Update: Google Impression Share Reporting Changes Live

It’s finally here! As mentioned in a previous news update, Google has been hard at work updating AdWords Impression Share reporting. As of November 7th, that work has finally come to the PPC general public as detailed on the AdWords Blog here.

If this particular change caught you unawares, then you’ll need to be updated on the new features, and more importantly – the biggest drawbacks. You no longer have access to your historical impression share data! If you didn’t download it prior to this changeover, it’s now lost to the internet ether. You only have impression share data going back to October 1st, 2012. If you were hoping for a longer data range, you’re now out of luck.

So: that’s the bad news. The good? With this update comes a whole host of added functions, with more impression share data than you ever dreamed. What’s new?

Distinct search and display columns
Hour of day segmentation
Filters, charts and rules
Accuracy

Armed with this data, you can start doing all kinds of interesting stuff, whether it’s reverse-engineering potential budgets for your campaigns, identifying expansion opportunities, or learning the joys of dayparting. Take a look, see what you can find, and let us know what you think! I’ve included the original article below for reference, as it contains some pertinent information regarding the future of the original impression share columns. Enjoy, and thanks for reading!

________________________________________________________________________________

Google Adds In New Impression Share Reports:

“You can already do some pretty interesting stuff with the existing Google Impression Share data – my favorite of which, having been taught by Jeff Allen and Sean Quadlin, is reverse engineering your potential maximum budget based on lost Impression Share. Imagine then, if you will, their reaction to last week’s release on the Google AdWords blog detailing the new Impression Share reporting changes! (Hint: There might have been some giggling and awkward high fives.)

As detailed in this post, early November brings with it some reporting improvements:

Distinct search and display columns: For those of you who haven’t yet gotten around to segmenting your display campaigns.
Hour of day segmentation: Examine how your Impression Share varies by each hour of the day.
Filters, charts and rules: Apply filters, see pretty graphs, and make use of Google’s automated rules utilizing Impression Share metrics.
Accuracy: This is more a peek behind the curtain, but it’s still nice to know that we’ll be getting a more accurate idea of how our Impression Share breaks down – especially when combined with the above changes.

More data is always a good thing, especially when it comes to making informed decisions about how to best allocate your budget. With the new hour of day segmentation, you could potentially combine this feature with the existing ad scheduling options for more effective dayparting. Well, theoretically, at least.

With this change, the existing Impression Share columns will be phased out starting this November. If you’d like to keep an offline copy of the existing Impression Share data columns for posterity, I’d suggest handling that before the end of October – historical data before October 1^st will be unavailable to you after that point. The existing Impression Share columns will then expire in February 2013 (but you’ll be able to pull new data for them going back to October 1^st up until that point).”

Subscribe to Weekly Blog Updates