Microsoft Audience Ads announces new AI bid strategies and market expansion

Microsoft is launching two new automated bid strategies to help “advertisers reach their target audience with minimal effort”:

• Maximize conversion: Advertisers can use this feature to maximize conversions as much as possible, given the budget.
• Target CPA: Advertisers can use this feature to maximize conversions as much as possible, given the CPA target and the budget.

The two new offerings are currently in pilot with general roll out planned for October 2023.

In addition, the tech giant has expanded into 58 new markets, meaning its ads are now served in 187 countries across the globe.

Why we care. Automated bidding can save advertisers time and effort, thanks to AI doing the heavy lifting. It takes care of improving your campaign’s performance without you needing to get hands-on. With these particular new bid strategies, you also maintain control as you still have the freedom to set your budget and choose how you want to measure success.

What are Audience Ads? Audience Ads are Microsoft’s native, display ads. These products enable you to target your ideal audience based on Microsoft’s understanding of people’s interests and consumer intent signals. The ads are then served in placements across the web like Microsoft’s MSN, Start, Outlook, and more.

What has Microsoft said? Microsoft Senior Product Marketing Manager Mallory Harwood told Search Engine Land:

• “We are continuing to invest in more bid strategies for Microsoft Audience Ads to enable advertisers to meet their goals wherever they are across the globe.”
• “Market expansion has been a huge priority for us across our search and marketing offering. We recently expanded our Audience Ads to 58 new markets, which brings us to 187 countries as of mid August – which is huge and very exciting.”
• “A couple of years ago, we were only at seven markets – so as you can see, we have been doing a lot of investing very quickly!”

Deep dive. Read Microsoft’s Automated Bidding guidelines for more information.