Google Marketing Live, held on 20 May 2026 in Mountain View with a European edition in Dublin the next day, is where Google sets out the year's ads products. The theme was AI throughout: agents that run parts of an account, bidding that learns from more signals, and measurement that predicts conversions months ahead. Many of the tools launched in English first, which matters for Arabic accounts.
Agents in Google Ads
- Ads Advisor, updated in April, troubleshoots policy problems while a campaign is built, monitors account security and handles certifications. It asks for approval before acting, and is available in English accounts globally, with more languages to come.
- Ask Advisor, announced at the event, is a single Gemini agent across Google Ads, Google Analytics, Merchant Center and Google's marketing platform. Google's own pages disagree on whether it is in beta or generally available; either way, it is English only.
Bidding and budgets
- Smart Bidding Exploration, which lets smart bidding explore searches it would otherwise pass over, expanded from Search to Performance Max and Shopping. Google says it brought 27 percent more unique converting users on Search. Since June it is generally available for Performance Max campaigns without product feeds, and in beta for those with feeds.
- Journey-aware bidding, in beta, lets Search campaigns learn from goals they do not bid on.
- Campaign total budgets, launched earlier in 2026 for Search, Shopping and Performance Max, set one budget for a campaign's whole run. Google says they cut manual budget changes by 66 percent.
- Promotion mode, in beta since June, allows a temporary return-on-spend tolerance and extra budget during a sale.
New customer modes
- New Customer Value mode values new customers more highly. Google says it gave 9 percent higher return when new customers were valued at twice the average order value.
- New Customer Only mode bids only for new customers.
- New Prospects mode, new for 2026, excludes past buyers, brand searchers, site visitors and people who have engaged.
Measurement
- Meridian, Google's open-source marketing mix model, is coming to Google Analytics 360.
- Qualified Future Conversions predict conversions up to 180 days out, alongside existing conversions, in a pilot. Ginny Marvin noted that about 70 percent of conversions generally happen within 30 days, but only 50 percent for Performance Max and 40 percent for Demand Gen.
- Attributed branded searches count brand searches within seven days of a YouTube ad view.
- Google tag gateway, which serves Google's tag through the advertiser's own domain, with an average 14 percent uplift that Google describes in different places as conversions or signals.
Performance Max through 2026
- Channel reporting, search terms, full asset metrics and campaign negative keywords, up to 10,000, arrived in 2025.
- In March 2026 Google added first-party audience exclusions, a budget report projecting month-end spend, age and gender reporting, and placement reports split by network.
- In July Google began a limited pilot letting some advertisers switch off Search Partners and Display in Performance Max.
- From late September, the campaign language setting no longer governs Performance Max's search traffic.
Commerce
Google announced Universal Cart and checkout inside AI Mode through its Universal Commerce Protocol, starting in the US, with Canada and Australia next and the UK planned. Merchant Center's AI performance insights launched in Australia, Canada, India, New Zealand and the US. None of these includes the Gulf yet. Asset Studio's AI video generation is rolling out globally, in English only.
What to take from it
- Most new AI tools launched in English first. For Arabic accounts, test each one before relying on it.
- Try the new customer modes where clients care about acquisition rather than repeat purchases.
- Use campaign total budgets for fixed-length campaigns such as Ramadan, White Friday and National Day sales.
- Review Performance Max placements and search terms monthly, now that the reports exist.
The GCC marketing calendar on this site lists the region's campaign moments, useful for planning fixed-length budgets.
