Google just rolled out its most meaningful set of Performance Max (PMax) updates since the campaign type launched. For years, advertisers have asked for greater transparency into how PMax allocates spend and delivers performance across Google’s ecosystem. These latest changes finally start to deliver on that promise.

This article breaks down what’s new, what it enables for high-growth ecommerce brands, and where PMax still falls short. If you're operating a 7–8 figure brand and investing heavily in Google Ads, these updates aren’t just “nice to know”—they could meaningfully improve how you deploy and manage budget.

1. Channel-Level Reporting: Real Visibility Into Budget Allocation

Google is now introducing native Channel Performance Reporting within the PMax interface. This is a long-overdue improvement, replacing workarounds like third-party scripts or data stitching. Advertisers will now have access to:

• A visual breakdown of how PMax allocates impressions, clicks, and conversions across Search, Shopping, YouTube, Display, Discover, Gmail, Maps, and Search Partners.
• A granular table view with sortable, downloadable data including cost, conversions, and more by channel.
• Diagnostic insights tied to channel-specific delivery issues (e.g., poor video performance due to weak creative or lack of assets).

This level of transparency helps advertisers better understand which channels are actually delivering value and allows for clearer internal reporting—especially when different stakeholders have different priorities (e.g., acquisition vs. awareness).

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What this enables

For mid-market and enterprise ecommerce brands, this opens the door to smarter media planning:

• You can identify which channels are scaling profitably vs. which are consuming budget with little return.
• Feed-driven brands can isolate Shopping-style placements (on Search) from broader media activity (like Display or YouTube).
• You can start treating PMax as a true multi-channel strategy, rather than assuming most spend flows through Shopping.

A brand spending $100k+ per month can now start isolating which segments of that spend are profitable—and which are not—down to the channel level.

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2. Search Term Reporting: Closing the Visibility Gap with Standard Shopping

Another key update: Search term visibility is now available inside PMax. Previously, advertisers had limited access to the actual queries triggering Shopping and text ads within PMax. This update now brings parity with Standard Shopping and Search campaigns.

You'll be able to:

• View the specific search queries generating impressions and clicks.
• Apply negative keywords more effectively, particularly at the campaign level.
• Evaluate performance from Search Partners (though still without the ability to exclude them)

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Why it matters

PMax has always blended search and non-search traffic, making it difficult to understand how paid search was performing in isolation. With this new data:

• You can tighten targeting by excluding poor-quality or irrelevant terms.
• You’ll improve efficiency by addressing wasted spend on non-converting queries.
• Copy and creative can now be aligned more closely with the queries driving revenue.

For brands with high SKU counts or branded terms that tend to get cannibalized, this is a critical improvement.

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3. Expanded Asset-Level Reporting: Measuring What Actually Works

This update is flying under the radar—but may be the most impactful for creative testing.

Google is expanding asset-level reporting across PMax, Search (RSAs), and Display. You'll now be able to view impressions, clicks, cost, and conversions for:

• Image assets
• Video assets
• Headlines and descriptions in Responsive Search Ads
• Final URLs in RSA

Previously, Google gave general "Ad Strength" scores with little insight into which assets were actually driving performance.

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Why this is significant

For growing DTC brands with in-house creative teams or agencies:

• This is the first time you can validate creative performance in a data-driven way.
• It allows for true asset iteration—retire underperformers and scale what’s working.
• For RSAs, you’re no longer relying on Google's Ad Strength heuristic. You now have real performance data per headline and description

This update allows for much deeper collaboration between creative, performance, and merchandising teams—especially when your success relies on both visual content and high-performing product ads.

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How These Updates Will Impact 7–8 Figure Ecommerce Brands

For larger DTC brands actively using PMax, these changes are especially impactful. Here’s how they translate into strategic advantages:

1. Tighter Budget Governance

You now have the ability to see exactly where your budget is being spent across Google’s network. This enables:

• More strategic budget allocation by channel.
• Better decision-making around creative asset development (e.g., scaling YouTube assets when video conversions are strong).
• The opportunity to start testing channel-level budget shifts in response to performance insights—even if direct controls aren’t yet available.

2. Query-Level Optimization

The addition of search term data allows brands to bring their historical Shopping campaign tactics into PMax, including:

• Smarter exclusion of irrelevant terms
• Improved alignment between feed titles and actual queries
• Brand term protection and cannibalization mitigation

This is especially useful for brands managing large inventories or multi-category catalogs where term quality can vary widely by product type.

3. Smarter Creative Investment

Asset reporting ensures that creative teams can finally tie visual and textual performance to measurable outcomes. For brands investing in content:

• You can justify higher production budgets when specific assets convert.
• You can de-prioritize formats or headlines that consistently underperform.
• You can align product marketing and creative direction more directly with actual sales data.

This brings a layer of sophistication and accountability to creative testing that’s long been missing in Google Ads.

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What Still Needs Work

While these are important updates, there are still critical gaps:

• No channel-level bidding or budget controls: You can see how YouTube performs, but can’t tell Google to spend more (or less) there.
• No ROAS targets by channel: High-value Search may be getting blended with lower-performing Display and pulling down the average.
• Limited placement exclusion options: Especially relevant for brands sensitive to where their ads appear (e.g., luxury brands on low-quality apps or websites).

In short, Google has moved from a “black box” to a “glass box”—you can now see what’s happening, but you still can’t fully control it.

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What To Do Next

If you're managing a brand with six- or seven-figure monthly ad spend, here’s how to capitalize on these updates now:

1. Request access to the PMax Channel Reporting beta via your Google rep.
2. Audit your existing PMax campaigns and isolate performance trends by channel.
3. Review new search term data and begin refining your negative keyword strategy.
4. Evaluate your creative portfolio and prepare to scale top-performing assets.
5. Meet with your feed manager to ensure product titles, images, and data quality align with high-performing channels and queries.

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Final Thoughts

Google’s updates don’t solve every issue with PMax, but they represent real progress. For brands that have been managing large budgets without clear feedback loops, these transparency improvements should help unlock smarter decision-making, tighter targeting, and more efficient scaling.

There’s still work to be done on the control side—but insight precedes control. And for the first time, Google is giving advertisers more than just blind faith in machine learning.

Stay tuned for more updates from Google Marketing Live in May—especially if channel-level budget or ROAS guidance becomes a reality.

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