Clearing platform bid modifiers of Target CPA and Conversion Optimizer campaigns starting in late August

Update (Dec 13, 2016): The clearing of bid modifiers described in the previous version of this post are complete.

What’s changing?

Starting in late August, platform bid modifiers of campaigns and ad groups attached to Target CPA and Conversion Optimizer bidding strategies will be cleared. Your campaigns will continue to serve as they do currently.

Why is this happening?

The clearing of these bid modifiers is part of an upcoming feature launch. The new feature will allow users to set platform bid modifiers for entities attached to Target CPA and Conversion Optimizer bidding strategies. In the past, this platform bid modifier value was ignored. By clearing these values for you, we can release the functionality without affecting your currently serving campaigns.

How does this affect me?

For most users, we will only clear platform bid modifiers on Target CPA and Conversion Optimizer entities. Some customers will also see a shifting of platform bid modifiers where a Target CPA ad group inherits modifiers from a non-Target CPA campaign.

Here are some changes that you’ll see in your account before the new features launches:

• For ad groups, clearing mean the entire AdGroupBidModifier will be removed.
• For campaigns, clearing means CampaignCriterion.bidModifier will be set to 1.0.
• If the AdGroupBidModifier.bidModifier or the CampaignCriterion.bidModifier was set to 0.0 to opt-out, the bid modifier will not be touched.
• If the AdGroupBidModifier.bidModifier or the CampaignCriterion.bidModifier does not target a Platform criterion, the bid modifier will not be touched.

The new feature will roll out to all users over the course of three weeks starting in late August. Sometime during those three weeks, we will clear your platform bid modifiers, and shortly thereafter we will enable the feature for your account. You will then see the option to set platform bid modifiers in the AdWords user interface. Bid modifiers set after that point will be preserved.

What should I do?

• Check your code and verify that if you’re setting this platform bid modifier it’s intended because that code will have an effect on bidding after the clearing process.
• If you care about the platform bid modifiers that you have set for Target CPA or Conversion Optimizer campaigns, save them offline before late August.

Where can I learn more?

• Bidding guide
• Bid modifiers guide
• Ads API Client Libraries

Questions? Visit us on the AdWords API Forum or our Google+ page.
Nadine Sundquist, AdWords API Team