PPCChat | Thoughts on Google Marketing Live

Posted May 28th, 2025 by Amita & filed under PPCChat.

Welcome, readers! On May 21st, during its Google Marketing Live event, Google unveiled innovations that are transforming how PPC professionals connect with their audiences. Which announcements sparked excitement or concern among experts? What were their biggest takeaways, and what questions or uncertainties do they still have? All of these topics were explored in this week’s PPCChat session, hosted by Julie F Bacchini.

Q1: What was your biggest takeaway from GML 2025?

Not surprisingly, AI is being shoved EVERYWHERE. I found the Gen Z focus really interesting too @NeptuneMoon

Show me the reporting!!! – I’m channeling Jerry McGuire. @MariaCorcoran

My biggest takeaway was how little they actually dove into at GML… lots of great things were mentioned but without Ginny, we wouldn’t know what most of them meant. and I still have a lot of questions @revaminkoff

@revaminkoff I will be collecting questions later in the chat for Ginny! @NeptuneMoon

so yes, AI everywhere and search is changing, but also reminded me that it’s important to include the substance somewhere at some point. @revaminkoff

I kept thinking, when they talked about AI and “agentic” things (get ready to be sick of that word) are people really clamoring for this? Or is it a dressed up way of getting Google Ads recommendations implemented? Is this all aimed at Gen Z as the consumers of ads, but also the people in charge of ads? Because my Gen X self is in the no thank you category for most of the AI stuff @NeptuneMoon

I actually felt 95% of it was exactly what we expected as marketers who follow the direction of Google (and other platforms) basically daily or weekly. AI was the biggest thing they discussed and most of the predictions we have all had over the years are starting to come to fruition (keywordless ads, etc…) Some nice new additions with the Creator Partnership Hub and some other small mentions for our brands, but nothing really big per say. @Ichasse

And, this year followed last year’s trend of the biggest announcements having been announced prior to GML day. PMax reporting enhancements and AI Max. @NeptuneMoon

That SEO is going to be a core part of PPC moving forward. @navahhopkins

Yes @navahhopkins that was a little mention, but huge implications. @NeptuneMoon

@NeptuneMoon The reporting is awesome and very welcome, but we also need to be able to do something with the data. Otherwise, all the nice data they will provide will be for show only. @Ichasse

I’m excited about the agentic web. But I don’t think blogs will be happy @navahhopkins

I’m skeptical about the agentic web – but I think it’s a big change and it’ll be interesting to see where it goes. @revaminkoff

Echoing what @navahhopkins mentioned, PPC will be the integrated function connecting Landing Page Optimization, SEO and being in charge of end to end funnel right since inception to maybe even expanding to retention marketing. Head of Growth is the new Head of PPC. @alimehdimukadam

I will give credit to Ginny for putting out a post-GML post talking about what was there for B2B. @NeptuneMoon

The big reason I’m excited about the agentic web is the eventual extinction of analysis paralysis. @navahhopkins

Cause it got no mention during the event… of course. @NeptuneMoon

At the end of last year and into this year, I had already been telling my brands to lean into SEO hard and get “good” SEO talent to work on their brands. Google just validated what I have been telling my brands. SEO is going to be huge for our work and making our ads more successful in the coming quarters/years. @Ichasse

Maybe I am just too cynical, but I could not, in good faith, advise businesses to just let their agent interact with Google Ads agent and run everything. Google Ads incentives are not 100% aligned with advertiser incentives. It is literally impossible. That is where humans are needed to at least be guardrails. @NeptuneMoon

I fully believe lead gen’s lack of presence on Google is because of landing pages. Now that we’re being pushed to use organic sites, we should start seeing more lead gen tools because they’ll have the data. @navahhopkins

@navahhopkins I hope you’re right on that. But making tools and functionalities for ecommerce and high volume accounts is just easier, so we shall see…@NeptuneMoon

It’s easier because they share more content with them. Microsoft is lead gen city. The only difference is the amount of data shared. @navahhopkins

Ecommerce is set up to have data at the ready and lots of it. Much lead gen, is not. So yes, it is at least in part a data issue. @NeptuneMoon

I’m curious what folks think about SynthID @navahhopkins

What is Synth ID – could you explain? @NeptuneMoon

That’s their tech to check how much if any AI was used in content creation. That was shared at GML too (which is crazy to me because it should be more of an I/O announcement) @navahhopkins

It is my understanding that AI-generated assets will not be marked in any way that is visible to people viewing them. The tagging will be of the backend variety only. I heard this from multiple sources who attended a non NDA GML session post-keynote. @NeptuneMoon

Also having I/O and GML happening together was also a bit bananas. They are usually a week apart. @NeptuneMoon

Microsoft Build the same week, was extra crazy. Also, Clause’s newest model launched. @navahhopkins

@navahhopkins Claude 4. @alimehdimukadam

I saw – it’s absolutely evil. @navahhopkins

Q2: What are you most excited about from GML 2025?

The concept of lowered thresholds for incrementality testing is definitely intriguing. I wonder if they will actually be able to do this or if this will be one of those announcements that sounds like they are doing something awesome for smaller accounts, and in reality, it doesn’t actually work at the lower thresholds. Time will tell, but I’m interested to see. @NeptuneMoon

I’m excited about AI. @runnerkik

Excited about AI overview ads and how it takes off. If it does, every AI company will adopt ads (ChatGPT, Perplexity) – Claude may not coz they are more B2B focused. And worried about litigation, lawsuits, gaffes like we saw about the glue on pizza. @alimehdimukadam

Is it odd that my excitement is dulled by Google going all in on prescription AI? @navahhopkins

@runnerkik Did AI write that? @NeptuneMoon

All the tools are interesting but I really struggle with how the tools are shaping up to erode critical thinking and creative expression. @navahhopkins

@NeptuneMoon thank you for being the only person that got my joke. @runnerkik

Is no one going to say the “Power Pack”???? @NeptuneMoon

Dude I died when Google said we don’t know how to target. @navahhopkins

I was low-key happy to see Google Creator Partnerships hug and some of the tagging updates, not much else really grabbed me as big beyond some of the data requirements. I do like the AI stuff and am excited to see where that goes, but still a bit skeptical because it is still influenced by the organizations who own them. The other stuff was interesting, but again skeptical optimism at this point. I am hoping for the best, but not expecting too much. @Ichasse

But seriously, I’m excited about everything to see how it ACTUALLY works in the real world. @runnerkik

For me, it was surprising Google full throttle in on AI across the board, wouldn’t have been an easy call. Killing their Golden Goose and also Reddit in a way. @alimehdimukadam

And for non-household name brands…I always say about GML, though that it is 40% for (very large) marketers and 60% for Wall Street. If you view through that lens, it makes so much more sense what gets highlighted. @NeptuneMoon

The photos turning into videos is interesting. @navahhopkins

Google does not want to be seen as not at THE FRONT of AI @NeptuneMoon

Yup, it was a sweet 5% trade post I/O. @alimehdimukadam

I thought the tool that can expand your background to make images fit in different sizes and aspect ratios was cool. I could not get past the idea, though that Google thinks people want an entirely new relationship dynamic with search. Do they? Am I just old? @NeptuneMoon

I’m still thinking about how dangerously cool the glasses are – at what point is our entire life an immersive ad. @navahhopkins

Search is changing – yes but who is driving that? Massive user adoption or Google turning functions on for everyone. Those are NOT the same thing. @NeptuneMoon

Glasses, the new ChatGPT device with Johnny IveOpen AI has been trying to one up Google with major announcements immediately after but this one received some flak and Google did come out on top in this round. @alimehdimukadam

@navahhopkins It is coming, but thankfully as a Gen X, I only have a handful of years left as a marketer then I will be fully unplugged fishing somewhere with my dog, lol. @Ichasse

I think search as is, is a legacy tool. The quality has been going downhill for 1-2 years. The problem is we are jumping to a tool that hallucinates at the same time we don’t all agree on what’s true. @navahhopkins

@NeptuneMoon in a way, Google drove the change with poor content ranking on top, gaming the algorithm for SEO, etc. @alimehdimukadam

AI search results leave a lot to be desired, at least today. I did some searching earlier to see if I saw ads in AI Overviews. And the makeup of a SERP is not what it used to be. Again, this applies to product searches at this point. @NeptuneMoon

AI Overviews isn’t the same as interfacing with Gemini. @navahhopkins

I would also argue that Google has been creating more and more ad inventory spots. Because you cannot drive quarter over quarter over quarter growth without increasing the inventory that you sell. You can only increase CPCs so far before advertisers start to question the value or return. @NeptuneMoon

YouTube creators are not happy with Google. @navahhopkins

Returns on ad spend have been going down over the years, and CPCs/Inventory are probably the biggest culprits. They will need to innovate at some point to keep increasing revenue for their shareholders. The biggest issue is for smaller local brands and how this impacts them. So far, I have seen mostly updated that favor the big brands who spend the most, and that makes sense when you want to increase revenue, but long term that could be harmful. @Ichasse

Pay attention to that – because there’s a real risk it turn into the junk heap that is X because good creators move to Substack and Nebula. @navahhopkins

No video platform has the current reach of YT. Not by a mile. @NeptuneMoon

The ad tech is really powerful but the politics of content and users getting frustrated with ad saturation might turn YouTube to a problem channel. @navahhopkins

Enter YouTube Premium Lite. @alimehdimukadam

I don’t see YouTube losing much to other platforms for a while yet. Maybe at some point, but unless another platform takes off it won’t happen. Same with X or other popular platforms. Brands want to be where the eyes are and those legacy platforms have massive footholds on huge audiences. @Ichasse

It’s the largest for sure – but it’s also a battleground of us politicians…which means innocent channels might get punished. @navahhopkins

The younger generations watch an alarming amount of YT. To where the school district ended up blocking it on school issued devices this year. @NeptuneMoon

As a consumer I can say YouTube experience is 10x worse than 3-4 years ago. The algo is bad and the ads are annoying. @navahhopkins

Gen Z and younger are huge YouTube watchers. Let’s not even talk about how many folks watch actual television anymore compared to YouTube, lol. @Ichasse

That I stay is because I have memberships with certain channels – but brands who advertise to me there are noise or annoyance. So I wish they would pair all the amazing tech with brand sentiment tools. Plex is absolutely pulling some though. @navahhopkins

YT premium – no other way to consume YT content for me personally. Can’t imagine having a podcast in the background & ads start playing. Another advantage to have it in background with only audio on. I like the recommendation algorithm. @alimehdimukadam

As a marketer I try to keep the ads. It’s how I balance the scales and confirm ad inventory is useful. @navahhopkins

Yes, that’s true. I have another device to check those. Still have to get started with TikTok but dreading to download it. @alimehdimukadam

I’m so ready for TikTok to implode. @navahhopkins

Quite possible.. @alimehdimukadam

Q3: What are you most concerned or worried about from GML 2025?

This was highlighted more at the Newfronts, but Google’s idea that interrupting YouTube videos at key moments is a horrible one. I have shared here before that when my 12-year-old is watching something on YT and an ad interrupts she will shout “no one cares Nissan” and skip that thing as soon as she can.

I see my grandkids doing things like marking ads as inappropriate so they can skip them faster and other little tactics. The signals that provides Google is probably not a good one and will end up limiting where/what ads show up for people who may actually be interested. @Ichasse

I wish Google had an option within an account to have a child sub login. @NeptuneMoon

Most concerned about the Agentic suggestions for autoapply especially for small advertisers and perception of no longer needing PPC professionals, coz Agents will take care of it. @alimehdimukadam

I do think the agentic stuff could be an auto-applied nightmare. But it is clear that Google keeps moving toward models that squeeze out PPC practitioners. The whole concept they introduced and subtly repeated about search becoming “predictive” also got my attention. The way it was presented made me feel like it was going to lead to less advertiser input and control/options, and more “let our AI do it.” @NeptuneMoon

Q4: What questions do you have from the announcements at GML 2025?

Can we get clarification on the selling 1p data announcement – that was confusing. @navahhopkins

How does Google see the role of partners, agencies and PPC professionals in the world of Agentic AI? What’s their position? @alimehdimukadam

@navahhopkins Second on that accessing what sounded like others’ first-party data! @NeptuneMoon

I don’t even know how to properly ask the question (maybe someone else can word it better), but the tag stuff was interesting (Google Tag Gateway) to help with not having to use development resources and keep our tags updated properly whenever things change. Curious how that will work, and will it be easy to implement on accounts, preferably without IT resources, which always seem to be too busy to do things for the brands. @Ichasse

I feel like if Google wanted a new revenue stream they could offer paid support/help/consulting for tagging and setup for Google Tag Manager to run conversion tagging and for GA4 setup and customization. How much, if any, insight will advertisers have into the ad impressions that were part of an AI Overview or AI search session? @NeptuneMoon

@alimehdimukadam Not sure we will get a real answer vs. a political one to be honest. The reality is by removing agencies/partners, they feel they would get more of that money. These big accounts get big $$$ for agencies, and I am sure Google sees that as potential revenue that could be in their pockets, howeve,r they will not directly say that and we just need to infer it from the direction they are taking the tools. @Ichasse

Are AI Overviews, ads that appear in a carousel below the AI Overviews, ads that appear in the second or third steps in an AI search session all separate auctions? I assume yes, but clarification on that would be helpful, especially in light of the announcement a little while ago about top and bottom of the page ads being in separate auctions. Which data points will be actionable in PMax and AI Max going forward? Cause seeing is one thing (and better than not seeing!) but being able to act on data is quite another. @NeptuneMoon

AI Max seems like it has a lot of controls, which I love. PMax getting more control would be incredible and extremely welcomed. @Ichasse

I would love to see the modular aspect of AI Max applied to PMax! I am not holding my breath though…@NeptuneMoon

Probably a good thing since we need you for our PPCChats. Plus who else could I talk football with each season…. @Ichasse

Go Birds! @NeptuneMoon

Would love to hear more about the “stretchy” smart bidding – where you can give ranges for targets? They didn’t talk about it much and certainly not in any detail. Would also like to learn how one gets their ad into the AI overviews. Is it a regular search ad or some other form of content? @revaminkoff

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