• by Laurie Sullivan , Staff Writer @lauriesullivan, 8 hours ago

Microsoft on Thursday shared updates to the Mercedes Benz Showroom Ads pilot, Performance Max, MSA Report Builder, Showroom Ads, and showcased a new Search Advertising Landscape Guide.

Mercedes-Benz is Microsoft’s first client working with Showroom Ads.

The three-month-old ad pilot -- which is considered lead generation combined with ecommerce -- attempts to replicate the feeling of going into a showroom and touching the car, but doing it online.

If someone wants to update their Mercedes-Benz car, the ad sequence begins in the Copilot experience. If someone is shown a car but asks online: “This car looks similar to what I have, so what makes it different?” the content automatically changes in Copilot. All the information is served in the results online.

This is not a typical ad pilot for Microsoft, the company said, because it’s a new way of thinking about conversational AI.

The format will not work for all brands. It’s not the type of strategy to use for a brand selling toothpaste, for example. Microsoft did walk through the experience, something they demonstrated at Cannes Lions 

The ad format is focused on taking a consumer through the online funnel, from discovery to purchase as the online purchase funnel collapses and becomes a tunnel, a Microsoft spokesperson said, citing a phrase he heard at Cannes Lions.

Showroom Ads is meant to become an immersive digital experience mimicking physical showrooms. It allows consumers to explore products and ask questions, and sponsored content complements organic experience. In the future this ad experience will interact with brand agents.

Microsoft also rolled out a redesign of the reporting home page — Custom Report Building — with recommended reports based on what is popular.

Templates have been organized by category, such as Goals & Conversions.

Previously there was no way to build a report from scratch, but now marketers can build any report by choosing compatible metrics and breakdowns of categories.

Custom reports can now be saved to profiles and accessible across all the accounts that marketing manages. General availability will roll out on Monday.

Navah Hopkins, Microsoft Ads liaison, spoke about the Search Advertising Landscape Guide that not only applies to Microsoft but more broadly to the industry. She shared data related to performance advertising and Microsoft’s Performance Max platform.

Performance Max, Shopping, Multimedia, and Search all have an opportunity to serve on Copilot, Hopkins said. Although all have an equal opportunity, Performance Max tends to serve up more often.

When Microsoft looks at what enters the auction, Performance Max previously ranked ahead of Shopping, but to have parity with Google it will no longer happen, whether the ad serves in the search results page, MSN or Copilot.

The research guide showed how much Copilot drives interaction and relevancy. There is a 53% higher likelihood of someone making a purchase when someone engages through the platform.

Copilot seems to have increased relevancy compared with a Bing Search, which means that people find the information through Copilot more relevant to them.