How businesses can boost sales with the 2025 Google Ads updates
Google hosted their annual Marketing Live event in May 2025, and the features they unveiled will change the way your customers search, shop, and interact with your ads.
The search giant is doubling down on AI-driven advertising and rolling out new visual ad formats, like AI-generated search results that include paid ads and 3D product images and virtual try-ons.
With the right knowledge and a few strategic pivots, these changes can be opportunities, not threats! Here, we unpack what’s new, and what it means for marketers and brand leaders.
Ads added to AI search overviews
AI Overviews, first introduced in 2023, are the blocks of text at the tops of search results pages which attempt to summarise the content from the links below using generative AI.
Now, these overview spaces can feature paid ads. Your brand’s ad could appear inside a conversational answer, rather than in a ‘traditional’ ad block.
Though the accuracy and reliability of these generative overviews still needs a fair amount of fine-tuning as of mid-2025, many surveys show that the majority of users don’t even scroll past them.
So, it’s clearly prime real estate for promotional messaging, but there’s something important to remember: Google are rewarding brands which answer real customer questions with genuine relevance and authority.
If your copy looks too much like an ad, it risks being ignored in AI Overviews, which are designed to give helpful, human-like answers.
But if you align your messaging with well-researched user intent and show up at the right moment, you’re part of the solution, not the noise, and Google’s algorithms will notice.
So, when working on a new campaign, you should ask: “Would this actually help someone in the middle of a search?” If “yes,” it’s ready for the era of AI Overview ads!
If you’re wondering how to optimise your assets for AI Overviews, get in touch.
Shopping ads get more immersive
While features like 360º product views and virtual try-ons (e.g. AR clothes filters) have existed in some form for years, what's new is their integration into Google Ads, and at scale.
Previously limited to organic placements or custom implementations, these formats are now more automated, accessible, and prioritised across placements like Performance Max, Demand Gen, and AI search overviews.
In short: what was once a nice-to-have is now central to paid visibility. The focus is on showing, not telling.
If you're in retail, hospitality, or lifestyle-driven sectors, this matters! A boutique hotel could showcase its interiors through swipeable video carousels. A clothing brand might let customers "try on" outfits virtually across diverse body types. A restaurant could use the 3D imagery feature to make dishes ‘pop’ out of the page!
The possibilities are endless, and they’ve never been easier to peruse for prospective customers.
YouTube as a discovery engine
YouTube is going through something of a renaissance, and becoming a core discovery engine. And not just for entertainment, by the way! But for shopping and experience planning, too.
Products can now be tagged directly in videos and Shorts. Interactive stickers can take users to your site. And vertical video formats are being prioritised across the board.
With interactive TV experiences and shoppable YouTube Mastheads now available, your brand story can move from inspiration to transaction on the biggest screen in the house.
These changes are an especially big deal for hyperlocal brands. YouTube is already where many people search for information about places to eat, local businesses, nearby health services, and travel inspiration. Now those queries are shoppable.
Performance Max and Promoted Pins get smarter
Google’s Performance Max (PMax) campaigns have always promised simplicity: one campaign, across all of Google’s placements. But until recently, they could be quite opaque. Insights on which channels perform best was fairly limited.
But with this new slate of updates, Google are giving us:
Asset-level reporting
Channel-level insights and exclusions
Profit-based bidding using ‘cost of goods’ data
In the realm of hyperlocal, one of the most exciting updates is ‘Promoted Pins’ becoming available for Demand Gen campaigns. That means ads can reach users who are actively browsing Google Maps as they’re looking up cafés, shops, bars, sports centres, etc.
This new feature highlights a larger trend across Google’s updates: merging ad performance with real-world relevance.
Creative workflows are changing fast
Google’s new Asset Studio and AutoOutpainting tools use artificial intelligence to help brands generate image and video variations quickly — turning a single photo into a full suite of ad assets, for example.
For smaller teams or hybrid marketers managing both social and search, these tools promise to reduce the time spent resizing assets (AKA ‘busy work’), and increase the time spent crafting ideas that resonate.
That last part is so important. Faster production pipelines shouldn’t just increase ad output; it should increase the quality of ad output.
What do the Google Ads updates mean for brands?
Visual formats need variety: because Google’s ad products are becoming more visual (3D images, swipeable carousels, AR try-ons, Shorts, etc.), you’ll need a lot more high-quality visuals (and perhaps an agency to help you create them). Not just one great product photo, but a growing, evolving library of assets for different formats, audiences, and touchpoints.
Attribution is less linear, so start measuring momentum, not just last-click: with customers now discovering brands in so many ways (YouTube Shorts, AI search, Maps, etc.), you can’t just rely on last-click attribution (i.e., the final thing a customer clicks before buying) — you need to track how brand interest builds over time, even if it doesn’t immediately convert!
Discovery is the new intent: people no longer start their journey with a search box; they start on YouTube, Maps, and Shorts. That means brand visibility now depends as much on serendipity as it does on keywords. Your job isn’t just to be found — it’s to be discovered! That means leaning into storytelling, strong visual hooks, and local context that makes your brand feel immediately relevant
Automation is powerful, but it still needs guidance: even with all this automation, what you say and how well you understand your audience still determines success. AI can help scale, but it can’t invent your brand’s voice, know your customer’s cultural references (vital at the hyperlocal level), or understand subtle industry shifts.
So, it’s clear the Google Ads landscape is shifting in some major ways, and fast.
For brand owners and marketers, this is a huge strategic moment.
It’s a chance to rethink your creative workflows, your measurement mindset, and your visibility across Google’s ever-growing ecosystem. But you don’t have to navigate it alone!
Let’s talk about how your brand can adapt, compete, and lead in the new era of Google advertising.