The changes that matter to advertisers, with the sources behind them and a practical next step. Pick a topic and catch up at your own pace.
Google Ads
Google Ads will enforce its 37-month data retention policy starting 1 June 2026, with Arpan Banerjee reiterating the deadline. Hourly, daily, and weekly data will be available for 37 months; monthly, quarterly, and annual data are retained for 11 years.
Google Ads
Ginny Marvin, Google Ads Product Liaison, has published a backstage edition of Ads Decoded from Google Marketing Live 2026, sitting down with Google's Head of Ads and Commerce Vidhya Srinivasan and product leaders Chris Monkman, Josh Moser, and Christine Turner to unpack the day's biggest announcements. The piece is organised around four themes.
Google Ads
Google has confirmed the Google Ads API will move reach metrics to a "Total Co-view" definition starting 2 June 2026. The change aligns Google Ads reporting with offline media and third-party measurement standards across the API, UI, and Editor.
Google Ads
Google Ads has given AI Max campaigns a dedicated Branded Searches control, surfaced by Thomas Eccel. Advertisers can now choose exactly how AI Max handles brand queries with three settings: show ads on all relevant searches (the default), control branded searches through brand inclusions and exclusions, or show ads only on unbranded searches.
Google Ads
VIVEK GUPTA has flagged a new Sync Columns feature inside Google Ads: letting users keep table columns, and segments synchronised across all accounts viewed from a Manager Account (MCC). Set up one account's columns and segments as you want, then apply the same configuration to other accounts in a single action.
Google Ads
VIVEK GUPTA has surfaced a limited-time 2x Google Ads Credit offer rolling out to eligible new advertisers. Reported offer tiers: spend $500 → get $1,000 credit, spend $680 → get $1,360 credit, spend $1,400 → get $2,800 credit.
Industry
Business Agent for Leads is a new Search ad format that replaces the static lead form with a conversational AI agent built on Gemini. Instead of filling out a form, a prospect researching, for example, an MBA programme can click "Chat" directly within the ad to ask questions, with answers grounded in the advertiser's website content.
Industry
AI Max for Shopping campaigns is rolling out to retailers, bringing the AI Max toggle to standard Shopping campaigns as a one-click upgrade.
YouTube
Checkout Links: the format that routes Demand Gen viewers directly to a merchant's checkout page: is generally available in the US, CA, GB, DE, JP, IN, with rollout coming to AU, KR, ID, MX, AR, FR, IL, CH, PL. Checkout Links have also expanded to YouTube Shorts and in-feed ads in Demand Gen.
Google Ads
Affiliate partnerships boost is a new advertising solution that lets merchants discover and boost organic YouTube Shopping affiliate videos within Demand Gen campaigns. The structural value: merchants leverage existing creator trust at scale, with the licensing and discovery workflow streamlined inside Google Ads.
Google Ads
AI-assisted Demand Gen campaign creation is a new workflow that uses account-level intelligence to pre-fill Demand Gen campaigns with optimal budget, bidding, and audience settings based on existing Performance Max campaigns. The system uses historical performance to recommend campaign best practices, provides a clear rationale for each setting, and reduces manual entry errors.
Gemini
AI-powered Shopping ads use Gemini to identify the most relevant products for a shopper's query and instantly write a custom explainer highlighting why each product is the right answer. The mechanic transforms Shopping ads from product-only listings into product + expert summary results, replacing standard product results with a Gemini-powered shopping experience for considered purchases such as espresso machines, fridges, or TVs.
Google Ads
Anthony Higman has flagged that the ability to apply for Google Ads Ad Certifications is now available directly inside Google Ads accounts: what was formerly the standalone Google Ads Advertiser Verification Page. The integration removes a friction point in the certification application workflow, with the certification surface now appearing within the account UI rather than on an external page.
YouTube
Arpan Banerjee discovered that brand names are now appearing in YouTube product Ads: including the YouTube Shorts Shopping ad surface: a finding flagged by Adriaan Dekker on LinkedIn. Where YouTube product Ads previously displayed product images, price, and store name, the brand name now appears as an additional surface element.
Google Ads
Product videos at scale eliminate the previous 5-video upload limit, enabling Demand Gen campaigns to leverage the entire Google Merchant Centre video library. The system dynamically serves product-specific videos based on real-time user intent and interest, reducing creative overhead and improving relevance through AI-driven video-to-user matching.
Google Ads
As a reminder, Thomas Eccel recalls the material spend impact of the new ad schedule changes: from 1 June 2026, Google will change how it paces campaign budgets based on ad schedules. Today, Google paces around active scheduled days (e.g., 22 weekdays per month for a weekdays-only campaign); from 1 June, Google will pace toward the full monthly cap (30.4x daily budget): speeding up spend on active days.
Google Ads
Creator videos in the asset picker is a new Demand Gen feature that surfaces a library of suggested creator partnership videos directly in the Google Ads asset picker during campaign setup. The system automatically identifies relevant creator content tailored to the brand, increases campaign authenticity via trusted creator voices, and reduces creative production time by pulling existing video content into the campaign.
Google Ads
View-through conversion optimisation is a new bidding enhancement for Demand Gen that lets campaigns include and optimise for view-through conversions alongside click-based conversions. The mechanic accelerates results by capturing conversions when users see an ad and convert later without clicking; scales conversion volume by allowing Google AI to bid on users most likely to convert via either path; and drives strategy alignment by adopting comparable approaches to paid social platforms, where view-then-buy behaviour is prevalent.
Google Ads
Leads in Google Ads is a new, lightweight CRM surface inside Google Ads that consolidates Google-hosted form leads into a single interface. The feature centralises lead management (no prospect falls through the cracks), syncs quality signals back into Google Ads to optimise bidding, surfaces lead-stage progression (raw → qualified → converted → lost), and feeds high-value conversion data into Smart Bidding strategies.
Google Ads
Google Maps inventory is now available in Demand Gen as a selectable channel, allowing advertisers to reach high-intent users in Browse, Directions, and Entity/Place Details modes within Maps. The format uses non-disruptive Promoted Pins with channel controls to opt in or out based on brand or campaign needs.
Industry
Universal Cart is Google's new agentic shopping cart, announced at Google I/O on 20 May. Brodie Clark and Juozas Kaziukėnas both flagged the launch as the standout I/O ecommerce announcement.
Google Ads
Three Google Ads developer/policy items landed alongside GML:
Google Ads
Product feeds in Demand Gen are expanding across three structural dimensions. New verticals: Vehicle feeds become eligible for Demand Gen product feeds in Q3 2026, extending the format beyond traditional ecommerce.
Google Ads
Demand Gen Uplift Experiments is a new automated A/B testing framework that measures the statistically significant uplift of adding Demand Gen to an existing campaign mix (PMax, App, Video, Display). The mechanic provides a turnkey way to isolate Demand Gen's impact on conversions, sales, CPA, or ROAS: answering the long-standing question of whether Demand Gen is incremental or cannibalising.
Google Ads
Ask Advisor in Google Ads is upgraded with five 2026 additions: Gemini 3 model upgrade, mobile app availability, instant certifications that replace weeks of manual paperwork with instant approvals (Anthony Higman flagged the certification surface this week appearing inside the Google Ads account), 24/7 security monitoring with personalised dashboards (flagged domains, dormant user review), and a revamped homepage with intelligent reporting and AI-powered data visualisation. The visualisation surface lets advertisers transform complex data into clear visualisations with a single prompt.
Google Ads
Demand Gen campaigns are now generally available within Commerce Media Suite: letting brands use retailers' first-party data to reach high-intent shoppers across YouTube, Discover, and Gmail. The integration enables brand-retailer collaboration on YouTube and Demand Gen surfaces, with conversion and sales optimisation powered by retailer first-party data flowing through Google AI.
Google Merchant Center
Marcin Wsól has surfaced an upcoming Google Ads change: Google will automatically link Google Ads accounts to Merchant Center for advertisers running Shopping campaigns or product-feed-driven inventory. The auto-link enables product data and conversion flow between the two platforms, using the same mechanics as the YouTube auto-linking covered above.
YouTube
Arpan Banerjee has flagged a Google Ads auto-linking change with a hard deadline of 10 June 2026. From that date, Google will automatically link YouTube channels to Google Ads accounts unless the advertiser opts out before the deadline.
Google Ads
Jason King has spotted phone support reappearing in the Google Ads dashboard Overview: a return of a support surface that had been progressively de-emphasised in recent years. The option appears in the dashboard's contact-support pane, alongside chat and email options, for advertisers who reach the support flow via the Overview tab.
Google Ads
Arpan Banerjee has flagged a second hard deadline from Google: UploadClickConversions is deprecated, effective 15 June 2026. After that date, the API method for uploading click-attributed conversions will no longer be supported, and integrations still using the deprecated endpoint will break.
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