AI Advertising Releases You Missed Because of Google

Between Google Marketing Live, AI Overviews (no, we’re not eating a rock a day over here), and the massive algorithm leak, Google absolutely dominated marketing headlines last month.

That means you probably need a refresher on (or an intro to) some interesting AI updates from the rest of the marketing world, so let us break down some of the recent releases we’re keeping an eye on.

TikTok Leans into AI for Optimization

TikTok announced new automation tools for advertisers in an attempt to ease the burden of creative development for brands with limited resources. Based on initial testing, TikTok claims that advertisers who leveraged these new tools saw 136% higher sales and 4x higher ROI while saving 10 hours per week.

Four especially notable features:

• TikTok One, a central hub that gives advertisers access to creators and creative tools
• TikTok Symphony, which provides support for script writing, video production, and creative asset optimization
• Automated ad optimization that leverages AI to optimize ad creative, targeting, budgets to hit campaign goals
• TikTok shop automation that optimizes ad spend, bidding, and creative for TikTok Shop ads

Overall, these releases lower the bar for small companies to start building and testing campaigns in TikTok.

Snapchat Doubles Down on AI after a Strong Q1

Did you catch that Snapchat’s Q1 revenue was up 21% year over year? There’s wind in the platform’s sails, and they’re using it to invest in AI to improve ad effectiveness.

Per the Snap CEO, some initiatives in focus include:

• More personalized targeting
• Improving artificial reality filters and software
• Improving augmented reality features
• Better recommendation algorithms for Stories and Spotlight

Snap and TikTok are competing for a similar set of users – with TikTok’s future in the U.S. murky from regulation, Snap’s building a case to take ad dollars down the road.

Microsoft Ads Launch AI Generated Creatives for Display

Microsoft recently launched a new feature for Display ads that will create new image assets tailored specifically to a businesses’ brand. Their AI technology will pull texts and images based on the ads’ final URL and will automatically recommend different creatives to choose from. 

This is not the most revolutionary development; Google has had similar capabilities for a while. Note that, as with any AI product, you need to closely review any of the generated suggestions that Microsoft Ads creates, and you be able to edit pretty much all the elements: text, call-to-action, and even the suggested images.

We do believe it’s worth testing if you’re running Microsoft campaigns; AI-generated creatives can help speed up ad creation and may give you new copy ideas – just make sure you’re QAing everything.

We’ve got these in our testing rotation and will report back on findings to help you stay on top of the latest and greatest!