Brand protection · UK
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Observations, not verdicts
Glossary · A

Letter
A
Related terms
4
Guides
6
Lessons
2
In one line

A Google Ads report comparing you with the other advertisers in the auctions you entered, one row per display domain.

Auction insights is the one Google Ads report that shows other advertisers. It's available for Search, Shopping and Performance Max campaigns. For Search you open it by ticking rows in the Campaigns, Ad groups or Search keywords tables and selecting Auction insights. Each row is a display domain, not a named advertiser.

  • Search gets six figures: impression share, overlap rate, position above rate, top of page rate, absolute top of the page rate and outranking share.
  • Shopping gets three: impression share, overlap rate and outranking share.
  • Performance Max is split into Search and Shopping, at account and campaign level.

Its limits matter as much as its columns. It only covers auctions your own campaign entered, so a search you don't bid on is invisible. Google's help says it doesn't show insights when impression share is under 10%. It splits by time and device, never by hour. Search partners aren't included. And because rows are domains, two accounts showing the same domain share one row.

The guide to Auction insights takes each column in turn with a worked example.

Sources

Google's own help and policy pages first.

  1. Google Ads Help: Use auction insights to compare performance
  2. Google Ads API: metrics
Related terms
Guides that use it
  1. Who is bidding on your brand? How to find outSix places to see which advertisers show ads on searches for your name, what each can and can't tell you, and how to look without skewing your own ads.
  2. Why “your brand + discount code” searches matterWhy searches for your name with “discount code”, “voucher code” or “promo code” are their own auctions, who advertises on them, and how to count them.
  3. Auction insights for brand campaigns: what each column meansHow to read Auction insights on your brand campaign: each column, the segments worth using, a worked example, and the auctions it can never show you.
  4. How to read your brand campaign's impression share when others bidYour brand campaign's own impression share columns, from Search impr. share to Search lost abs. top IS (rank): what each says when others bid on your name.
  5. How to watch your brand's searches at night and at weekendsFor the hours your checks miss: map your week from your own Ad schedule page, close your own gaps, put each report on one clock and record what you see.
  6. Should you bid on your own brand? What the studies foundWhat the field experiments on brand search ads found, why their answers differ, and how to run a fair test on your own name before you switch anything off.
Lessons that use it
  1. Brand search and your termsWho searches your name, how Google's auction prices those searches, what its policies cover, and what your programme's terms need to say.
  2. Out of hoursHow an ad schedule can keep another ad off your brand search while you check, and where the night shows in your own reports.
Related terms
  1. Impression share
  2. Ad Rank
  3. Brand campaign
  4. Search lost IS (rank)