Many marketers work with Brand Lift — this is the most common type of lift study, but far from the only one. In this article, we will also look at Search Lift and Conversion Lift, explain their methodology, and show how to use these tools for a more accurate assessment of advertising effectiveness. Understanding these approaches will help optimize marketing strategies and strengthen the impact of communications on the target audience.

What are Lift Studies and how do they work

Lift studies are a method of measuring the real impact of advertising, based on comparing the behavior of two audience segments: those who saw the ad and those who did not. For this, the system forms a control group — a segment of users who do not receive campaign impressions.

It’s important to launch lift studies before starting the advertising campaign. If activated after impressions have begun, results will be skewed: part of the control group may have already seen the ad, making the comparison inaccurate.

Further in the article, we will cover how to launch lifts with multiple parallel flights correctly. For now, let’s note the main rule: the lift must be planned and activated before pressing the “Launch” button in the campaign.

At this point, a logical question may arise: doesn’t the lift study reduce the campaign’s reach, since part of the audience deliberately doesn’t see the ad? Yes, some reduction in reach is inevitable, but it ensures the ability to obtain reliable insights into the real effectiveness of the advertising campaign.

Such insights are especially valuable when testing new approaches, creatives, or strategies, so Lift Studies should be launched at least in the experimentation and optimization phase. This will help build further decisions on facts, not assumptions.

Types of Lift Studies from Google

Google uses several types of lift studies, each measuring a specific aspect of advertising impact. All are based on comparing control and experimental groups, allowing determination of both absolute lift and relative lift — that is, not only absolute changes in metrics but also relative growth in behavioral indicators. This approach helps more accurately assess the real campaign effect, especially when baseline audience values are low.

Brand Lift

Brand Lift shows how an advertising campaign has influenced the audience’s attitude toward a brand. It measures changes in awareness, perception, and user intentions after contact with the ad, comparing these indicators with a control group that did not see the advertising. This makes it possible to determine whether the campaign truly generated interest and whether the likelihood has increased that the brand will be remembered or considered for purchase.

The study is conducted in the format of short surveys displayed directly within the Google ecosystem. Users may be asked which brands they know, which they trust, or how highly they rate their intent to purchase a product. The difference between responses from the control and experimental groups forms the lift indicator.

Brand Lift provides both absolute lift (difference in percentage points) and relative lift — the relative increase, showing how much stronger the audience that saw the ad reacted compared to the control segment. Relative lift is especially valuable in situations where baseline awareness is low: even a small absolute increase can mean a significant growth in interest in the brand.

Brand Lift allows marketers to evaluate not just reach or views, but the actual impact of creatives and messages on brand perception. This makes it a key tool for campaigns focused on increasing awareness and building preference.

We previously described how we work with brand lift in the article “What is BrandLift and how we do it“

Search Lift

Search Lift in Google shows how an advertising campaign affected the dynamics of search queries — both in Google Search and on YouTube. This study is activated through YouTube campaigns and measures whether the advertising stimulated additional interest in the brand or product in search.

As in all types of Lift studies, part of the audience is reserved as a control group that will not see the ad. It is the comparison of the behavior of these two groups that forms the lift indicator. The difference from Brand Lift is that effectiveness is measured not by surveys, but by changes in the frequency of searches for specified keywords. The list of keywords is set by the advertiser at the launch stage.

For correct analysis, it’s desirable to use two sets of keywords: branded and product-related. It’s important to choose high-frequency queries that can naturally arise in a large part of the audience. For example, the query “dress” can demonstrate real growth among those who saw the ad, while the query “red dress for New Year buy delivery Kozyatyn” is too rare to provide a statistically significant result.

Search Lift often reveals insights that are impossible to see in a standard period comparison in Search Console. For example, in one of our projects, the lift did not show growth for branded queries, but demonstrated a +31% relative lift for the main product keywords in the client’s niche — that is, queries became 31% more frequent in the experimental group compared to the control group.

In general, data from Think with Google confirms that Search Lift results differ significantly between industries, so each business needs to test and analyze its own metrics.

Conversion Lift

Conversion Lift is a study that shows how advertising has affected the number of conversions recorded in your account. To launch this type of study, you need to use conversion-focused video formats such as Video Action or Discovery, as they are optimized for user actions.

After launching the campaign, Google automatically divides the target audience into two groups:

• Experimental group — users who will see your ad.
• Control group — users who could have seen the ad, but instead received another ad in the auction.

At the end of the study, Google compares the number of conversions between these two groups to determine which volume of actions was caused specifically by the advertising, and which would have happened under normal conditions. In the report, the advertiser receives detailed information about the increase in conversions, organized by their types.

Conversion Lift allows evaluating both absolute lift (the difference in conversions between groups) and relative lift — the relative increase, which shows how much more frequently users performed target actions after viewing the ad. It is the relative lift that helps more accurately assess incremental impact, especially when baseline conversion values are small.

The official instructions for launching Conversion Lift are available in the Google Ads help. We will not reproduce it here — the primary source provides the most accurate step-by-step algorithm and takes into account current technical nuances.

Absolute Lift and Relative Lift: what’s the difference and why it matters

To correctly interpret results from Brand Lift, Search Lift, or Conversion Lift, it’s important to understand two key types of lift that Google uses: absolute lift and relative lift. They measure the same effect but reflect its scale differently, providing different levels of analysis depth.

Absolute lift shows the difference in the metric between the experimental and control groups in percentage points.

Absolute Lift = Exposed Rate – Control Rate

For example, if 5% of the audience that saw the ad performed the target action, and in the control group 2%, then the absolute lift will be +3 p.p.

Absolute Lift = 5% – 2% = +3 p.p.

This is a simple and clear way to evaluate direct growth.

Relative lift demonstrates how much stronger the audience that saw the ad performed compared to the control group.

Relative Lift = (Exposed Rate – Control Rate) / Control Rate × 100%

For the same difference of 5% vs. 2%, relative lift will be +150%, meaning users from the experimental group acted 1.5 times more frequently.

(5% – 2%) / 2% × 100% = 150% relative lift

This metric is especially useful when baseline values are low — it reveals the real scale of changes that absolute values don’t always reflect.

Absolute lift allows evaluating the actual increase, while relative lift shows the strength of the ad’s impact. Together, they provide a complete picture: both about the number of additional actions and how significantly the campaign changes audience behavior. That’s why analyzing lifts without considering both metrics can be incomplete or even misleading.

How and when to launch Lift Studies

Our approach is to launch Search Lift and Conversion Lift in tandem with Brand Lift. This combination provides a holistic understanding of how the same advertising affects brand knowledge, intent to return or interact with it, and final conversions.

The optimal option is to launch all lift studies simultaneously or, at a minimum, synchronize them with Brand Lift at the Ad Recall metric level. It serves as the baseline indicator that the audience truly noticed the advertising message. Without it, qualitatively interpreting Search Lift and Conversion Lift results is much more difficult, as it’s hard to separate the real incremental impact of the ad from external factors.

How to launch Lift Studies for parallel campaigns

When multiple advertising campaigns are launched simultaneously in an account, it’s important to properly set up Lift studies so that the results are accurate. The problem is that users reserved as the control group for one campaign may end up in the experimental group of another. This creates cross-influence and can distort the results.

To avoid such overlaps, there are two main approaches:

1. Launch one general Brand Lift at the account level.
2. Create separate Brand Lift studies for each campaign.

Google usually recommends choosing the first option — one large-scale study for the entire account. In many cases, this is indeed the optimal approach, as it ensures consistent formation of control and experimental groups and minimizes audience duplication.

However, there may be exceptions in practice. Sometimes Google advises using the second option and launching lifts separately for each campaign. This allows more precise tracking of the impact of different creatives and strategies within the same hypothesis.

Conclusions

Lift studies — Brand Lift, Search Lift, and Conversion Lift — open up much broader opportunities for understanding advertising campaign effectiveness. They allow evaluating not just views or clicks, but the real impact of communication: how attitudes toward the brand changed, how interest grew in search, and how much the advertising truly drove conversions.

Lift Studies work on the principle of comparing two audience segments: those who saw the ad and those who did not. That’s why they need to be set up before the campaign starts, so the system can form a clean control group and ensure experiment accuracy. Although reserving the control group reduces potential reach, it provides the advertiser with much more valuable insights to optimize future strategies.

Today, Google offers three types of Lift Studies, each measuring its own aspect of impact: Brand Lift analyzes brand metrics, Search Lift measures changes in search interest, and Conversion Lift assesses conversion growth. In our practice, the most complete picture comes from combining Brand Lift with Search Lift and Conversion Lift: this way, we see how one campaign simultaneously affects brand perception, user behavior, and business results.

If you need help launching or interpreting Lift studies, the newage. team can take this process turnkey, from methodology to implementing decisions based on the insights obtained. We will help turn data into specific actions that enhance the effectiveness of your advertising campaigns.

FAQ

Does launching Lift Studies affect campaign reach?

Yes, part of the audience is reserved for the control group and does not see the ad. However, this minimal reduction in reach is compensated by precise insights into the real impact of the campaign, allowing for more accurate budget optimization.

Can lift studies be launched for an already active campaign?

No. Lift Studies must be activated before impressions start, otherwise the system cannot correctly form the control group, and results will be distorted.

What is the difference between absolute lift and relative lift?

Absolute lift shows the difference between groups in percentage points. Relative lift demonstrates how much stronger the experimental group reacted to the ad compared to the control group, in percentages. Together, they provide a complete picture of the impact.

Why launch Search Lift and Conversion Lift together with Brand Lift?

Brand Lift captures the baseline level of ad recall and perception. Without it, it’s hard to interpret growth in search or conversions, as it’s unclear whether the audience actually noticed the ad.

What ad formats are needed to launch Conversion Lift?

Conversion Lift works only with conversion formats — Video Action and Discovery. These allow evaluating incremental conversions and determining the real contribution of video ads to business results.