Why you shouldn't use automated bidding on your Search brandname

Most marketers have moved to fully automated bidding, and for good reason. But there is still one place where manual bidding wins, and it is the campaign nobody thinks to question: your own brand name.

Google has pushed hard on automation — Dynamic Search Ads, Responsive Search Ads, Performance Max, and the smart bidding strategies underneath them. Tested properly, they earn their place. That success is exactly why the shift happened so fast, and why almost nobody goes back to check the exceptions.

The exception is your brand campaign

There are several smart bidding strategies available: Target impression share, Target CPA, Maximise conversions. Picking the right one for the objective saves real money. Picking the wrong one costs it quietly.

During account audits I am regularly surprised by how much of the reported performance comes from brand traffic alone. It is the easiest way for a platform to prove it works. But a brand that wants to scale efficiently cannot do it by spending the majority of its budget on people who already typed its name.

Top visibility on pure brand terms still matters — you are protecting the brand, not buying growth. The side effect of automated bidding here is inflated CPCs, and with them higher CPAs and wasted budget on the one auction you were never going to lose.

Test it, don’t take my word for it

Set up an experiment in the account: a 50/50 split of manual CPC against Target CPA or Target impression share. Let it run for at least 30 days.

In most accounts you will see manual bidding pull CPCs down, and CPAs with them, without a meaningful drop in conversions or impression share.

Automation is worth using nearly everywhere. On brand search, manual bidding is still my preferred strategy — it keeps the visibility and takes back the efficiency.