Placements exclusion in Google Ads Performance Max campaigns is something that many people are not aware of. However this is an important task if you are wondering how to optimize performance max campaigns.
There are other types of exclusions that you may want to consider, such as to exclude brand terms from performance max, or to exclude keywords from PMax; but as for today we are going to see how to get the Performance Max campaign placements data and how to exclude placements in Google Ads:
1) How to get the Performance Max campaign placements data
A) In Google Ads interface (limited metrics available)
B) In Dolnai tool (all metrics available)
2) How to Exclude Placements in PMax Campaigns (account-level exclusion)
Although PMax campaigns only allow for placements exclusion at the Account level, it is always a good idea to exclude placements that are not a good fit for your business and that subtly drain your budget.
To find those websites, apps, YouTube videos/channels,..., where your ads were shown you need to know that for Performance Max campaigns this data is located in a different section than the rest of campaign types.
If you try to see this data from the usual “Placement” report under the "Content" section in Google Ads interface, you will only see placements concerning other campaigns that are not PMax campaigns.
In order to see the data concernig PMax campaigns you need to go to the Performance Max Placements report. To get this report go to the “Predefined Reports” section and select “Performance Max Placements report”.
Once you select the "Performance Max campaigns placements" report you will find the following table:
As you will notice, Google Ads does not provide much information...basically just the placements impressions. If you try to add some metrics like Clicks you will find out that they are not available in this report:
However at Dolnai we developed a tool for PMax Campaigns that (inter alia) will provide you with much more information regarding those Performance Max campaign placements. See below a screenshot of Dolnai PMax tool:
Below you can see an expanded view of the Dolnai Tool for PMax campaign placements with all the metrics available:
With all the above available information you can get a better understanding of where your ads showed and the performance along all those placements.
Currently it is only possible to exclude placements at the Account-level but, as mentioned at the beginning of this post, it is always a good idea to exclude unwanted placements even if it is at the account level.
Once you have detected a number of placements that you wish to exclude from your account, go to Content > Placements > Placement Exclusion
There you just have to add those YouTube channles/videos, websites, apps or app categories that you wish to exclude.
Remember that you can only edit account-level placement exclusions for Performance Max campaigns
Just click "Save"...and that's it. From now on those placements will be excluded from your account placements.
Now it is on you to focus on what matters ;)
Performance Max placement report shows you where your ads showed. This report tells you how many impressions your ads received among the different websites, apps, YouTube channels/videos,...they were showed.
Google Ads interface only shows you the Impressions, however with Dolnai PMax Tool you can get many more metrics like Clicks, Conversions, ...
Yes you can, nevertheless this exclusions will apply at the Account-level. Meaning you cannot exclude placements only for Performance Max campaigns.
These are all sites owned by Google and shows you the combined impressions served on YouTube, Discover, Feed, Gmail and others.
