Target outranking share is a portfolio bid strategy that helps your ads outrank ads from another domain. 

This article explains how the Target outranking share bid strategy works, what its settings are, and a few things to keep in mind when using this strategy.

Before you begin

If you don’t yet know what type of portfolio bid strategy is right for you, read About automated bidding first.

How it works

Google Ads automatically raises or lowers your bids to help your ads outrank ads from another domain. This bid strategy works with campaigns targeting the Search Network only. You can only target one domain to outrank for each bid strategy.

When your ad outranks another ad, it’s displayed above the other domain's ad on Google Search results pages or shows when the other ad does not. It’s important to understand that this strategy doesn’t necessarily improve your overall ad rank; it only works to help you improve your rank in comparison to another domain’s ads.

The Target outranking share bid strategy will typically attempt to achieve your desired outranking share, but final placement is ultimately determined by the outcome of the ad auction, which is influenced by advertiser competition and Quality Score. Also note that Target outranking share only modifies your bids. It won’t enter you into auctions that you wouldn’t normally be participating in.

Settings

Domain name to outrank

Select the domain whose ads you'd like to outrank in search results. If your campaign has enough data, we'll display a list of domains that have recently bid in the same auctions as your ads. You can also manually enter a domain if you don't see one listed.

Target to outrank

Enter the percentage of auctions that you would like to outrank the selected domain. Keep in mind that the higher your target to outrank, the more budget you'll likely need to support the strategy.

Max. bid limit

The highest max. CPC bid that you want Google Ads to set for any keywords, ad groups, or campaigns using Target outranking share. Keep in mind that the strategy won't raise bids for keywords in budget-limited campaigns. If your campaign is limited by budget, the strategy might not be able to achieve the targeting goal.

Bid automation

• Automated bids gives Google Ads the ability to raise and lower bids as needed to outrank the selected domain. With this setting, there is no need to set bids manually.
• Manual bids allows you to set bids yourself, while adjusts bids so that they are at least as high as needed to outrank the selected domain.

Low quality keywords

Select how you want Google Ads to bid for keywords that are of low quality for your ad auctions. It may cost more to raise your bids for keywords that are of lesser quality, so we recommend that you leave this setting on the default "Don't raise bids."

Keep in mind

• When you first apply this strategy, it may take up to a day for your bids to be updated. The outranking share data is updated once a day, however, so your bids are also updated daily to help you achieve your target outranking share. Because the strategy can take up to 7 days to start producing results, we recommend waiting at least that long before making changes to the strategy settings.
• If two domains are both using a Target outranking share bid strategy, the strategies will increase each domain’s bid until one of them reaches their maximum bid limit. The participant with the best bid and quality score will earn the higher ad rank.
• This strategy changes bids on a keyword-by-keyword basis—it does not change bids in every ad auction. Therefore, when a bid is set, it will affect all auctions that each keyword matches, not just the ones in which your ads and your target domain's ads are participating.