What Measured testing reveals about driving greater incremental return through smarter Google execution
Performance marketers face increasing pressure to deliver more growth, and to prove where it's coming from. Measured has independently tested thousands of Google campaigns using geo experiments and Media Mix Modeling across enterprise ecommerce, omnichannel, and retail brands.
This blog distills five strategies where we’ve consistently seen Google deliver incremental value, and where an incrementality measurement practice makes the difference.
About the Data: Measured is an independent measurement company. The insights in this article are based on observed outcomes from in-market incrementality tests and platform-agnostic benchmarks across our customer portfolio. We’re sharing what’s working, and how brands are unlocking performance, grounded purely in data and incrementality-driven insights.
1. Optimizing PMax for Incrementality: Brand Exclusions Unlock Efficiency + Scale by 25%+
Google's Performance Max (PMax) has become widely adopted in marketing media strategies and, when optimized for incrementality, it is a powerful tool in the paid media toolkit.
From January through September 2025, Measured performed 322 incrementality tests across all AI Ad products, industry wide. PMax has shown the strongest iROAS with a median incremental return of $2.02 in those studies.
Across the Measured portfolio, nearly three-quarters of advertisers run PMax campaigns, accounting for 14.2% of total media spend. But the real opportunity lies in how PMax is structured within your portfolio to optimize for incrementality.
A growing number of Measured brands are now running PMax campaigns with branded negative keyword exclusions. Why? Because these campaigns are proven to drive net-new incremental performance, and the results are compelling:
- $2.17 median iROAS — a 21% lift vs. PMax campaigns without exclusions
- 11.3% of total media budgets are now flowing into these brand-excluded PMax campaigns, highlighting not just efficiency, but scale
On average, brands that leverage PMax campaigns with brand keyword exclusions spend 54% more on PMax in total than brands that don’t, and they generate a 25% better iROAS on PMax as a whole. These aren’t just cleanup campaigns, they’re becoming a core driver of incremental performance and profitable growth.
Takeaway: PMax works. But it works best when it’s structured to optimize for incrementality. Create dedicated campaigns that exclude your brand keywords, test for lift, and scale what works.
2. Scaling New Customer Growth With Google
While Google may not offer the same level of audience targeting control as social platforms, it continues to deliver efficient new customer acquisition — especially when campaign structure and measurement are aligned to incrementality.
Over the past year, Google has rolled out improvements to better target new audiences, and Measured testing suggests those improvements are working.
In 2025, Google campaigns drove a median new customer iROAS of $1.11 (outperforming similar campaigns on other platforms). More importantly, 42% of incremental Google conversions came from new customers — a meaningful signal of acquisition value, especially at scale.
Certain Google channels are particularly effective at acquiring net-new users:
- YouTube: 72% of incremental conversions came from new customers
- Non-Brand Search: 63% of incremental conversions came from new customers
- PMax with Brand Exclusions: 49% of incremental conversions came from new customers
These are not just efficient channels, they’re meaningful drivers of long term growth.
Takeaway: With the right campaign mix for incrementality, Google delivers scalable and efficient new customer acquisition. Focus on YouTube, non-brand search, and PMax with brand exclusions to maximize your return.
3. Drive More Omnichannel Sales
Too many advertisers still underinvest in Google because they underestimate its full impact, especially offline. For large omnichannel retailers, that’s a costly blind spot.
Measured’s testing in 2025 shows that Google campaigns consistently drive meaningful in-store lift across Search, Shopping, PMax, and YouTube. When you only look at ecommerce returns, you miss the full picture.
- Median ecommerce iROAS on Google: $2.27
- Median in-store iROAS from first-party retail transactions: $1.12
That’s a combined omnichannel iROAS of $3.39 for national retailers. So if you’re only measuring online outcomes, you’re potentially ignoring one third of Google’s total impact.
Omnichannel brands need omnichannel measurement. Retailers with a strong brick-and-mortar presence should leverage omnichannel bidding and make testing and measurement across both e-commerce and in-store sales a priority. And once they do, the case for increasing Google investment, especially into PMax and YouTube, becomes clear.
Takeaway: Don’t let narrow measurement lead to underinvestment. Google drives omnichannel sales, and the lift is real when you measure for it.
4. Add Upper Funnel Campaigns to Boost YouTube Performance
YouTube isn’t just a branding channel, it’s a proven growth lever when treated as a full funnel opportunity and measured accordingly. Across the Measured portfolio, 75% of brands are using Google spend on YouTube.
Brands that optimize YouTube for reach and view objectives, and pair it with conversion-optimized YouTube or DemandGen campaigns, see statistically significant lift in 82% of geo-based incrementality tests, typically over 4–8 week windows.
- Median Sales% Lift from geo tests: 3.2%
- Median iROAS from geo tests: $0.82
- Calibrated MMM iROAS (accounting for longer-term impacts):
- $1.04 for ecommerce-only brands
- $1.44 for omnichannel brands
Planning also matters: Brands that begin investment 6+ weeks in advance of seasonal or high intent brand moments see the most consistent returns. Testing YouTube into the lead-up to Black Friday, Cyber Monday is a great way to prove out the impact of upper funnel marketing on sales.
And unlike typical mid- and lower-funnel media, YouTube platform reported performance often meaningfully under-represents its incremental impact. Incrementality testing reveals that YouTube’s true lift is underreported by Google platform metrics, on average by 35%, but for 1 in 4 advertisers that number is >400%, making testing not just helpful, but essential.
Takeaway: YouTube works when you include top-of-funnel campaigns as part of a full-funnel marketing strategy, measure for incrementality, and plan in advance. Include bumper ads and shorts to increase reach and awareness. Ignore click-through rates. Optimize for reach, measure lift, and calibrate your Media Mix Models accordingly.
5. The Best Brands Test Quarterly, Not Occasionally
The most successful brands on Google don’t just test once in a while, they make it a habit. The data proves that a consistent test-and-learn strategy delivers real performance gains. That means creating a quarterly (at least) testing sprint on Google with each quarter’s learning agenda informed by previous testing. High velocity testing brands have performed at least 10 Google tests since January 2024, with many >20.
Across the Measured portfolio, brands that have run 10 or more Google incrementality tests since January 2024 saw:
- +7.7% increase in Google spend in 2025
- +7.6% improvement in iROAS
- Resulting in an average +9.9% YoY lift in incremental sales from Google
These aren’t one-off results. Of course brands that spend more on Google should see more return, but it’s rare to spend more and improve efficiency while doing so. That’s a clear signal that testing and acting on what you learn creates a compounding advantage. These brands recalibrated their models, optimized media strategy and campaign structure, and shifted budget into high-performing tactics uncovered through testing.
Takeaway: You don’t need to test everything all at once, but you do need to test consistently. When testing becomes a discipline (not a side project), performance improves quarter after quarter.
Closing Thoughts
Advertisers have access to more sophisticated tools than ever, but real value is only unlocked when those tools are pointed toward measurable business outcomes. Google offers a broad set of capabilities that, when used intentionally and tested independently, have delivered strong incremental impact across ecommerce and omnichannel brands alike.