Author Archives: Google Ads Developer Advisor

Announcing the “Getting started with the Java Client Library” video series

Today, we are pleased to announce a new video series just published on our YouTube channel, titled “Getting started with the Java Client Library”.

The seven episodes guide you through all the steps required to create a Google Ads campaign with the Java client library from scratch; the only prerequisites are a working Java development environment and a Google Ads manager account.

The videos walk you through the setup of an empty Java project and the import of the Google Ads client library for Java, then describe the process to obtain all required credentials and how to configure them in your Java project.

The last video in the series puts everything together and shows how to execute a basic call to the Google Ads API by running the AddCampaigns code example.

We hope the video series will help you understand all the required steps to get started developing a Java application on top of the Google Ads API. Meanwhile, even if you’re not using Java, we still recommend subscribing to the Google Ads Developers channel on YouTube to always be up to date with our video content.

 - Mattia Tommasone, Google Ads API Team

Sunsetting Display & Video 360 Entity Read Files on October 31, 2024

On October 31, 2024, Display & Video 360 Entity Read Files (ERFs) will sunset. Public and private ERFs won’t be generated after this date. Migrate to the Display & Video 360 API to continue programmatically retrieving Display & Video 360 resource configurations.

ERFs were deprecated in June 2021. Since then, we’ve made updates to help you migrate from ERFs:

See our migration guide for more information on migrating from ERFs to the Display & Video 360 API.

If you have questions regarding these changes, please contact us using our support contact form.

- Trevor Mulchay, Display & Video 360 API Team

January 2024 update to Display & Video 360 API

Today we’re announcing the January 2024 update to the Display & Video 360 API. This update includes the following features:

More detailed information about this update can be found in the Display & Video 360 API release notes. Before using these new features, make sure to update your client library to the latest version.

If you need help with these new features, please contact us using our support contact form.

- Trevor Mulchay, Display & Video 360 API Team

Update to Display & Video 360 API Terms of Service to ensure Online Behavior Advertising compliance

On February 9, 2024, we will update the Display & Video 360 API Terms of Service to add new language that supports announced changes to promote advertiser transparency and content reporting in Display & Video 360.

The new language specifies that, by setting the Advertiser resource field obaComplianceDisabled to true, you are attesting to using an alternative ad badging, transparency, and reporting solution for ads served in the European Economic Area (EEA) such that the following requirements are met:

  • The alternative solution includes any required transparency information and a mechanism for reporting illegal content.
  • You notify Google of any illegal content reports using this form.

The obaComplianceDisabled field description will also be updated to reflect this change.

If you have questions regarding these changes, please contact us using our support contact form.

- Trevor Mulchay, Display & Video 360 API Team

Update to Display & Video 360 API Terms of Service to ensure Online Behavior Advertising compliance

On February 9, 2024, we will update the Display & Video 360 API Terms of Service to add new language that supports announced changes to promote advertiser transparency and content reporting in Display & Video 360.

The new language specifies that, by setting the Advertiser resource field obaComplianceDisabled to true, you are attesting to using an alternative ad badging, transparency, and reporting solution for ads served in the European Economic Area (EEA) such that the following requirements are met:

  • The alternative solution includes any required transparency information and a mechanism for reporting illegal content.
  • You notify Google of any illegal content reports using this form.

The obaComplianceDisabled field description will also be updated to reflect this change.

If you have questions regarding these changes, please contact us using our support contact form.

- Trevor Mulchay, Display & Video 360 API Team

Performance Max Guide Enhancements

Today, we are pleased to announce several guide enhancements to improve the experience of creating, managing and reporting on Performance Max campaigns with the Google Ads API.

Improving Performance Max integrations Blog Series

This article is part of a series that discusses new and upcoming features that you have been asking for. Keep an eye out for further updates and improvements on our developer blog, continue providing feedback on Performance Max integrations with the Google Ads API, and as always, contact our team if you need support.

- Devin Chasanoff, on behalf of the Google Ads API Team

Deprecation of cross-device conversion metric values in the Bid Manager API

Today we’re deprecating cross-device conversion metric values in Bid Manager API. The following values will sunset on February 28, 2024:

  • METRIC_CM360_POST_CLICK_REVENUE_CROSS_ENVIRONMENT
  • METRIC_CM360_POST_VIEW_REVENUE_CROSS_ENVIRONMENT
  • METRIC_POST_CLICK_CONVERSIONS_CROSS_ENVIRONMENT
  • METRIC_POST_VIEW_CONVERSIONS_CROSS_ENVIRONMENT
  • METRIC_TOTAL_CONVERSIONS_CROSS_ENVIRONMENT

Upon sunset, queries.create requests using these values will return an INVALID_ARGUMENT error, and these values will be removed from existing Query resources.

We’ve added the upcoming sunset to our change log. To avoid an interruption of service, we recommend that you stop creating any reports using these values before the applicable sunset date.

If you have questions regarding these changes, please contact us using our support contact form.

- Trevor Mulchay, Bid Manager API Team

Google Ads API v13 sunset reminder

Google Ads API v13 will sunset on January 31, 2024. After this date, all v13 API requests will begin to fail. Please migrate to a newer version prior to January 31, 2024 to ensure your API access is unaffected.

We've prepared various resources to help you with the migration: In addition, using the Google Cloud Console, you can view the list of methods and services to which your project recently submitted requests:
  1. Open the Dashboard page (found under APIs & Services) in the Google Cloud Console.
  2. Click on Google Ads API in the table.
  3. On the METRICS subtab, you should see your recent requests plotted on each graph. At the bottom of the page, you’ll see the Methods table, where you can see which methods you’ve sent requests to. The method name includes a Google Ads API version, a service, and a method name, e.g., google.ads.googleads.v13.services.GoogleAdsService.Mutate. In this way, you can see all versions that you’ve used recently.
  4. (Optional) Click on the time frame at the top right of the page if you need to change it.
If you have questions while you’re upgrading, please reach out to us on the forum or at [email protected].
 - Thanet Knack Praneenararat, Google Ads API Team

Deprecating Content API Easy Onboarding In Merchant Center

Starting on March 29, 2024, the Content API for Shopping authentication method and tab in Merchant Center will no longer be available in the classic Merchant Center. This tab, which creates a service account for you, will not be migrated to Merchant Center Next. Service accounts formerly created through this tab will continue to work even after the deprecation. You can still authenticate your Content API calls with a new service account via the service account setup to generate an API key.

After the deprecation, follow these steps, further detailed in our API documentation, if you need to set up a new service account to access the Content API for Shopping:

  1. Ensure you have an existing cloud project or create a new one in the Google Cloud Console.
  2. Generate or access your service account credentials.
  3. Download the JSON private key from Google API Console. This JSON private key can be used in the same way as the one downloaded from Merchant Center previously.
  4. Add the new service account as a user to your Merchant Center account. If you’re a third-party developer (and don’t have access to the Merchant Center UI for the account), your client will need to complete this step for you.

If you have any questions or concerns, please don't hesitate to contact us via the forum.

Benji Rothman, Content API for Shopping Team

Optimally configure the Attribution Reporting API for ad measurement

Background

Ad-tech providers have historically used third-party cookies for conversion measurement, and for attributing conversions to ad interactions. Conversion measurement is critical for evaluating the performance of ad campaigns and automated bidding strategies. Now, with technology changes and privacy regulations on the rise, traditional ad-measurement systems must change in order to remain effective while protecting user privacy.

Chrome’s Attribution Reporting API (ARA), part of the Privacy Sandbox initiative, offers a new path to conversion measurement after Chrome’s planned third-party cookie deprecation in the second half of 2024, subject to addressing any remaining competition concerns of the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA). Google’s ads teams have made significant investments in learning to use the ARA more effectively, to help advertisers achieve more accurate measurement.

In a previous post, we provided a high-level overview of the approach Google’s ads teams are taking to effectively blend the ARA event-level and aggregate summary reports to maximize accuracy. A key point is that your configuration determines what data you query, and how you query it. It’s crucial for ad-tech providers to effectively configure the ARA for their use cases. Google’s ads teams have found that configuring specific ARA settings can lead to notable accuracy improvements. We encourage other ad-tech providers to integrate with the ARA to retrieve the conversion data they need, and process the ARA's output to help maintain accurate measurement in a post-third-party-cookie world.

The ARA is flexible to support various use cases. Google’s ads teams use this flexibility to configure unique ARA settings for each advertiser. This way, ARA-based measurement adapts to each advertiser’s specific needs. For example, we’ve noticed that when advertisers differ in conversion volume, it’s better to have advertiser-specific configurations related to the granularity of aggregation keys and the maximum observable conversions per ad interaction.

Google’s ads teams’ approach

Here's how Google's ads teams use the ARA to ensure the raw data we receive is as useful as possible for downstream blending. We configure ARA settings as explicit mathematical optimizations by defining objective functions to represent data quality, then choosing settings to optimize those functions. Ad-tech providers can choose their own approach. Google’s ads teams plan to continue sharing insights we learn from our own optimizations with the ad-tech community.

Please see our detailed technical explainer for more information about our approach to ARA configuration.

- Harikesh Nair, Senior Director, Data Science, Ads Measurement