Measuring Ad Extension Performance in Google Ads

June 14, 2019

Ad extensions play a crucial role in getting users to click on your ads, and improve your quality score, so it’s important to know how to review their performance. Between the new updates and endless amounts of data, it’s sometimes difficult to navigate and find what you need. One example comes to mind when talking about ad extensions. A common misconception occurs when exploring the performance of your ad extensions. Within the Google Ads UI you’ll find performance for ad extensions in the tab besides the main ad.

But don’t be fooled by these numbers because this view reports on the performance of the overall ad (main ad + ad extensions) when a particular ad extension is present. As performance marketers we’re more interested in how the ad extension performed itself as opposed to the entire ad as a whole. This way we can optimize towards our ad extensions as opposed to other parts of the overall ad. To differentiate between the two, you’ll need to click on the “Segment” button and choose “This Extension vs. Other”.

This will separate performance between “This extension” (clicks on the actual ad extension) from “Other” (clicks on the overall ad anywhere besides this particular ad extension when the ad extension was present). Now you will see a more practical view of your ad extension performance and decide whether you want to improve it or leave it alone.

If you’re trying to look for performance for a sitelink that’s been removed, then you’re out of luck with the Google Ads UI. But luckily, if you’ve integrated with Google Analytics you can still find those old sitelinks that were removed. From the Google Analytics UI, you’ll want to navigate to the left-hand menu’s “Acquisition”, “Google Ads”, and then “Sitelinks”. Please note that the sitelink’s performance metrics found in Google Analytics are for clicks on the actual ad extension itself.

I hope this helps you better understand and navigate ad extensions within Google Ads and Google Analytics UI. Constant innovation and testing is crucial in today’s competitive marketplace and optimizing down to the ad extensions are just another way to stay ahead of the rest. Happy marketing!