Google Post Ads Now Available To All

At the end of last year, Google announced its +Post Ads, an Google Ads feature that allowed a limited number of select advertisers to turn a public post on Google+ into an interactive ad.  A bit more than a week ago though, Google made their +Post Ads available to everybody.  Everybody who advertises, and has at least 1,000 followers on Google+ anyway.

Post Ads allow you to turn any piece of public content posted on Google+ into an interactive display ad that users can actually engage with directly from the ad.

Improved Engagement Stats

Toyota, one of the brands that were in on the beta test of the new ad format, reported an engagement rate increase of 50% over the industry average for rich media ads, while other participating brands saw engagement rates that not only equalled those, but in some cases exceeded them.

A campaign by Ogilvy Brussels, for example, saw a 100% increase in engagement, at a lower cost per engagement than any previous campaign.  You can read the official announcement about +Post Ads here.

Local +Post Ads

Right now, it’s probably not likely that many small and medium brands in South Africa can boast more than 1,000 followers on Google+ which is the current requirement.  At the moment, local Google+ take-up is only just starting to get going.

But if you needed yet another reason to start building your presence there, then this should be it.  Post ads are looking like a great alternative to more traditional static and even animated banner ads, so if you want to start taking advantage of them, the sooner you get started the better.