Everything you need to know about AI Max

Article topics

1. What are AI Max ads?
2. How do you get started with AI Max ads?
3. What are the advantages of AI Max ads?
4. What are the disadvantages of AI Max ads?
5. How to make the most out of your AI Max campaigns
6. Should you use AI Max?

It’s pretty hard to get away from artificial intelligence (AI) at the moment.

AI Chatbots like ChatGPT, Claude, and Copilot are everywhere, our social media feeds are filled with AI-generated images, and Google is using AI to summarise search results!

Google Ads has also been experimenting with AI to help users reach prospective customers. Its most recent development, AI Max, has been designed to create intelligent ads, with searchers’ specific needs in mind.

If you’ve heard of AI Max but aren’t sure what it’s all about, we’ve put together this guide to shed some light on it.

We’ll talk about what it does, the pros and cons, and how to make the most of this brand-new tool.

What are AI Max ads?

Google AI Max (originally called Search Max) was introduced to Google Ads early this summer. It uses AI to enhance your search ads, based on user intent and behaviour.

In the past, Google search ads worked on keywords. Businesses would bid on words and phrases in Google Ads, and if they bid the right amount, their ads would appear when customers searched for the relevant terms in Google.

AI Max takes ads to the next level. As well as using keywords, it analyses search engine users’ previous searches, browsing habits, and where they are in the sales funnel, to show them an ad that is most likely to make them click.

This new feature also takes advantage of your existing resources. It uses text from your website, landing pages, existing ads, and assets to create new ad copy that resonates with prospective customers.

It can also automatically adjust the page your ad links to in order to maximise conversions.

AI Max isn’t a new campaign type like Performance Max, but it enhances search ads.

How do you get started with AI Max ads?

To add AI Max to a new search campaign, just click the Optimise your campaign with AI Max toggle.

You can select which specific elements of AI Max you want to use in your campaigns.

It’s also possible to add AI Max to an existing search campaign – go into your campaign settings and turn it on.

What are the advantages of AI Max ads?

When used right, AI Max ads can help increase your conversion rate on your website. Your ads will target customers you may not have thought about focusing your campaigns on, and you can create personalised ads for every prospective customer.

(Don’t forget that 71% of customers expect personalisation, and 76% get frustrated when they don’t get it.)

Another benefit is that AI Max can save you time. Google Ads uses your existing resources, business data, as well as AI best practices, to ensure you always serve high-performing ads without having to keep up to date with the latest developments.

What are the disadvantages of AI Max ads?

The key drawback of AI Max is that it can lead to a loss of control over your campaigns. Unlike manual campaigns, where you determine how much you bid and which words you bid on, AI Max takes the lead. This can result in irrelevant queries and poor-quality leads when mismanaged.

The good news is that AI Max is highly flexible. You can choose which features you want to use and determine specific campaign elements you want to exclude. We’ll look at this in more detail in the next section of this article.

Another disadvantage is that AI tools need time to train themselves on your data in order to provide the best quality results. If you’re short on time or only have a small data set to work with, you may find you don’t get the conversions you are looking for.

How to make the most out of your AI Max campaigns

If you want to build AI Max campaigns that deliver results, it’s important to do the groundwork first. This will ensure you create effective, trackable ads that prospective customers want to click on.

Here are our top tips for getting the best outcome from your campaigns.

1. Start small

While it may be tempting to go all-in with AI Max, we recommend starting with one campaign.

As AI Max is an enhancement rather than a specific campaign type, you can run AI Max-supported keywords and standard keywords within the same campaign to see which does best.

2. Track your conversions

AI Max uses your existing campaign data to make decisions about how your ads look and who your ads target. If you don’t have conversion tracking in place, Google Ads may struggle to understand what a potential lead looks like.

You can track conversions on your website by installing Google Tag or linking your Google Analytics account.

Don’t forget conversions that happen offline, for example, if you sell through a brick-and-mortar store. You can connect a customer relationship management (CRM) system like HubSpot, Salesforce, or Soho, or even a spreadsheet like Google Sheets.

3. Exclude campaign elements you don’t want to use

If you’re worried that your AI Max campaigns will be too broad and target people that you don’t want to focus on, you can narrow them down.

One of the best ways to do this (not only for AI Max but for your standard search campaigns) is through negative keywords. This is a list of words and phrases that you don’t want to show an ad for.

You can also include and exclude locations – whether that’s a country, region, town – even a specific postcode.

If you use AI Max’s ‘Final URL’ customisation, you can exclude URLs on your website that you don’t want AI Max to point to. For example, login pages or system pages.

Finally, you can set it so your ads only show (or don’t show) on searches that mention specific brands or related products or services.

Let’s say you’re an authorised reseller for Patagonia. You can set it so your ads are associated with searches for Patagonia, and you can also use the exclusion list to make sure you don’t appear for cheaper competitors.

4. Make sure your website is up to date

AI Max allows you to create ad campaign copy based on your existing website content.

This means it’s vital to regularly review your website to make sure your pages are accurate and relevant to your target audience.

Schedule frequent content audits and get rid of any old data or information about products or services you no longer offer.

5. Use the reporting available

AI Max offers highly detailed reporting that you can use to identify which ads are doing well. This reporting stands alone, meaning you can analyse the performance of AI Max keywords separately from standard ones.

You can view the ad headlines, URLs, and assets served for each specific query, so you can keep track of each user’s unique journey.

You can use this information not only to power your AI Max campaigns but also to support your other Google Ads campaigns and marketing efforts. For example, you can use high-converting wording in your display ads.

Should you use AI Max?

Google Ads has advised that using AI Max can increase conversions by up to 27%. Although, of course, this stat has come straight from Google Ads, so we’d take it with a pinch of salt!

We’ve trialled AI Max and we’ve found that the results can vary. While it’s driven conversions significantly in some cases, it’s not in others. It’s vital to keep an eye on your campaigns to see if AI Max is making an impact.

In our experience, we think that AI Max is best for large businesses, or businesses that sell a lot of products or services, but don’t want to go all-in with Performance Max. It’s a good way to enhance your search ads and appeal to customers that you might not have considered before.

It’s important to note that AI Max is still new and is still evolving. This means Google Ads may implement new enhancements in the future that make it more useful.

When Performance Max launched, it was criticised for being too rigid and overly reliant on automation, but it has become better with time. We think AI Max will follow a similar path.

Xigen: Your PPC eCommerce agency

AI Max focuses less on what your customers are specifically searching for, and prioritises the ‘why’ behind their choices. It’s a smart tool and is capable of a lot, but it’s vital to invest in it properly.

Set your parameters from the offset, give it time to understand your business, and constantly monitor it to see if it’s delivering the right results.

If you want to get started with AI Max but need a little help setting up your first campaign, our experts are here to support you. We’ll build and manage your ads for you, making sure they’re designed to drive clicks, conversions, and most importantly, sales.