Display Ads in Google Ads
Banners on websites, in apps and in Gmail that bring back warm audiences and remind people about you in the right context. No budget wasted on accidental clicks in games or on sites built just for ads.
- Funnel stageReach
- Setupfrom ₴24,000
- Managementfrom ₴12,000/mo
A news site article: a responsive Grainvo ad with a kitchen photo, logo and a “Get a quote” button loads into the sidebar and into the article, and the cursor moves onto the button and clicks it.
A responsive display ad: one set of Grainvo assets — photos, logo, headlines and a button — is composed, one after another, into 728 × 90, 300 × 250 and 320 × 50 banners and a native card.
A news app feed: someone scrolls the stories, a native Brewnest ad with an “Ad” label, a photo and an “Order now” button blends in between them, a frame shows it is the ad, and the button is tapped.
Display Ads explained in 40 seconds
Display Ads: the essentials
Display ads are image and responsive ads on the Google Display Network (GDN): news portals, niche websites, forums, mobile apps, YouTube and Gmail. It offers the widest reach in Google Ads and also the most uneven inventory: next to quality publishers sit gaming apps full of accidental clicks and sites built purely to serve ads. What separates a useful campaign from a wasted one is its audiences, its exclusions and what exactly it optimizes for.
In 2026 Google began moving Display campaigns into Demand Gen: the GDN inventory stays, but you will gradually have to manage it there. Some familiar settings are not supported in Demand Gen: manual bidding, paying for viewable impressions, bid adjustments and frequency caps. That is why the migration should be deliberate: clean up placements, move exclusions to the account level and choose a new bid strategy in advance. We run display advertising in both formats and migrate campaigns together with their learning history.
How it works under the hood
- 01
Audience or context
We choose who sees the ads: site visitors, your customers, in-market segments, custom segments. Or where: on specific sites, within topics, on pages with the right keywords.
- 02
An ad for any slot
Responsive display ads are assembled from your images, logos and copy to fit each placement. Uploaded banners show exactly as your designer made them.
- 03
An auction for every impression
Google evaluates each impression: the likelihood of conversion, banner viewability, page context. Optimized targeting can expand delivery beyond your selected audiences unless you turn it off.
- 04
Cleanup and optimization
We regularly review where ads actually showed, exclude apps and sites that don't deliver, and shift budget to the placements and audiences that convert.
When to use Display Ads
Dynamic remarketing for online stores
People see the exact products they viewed, with the current price from the feed. The most practical display scenario for e-commerce.
Long decision cycles
Real estate, education, B2B services: people return to the decision several times, and a banner keeps you in mind between those visits.
Niche audiences on topical sites
Industry media, professional portals, topical forums: targeted placements where your customer reads about their field.
Supporting a promotion or launch
A visual reminder of a sale, an opening or a seasonal offer for an audience that already knows your brand.
Brand visibility alongside other channels
When viewable impressions and contact frequency matter more than clicks: display reinforces YouTube and Search with low-cost repeat touchpoints.
Ad formats and their anatomy
Responsive display ads
Up to 15 images, 5 logos, 5 short headlines, a long headline and 5 descriptions. Google assembles the banner to fit the slot and over time favors the best combinations.
Image requirements
Landscape 1.91:1 and square 1:1 images are required, portrait 4:5 is recommended; logos are 1:1 and 4:1. The quality of these files determines how the banner looks in every slot.
Uploaded image ads
Ready-made banners with full design control. The most common sizes are 300×250, 336×280, 728×90, 300×600, 160×600, 320×50 and 970×250, with files up to 150 KB.
Dynamic ads
Banners that pull products or services from a Merchant Center feed or a business data feed: the image, name and price of exactly what the person viewed.
HTML5 banners
Animated banners with custom code. They have separate requirements, and Google is still rolling out their support in Demand Gen. We account for this during migration.
What we set up in the campaign: 11 steps
No templates: we adapt every item to your niche, margins and goals. Here’s what our launch checklist looks like.
- 01 Remarketing separate from prospecting Remarketing, dynamic remarketing and cold audiences run as separate campaigns with different goals, bids and creatives.
- 02 Segments from your data We split the audience by depth of engagement: viewed a product, added to cart, abandoned a form, checked prices. Membership duration matches your real decision cycle.
- 03 Custom segments People who searched your terms on Google or visit similar sites. More precise than broad interests like “business” or “shopping”.
- 04 Optimized targeting, used deliberately We turn it off for remarketing so the campaign stays within the list; for prospecting we keep it only with a conversion-based strategy and placement control.
- 05 Mobile app exclusions We exclude app categories and specific games where clicks are accidental. At launch we review the placement report every week.
- 06 Made-for-advertising sites We build exclusion lists of sites with excessive ads, cloned content and suspiciously high CTR, and apply them at the account level.
- 07 Content suitability and brand safety We choose the inventory type and exclude sensitive topics, parked domains and content categories your brand shouldn't appear next to.
- 08 Dynamic remarketing with a feed We connect Merchant Center or a business data feed, set up product ID passing via the Google tag or GTM, and check that the IDs on the site match the IDs in the feed.
- 09 Frequency capping In Display campaigns we cap impressions per person. Demand Gen has no such cap, so there we manage frequency through audience size, membership duration and excluding converters.
- 10 A complete creative set Images without small text, a clean logo, several headlines and descriptions for responsive ads, plus static banners in popular sizes for key placements.
- 11 Preparing for the move to Demand Gen We move content suitability exclusions to the account level, remove bid adjustments and choose replacements for manual bidding and vCPM in advance.
The mistakes we find most often
If your ads are already running, let’s start with an audit. Here’s what usually eats up the budget in this campaign type.
Bidding for clicks in lead generation
The cheapest GDN clicks come from mobile games and clickbait sites. The report looks great, with lots of clicks for pennies, but there are no leads.
Remarketing with optimized targeting
A campaign meant to show only to site visitors reaches cold audiences, yet the report still calls it “remarketing”.
Zero placement exclusions
Nobody has opened the “Where ads showed” report in months. The budget leaks into apps, kids' games and made-for-advertising sites.
Dynamic remarketing with mismatched IDs
The site tag sends one set of IDs and the feed has another, so banners show random products or don't show at all. We check the match before launch.
A banner nobody can read
Tiny text on the image, a cropped logo, one landscape image for every slot. The responsive ad looks broken in some sizes.
Trusting view-through conversions
The campaign “drives” lots of view-through conversions because the banner was shown to people who would have bought anyway. We separate them from click-through conversions and check the real contribution.
What we track
- Cost per conversion and ROAS For remarketing and dynamic campaigns, what matters is the cost of a lead or a sale. Clicks and impressions are only intermediate metrics here.
- Viewable impressions and vCPM For awareness campaigns, only what people could actually see counts: at least half of the banner on screen for one second. An unseen impression builds no brand.
- Traffic quality by placement Engagement and conversions in GA4 for every site and app. High CTR with zero engagement is a classic sign of accidental clicks.
- View-through conversions Actions by people who saw the banner but didn't click. A useful but inflated signal, so we count it separately and with caution.
- Frequency and reach How many times one person sees the banner. High frequency on a small remarketing list quickly turns a reminder into an irritation.
- Asset performance The asset report for responsive ads shows which images and headlines deliver results. We replace weak ones and reuse strong ones in other campaigns.
Bid strategies
Where this campaign type works especially well
Full-service Display Ads: what it costs
You pay the ad budget directly to Google. Our fee is fixed — no percentage of spend below the Scale plan.
Questions and answers: Display Ads
Didn’t find your answer? Ask us directly — we’ll advise for free.
Is display advertising the same as remarketing?
No, remarketing is just one use case. The Display Network also lets you reach new people by interests, intent, topics or specific sites. But for most businesses, remarketing and dynamic remarketing deliver the most practical results, so that is usually where we start.
What happens to Display campaigns after the move to Demand Gen?
Google is gradually moving Display campaigns into Demand Gen, where the Display Network becomes one channel alongside YouTube, Discover and Gmail. Settings and part of the history carry over in the migration, but manual bidding, vCPM, bid adjustments and frequency caps don't work there. We prepare campaigns in advance so the move doesn't break optimization.
Why does display bring lots of clicks but few leads?
Most often it's because ads show in mobile apps and on made-for-advertising sites where clicks are accidental. The second reason is a click-based strategy instead of a conversion-based one, combined with unchecked optimized targeting. We clean up placements, change the strategy and separate cold audiences from remarketing.
What banners do we need to launch?
For responsive ads, you need landscape and square images without small text, a logo in two formats and several headline and description variations. We add static banners in popular sizes when you need full control over the design. If you don't have your own materials, we prepare a brief for a designer.
How do you set up dynamic remarketing?
You need a feed: Google Merchant Center for products, or a business data feed for services, real estate, education or travel. On the site, the Google tag via GTM passes the IDs of viewed items, and they must exactly match the IDs in the feed. After that, Google builds banners from whatever the person viewed.
Is it safe for our brand to appear on the Display Network?
Yes, if content suitability is configured: inventory type, exclusions for sensitive topics and categories, and lists of blocked sites and apps. We set these at the account level so they apply to both Display and Demand Gen campaigns.
We’ll launch your campaign right from day one
Leave your contact — a specialist will review your ads or website and prepare a short breakdown with concrete next steps. No obligations, no hard selling.
- 01 A short call or chat We clarify your niche, goals and what you’ve already tried.
- 02 Ads and website review We check the account (read-only access), tracking and landing pages.
- 03 Action plan You get a list of issues and priorities — even if you don’t work with us.
We reply within 1 business day