What’s Happening
Maintaining parity with last year’s move by Google Ads to rethink ad position metrics, Microsoft has rolled out a new set of “prominence metrics” (formerly, Share of Voice).
The metrics are:
- Top Impression Share – The percent of ad impressions that appeared above organic results on the search engine results page (SERP), relative to the number of times your ads were eligible to show in one of those top spots.
- Top IS Lost to Budget – The percent of times your ads were eligible to show above organic results on the SERP, but did not because your budget was insufficient.
- Top IS Lost to Rank – The percent of times your ads were eligible to show above organic results on the SERP, but did not because your bid was too low.
- Absolute Top Impression Share – The percent of ad impressions that appeared in the #1 position on the SERP, relative to the number of times your ads were eligible to show in that spot.
- Absolute Top IS Lost to Budget – The percent of times your ads were eligible to show in the #1 spot, but did not because your budget was insufficient.
- Absolute Top IS Lost to Rank – The percent of times your ads were eligible to show in the #1 spot, but did not because your bid was too low.
What It Means
Consistency across platforms will simplify multi-channel reporting.
After Google Ads decided to get rid of the average position metric, it became more difficult to report search prominence in aggregate (combining data for Google and Bing). This update from Microsoft Advertising should simplify the effort for advertisers and enable consistency in ad analysis and optimization processes.
Notably, Microsoft has announced its intention to retain Average Position, since advertisers have been vocal about the value that metric provides.
What to Expect
Although language in the announcement suggested this was a universal rollout, I have not yet seen all the new prominence metrics appear in my Microsoft Advertising accounts. Thus, you should be prepared for a potentially gradual rollout in the coming weeks and months.
You can look for the new prominence metrics under the Competitive (Share of Voice) tab of column selection in the Campaigns, Ad Groups, and Keywords pages of Microsoft Advertising.
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About New Ad Prominence Metrics