AdWords Adds Cross-Device Conversions by Default
It's very common these days for a customer to start shopping on one device and then finalize their purchase on another. Google informs us in one of their studies that:
In fact, 61% of Internet users and over 80% of online millennials start shopping on one device but continue or finish on a different one.
Because of this behavior Google released Cross-device conversions to AdWords three years ago, which has given valuable insight to today’s consumer habits when it comes to what devices are most often used in the different stages of the conversion process. These insights are incredibly helpful when choosing the kinds of ads that are best for targeting your customers when they're ready to buy. They'll show you which devices they're using to communicate and entertain themselves and which to search and shop.
Well, the cross-device conversions feature has been so successful that it's now added by default to all new AdWords accounts as of August 2016. As for the existing accounts, this modification will start taking place as of September 6th and until then you can manually add it in if you haven't already.
Of course this is beneficial to Google because it has the potential to drive more advertisers to purchase a higher amount of mobile ads. But it's also a win for the advertiser to have access to the way their ad is performing across different devices.
Here is an example we pulled from Google's announcement showing how one advertiser dramatically improved their business performance with the information gathered from cross-device conversions:
Lighting New York, a residential and commercial lighting retailer, has included cross-device conversions as a critical metric for their campaigns and automated bidding. Says Aaron Covaleski, Director of Search Marketing, “Cross-device conversions allows us to fully value mobile traffic and deliver a more aggressive marketing strategy. Armed with this data, we drove 50% year over year growth during our busiest Black Friday and Cyber Monday periods last year. We also strengthened awareness for our brand, and this was reflected in branded searches doubling across mobile and desktop."
