Bing is testing new filters for shopping results. These filters appear above the shopping ads, and clicking one changes the results accordingly.

I spotted this yesterday and assume it’s new, since I hadn’t seen this before. Personally, I like this filter because it can be helpful for users who don’t find what they’re looking for on the first try instead of typing a new keyword into the search box, they can simply apply a filter instead.

Here is a screenshot of how it looks.

Showing filters above shopping ads could catch users‘ attention more easily, and clicking through these filters may help users find what they’re looking for faster potentially increasing conversions for the websites featured in those results.

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Source:: searchenginewatch.com

Microsoft Advertising says advertisers remain responsible for the AI-generated content in their campaigns, including when Microsoft’s own tools create it. Its guidance covers required disclosures, permission to use someone’s likeness or voice, and preserving information that identifies content as AI-generated.

The company’s dedicated help page, reported by Search Engine Land on September 14, addresses AI-generated, AI-manipulated and other synthetic advertising content.

It does not announce a universal requirement to put the same AI label on every ad. Microsoft ties mandatory disclosures to the laws that apply where an ad runs, with requirements varying by market and content type.

Microsoft’s watermark may be invisible to your customer

Microsoft says its AI tools apply metadata, machine-readable provenance information and imperceptible watermarks to generated images, audio and video. These signals identify how content was made, but may not appear as a label that a consumer can see.

Advertisers must still add any legally required visible or audible disclosure. Microsoft says it should be understandable and placed near the relevant content, and recommends embedding disclosures directly in image and video assets.

The distinction matters during production: a file can carry information identifying it as AI-generated while giving the person viewing the ad no visible indication of that fact. Advertisers need to preserve the former and check whether they must add the latter.

Microsoft also makes clear that disclosure does not excuse deception. Ads may be rejected, restricted or removed for prohibited deepfakes, impersonation, missing required disclosures, unauthorized use of someone’s likeness or voice, or interference with required machine-readable information.

The disclaimer tool can narrow your reach

The guidance points advertisers to Microsoft’s existing Disclaimer in ads feature, where the chosen format supports it. But that feature’s documentation contains a practical caveat: enabling a disclaimer means losing traffic from publishers that do not support disclaimers.

There are format restrictions too. The feature does not support Multimedia ads. For Audience campaigns, it works with Native ads. Performance Max support is limited to campaigns without a catalog feed serving Product ads.

Search advertisers can choose a popup or an additional line of text, with the latter replacing Ad text 2. Audience and Performance Max campaigns only offer the popup layout.

These are existing limits of the disclaimer feature, rather than a newly announced penalty for AI-generated ads. They mean advertisers considering the tool need to check both how the disclosure appears and which placements remain available. The AI guidance does not quantify any resulting traffic loss.

AI creation still needs human review

Microsoft already offers tools that generate ad text, images, backgrounds and videos. The transparency guidance leaves advertisers responsible for reviewing the resulting creative before submission and checking that its depictions and claims are accurate.

For campaign teams, that makes the final exported asset a useful review point: does the disclosure remain readable, has the file retained its provenance information, and does the ad accurately represent the product being sold?

SEW recently documented Google testing visible AI labels on generated review summaries in ads. Microsoft’s guidance addresses the advertiser’s side of that transparency problem: using an AI creation tool does not establish that the finished ad meets the disclosure rules where it will run.

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Source:: searchenginewatch.com

Google’s John Mueller has acknowledged a limitation in Search Console’s AI reporting: it cannot tell publishers where their links sit within an AI Overview. Google records the answer’s position as a whole, leaving the prominence of individual sources unresolved.

In a Reddit discussion, Mueller said:

“Position for these is hard to do in a way that makes it useful, so we’re currently tracking it like we do for many search features (as a block), & it’s not separated out in the Gen-AI performance report.”

The exchange was reported by Search Engine Journal on September 13. Mueller acknowledged a specific measurement problem and invited suggestions. He did not announce a replacement metric or a release date.

The answer gets a position. Every source inherits it.

Google’s measurement documentation says an AI Overview occupies one position in search results. Every link inside it receives that same position.

Consider an AI Overview containing several sources. A link near the beginning and another farther into the answer can receive the same recorded position. That number cannot tell a publisher which placement it received, or whether its citation became easier to find.

This rule applies specifically to AI Overviews. Google describes AI Mode separately, using search-result positioning rules that also account for elements such as image and carousel blocks.

An impression does not prove someone noticed your link

Google applies its standard impression rules to AI Overviews. Depending on the result format, an impression can count without the user scrolling the link into view. Links that require an expansion to appear are counted when that section is expanded.

That distinction matters when interpreting visibility. A recorded impression is not evidence that someone read a citation. Equally, a source hidden behind an unopened expansion has not necessarily received exposure simply because Google included it in the answer.

A separate AI report still leaves gaps

Google introduced its generative AI performance reports on June 3 and says the worldwide rollout was completed on August 31. The Search report covers impressions from AI Overviews and AI Mode.

Its documented breakdowns include pages, countries, devices and dates. Those can help publishers see which URLs appear in AI features and how those appearances change over time. The dedicated report does not provide the corresponding click, click-through-rate or position metrics.

That limits what a publisher can conclude from a rising impressions chart. It can show more recorded appearances, but cannot establish that citations became more prominent or generated more visits.

There is also a reporting trap: Google says the AI report’s data is already included in the main Web performance report. Adding the two totals together would count overlapping data twice. Dividing all Web clicks by AI impressions would also mix different sets of activity, producing something other than an AI-specific click-through rate.

Mueller said modern results give users several ways to interact, making the familiar ranking scale difficult to translate into useful reporting. He offered to take suggestions to the team. For publishers, the missing detail remains concrete: which placements actually put their links in front of readers and persuade them to visit.

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Source:: searchenginewatch.com

Google has announced the availability of “Collected Info,” a Business Profile tab that lets owners inspect details gathered by its automated assistant. But deleting an outdated record does not change other information already on the listing, according to Google’s help documentation.

Search Engine Land reported the announcement on September 14, citing a post from Google’s Business Profile account on X. The feature had already appeared in June documentation, followed by screenshots reported in July.

Google’s current instructions still limit availability to certain regions, languages and business categories. Owners should not assume every profile has the tab yet.

Google’s calls leave a paper trail

Google can contact businesses through automated calls, texts or WhatsApp messages to confirm information such as opening hours and whether particular services are available. Its automated communications documentation says information supplied in response can be added to the Business Profile on the business’s behalf.

Collected Info gives owners a place to inspect that material, including its source and collection date. Information appears in the language in which it was originally provided.

For an agency managing a client’s listing, those details could help explain where an unexpected claim came from. A conversation handled by someone at the business may contain information the person managing its Google profile has never seen.

Conversations are only one input. Google separately says it builds business profiles from several sources, including websites, licensed data, user contributions and its own interactions with businesses. Its description of Collected Info does not establish that the tab exposes every source behind every profile field.

Delete is not an undo button

Google’s instructions draw a distinction between removing collected information and changing the rest of the profile: deletion removes the collected record, while other existing profile details remain unchanged.

Where the feature is available, the documented route is Edit profile → Collected info. Review the entries and select Delete, then confirm, for information you want removed.

Afterwards, check what customers see on Search and Maps and correct any remaining inaccurate profile fields through the relevant editing controls.

Google’s separate guidance on automatic profile updates says changes made by Google appear in blue in the profile editor. It also cautions that owners cannot manage every Google update through their Business Profile.

SEW previously covered Business Profile post view counts appearing in some accounts, another step toward giving owners more visibility into their listings. Collected Info addresses a different question: where Google obtained the information it holds about a business.

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Source:: searchenginewatch.com

Google Ads is testing Product Value Optimization, a feature that lets retailers adjust how much selected products are worth to its automated bidding system. The aim is to give advertisers more influence over which products their campaigns pursue, including items with stronger margins or stock they need to clear. Google’s product announcement describes the intended uses.

Search Engine Roundtable reported the beta on September 14, following a LinkedIn post from advertiser Adriaan Dekker, who credited Tiago Goncalves for sharing it. Google already includes the feature in its Google Marketing Live 2026 announcements, so the latest sighting should not be confused with a general launch.

Retailers can tell Google which stock to shift

Google says the feature works with Performance Max and Shopping campaigns. Advertisers can adjust values for individual products or groups defined by attributes such as brand and category, without changing their campaign structure.

According to Dekker’s description of the beta, the controls allow advertisers to multiply conversion values for selected products and apply those adjustments at campaign level.

That addresses a familiar retail problem: two products can bring in the same sales revenue while serving very different business needs.

For example, imagine two products that each sell for $100. One leaves $40 after the cost of the goods; the other leaves $10. If both purchases are reported purely as $100 in revenue, that figure alone does not communicate the difference in their margins.

Stock clearance introduces another priority. A retailer may have a reason to push an item before the season ends, even when another product has a better margin.

Google’s own illustration of the feature makes that distinction: it assigns example multipliers of 1.2 to a holiday promotion, 1.5 to high-margin products and 1.8 to overstock. Those are illustrative settings, not reported performance gains.

A multiplier does not put more money in the till

The mechanism changes the value supplied to bidding. It does not, by itself, increase what a customer pays or what the retailer earns.

In a simplified example, multiplying a $100 conversion value by 1.5 makes its adjusted value $150. The transaction still brought in $100. Whether prioritizing that product improves the business depends on the resulting sales, costs and advertising spend.

Google already supports conversion value rules based on location, device and customer attributes. Product Value Optimization applies a similar principle to merchandise priorities. It should not be read as Google introducing value-based bidding for the first time.

There is a reporting consequence to watch. For its existing conversion value rules, Google says adjusted values affect both optimization and reporting, and provides ways to separate original values from adjustments.

That documentation does not establish exactly how every reporting field in the product beta behaves. It does show why advertisers should check what a reported value includes before treating an increase as revenue growth.

Google has shown the controls, but not the results

Google’s product announcement does not specify country availability, detailed eligibility requirements or a general release date. It also provides no measured performance results for the feature.

For retailers evaluating it, the practical question is whether the new priorities produce a better sales mix at an acceptable advertising cost. Raising the value assigned to a product is an instruction to the bidding system; the commercial outcome still needs measuring.

SEW recently covered Google’s Meridian GeoX tool for testing whether ads generate additional sales. That addresses a separate measurement question, but one that remains relevant here: after changing what the algorithm is asked to pursue, did the business actually gain sales it would otherwise have missed?

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Source:: searchenginewatch.com