How to Mimic Google Ads Scripts to Create Automation Rules for Native Campaigns
As every PPC manager knows, our job is a juggling act. At any given time, we’re running several accounts, with multiple campaigns in a bunch of countries. Each campaign demands individual attention and its own special treatment. Once you start to scale your Google Ads activity, running it all manually becomes very difficult and even the smallest tasks become way too time-consuming. So what’s the solution?
Automation.
Like the Internet Revolution before it, you might say that the world of PPC is in the midst of an Automation Revolution.
The best way to maintain control of your Google Ads accounts and automate tasks as you scale is to use Google Ads scripts, those pieces of JavaScript that help you to automate, manage and improve your performance and reporting.
But automation is not just Google’s gig. It’s starting to creep into other advertising platforms too, helping to revolutionize the entire industry with a faster, more efficient and accurate approach.
That includes Outbrain’s native advertising platform, with the introduction of the new task automation feature OB Code.
What is OB Code?
OB Code is designed to help advertisers on Outbrain automate their campaign activity and make it more high performing and cost effective. However, the new OB Code is actually a set of automated rules, not codes. This begs the question: if OB Code is rules, why not just compare them to Google ad rules? The answer lies in a key difference – alerts.
Google’s automated rules are great for setting up alerts to notify you of certain situations, for example, if you are spending too much without getting enough conversions. However, Google rules can only be run once daily. Outbrain’s OB Code can run on an hourly or daily basis, making them much more powerful and actionable.
In this article, we’re going to take a look at two useful Google scripts and what they do, and we’ll also jump across to OB Code and see how it works. Plus we’ll end off with an additional four Google Ads scripts that I use often, and you may like to try if you are not using them already.
So let’s go!
Google Ads Script #1: Manage your budget spend
Google can spend up to twice your set daily budget to help you reach your campaign goals, but you don’t necessarily want to be spending that full amount. With this script by Daniel Gilbert, you’ll get an alert as soon as your spending has reached a certain percentage of the daily budget that you pre-define. This will go a long way to help you make your budget more efficient.
OB Code Version
Outbrain’s OB Code allows you to create two similar predefined variations of the rule:
- Increase the budget when your campaign goal is reached and the campaign has capped.
- Get a notification when any of your campaigns have capped.
Google Ads Script #2: Pausing low CTR ads
If you run multiple campaigns, you probably have at least two ads per ad group. Controlling all these is difficult, especially if you are testing them at the same time. This Google Ads script by Russell Savage automatically finds the low CTR ads in your ad groups and pauses them for you. Sometimes, low CTR comes with high CVR, so it’s always a good idea to check the paused ads and make sure.
As mentioned earlier, if you are running several tests of ad copy, you should use this script to pause underperforming ads in A/B testing. This will help you to identify the best performing ad in the test and shows you how much better your account would be doing if you paused the losing ads.
OB Code Version
Now let’s take a look at similar rules you can create with Outbrain OB code:
- Block sections with high spend and low CTR compared to the average.
- Pause content with high spend and low CTR.
Bonus Extra: 4 Favorite Google Ads Scripts
There are loads of Google Ads Scripts at your fingertips, and every campaign manager must find the ones that work best for them. Here are four that I use often and they make all the difference to my performance efficiency:
1. Link Checker
The most common script is the Link checker script, which you can use in a single account or manager account for multiple accounts. The script checks the URL’s status for 404 errors or Page Not Found issues. It does this by checking your ads, keywords, and sitelinks, emailing you when errors are detected, and storing the results of the analysis in a spreadsheet for reference.
2. Negative Keyword Conflicts
If you run Google ad campaigns for a long time period with different match types, and use negative keywords with different match types on a daily basis, it is difficult to know if there is a conflict between the negative keywords and keywords in the campaigns. This can prevent you winning auctions and showing your ads. Google created this script to identify and store all these conflicts in a spreadsheet and notify you via email alert. You can use it in a single account or manager account for multiple accounts
3. Account Anomaly Detector
Google Ads Account Anomaly Detector lets advertisers know when accounts don’t run as expected or behave differently than they usually do. When an issue is encountered, the script lets the user know via notification alert. You can use this script in a single account or manager account for multiple accounts.
4. High CPC Bid Alerts
Google Ads offers several bid strategies, mostly automatic, allowing you to choose the best one for your goals. Besides the automatic strategies, there is also manual CPC. Running a large number of campaigns with some having manual bidding can make controlling campaigns difficult. Every small mistake counts and can have a big impact on your bid, so you end up paying too much compared to the competition and reducing the efficiency of your budget. To avoid these kinds of mistakes, I use this script by Nils Rooijmans, which sends me alerts if my CPC goes over a certain level.
Start Scripting!
There are so many Google Ads scripts for all kinds of account actions – it would take a virtual encyclopedia to describe them all. And as automation tools become more sophisticated, there will be many more scripts and rules to come. Not just for Google but for other ad platforms too, like Outbrain native advertising. This article gives a small glimpse into the potential of ad scripts, and introduces you to some features of the new OB Code that can seriously improve your native campaign performance. And remember, stay tuned for updates of the next rollout of advanced OB Code scripts, coming your way!
