SBE offers new ways to test out bidding options, but is it just for the big guys?
Search bidding exploration (SBE) is a secret making its way around search engine marketing circles, despite not having been announced publicly by Google. Adweek reports that Google began pitching SBE to advertisers in the third quarter of 2024 and slowly rolling it out to a select group of beta testers.
What is Search Bidding Exploration (SBE)?
SBE is an AI-powered bidding optimization tool that helps advertisers understand how different bid adjustments can impact their ad performance and allows them to test those adjustments easily.
SBE finds and drives traffic to overlooked pockets of search traffic called lower-traffic queries. A lower-traffic search query is a search term or keyword that receives relatively few searches compared to more commonly searched terms. These queries often have less competition, which can make it easier for websites to rank higher for those specific terms in search engine results pages (SERPs).
How does SBE differ from other search marketing tools?
AI tools currently in use like Performance Max and Meta’s Advantage+ tool face criticism because they tend to target audiences who would convert regardless of targeting. SBE would be targeting audiences who are not guaranteed to convert, giving companies that take the jump to use it a potential leg up in conversion.
Key Features
SBE offers a new level of experimentation with bidding options in search engine marketing, letting advertisers test the most effective bids in a controlled environment before going live.
SBE leverages historical performance data to optimize bid strategy testing for low-traffic queries, enabling search marketers to predict campaign performance across different conditions. In this way, SBE can instill a higher level of confidence in search marketers as they navigate machine learning and predictive analytics tools.
Budget Constraints
SBE seems to have the potential to be the 'it' tool for search optimization; however, there's one catch: SBE currently seems primed for campaigns with larger budgets. This raises the question, will big brands continue to grow bigger?
Google is already oversaturated with advertisements and campaigns from big-budget brands, and AI-powered search is supposed to prioritize the best quality answer for queries. While plans for SBE remain private for now, it will be interesting to see if SBE can improve upon Google’s current model or if it will be more of the same.
More Clarity Needed
Without much information available from Google yet, advertisers are still curious about its potential for maximizing campaign effectiveness. Since SBE is an automated bidding system, there might not be exact clarity about how or why certain recommendations are made, which might prove frustrating for advertisers.
In an age where brand marketers and their agencies need to justify every dollar spent, if there is a lack of transparency, will media buyers even want to use it?
We're keeping a close eye on the development of SBE in 2025 and its potential impact on search advertising. But one thing is for sure – Google's continuing investments in AI and automation are pushing the boundaries of what's possible in the world of search engine marketing.
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