creating the assets like through
like AI, or is it just likechoosing like stock imagery?
SPEAKER_00 (10:59):
It's like there, so it does stock imagery, um, but I
think it does have somegenerative AI pieces, especially
with like headlines and all thatkind of stuff.
Um, it tries to stay within thebounds of what you give it.
It's almost like giving um an AIum, you know, 10 different
headlines and you tell it togenerate 10 more off the 10 that
(11:22):
you gave it.
So it's kind of rehashing whatit's doing, but you still don't
know what it's doing unless youreally go in there and look at
it.
Um honestly, my recommendationis just turn that off, that
automated stuff.
Um that's not only in PMAX, theyalso do it for search and other
campaign types where you canjust let it automate for itself.
(11:43):
Um, they really only want you todo that, so then it can just
spend more money going off onits own tangent, but that's a
different tangent for anotherepisode.
Um but kind of getting back intouh your question before, um does
it need a search campaign?
SPEAKER_01 (12:02):
Well, how much yeah, how much of an impact do you
think it's going to have, right?
Because it highly recommends it.
And you kind of touched on thisa little bit where it takes
intent data right from youraccount already.
But and if if we're running thataccount by itself, is it
performing the best through itsbest of abilities?
And we know it's doing good, buthow much better could it do with
(12:25):
search campaign?
Or does it even matter, right?
And that's kind of what we'retrying to figure out in this
experiment.
I guess my main question is whatdo you think we're going to
learn from taking search out?
Or what do you think we'rehoping to figure out by taking
out of the equation?
SPEAKER_00 (12:38):
I think the biggest thing is that PMEX campaigns run
off of conversion data, whetherthat is like historical
conversion data inside your umGoogle Ads account or conversion
data that you're generating.
So that being said, I think whatwe're gonna learn here is that
service-oriented um campaigns,so like stuff that we do, we're
(13:01):
providing a service withmarketing.
You're not gonna get a ton ofnatural conversions just based
off of service, like you would aproduct, like if we're selling a
t-shirt or anything like that.
Um I think it's going tostruggle more because it's based
off that conversion data.
If you can't generate enoughconversions quick enough without
(13:22):
that search campaign, becausethat's why they recommend you
running a search campaignalongside it.
The search campaign is there togenerate those kind of base uh
conversions so then it can umtake that data and then outreach
based off of what you're givingit.
Um I think that's really whatwe're gonna learn is that like
without the search campaign,service uh-oriented campaigns
(13:46):
are going to hurt.
Whereas like product, I feellike might generate enough
conversions to where it can runitself on its own.
Or at least that's my likeexplanation, seeing the other
campaign from one of our clientsum running without a search
campaign.
That's what I like to think.
I like that it's journ it'screating enough um conversions
(14:07):
that it can just kind of runitself.
Um but I think that's the wholedetriment is that if you don't
run a search campaign next to itand you're not generating enough
conversions, then will it reallywork?
You know, that's the bigquestion.
SPEAKER_01 (14:20):
So and we're kind of still in the beginning stages of
planning out how we're gonna dothis experiment.
So I would say if there'ssomething that you in the
audience want to see us try outwith a PMAX campaign, we're
definitely open to doing that.
Uh I mean, it have to be before2026.
Uh so if you're listening tothis in 2026 and you might want
(14:42):
to check out the experiment likefinal product, we'll probably
have a video or a blog orprobably both.
As I said earlier, we're stillplanning this.
So there's probably gonna besome things that we're gonna try
out.
Like, as Riley touched on, likehe thinks a product's gonna
perform better than a service.
While we're still working outexactly what account we want to
use to run this, so there'd bedifferent things we look at.
(15:05):
I mean, we have access toproduct, a product, uh, an
account that sells andadvertises different products,
and we also have you know ourown account that we might test
out with some of our B2Bmarketing like service-based
content, like ads that we'll putout.
So there's things we're gonna belooking at.
None of this is exactly final,but this is an experiment where
we are for sure going to run in2026.
(15:27):
But uh, you're getting in on theground level, you're hearing
what we're going what we'rethinking about running this
experiment.
And hopefully it sparks some uhinterest in like learning more
about PMAX campaigns and alsoseeing how this experiment will
turn out.
So uh stay tuned for thatupdate.
But uh the second point we wantto talk about is how we're gonna
(15:49):
set this up, right?
So some of the things we'rethinking about when we're
setting this up.
So things like what assets,signals, and conversion goals
we're giving this.
So if you want to touch on that,Riley.
SPEAKER_00 (16:00):
I think the biggest thing is controlling as many
variables as you can.
Um, it is at the very end of theday, it's not just a campaign.
We're running an experiment tosee how it works.
Um so kind of our likefoundational thoughts right now
is we want to run aservice-oriented campaign, we
want to run a product-orientedcampaign.
(16:20):
We want to test the two becausethose are the two main ones that
you're gonna have across nomatter what business you're
gonna have.
Um so we have two um two ad uhtypes or like what we're
advertising for.
Well, yeah, we have two, we havetwo different um ad types.
We also have two different umaccounts that we're gonna run it
(16:41):
in.
That's the word I'm trying tolook for.
Um one that's product and onethat's service.
Um how we're gonna set it up.
What I would like to do is wewant to try the PMAX first.
Because then you're not givingjust by itself.
SPEAKER_01 (16:57):
So we have the control of it.
SPEAKER_00 (17:00):
Definitely.
So you have control of the PMAX.
You let the PMAX run becauseit's it it doesn't really make
sense to run the search firstbecause you're giving it the
outlet to have the conversiondata.
We want to see how it runswithout it.
Like we're throwing it in thefire.
We want to see like, can you canyou make this work without the
search campaign?
You know?
SPEAKER_01 (17:19):
And are we gonna give it are we gonna give it
like assets in like stuff too?
Or are we gonna like, are wejust gonna be like, we're never
gonna we're not gonna go crazywith the assets.
I think that's too much.
Because this is a real account,you know?
Yes.
SPEAKER_00 (17:33):
It is a real account.
SPEAKER_01 (17:35):
I w I wonder what would happen though, if you can
give it anything.
SPEAKER_00 (17:39):
You do have to give it some sort of assets.
And it is kind of like a searchcampaign where if you don't give
it enough assets, you just get alow quality score.
It will run, but it would likestruggle to run against
everything else.
Okay.
Um because it is like a livebid.
SPEAKER_01 (17:54):
So we're gonna give it its best chance at performing
on its own.
SPEAKER_00 (17:58):
Yeah.
Basically, the biggest thing tocontrol the variables is that if
one can't like if we have avideo for one campaign type and
we don't have a video for theother, or I should say, um for
one channel.
Like if we have a video for theproduct side and we don't have a
video for the service side,we're not going to use video
(18:18):
because one will have anadvantage over the other.
We want to have the exact amountof um assets and different
assets types from each other.
So maxing out the headlines,maxing out the images, like all
of those different things.
If we don't have a video forone, we don't have a video for
both.
Like we want to make surethey're on the same uh level of
(18:41):
playing and all that kind ofstuff, on the same field, I
guess.
Um, we don't want to give to,right?
Exactly.
Same budget across both.
Um, basically leveling theplaying field for both of them.
Uh no campaign type is gonnahave the advantage in the
beginning, at least.
Um, whatever can generate thefastest amount of conversions
will then build up thatadvantage over time.
(19:02):
But that's the that's the wholeexperiment.
We're gonna see if it actuallycan do that, um, or if it will
just struggle.
Because one of the things thatI've heard is that like if you
don't give it a solid umconversion foundation kind of,
you know, if you don't have alot of uh conversions built up
in the account, or you don'thave something that's like
building up the conversions, itwill just kind of spiral itself.
(19:26):
It won't know where to gobecause it doesn't have that
data to then train itself on,right?
So that's gonna be the biggestthing we can't really control
for that.
Um what conversion data isalready in the account.
We kind of just have to rollwith it.
Um so we're basically justcontrolling the actual campaign
um and the actual asset typesthat are in there.
You can't really control forwhat conversion data is in the
(19:49):
account already, unfortunately.
The only way that you would dothat is if you started up a
fresh new account.
I don't know if we're gonna dothat with this.
Um we might, who knows?
We might, who knows?
I mean, it could be interestingbecause then you're starting
completely fresh.
There is no conversion data inthere.
Um, so that might be somethingworth looking at in the future
as well.
Like, does it even work with afresh new account?
SPEAKER_01 (20:09):
And all these variables that we're talking
about won't be up in the airwhen we actually run the
experiment, obviously.
So we'll dive deeper into uh thereasoning behind everything when
we actually do this experiment.
Uh depending on how it goes, itmight be a blog, it'll probably
be a video no matter what, butit'll also be uh it could also
(20:30):
be like a one sheet if it's likereally in-depth and it does
really well.
Definitely we can kind of talkdeeper about uh some of these
variables.
At the end of the day, I thinkkind of what I'm hearing is that
we'll give it both campaignstheir best shot of performing
well, kind of how we would dofor a client.
Because at the end of the day,if this if a PMAX campaign can
(20:50):
perform well in multipleinstances, not just for one
client, but also for thisexperiment that we're running,
and we can figure out how itdoes perform well about stuff
and how it can, so you don'thave to run two campaigns.
That might be something that youknow we can help other those of
you in the audience with.
But if it performs better with asearch campaign, then that's
(21:12):
something we can go back to aclient with and be like, hey, we
probably should run a searchcampaign with this, even though
that your campaign's doing well.
There's a higher potential ifyou use the search campaign.
So that's what we're gonnafigure out.
Um, PMAX is pretty new, so Ithink people need to be testing
this stuff out, and we are goingto be those people.
So what give me your boldestprediction, Riley?
(21:35):
What do you think P Max will doon its own?
We've kind of seen some successwith that client, but we don't
know if we'll necessarily havethe same conversion data that
they'll have.
So what do you think about it?
SPEAKER_00 (21:47):
That's the biggest thing.
Honestly, that's the biggestthing with the one client that
we've mentioned.
Um, there's a lot of differentvariables that like we aren't
aware of or that we haven'tconsidered.
Like, do they have a strong likebase, like conversion database
and that kind of stuff?
Um and if they do, like thereyou go.
That's the reason.
You know, it's just running offof that and it can generate
(22:07):
more.
I think honestly, my theory isthat um because they're so
dependent on conversion data,that we're gonna see product
campaigns that can generate fastconversions succeed over like a
service-oriented.
So I think like if um whateverproduct campaign that we're
(22:30):
gonna start to run, I think thatone's probably gonna take the
winner over this um the uhservice-oriented campaign.
Because I just thinkservice-oriented campaigns like
that B2B kind of situation, umyou just don't generate enough
leads or enough conversion datadata fast enough to fuel a
conversion or a PMAX campaign.
(22:53):
So that's really what I think isgonna happen.
I think the um product campaignis probably gonna take the win
over it.
Either way, I think it's it'sgonna win, it's gonna win uh by
itself with a PMAX.
And then even when you introducethe search campaign to it, I
still think that it's gonna havethat lead that the
service-oriented one won't beable to make up for in the end.
SPEAKER_01 (23:16):
I'm wondering, so I'm wondering if Google just
recommends that you do it with asearch campaign.
I mean, one, you need the data,but I'm wondering if it's just
so that you run two campaigns.
You know what I mean?
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (23:29):
Like, I mean, I'm kind of just wondering that I
mean, there's a lot that youcould say about Google that kind
of backs up that theory becauseif you're running campaigns and
you get like Google reps thatwant to contact you, everything
that they try to tell you isreally based around like
spending more in there.
(23:50):
Yes, if you spend more, you'remost likely going to get more
out of it.
Yeah.
But that really depends on yourbudget.
Do you have the budget to spendmore?
SPEAKER_01 (23:58):
You don't necessarily need to run like
they're trying at the end of theday, they're help a lot of them
are helpful, right?
But they're also trying to sellyou on doing more within your
account, right?
Like you said.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (24:11):
So I don't blame them.
They're just a lot of the timesthey're just contracted to
Google and Google's giving themlike the talking points.
So like it's not really theirfault.
SPEAKER_01 (24:20):
Um but and they want to help you with but also you
need to know what works best foryou.
And honestly, we'll help you.
We're we're here to help youfigure this out, right?
Like, we're going to be lookingand we're kind we're kind of
like mythbusters, right?
Like, do you actually need asearch campaign to be successful
at PMAX?
Are my gut's telling me no,because we've already done it
(24:43):
for a client and they're doingpretty well.
But I mean, just because we haveone client that it's doing well
for doesn't mean that'll do wellfor everyone, right?
And this experiment's gonna lookat the variables and kind of the
why this performed well and whyit didn't.
And we'll we'll have some thesome of those answers for you,
right?
And this this is the reasonwe're doing these experiments,
(25:03):
so that we are on top of all ofthis new stuff and you don't
have to worry about it.
So third and final point is uhhow are we gonna judge this
experiment worked, right?
So what success looks like lookslike.
We've kind of talked about whatit looks like, but to you,
Riley, uh what would you see asuccess?
(25:24):
Like what's like a benchmark,right?
Because a PMAX campaignperforming on its own, like what
does success with that looklike?
Like what do we if it does if itgets some results, like I guess
how much how how higher resultsdo we need to see this as a
success, right?
SPEAKER_00 (25:42):
I think that's hard um to answer right away, just
because we don't have all of thevariables in line currently.
I think it's gotta besignificant though, in order to
show one between the twodifferent campaign types and two
whether you need a searchcampaign or not.
Um it's kind of like atwo-parter test a little bit,
(26:03):
like which one does it run bestfor?
Does it run best for like ane-commerce like product kind of
campaign, or does it run bestfor like a um, you know, like a
pro or a service-oriented B2Bkind of kind of campaign?
Um I've seen it work well wellfor both, honestly.
Um but for the variables to likekind of test for what success
(26:26):
looks like, honestly, it's gonnabe really up to just uh
comparing the two differentcampaign types and then
comparing the campaign typesagainst themselves when they do
and when they don't have asearch campaign running
alongside them.
I again I think it's gotta besignificant.
Um something that I'm probablygonna look out for is obviously
how many conversions it'sgenerating, what the conversion
(26:47):
rate looks like, um maybe likeCPAs, uh which are cost per
acquisition.
So like how much you're spendingto get those conversions on
average.
Um it's really gonna be around alot of the conversion data that
we're getting or the conversionnumbers.
SPEAKER_01 (27:04):
So yeah, no, that's that's a great answer.
I think first the experiment asa whole, right?
So if we get results and if weget positive results from I mean
what happens when we get if bothcampaigns just perform like the
same, right?
That'll be interesting to see.
But I think I think the goal ofthis experiment is to at the end
(27:29):
of the day, is to learn moreabout how PMAX campaigns perform
when put into differentsituations and with different
variables, right?
So we're gonna look at them bythemselves, which is the main
part of the experiment, becausewe want to see if they actually
need a search campaign, but wealso want to see what success
looks like and how we can findthe most success with PMAX
(27:51):
campaigns.
So maybe they perform wellalone, but they need these
specific asset types or theyneed these specific, like
targeting, like they need this,these specific things, right?
Not targeting, it does on itsown, but um I think that's
what's gonna be reallysuccessful, right?
Is we're gonna learn so muchabout PMAX campaigns, and we're
gonna be able to say, okay, likethis performed well because of
(28:14):
this, this didn't perform wellbecause of this, and we're gonna
be able to find the bestsolution for PMAX campaigns for
all of our clients.
And if you in the audience wantto learn more about PMAX
campaigns, um, obviously we haveexperience with them, we do them
for other clients, but uh we'realso we can help you with that,
right?
And we're gonna be experts onthem by the time we run this
experiment.
(28:34):
But uh yeah, I think uh I thinkit's gonna be awesome.
I think it's gonna help us withlike future campaigns and
strategies, and I think, ohyeah, I'm just really excited
about this.
SPEAKER_00 (28:50):
It's it's a really interesting test because you
hear a lot of different things,which up about the PMAX
campaign, and if you're indigital space long enough, you
hear people who are really highon them and who are really
negative on them.
So it's like, what's the truth?
You know, like if you give itnothing and let it run, will it
run?
You know, like and will it dowell?
(29:10):
So yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (29:12):
Well, I think that's that's an episode, Riley.
I think we covered everythingthere.
Um again, uh we told you whywe're running this PMAX
campaign.
Um, we want to see if PMAXactually needs a search
campaign, and we want to see howPMAX performs under different
environments and differentservices, product products and
services.
(29:32):
And if it honestly, we're gonnawe're gonna try a bunch of
different stuff.
So just stay tuned for that.
Uh we talked about how we'resetting it up, and we talked
about like what success lookslike for that.
So that's a great episode.
Um, as always, you can find ouragency at antidote71.com, and
all of our socials are there aswell.
Uh, so stay tuned to thosesocials because we're definitely
(29:55):
gonna be posting more about thisexperiment as we get into 2026.
Again, this is kind of a behind.
The scenes before we even do it.
So you're getting in on theground floor.
Definitely invest in it.
SPEAKER_00 (30:05):
Just kidding.
SPEAKER_01 (30:06):
Head to CTA Podcast.live to shoot us an
email.
We always take like questions.
You can always comment on theactual like episode, like social
post too, if you don't want tosend us a voicemail or email.
I'd be curious to see whatpeople think of this experiment,
especially other marketers.
So feel free to feel free toreach out.
(30:26):
Even better, you can alwaysleave us a voice message on our
hotline at 402-718-9971.
As Rich always says, we do getcalls there, but it's just spam.
So maybe you could be the firstcall that's not spam, and that'd
be a really awesome.
Your question will make it intoa future episode.
And honestly, if you ask aquestion, it's going to be its
(30:48):
own episode.
We're going to roll out the bedquite.
So uh as always, we'll see younext week.
Thank you for being here, Riley.
Uh, next week we'll probably dosomething similar to this, which
is still going to be out.
So stay tuned for something newand different.
And uh yeah, we'll see you nextweek.
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