• by Laurie Sullivan  @lauriesullivan, October 2, 2024

Microsoft is adding targeted ads, metrics and diagnostic capabilities to Copilot, the company announced Wednesday. 

The ads will run below Copilot’s organic response in results, with a stronger focus on relevancy of the information served.

Users will see fewer ad annotations and extensions, said Paul Longo, Microsoft general manager of AI in Ads, attributing this to the technologies’ ability to more effectively identify relevant and useful content.

“The updated Microsoft Copilot delineates organic and sponsored conversations better and introduces ads in a way that complements Copilot’s simplified layout,” Longo wrote in a post.

Consumers also will begin to notice how ads in Copilot will be triggered by considering the entire conversation in one session and not just the last prompt.

Before an ad block is served, Copilot will share with the user how the following ad section connects to their conversation.

For now, Longo said, Microsoft will call this feature “ad voice” -- a summary that acknowledges the organic response and introduces the message from advertisers, making it more inviting and natural to the conversation.

This experience begins rolling out on copilot.microsoft.com in October and will expand over time to updated apps on Android and iOS as well as Copilot experiences in Bing and Edge. 

Microsoft’s AI companion Copilot has seen engagement and use rates increase, with the number of conversations more than doubling year-on-year since the company began testing advertising in generative AI (GAI) experiences.

Longo said Microsoft developers also are focusing on providing engaging and useful digital experiences, so they are thinking about ways to use conversational advertising and adapting more ads to the specific context of each user and each moment.

This means more immersive ads that showcase interactive product details.

“What we’re thinking about as brand voice -- enabling Copilot to bring them to the conversation to help consumers looking for product recommendations,” Longo wrote. “While we are still early on this journey, it’s clear that the future holds tremendous potential for how brands connect with consumers."

New GAI tools also include diagnostic tools to inspect campaign setup, assess the health of accounts, diagnose where attention is needed, and propose what to do next, in conversational engagement.

The diagnostics feature begins piloting this month.

Performance snapshot is launching to give advertisers quick updates on how their campaigns and accounts have been performing during a specific length in time. This feature gives advertisers the ability to use natural language to ask Copilot in the Microsoft Advertising Platform to obtain an account or campaign-specific performance overview with a summary of key insights, trends, and anomalies.

This feature begins piloting this month, gradually rolling out to all regions where Copilot in the Microsoft Advertising Platform is available.