Mackerel Media’s Search and Digital Marketing Roundup – August 2025

As August comes to a close and Summer starts to wind down, now’s the perfect time to review the latest updates which are shaping the search and digital marketing space. This month’s roundup includes recent updates from Google, Meta, Amazon and Bing, and what they mean for the upcoming months ahead.

Google Ads Levels Up

Google Ads have expanded their Performance Max campaigns to include account-level reporting across all channels. This update means that advertisers can now see how Search, Shopping, YouTube and other ad placements perform across Google’s network in one view, rather than checking each individual campaign. With account-level reporting, you can compare campaign performance and identify which channels are performing well and which need optimisation.

A leaked internal document from Google has detailed that text and shopping ads will be introduced into their AI Mode. Instead of ads only being shown for a specific search query, the placement of ads in AI mode will be based around the wider context of a user’s conversation. So far, ad formats eligible for AI Mode include text and shopping ads. This is a departure from the traditional keyword targeting, and advertisers should ensure that their targeted terms, creative and ad copy can fit naturally into a conversation.

Relax Robots, Your Content is Safe!

Google’s Gary Illyes has recently clarified that AI-generated content will not automatically be penalised in search results. Instead, Google is focused on the overall quality, relevance and usefulness of the content regardless if it is human or AI-generated (which also includes AI-generated images). Google has said that all content must follow their helpful content guidelines, and that low quality or automated AI content which adds little value will still hurt your rankings. Whilst many companies are turning to AI for automation, it’s important that all content is reviewed, edited for clarity and is helpful to a user, whilst still maintaining the voice and tone of the brand.

Meta has upgraded their professional dashboard on Facebook to offer more detailed insights into campaign performance and monetisation.You can now get access to data on reach, engagement, audience trends and earnings potential, making it easier to track and monitor campaign performance all in one place.

 

LinkedIn: Turning Colleagues into Influencers

LinkedIn has expanded their Thought Leader Ads to include event-related posts. This means that companies can promote content and upcoming events from individual profiles rather than brand pages. Promoting through trusted voices has been shown to increase higher engagement rates compared to advertising through branded accounts alone, whilst also strengthening credibility, especially for any B2B marketing and events.

Amazon has resumed running Shopping ads on Google across all international domains (excluding the US), one month after pulling out. This move means that one the world’s largest online retailers is now back into direct competition with other advertisers on Google shopping ads. Amazon’s large product catalog and bidding budget means there will now be even greater competition for smaller retailers to compete and remain visible, and that advertisers will need to optimise their bidding strategy so that they don’t get overshadowed by Amazon.

Bing Webmaster Tools have doubled their performance data retention period, from 12 months to 24 months, along with new filters by country and device. This longer data window makes it easier to track year over year trends, measure seasonal performance and monitor organic performance over a longer time period. This is especially useful for businesses with seasonal spikes, such as ecommerce, travel or event related services.

Fewer Hashtags, More Laughs! 

TikTok is now reducing the number of hashtags per post to five. TikTok are hoping that this will remove clutter and spam whilst improving the relevance of each post. This change coincides with other platforms reducing the dependence on hashtags, and instead relying more on engagement signals. Creators and advertisers must now be more strategic with their hashtag selection, focusing on hashtag relevance rather than more general hashtag popularity and volume.