Microsoft Advertising rolled out several updates this September, building on recent advancements in AI and retail media. Following August’s highlights on Joint Business Plans and AI-driven insights, these new features are designed to make advertising more efficient, relevant, and accessible.
Key updates:
- Enhanced Display and Video Ads: Starting this month, advertisers can access new bidding strategies, targeting options, and conversion tracking for display and video ads. These tools offer greater flexibility to tailor ads across the funnel.
- Native Ads with Logos and Call to Actions: Advertisers can now add business logos and call-to-action buttons to native ads, increasing engagement. Options include automated calls to action or importing them from Google.
- IAS Verification Across All Ad Formats: Microsoft now supports IAS verification for viewability, brand safety, and invalid traffic on native, display, and video ads, regardless of bid strategy. Advertisers can integrate their IAS tag URL within the platform.
Making Connected TV (CTV) more accessible
Microsoft Advertising is expanding its CTV offerings to make this powerful medium available to businesses of all sizes. Advertisers can now:
- Use longer Video Ads: Support for 45 and 75-second video ads caters to new pharma regulations and provides more creative flexibility for all industries.
- AI-Powered creative recommendations: Integrated AI tools now assist in generating ad content for CTV, using existing assets to create video-ready ads.
Performance Max Updates
Microsoft continues to refine its Performance Max campaign type, with key updates including:
- SA360 Support: Performance Max campaigns imported from Google are now fully supported.
- Search Term Insights: Rolling out to all advertisers, this feature provides deeper insights into campaign performance.
- Search Themes: Now in pilot, these themes help optimize campaigns during the learning phase.
New bid strategy available. For those focusing on high-value conversions, the Max Conversion value bid strategy is now available for portfolio bidding, helping advertisers maximize the total sales value of their campaigns.
Why we care. These updates are worth paying attention to as they are most likely to boost engagement, and provide greater flexibility in campaign customization. With even more AI-driven tools, expanded access to premium channels like Connected TV, and advanced verification features, these updates give more ways to reach the right audience, optimize performance, and protect your brand.
The bottom line: These updates not only expand the capabilities of Microsoft Advertising but also streamline the process for advertisers, making it easier to reach and engage audiences across various platforms and formats.
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About the author
Anu Adegbola has been Paid Media Editor of Search Engine Land since 2024. She covers paid search, paid social, retail media, video and more.
In 2008, Anu’s career started with
delivering digital marketing campaigns (mostly but not exclusively Paid Search) by building strategies, maximising ROI, automating repetitive processes and bringing efficiency from every part of marketing departments through inspiring leadership both on agency, client and marketing tech side.
Outside editing Search Engine Land article she is the founder of PPC networking event – PPC Live, host of weekly podcast PPCChat Roundup, and brand evangelist at ClickTech.
She is also an international speaker with some of the stages she has presented on being SMX (US), SMX (Munich), Friends of Search (Amsterdam), brightonSEO, The Marketing Meetup, HeroConf (PPC Hero), SearchLove, BiddableWorld, SESLondon, PPC Chat Live, AdWorld Experience (Bologna) and more.
