Raise Your Paid Media IQ in 2025

When OuterBox CEO Jeff Allen began his career, paid media sat under the IT department. You heard that right. The same department famous for the phrase, “Did you turn your computer off and then on again?”.

Allen theorizes this may have started the misconception that paid media is a technical practice. However, it’s not computer science or computer engineering. It’s another channel in your marketing arsenal to reach customers.

Sure—it gets tricky. As platforms streamline and introduce features like AI, it feels like there’s a loss of control. You can’t pull the levers you used to. But Allen reminds us:

No one is typing a search query hoping to get an ad. Users just want answers. When paid search is done right, it starts with who the customer is and what the customer wants.

With this in mind, let’s improve your paid search intelligence by understanding the state of paid search in 2025. Getting a knowledge of AI’s effects, the prominence of new channels, and the basics like customer IQ will keep your paid media strategy going strong this year.

AI-Driven Automation in Paid Media Tools

Paid search intelligence requires analyzing data and insights from your paid media campaigns and optimizing strategies to boost your ROI. AI and machine learning are looking to simplify this for marketers.

AI and machine learning automatically manage bids, optimize ad creative, and target audiences. However, this doesn’t always address our specific use cases. Your company is unique, right? RIGHT.

Google Ads’ Performance Max (PMax) is an AI-driven tool that allows marketers to input audience signals and creative assets and then handles keywords and bids. A recent fix allows Search, Shopping, and PMax campaigns to enter the same auctions for the same products. Do you need all three? You may not. That’s a lever you can pull.

Another feature leveraging AI is enhanced conversions, which improves conversion measurement accuracy to improve bidding. Despite these new bells and whistles, the key to any AI is what you input. That is the big lever.

That means successful Google Ads results apply digital marketing basics:

• Conversion tracking setups for online and offline traffic—phone tracking is a data gold mine.
• Target keywords your customers use and apply negative keywords to keep quality up.
• Crafting ad copy and creative assets that speak to your customers and drive them to responsive landing pages.
• Take the reins of your budget and consider the economic factors that can influence account performance. AI-driven bidding is not for everyone!

Having paid media management that honors these basics and experiments and tests AI to see where it makes sense in your strategy is how businesses stay smart.

Google’s Search Generative Experience (SGE) and AI Overviews are causing concerns about zero-click results. How search engines serve ads along with rich and organic results means paid media no longer secures top-result placements. Fear not; adaptation is possible.

Paid search marketing can acclimate by employing AI-optimized ad copy, visual elements like images and video extensions, and brand positioning with a one-two punch of organic and paid results in the same landscape. Showing up multiple times, in multiple formats, will give your business a leg up on the competition.

Cost-per-click (CPC) will rise thanks to the tight squeeze on space. Back on the automation front, AI-driven bidding looks to maximize conversions, but it can lead to higher costs. No matter your IQ, more money isn’t always better, and it isn’t smarter.

Here are the basics that can help when budgeting and fighting for the right space:

• What are your competitors up to, and what are your differentiators?
• What’s your brand’s positioning?
• Good old customer research – what quality leads are looking for vs. what’s driving the most traffic?

One Reminder: Google makes bank with Google Ads, and reducing ad power isn’t in their best interest. Ads in AI Overviews are on mobile, and if your content fits the query, it’s possible to show up. However, could we see bidding for AI Overviews? Stay tuned.

Google’s multiple antitrust cases are humming along, but don’t expect action this year. What happens to Chrome or Google Ads is a 2026 trends topic. What’s happening now is Google is losing some of its search share. Google is still strong at 83.54%, but shining in various formats is a competitive edge today and will be tomorrow should that share decrease.

Seamless integration of paid media campaigns across multiple platforms, including social media, display networks, and shopping channels, produce a seamless buyer journey. Expect tighter integrations between Google Ads, Meta, Amazon, and TikTok. Product searches in retailers like Walmart, Amazon, and Target will also rise.

Let’s go back to AI. With the advancement of AI chatbots like ChatGPT, Gemini, and DeepSeek, you should emphasize voice search and conversational ads. Think about how you search as a customer every day. Marketers should ensure their ads align with natural language search queries. Overall, you’ll need more than traditional text-based ads. Social media loves video, and YouTube is one of the channels cutting into search share. Organic-feeling approaches like thought leader ads (TLAs) can help.

Overall, prepare for a more dynamic paid media landscape this year and get smart with AI leveraging, evolving ad formats, and new channels to meet your customers where they are in this new landscape.

To get smart about your paid media, you need a holistic view of what’s working and what’s not across all channels. AI-powered analytics and attribution modeling can provide insights into campaign performance for better decision-making but focus on the metrics that ladder up to leads.

Paid search intelligence leans on data analysis, so only using Google Ads or social platform’s analytics offerings only provides pieces of the puzzle. A data analytics platform like LOOP Analytics, OuterBox’s proprietary lead form tracking tool, closes the gap between marketing metrics and lead data using first-party data. With the right data, you can start testing ad creatives and channels to find what brings the engagement.

It’s time to think bigger than keywords. Broaden your horizons and think about the channels your users visit and the value of your content. Think about all the possible buyer’s journeys and how your brand can shine in every space.

Finally, with traditional SEO tactics no longer enough, the same goes with KPIs like traffic and conversions. Referrals and traffic from external sources are now key additions. No matter the source, the goal is to optimize search experiences to create great user experiences that lead to purchases.

Like any new expedition, a guide will get you where you want to go more efficiently and make the experience more effective. Going forth with a team like OuterBox will make the ride smoother. Now, onward!