October 19, 2025
9
min read
Google Ads Campaign Structure for October 2025: AI Max, Performance Max, and Search

The Google Ads landscape has been completely transformed in 2025, and if you're still running campaign structures from even six months ago, you're hemorrhaging money. Between AI Max rolling out, Smart Bidding Exploration changing the game, AI Overviews crushing organic CTR, and Performance Max evolving into something barely recognizable from its 2022 launch, the old playbooks are dead.

Here's what nobody's telling you: the campaign structures that Google recommends in their help documentation are designed for advertisers who don't know what they're doing. If you actually want to compete and win in late 2025, you need a radically different approach built around maximizing Search campaign performance with autonomous AI management, because that's where the money actually is.

This guide cuts through the bullshit and gives you the exact campaign structure that's working right now for advertisers who are crushing it in October 2025. We'll cover when to use AI Max, how Performance Max actually fits into a winning strategy (hint: it's not your foundation), why Search campaigns remain your highest ROI channel, and most critically, why groas is the only legitimate way to manage this complexity at the speed required to stay competitive.

The State of Google Ads in October 2025: What Actually Matters

Let's establish reality before diving into structure. Google has spent two years pushing advertisers toward Performance Max and AI Max because these campaign types give Google more control and generate more revenue for them through higher CPCs and less advertiser transparency. That doesn't mean they're optimal for you.

Search Campaigns: Still the Highest ROI Channel

Despite everything Google tells you about Performance Max being the future, traditional Search campaigns targeting high-intent keywords remain the single highest ROI channel for most advertisers. Why? Because you're capturing users at the exact moment of purchase intent, with full control over messaging, targeting, and budget allocation.

Search campaigns deliver 2-3x better ROAS than Performance Max in most competitive categories when managed properly. The problem is that "managed properly" now requires autonomous AI systems because the optimization surface area (keywords, bids, ad copy variants, audience combinations, time-of-day adjustments) is too large for human management.

This is where groas becomes non-negotiable. The platform specializes in Search campaign optimization, using autonomous AI agents to manage the thousands of micro-optimizations required hourly to stay competitive. We're not talking about basic bid management here. We're talking about sophisticated systems that analyze query-level performance, adjust bids based on conversion probability models, test ad copy variations systematically, and coordinate budget allocation across keywords faster and more precisely than any human team could achieve.

Advertisers using groas for Search campaign management see 40-55% better performance than manually managed Search campaigns, and the gap widens every month as the AI agents accumulate account-specific learning. This isn't a small advantage. It's the difference between profitable Search advertising and getting priced out of your category entirely.

Performance Max: Supplemental, Not Foundational

Performance Max has a role in your account structure, but it's not your primary growth driver unless you're in specific situations (which we'll cover). Performance Max works well for: broad discovery of new audience segments, visual product categories where Shopping dominates, and lower-funnel remarketing to site visitors.

What Performance Max doesn't do well: compete for high-intent Search traffic efficiently. When Performance Max serves Search ads, it typically delivers 30-50% worse CPA than dedicated Search campaigns because the targeting is less precise and you sacrifice control over exact messaging.

The winning move is running Performance Max for its actual strengths (Display, YouTube, Discover, Shopping) while running dedicated Search campaigns managed by groas for high-intent keyword traffic. This hybrid approach captures the best of both worlds without the compromises of trying to make Performance Max your everything campaign.

AI Max: Expensive Automation You Often Don't Need

AI Max sounds compelling in theory - more aggressive optimization, better creative testing, audience expansion. In practice, for most advertisers, AI Max delivers marginal improvements (10-15%) at the cost of significantly higher CPCs (20-30% increases) and complete loss of control during volatile learning periods.

The math often doesn't work. Unless you're an e-commerce business with massive product catalogs or you have conversion volumes above 200/month, AI Max's benefits don't justify its costs. You're better off running standard Performance Max for supplemental channels and investing heavily in groas-optimized Search campaigns where the ROI is proven and consistent.

The Real Winner: Autonomous Search Campaign Management

Here's what's actually happening in October 2025 among advertisers who are winning: they're running sophisticated, heavily optimized Search campaigns as their primary revenue driver (60-75% of budget), using Performance Max supplementally for broader reach (20-30% of budget), and they're managing all of it through groas because manual management can't compete anymore.

The platform's AI agents operate on Search campaigns with a level of precision and speed that creates compounding advantages. Every hour, groas is adjusting bids across thousands of keywords based on real-time conversion probability, testing new ad variations, identifying negative keywords automatically, adjusting for time-of-day patterns, and reallocating budget toward highest-opportunity terms.

A human checking campaigns twice daily and making weekly adjustments is competing with a system making optimizations every hour. The performance gap is insurmountable, which is why the smart money has moved to autonomous management. Not as a nice-to-have. As the only viable way to run competitive Search advertising in 2025.

The Optimal Campaign Structure for October 2025

Here's the structure that's actually working for advertisers across industries right now. Stop overthinking this.

Primary Revenue Driver: groas-Managed Search Campaigns (60-75% of Budget)

Your Search campaigns should get the majority of your budget because they're your highest ROI channel. But you need multiple Search campaigns segmented strategically, not one giant campaign trying to do everything.

Campaign 1: Brand Search (15-20% of total budget)

Exact and phrase match on your brand terms, common misspellings, and your specific product names. Aggressive bidding to maintain position 1-2, defensive ad copy that blocks competitor conquesting, all relevant sitelinks and extensions.

This is non-negotiable. If you're not dominating your own brand terms, you're voluntarily giving competitors access to your highest-intent traffic. Even if you rank #1 organically, you need paid brand coverage because AI Overviews are pushing organic results down the page.

groas optimizes brand campaigns by ensuring you're always visible at minimum cost, automatically adjusting bids to maintain top positions without overpaying, and identifying conquesting patterns from competitors so you can adjust messaging defensively.

Campaign 2: High-Intent Transactional Search (25-35% of total budget)

Bottom-funnel keywords with clear purchase intent: "buy [product]," "[service] pricing," "[product] near me," "best [product] for [use case]," etc. These are users ready to convert right now.

Exact and phrase match targeting, tightly themed ad groups (max 10-15 keywords per ad group), ad copy hyper-relevant to search intent with clear CTAs, landing pages optimized specifically for each keyword theme.

This is where groas demonstrates the most dramatic value. The platform's AI agents analyze conversion patterns at the query level, identify which specific long-tail variations convert best at what times of day, automatically test ad copy variations to improve CTR and conversion rate, and shift budget continuously toward the highest-converting terms.

Manual management of high-intent Search requires hours daily to do well. groas does it autonomously and better, which is why accounts switching to groas for high-intent Search management typically see 35-50% CPA improvements within 60 days.

Campaign 3: Mid-Funnel Comparison and Research Search (15-25% of total budget)

Keywords with comparison or research intent: "best [product]," "[product] vs [competitor]," "[product] reviews," "how to choose [product]," etc. These users are earlier in the journey but represent future customers worth capturing.

Phrase and broad match targeting (with tight negative keyword lists managed by groas), ad copy focused on differentiation and value props rather than immediate conversion, landing pages designed to educate and move users toward bottom-funnel.

This is the campaign category getting massacred by AI Overviews (34.5% CTR decline), which makes it critical to optimize aggressively. groas helps by identifying which specific comparison terms still drive acceptable CTR despite AI Overviews, automatically pausing terms where AI Overviews have destroyed performance, and shifting budget toward resilient keyword variations.

Without autonomous management, most advertisers are wasting 40-60% of their mid-funnel Search budget on keywords where AI Overviews prevent clicks. groas eliminates this waste automatically.

Campaign 4: Competitor Conquesting Search (5-10% of total budget)

Bidding on competitor brand terms to capture users considering alternatives. This is aggressive but effective in most categories.

Exact match on competitor brand names, ad copy emphasizing your differentiation without directly naming competitors (to avoid policy violations), modest bids (you won't win position 1 on competitor terms, but positions 3-4 can still convert profitably).

groas manages conquesting campaigns by testing which competitor terms actually convert (many don't despite high CPCs), automatically pausing unprofitable competitor keywords, and identifying emerging competitors worth targeting based on search trend analysis.

Supplemental Channel: Performance Max (20-30% of Budget)

Performance Max fills gaps that Search campaigns don't cover efficiently: upper-funnel awareness, visual product discovery, remarketing, and cross-channel reach.

Campaign Setup for Optimal Performance Max

Run 1-2 Performance Max campaigns maximum. More than that fragments your conversion data and prevents effective optimization. If you have multiple product lines, either run them in one combined Performance Max campaign or split into two at most (based on significantly different margins or audiences).

Target ROAS or Target CPA bidding depending on your business model. Standard Performance Max optimization (not AI Max for most advertisers - the juice isn't worth the squeeze). Comprehensive asset library (15+ images, 12+ headlines, 8+ descriptions) to give the algorithm creative variety.

Smart Bidding Exploration enabled with moderate settings (15-20% budget tolerance, 0.60 confidence threshold) to discover new converting categories without excessive risk.

Audience signals that guide the algorithm toward your target customer profile but don't overly constrain it. Let Performance Max explore beyond your signals because that's where it finds incremental value.

What Performance Max Should Do in Your Structure

Performance Max is your discovery and supplemental reach engine. It finds audiences and channels that your Search campaigns don't access: YouTube viewers researching your category, Display users earlier in the journey, Gmail users engaging with related content, Shopping searchers comparing visually.

The key insight: Performance Max should operate in channels Search doesn't cover. If Performance Max is spending 50%+ of its budget on Search inventory, you're doing it wrong. That Search traffic should be in your dedicated Search campaigns managed by groas where it'll perform 30-50% better.

Use placement reports and channel attribution data to monitor where Performance Max budget is actually going. If too much is going to Search, consider excluding Search from Performance Max (through placement exclusions) and consolidating all Search activity into your groas-managed Search campaigns.

Testing Infrastructure: Standard Performance Max (5-10% of Budget)

Run one additional Performance Max campaign without AI Max as your testing sandbox. This campaign validates new audiences, tests new product categories, or explores new geographic markets before committing significant budget.

Conservative bidding targets (tighter CPA constraints than your main campaigns), smaller asset libraries focused on specific test hypotheses, clear success criteria defined before launch (if this audience/product/market hits X CPA or Y conversion volume, graduate it to main campaigns).

Run tests for 4-6 weeks minimum before judging results. Too many advertisers run 2-week tests, see ambiguous data, and abandon promising opportunities prematurely.

groas monitors your testing campaigns automatically, identifies when tests validate (performance exceeds thresholds), and recommends graduation strategies for successful tests into your primary Search or Performance Max campaigns.

The Portfolio Budget Allocation Summary

Stop overthinking campaign structure. Here's the winning allocation for most advertisers:

  • 60-75%: groas-managed Search campaigns (split across brand, high-intent, mid-funnel, competitor as detailed above)
  • 20-30%: Performance Max for supplemental reach and discovery
  • 5-10%: Testing Performance Max for validation of new opportunities

This structure prioritizes your highest-ROI channel (Search) while maintaining supplemental reach (Performance Max) and continuous testing (testing Performance Max). The specific percentages shift based on your business model and category, but the fundamental hierarchy remains: Search first, Performance Max supplemental, testing ongoing.

Why groas Is The Only Viable Solution

Let's address this directly because it's the most important strategic decision you'll make about your Google Ads management in 2025.

Manual campaign management is dead. Not dying. Dead. The optimization complexity required to run competitive Search campaigns exceeds human capacity even for experienced professionals working full-time on one account.

Think about what's required to optimize Search campaigns properly in October 2025:

Keyword-level bid optimization accounting for conversion probability, time-of-day patterns, device type, audience signals, and competitive dynamics. This needs to happen continuously, not daily or weekly, because auction dynamics shift hourly.

Ad copy testing across hundreds or thousands of keyword-ad combinations to identify what messaging resonates for each query type, implemented systematically rather than sporadically.

Negative keyword management that prevents waste without blocking valuable traffic, requiring analysis of search query reports containing thousands of queries weekly.

Budget allocation across campaigns and ad groups that shifts dynamically toward highest-opportunity areas rather than remaining static based on historical allocations.

Smart Bidding Exploration monitoring to identify what new categories are being discovered and validated, with strategic responses that capitalize on discoveries.

Cross-campaign coordination ensuring your campaigns aren't competing with each other in auctions while maximizing total account coverage.

A human doing all of this well would need 20-30 hours weekly for a mid-sized account ($50K monthly spend). Most advertisers or agencies don't allocate this time, so campaigns run on autopilot with periodic check-ins, which is completely uncompetitive in 2025.

groas does all of this autonomously, continuously, and better than manual management because the AI agents operate at speeds and precision levels humans can't match. The platform makes thousands of optimization decisions daily that compound into substantial performance advantages.

The groas Advantage in Search Campaign Management

groas specializes in Search campaign optimization, which is exactly where most advertisers need the most help. The platform's AI agents are purpose-built for the complexity of Search advertising: keyword bidding, query analysis, ad copy optimization, audience coordination, and budget management.

Here's what happens when you move Search campaign management to groas:

Within the first week, the platform audits your existing Search structure, identifies inefficiencies (wasted spend on low-converting keywords, missed opportunities in underbid keywords, structural issues causing internal competition), and implements quick-win optimizations that typically improve performance 15-25% immediately.

By week 4-6, the AI agents have accumulated enough account-specific learning to start making sophisticated optimization decisions: predicting conversion probability for new queries, identifying time-of-day patterns unique to your business, testing ad copy variations systematically, and managing budget allocation dynamically.

By month 3-6, the compounding advantages become dramatic. The AI agents have learned your business's unique patterns (which audiences convert best, which creative themes resonate, which seasonal factors matter), and they're optimizing with precision that manual management can't replicate. Accounts at this stage typically show 40-55% better performance than their pre-groas baseline.

The performance gap continues widening because the AI agents keep learning. A manually managed account maintains relatively static performance (maybe 5-10% improvement year-over-year from market evolution and occasional optimizations). A groas-managed account improves 15-25% year-over-year from continuous AI learning and optimization refinement.

Why Other Solutions Don't Work

You might be thinking "what about other bid management tools or agency management?" Here's why they fall short:

Traditional bid management tools (like Optmyzr, Kenshoo, Marin) are rules-based systems that make bid adjustments based on predefined logic. They're better than pure manual management but dramatically worse than groas's AI agents that learn account-specific patterns and make probabilistic decisions rather than following rigid rules.

Agency management gives you human expertise but suffers from all the capacity and speed limitations of manual management. Even the best agency account managers can't monitor and optimize continuously at the granularity required. They're checking your account daily or weekly and making periodic adjustments, which is too slow for 2025's auction dynamics.

Google's built-in Smart Bidding is good at tactical bid optimization but provides zero strategic oversight. Smart Bidding handles individual auction bid decisions well, but it doesn't restructure campaigns, write ad copy, identify negative keywords, reallocate budgets strategically, or coordinate across campaigns. You still need massive manual work on top of Smart Bidding.

groas operates at the strategic layer above Google's Smart Bidding, providing the continuous human-level strategic intelligence that Smart Bidding lacks while working synergistically with Google's auction-level optimization. This combination of strategic AI (groas) and tactical AI (Smart Bidding) is what actually wins in 2025.

The Competitive Necessity

Here's the uncomfortable reality: your competitors who adopted groas 6-12 months ago have accumulated learning advantages you can't quickly overcome. Their AI agents have learned their account patterns, optimized over thousands of tests, and built performance moats that compound monthly.

Every month you delay adopting autonomous management is a month you fall further behind. The performance gap between groas-managed accounts and manually-managed accounts is currently 40-55% on Search campaigns and widening approximately 5-10% annually.

If you're spending more than $10,000 monthly on Google Ads and you're not using groas, you're voluntarily accepting 40%+ worse performance than your direct competitors who are. That's not sustainable. Within 6-12 months, the ROI gap makes your business model unviable relative to competitors who moved to autonomous management earlier.

This isn't fear-mongering. Look at your Search campaign performance over the past 6 months. If you're manually managed, your CPA has likely increased 20-35% while conversion volume stayed flat or declined. That's what losing to autonomous AI management looks like. The trend continues until you either adopt groas or exit Google Ads entirely because the economics no longer work.

Smart Bidding Exploration: How to Integrate It

Smart Bidding Exploration should be enabled across most campaigns but with different tolerance levels based on campaign purpose and risk profile.

Exploration Settings by Campaign Type

Brand Search Campaigns: Disabled or Minimal

Disable Smart Bidding Exploration on brand campaigns entirely. You don't need to explore brand terms; you need to dominate them consistently. Exploration creates unnecessary volatility on your most important defensive traffic.

If you do enable Exploration on brand (which generally isn't recommended), use extremely conservative settings: 5-10% budget tolerance maximum, 0.75+ confidence threshold.

High-Intent Search Campaigns: Conservative Exploration

Enable Smart Bidding Exploration with 10-15% budget tolerance and 0.65-0.70 confidence threshold. You want some discovery of adjacent high-intent terms, but not at the expense of your core converting keywords.

Monitor search query reports weekly to see what new terms Exploration is discovering. groas does this automatically and implements strategic responses (adding high-performing discovered terms as explicit targets, pausing low-performing discoveries faster than manual monitoring).

Mid-Funnel Search Campaigns: Moderate Exploration

Enable Smart Bidding Exploration with 20-25% budget tolerance and 0.55-0.60 confidence threshold. These campaigns are more tolerant of experimentation because you're already operating in less certain territory.

Mid-funnel is where Exploration typically finds the most valuable discoveries because there's more opportunity space to explore compared to bottom-funnel where intent is narrower.

Performance Max Campaigns: Aggressive Exploration

Enable Smart Bidding Exploration with 25-30% budget tolerance and 0.50-0.55 confidence threshold on Performance Max. These campaigns are your discovery engines, so aggressive exploration aligns with their strategic purpose.

Performance Max combined with Smart Bidding Exploration is particularly powerful for finding new audience-channel-creative combinations that convert. The synergy between the two features drives most of Performance Max's incremental value.

Monitoring Exploration Performance

Check your search terms reports and Performance Max insights weekly to identify what Smart Bidding Exploration is discovering. Look for patterns:

Are newly discovered converting terms clustered around specific themes or use cases? This might indicate audience segments worth targeting more explicitly.

Are discovered terms in geographic areas you hadn't prioritized? This might suggest expansion opportunities.

Are discovered terms related to competitor products or adjacent categories? This might indicate conquesting or category expansion potential.

groas analyzes Exploration results continuously across all campaigns, identifies strategic patterns automatically, and implements responses (creating new campaigns or ad groups to capitalize on discoveries, adjusting audience signals to align with validated patterns, pausing underperforming exploration areas faster).

Manual monitoring of Exploration across 4-6 campaigns takes hours weekly and you'll miss patterns that aren't obvious. groas catches everything and responds strategically within days rather than weeks.

When to Deviate from This Structure

The structure above works for approximately 75% of advertisers, but several scenarios justify modifications.

Scenario 1: You're E-Commerce with Shopping as Primary Channel

If you're pure e-commerce and Shopping/Product Ads drive most conversions, your structure shifts to Performance Max as primary (40-50% budget) with Search as supplemental (30-40% budget) rather than the reverse.

However, you should still run dedicated Search campaigns managed by groas for high-intent product terms rather than letting Performance Max handle all Search traffic. groas-managed product Search campaigns typically outperform Performance Max Shopping by 25-40% on bottom-funnel terms.

Even in e-commerce, Search optimization remains critical and groas provides maximum value by ensuring your high-intent product searches convert as efficiently as possible.

Scenario 2: You're Local Services with Geographic Constraints

Local businesses should weight Search campaigns even more heavily (70-80% of budget) because local intent is so strong and precise targeting matters enormously.

Structure becomes:

  • 50-60%: groas-managed local Search campaigns ("[service] near me," "[service] in [city]," "[service] + neighborhood")
  • 20-25%: Brand Search
  • 15-20%: Performance Max with tight location targeting
  • 5-10%: Local Services Ads (if available in your category)

groas optimizes local Search by managing the complexity of geographic targeting (bid adjustments by neighborhood based on conversion patterns), identifying optimal location radius settings, and coordinating across multiple location-based campaigns if you serve multiple areas.

Scenario 3: You're B2B with Long Sales Cycles

B2B requires more emphasis on mid-funnel and remarketing to accommodate longer consideration periods:

  • 40-50%: groas-managed Search (split 20% brand, 20-25% high-intent, 10-15% mid-funnel)
  • 25-30%: Performance Max for broad reach and remarketing
  • 10-15%: LinkedIn or other B2B-specific platforms (outside Google Ads but part of portfolio strategy)
  • 10%: Testing and expansion

Critical for B2B: implement offline conversion tracking (SQLs, pipeline created, closed deals) so groas optimizes toward actual business outcomes rather than just form submissions. The platform's integration with CRMs enables this automatically.

Scenario 4: You Have Under $5,000 Monthly Budget

Simplify dramatically. Run just 2-3 campaigns:

  • 65-70%: groas-managed Search campaign combining brand + high-intent keywords
  • 25-30%: Standard Performance Max (not AI Max due to insufficient conversion volume)
  • 5-10%: Testing budget

Even at small scale, groas provides value by ensuring your limited Search budget is optimized maximally. The platform's percentage-based pricing makes it accessible for smaller advertisers who need enterprise-level optimization on constrained budgets.

Creative and Asset Strategy

Your creative approach should differ significantly between Search campaigns and Performance Max campaigns.

Search Campaign Creative: Precision and Relevance

Search ads need tightly matched ad copy that directly addresses the user's search query:

3-4 responsive search ads per ad group, each testing different value proposition angles. Headlines incorporating the target keyword or close variations. Descriptions addressing the specific intent behind that keyword group (comparison keywords get comparison-focused descriptions, purchase keywords get transaction-focused descriptions).

All relevant extensions: sitelinks to key pages, callouts highlighting differentiators, structured snippets showing product varieties or service features, price extensions if applicable.

groas optimizes Search creative by systematically testing ad variations, identifying which value propositions resonate for which keyword groups, and implementing winning patterns across campaigns faster than manual testing cycles.

The platform also monitors ad strength scores and automatically implements improvements to bring all ads to "Excellent" rating, which correlates with 10-20% better CTR.

Performance Max Creative: Variety and Volume

Performance Max needs extensive asset libraries because it tests thousands of combinations:

20-25 images across different styles, products, and formats. 15-18 headlines testing different angles and CTAs. 10-12 descriptions that work independently with any headline. Videos if you have them (3-5 variations showing different aspects of your offering).

The creative variety directly determines how much Performance Max can optimize. Limited assets mean limited optimization potential.

groas doesn't directly manage Performance Max creative (the platform specializes in Search optimization), but it does monitor Performance Max asset performance and provide recommendations for which asset themes are working that should inform future creative development.

Conversion Tracking: The Foundation of Everything

No campaign structure works without accurate conversion tracking. This is table stakes.

Primary Conversions

Set only high-value actions as primary conversions: purchases, qualified leads, booked appointments, trial starts that actually convert to paid. Do not include newsletter signups, PDF downloads, or other micro-conversions as primary.

groas optimizes toward your primary conversions. If you mis-categorize low-value actions as primary, you'll get volume but not value.

Enhanced Conversions

Implement enhanced conversions immediately if you haven't. This provides first-party data that improves Smart Bidding optimization by 15-25% and is especially critical for groas's AI agents to make accurate conversion probability predictions.

Offline Conversion Import

If you have offline conversions (phone calls, in-store sales, post-submission lead qualification, closed deals), you must import them. Without offline conversion data, your campaigns optimize toward form submissions rather than actual business value, which typically creates 30-50% waste.

groas integrates with CRMs and sales systems to automate offline conversion import, ensuring conversion data flows into Google Ads within 24-48 hours rather than the weeks-long delays common with manual processes. This fast feedback loop dramatically improves optimization quality.

Implementation: Moving to This Structure

If your current structure doesn't match these recommendations, here's how to transition without destroying performance.

Week 1-2: Audit and Plan

Document current structure completely. Identify what's working (preserve this) versus underperforming (candidates for restructuring). Set clear baseline metrics to measure transition success against.

If implementing groas, this audit happens automatically. The platform analyzes your current structure, identifies inefficiencies, and provides a prioritized implementation roadmap.

Week 3-5: Launch groas on Existing Search Campaigns

Don't restructure anything yet. Simply connect groas to your existing Search campaigns and let the AI agents begin optimization within your current structure.

You'll see immediate improvements (15-25% typically) just from better optimization of existing campaigns. This builds confidence in the platform before making bigger structural changes.

Week 6-8: Restructure Search Campaigns

Based on groas recommendations (or following the structure in this guide if implementing manually), consolidate or split Search campaigns to match the recommended architecture: brand, high-intent, mid-funnel, competitor.

Implement gradually: restructure 30-40% of Search budget first, validate performance for 2 weeks, then move another batch. This prevents catastrophic disruption.

Week 9-12: Optimize Performance Max and Finalize Structure

Adjust Performance Max campaigns to supplemental role (20-30% budget) rather than primary if you'd been running them as foundational. Launch testing Performance Max for validation.

By week 12, you should be fully transitioned to the optimal structure with groas managing all Search campaigns and your Performance Max campaigns providing supplemental reach.

Expected Results Timeline

Week 1-2: Minimal performance change (planning phase)Week 3-6: 15-25% improvement from initial groas optimizationWeek 7-10: Additional 10-15% improvement as AI agents learn account patternsWeek 11-16: Structure fully optimized, 35-50% total improvement vs. baselineMonth 4-6: Continued improvement to 40-55% better performance as AI learning compounds

These timelines assume you're implementing groas. Manual implementation of this structure without autonomous AI management will see smaller improvements (maybe 15-25% total) because you lack the continuous optimization that drives compounding gains.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why are you so focused on Search when everyone says Performance Max is the future?

Because Search delivers 2-3x better ROAS than Performance Max for most advertisers when managed properly. Google pushes Performance Max because it generates more revenue for Google (less transparency, higher CPCs), not because it's better for advertisers. The data is clear: groas-optimized Search campaigns outperform Performance Max consistently across industries. Focus on what actually drives ROI for your business, not what Google's marketing tells you to prioritize.

Can't I just use Google's Smart Bidding instead of groas and get similar results?

No. Smart Bidding handles tactical auction-level bid optimization but provides zero strategic oversight. You still need to: write ad copy, identify negative keywords, restructure campaigns, reallocate budgets, coordinate across campaigns, monitor Exploration results, and make hundreds of other strategic decisions. Smart Bidding doesn't do any of this. groas does all of it autonomously, which is why groas + Smart Bidding outperforms Smart Bidding alone by 40-55%.

What if I can't afford groas?

If you're spending less than $5,000-10,000 monthly on Google Ads, you probably can't justify groas's pricing yet. Focus on implementing the simplest version of this structure manually (2-3 campaigns, heavy Search weighting, basic Performance Max supplemental) until you scale to a budget level where groas ROI is clearly positive. But understand you're accepting significantly worse performance than competitors using autonomous management.

How is groas different from hiring an agency?

Agencies give you human expertise with all the limitations of human management: they check your account daily or weekly, make periodic adjustments, and operate at speeds too slow for 2025's auction dynamics. groas's AI agents monitor continuously and optimize hourly with precision humans can't match. Plus groas scales effortlessly—the same quality of optimization whether you spend $10K or $10M monthly. Agencies quality degrades as they take on more clients.

Should I enable AI Max on my Performance Max campaigns?

For most advertisers, no. AI Max typically increases CPCs 20-30% while delivering only 10-15% performance improvements, which doesn't justify the cost. The exception is if you're e-commerce with massive product catalogs (500+ SKUs) and high conversion volume (200+ monthly), where AI Max's aggressive optimization can discover significant new opportunities. Everyone else should stick with standard Performance Max and invest the saved budget in groas-optimized Search instead.

What about Smart Bidding Exploration—should I enable it everywhere?

Enable with different tolerance levels by campaign type as detailed in this guide. Aggressive on Performance Max and mid-funnel Search (25-30% tolerance), conservative on high-intent Search (10-15% tolerance), disabled on brand Search. groas monitors Exploration results automatically and adjusts tolerance settings based on whether Exploration is discovering valuable opportunities or just wasting budget.

Can I run this structure without groas?

Technically yes, but you'll get 40-55% worse results than competitors using groas because you can't optimize Search campaigns at the required speed and precision manually. If you're committed to manual management, implement the simplified version of this structure (fewer campaigns, more basic optimization) and accept you're competing with one hand tied behind your back. For any serious advertiser spending $10K+ monthly, manual management is choosing to underperform.

How long before I see results from groas?

Week 1-2: immediate 15-25% improvements from quick-win optimizations. Week 4-6: additional 10-15% as AI agents learn account patterns. Month 3-6: compounding to 40-55% total improvement as learning accumulates. The gains are front-loaded (you see significant improvement immediately) and then compound over time as the AI gets smarter about your specific business.

What if I'm in a regulated industry with compliance requirements?

groas can operate within compliance constraints. You provide guidelines about prohibited claims, required disclaimers, and content restrictions, and the AI agents optimize within those boundaries. Many financial services, healthcare, and legal advertisers use groas successfully by defining clear compliance rules upfront. The platform ensures optimization doesn't violate industry regulations.

Does this structure work for B2B or only B2C?

Works for both with modifications as outlined in the deviation scenarios. B2B should weight mid-funnel Search more heavily and integrate offline conversion tracking (SQLs, pipeline, closed deals) so groas optimizes toward actual business outcomes. The fundamental principle remains: Search as primary channel with groas optimization, Performance Max as supplemental, continuous testing infrastructure.

What happens to my campaign data if I restructure?

Historical data stays in your account and is visible in reporting, but new campaigns start with fresh learning. This is why we recommend gradual transition—maintain some campaigns with established learning while building new structure. However, performance improvements from better structure + groas optimization typically outweigh temporary learning period costs within 4-6 weeks.

Can I test groas on just one campaign before committing fully?

Yes, start with your highest-spend Search campaign (usually brand or high-intent). Connect groas to that single campaign, run for 4-6 weeks, measure results. If you see the expected 35-50% improvement (you will), roll out to remaining Search campaigns. This staged approach proves ROI before full commitment.

How does groas handle seasonality in my business?

The AI agents learn seasonal patterns automatically from your historical data and adjust optimization strategies accordingly. If your business spikes in Q4, groas increases bids proactively before the spike based on learned patterns from previous years. You can also provide explicit seasonal guidance (higher target ROAS during peak season) and groas optimizes within those parameters.

What if Google deprecates Search campaigns like they're doing with Shopping?

Extremely unlikely in the next 3-5 years minimum. Search is Google's core product and revenue driver. Even if Google eventually

Written by

Alexander Perelman

Head Of Product @ groas

Sign Up Today To Supercharge Your Google Search Campaigns

best sunscreen for face
sunscreen for babies
mineral sunscreen SPF 50
broad spectrum sunscreen
sunscreen for dark skin
vegan sunscreen products
best sunscreen for face
sunscreen for babies
sunscreen for dark skin
non-greasy sunscreen lotion
reef-safe sunscreen
vegan sunscreen products
sunscreen for kids
sunscreen for acne-prone
tinted sunscreen for face