In the year 2018, Google announced that they would unite Google Analytics 360 Suite and DoubleClick under the brand Google Marketing Platform. It’s been some time, so we’ve had a lot of time to try everything out in detail. Thanks to that, we bring you a series of articles in which we’ll introduce all the tools and our experiences.
Firstly, we’ll answer these questions: what is Google Marketing Platform, what tools does it offer, who is it intended for, and what benefits can your company gain by using it?
Google Marketing Platform (GMP) is a united marketing and analytic platform that aims to simplify marketing teams’ collaboration.
It allows you to understand audiences in depth, make informed decisions, share data and insights between teams, and reach goals faster.
GMP creates a connected digital marketing ecosystem that joins individual Google tools which cover all the areas of digital marketing.
You can connect all data, plan, measure, and refine campaigns or purchase advertising space, all from one place.
Which tools does GMP offer?
In GMP, you can find tools for marketing campaign management (Display & Video 360, Search Ads 360, and Campaign Manager 360) and analytical tools (Analytics 360, Tag Manager 360, Optimize 360, Surveys 360, and Data Studio). Together, they’ll help you manage the entire customer journey.
Advertising tools
Display & Video 360, as the name suggests, is a tool for the complex management of display and video campaigns. The biggest advantage of this demand-side platform (DSP) is a huge inventory reach, extensive targeting options, advanced options for campaign optimization, and also connection to other products of GMP platform.
Search Ads 360 can be used for management, automation, and optimization of search campaigns across various search engines. It offers performance reports in real time, automatic bidding strategies and rules, use of external data, budget management, and connection with other GTM products.
Campaign Manager 360 brings holistic and transparent solutions for ad serving, creation and management of audience, advanced measurement, and creation of summaries. CM360 uses Floodlight Activities as a tool for tracking and measuring in other GMP products.
Everything can be created and managed through CM360. Analytics of ads across channels are all in one interface and metrics are consistent and comparable, which helps you optimize performance in all your digital campaigns.
Analytical tools
Analytics 360 also gathers data from websites, apps, and CRM. You can use this data to learn how users on the website behave, where they come from, from which pages they leave, or whether they perform conversions. Apart from standard functions and summaries, it offers advanced options such as Unsampled Reports, data export to BigQuery or Data Driven Attribution.
Tag Manager 360 enables tag management on websites. It simplifies the job both for marketers and analysts and makes setting of marketing tools on the website easier regardless of developers.
You can simply insert just the TM360 tag into the source code of the website, and all the others are created in the user interface.
Optimize 360 is used for experimenting, testing, and personalizing websites. Every user is unique; the website content should match their individual tastes and needs. And that’s what Optimize 360 is for; it enables you to test website variants for key user groups.
It’s not necessary to use new code; you only need an Analytics 360 account, which is a huge advantage. You can import targets you already created from your account, or use audiences from your campaigns for testing.
Surveys 360 is a tool for market surveys. You can easily create a customized online survey and make qualified marketing decisions based on respondents’ answers. It offers an advanced geographical targeting option based on zip code and by remarketing audiences.
Data Studio brings a free tool for data visualization. You can easily create clear and highly configurable charts, reports, and dashboards which you can share with individuals or whole teams. It also enables access to various data sources such as other GMP tools, Google Sheets, YouTube, various databases or social network platforms.
The default and connecting point of the platform is Marketing Platform Home, a portal where you can find all of your tools. In Integration Center, you can manage tool connections, share audiences, and import data. Administration will enable you to manage invoices, users, authorizations, and organizations.
Who is the platform intended for?
The platform serves companies and marketing agencies, facilitates collaboration in teams, and helps reach their goals. Furthermore, Google offers two variants:
- For Small Businesses
A free option for small and medium businesses includes these products: Analytics, Data Studio, Optimize, Surveys and Tag Manager.
- For Enterprises
A paid version for all businesses or agencies that utilize advanced options. It contains the whole set of eight tools in 360 version.
Why should you choose the For Enterprises version?
- More detailed segmentations and analysis
- Smarter tools
- Better customization options
- More sophisticated reports
- More options for data collection
- More control
- Customer support
- Easier integration of individual GMP tools
What benefits will GMP bring to your business?
Let’s sum up all the benefits that GMP tools offers:
- Faster decision making and smarter marketing thanks to the automation of everyday processes and integrated intelligence.
- Greater control over investments thanks to the centralization of all data and the holistic approach of the platform.
- Deeper understanding of your audience. Thanks to data integration from individual tools, you can follow the whole customer journey, understand which channels work and how customers react to them.
- Sharing data across marketing teams. All of your data and summaries are in one place and everyone has access to them.
Are you interested in more details about the various tools of Google Marketing Platform? Then you shouldn’t miss our other articles. We’re working on an introduction.