Here at Croud, we're always trying to remain at the forefront of digital innovation, and attending Google's recent "Level Up" event on June 25, 2025, provided us with invaluable insights into the future of their advertising platforms. The overarching message was clear: Google is accelerating through 2025 with a strong emphasis on a streamlined, integrated ad tech stack, powered by groundbreaking AI capabilities. This means less complexity, more efficiency, and ultimately, better results for our clients.
Building foundational efficiencies: The integrated ad tech stack
Google highlighted the critical importance of overcoming foundational inefficiencies, often rooted in legacy platform issues like inconsistent account structures or tracking. Their vision revolves around reducing platform complexity for both agencies like Croud and our clients' internal teams.
To achieve this, Google is advocating for collaborative frameworks focusing on:
- Standardised naming conventions.
- Consistent tracking & tagging.
- Centralised measurement & reporting workflows.
At Croud, we're already champions of these best practices, and this renewed emphasis from Google empowers us further to build robust, future-proof setups for your campaigns and streamline campaign delivery, measurement and reporting.
DV360: AI, CTV, and YouTube take centre stage
Google’s Display & Video 360 (DV360) is undergoing significant transformation, with CTV and YouTube marked as the primary focus areas for 2025 into 2026. The key themes driving DV360's evolution are Reach, Performance, and Efficiency.
The Next-Gen AI DSP & Enhanced Capabilities
A major thrust is to embed AI more deeply into DV360. This includes a revamped Marketplace with AI-powered search and Instant Deals. A game-changer for efficiency is the Accelerated Self-Help Chatbot, powered by Gemini AI, which will offer natural language support to simplify setup and troubleshooting without needing direct rep interaction.
We're particularly excited about Targeting Templates, which are now in Beta. These allow our teams to set advertiser-level templates for frequently used elements like inventory packages, geo-locations, and audiences. Imagine one-click line item setup, saving significant time! Soon, AI will even suggest templates based on past learnings. GenAI workflow building will be invaluable for quickly adapting to platform or policy changes. Good news for audience strategy: Lookalike audiences will be returning to DV360, a direct response to cookies no longer being deprecated in Chrome.
CTV & YouTube: Unlocking new potential
Both CTV and YouTube are central to DV360's future.
- CTV in 2025 aims to unlock biddable programmatic capabilities to drive better results across the entire CTV funnel. The CTV Marketplace revamp will include keyword search, audience insights, and streamlined instant deals. DV360 now also support cross-device, cross-channel frequency management for true media unification.
- YouTube in 2025 will see updates across reservations, deals, brand and direct response auctions, and improvements in creatives, workflows, and measurement. Innovations include Pause Ads with radius targeting, Masthead on CTV, and Cultural Moment sponsorships. A fascinating new feature, Peakpoints, will allow advertisers to identify key emotional points in a video to tie an ad break to that specific emotion, such as a victory moment.
- For DemandGen, look out for proximity targeting coming soon and Google Display Network (GDN) support to help find new audiences by extending campaigns with image ads. View-through conversion bidding will also be enhanced to maximise ROI using custom attribution and deduped Floodlight VTC bid optimisation.
Google also highlighted Optimized Targeting, which now permits demographic enforcement alongside interest expansion. This is crucial for finding net-new audiences beyond existing segments, ensuring you don't miss out on growth opportunities. Read the full Google NewFront article here.
CM360: The future of creative & measurement
Campaign Manager 360 (CM360) is receiving significant investment, especially in AI, CTV, and creative tools.
- CM360 AI arrived last year (2024) with increased investment. Expect improved Floodlight attribution via AI in 2025.
- Core infrastructure investments include Yahoo integration this year, alongside Netflix integrations. Major reporting upgrades are also underway, addressing previous issues to make data more accessible. The 'Engine' aims for improved measurement and cross-media attribution.
- 2024 was a pivotal year for CTV in CM360. Enhancements include transparency and self-service controls, improved buying platform and publisher integrations, and new insights to quantify CTV performance.
Perhaps one of the most exciting developments is CM360's ambition to be the future of creative strategy, not just a reporting hub. Google is exploring dynamic video capabilities in CM360 as they reimagine the creative experience. They are alpha testing solutions now!
SA360: Smarter search, templates, and measurement
Search Ads 360 (SA360) is also evolving with a focus on AI, templates and measurement
- Spotlight feature coming soon which highlights gaps in campaign set ups, campaign optimisation etc. This can also give callouts in bid strategies for things like performance shifts. Anomaly detection to be introduced as part of this and will work the same way as in GA4.
- Multi Target Portfolios and Portfolio Experimentation are new features currently being developed
- Portfolio Experimentation unlocks cross-engine testing at portfolio level
- Other features added to the roadmap include:
- AI Max for Search coming soon
- Data Manager Integration coming soon
- MS Ads PMax in SA360 bidding
In Search Ads 360 (SA360), Templates are reusable frameworks that allow advertisers to automatically generate and update campaigns, ad groups, ads, and keywords based on a feed or structured data source. There have been/will be advancements for Templates as shown below:
- AI Powered Templates Feed Generator (Alpha)
- This will act as an easier entry into Templates which will eliminate the reliance on technical staff for feed creation
There has also been feedback from other GMP partners to include:
- Ability to link google sheets/external feeds as a bulk upload
- Dedicated Change history for Templates
Measurement is a key topic for SA360 where we have seen recent developments such as Diagnostics for Consent Mode and Enhanced Conversions. Other key topics related to measurement were covered at the Level Up event including:
- Engaged View Conversions are coming soon to maintain holistic, durable measurement for conversions on Video/PMax campaigns that use Enhanced Conversions
- Custom Floodlight Variable reporting in Looker Studio
- Privacy safe offline conversion measurement coming soon
On the measurement front, there's now custom Floodlight Variable reporting in Looker Studio. We've also echoed client feedback regarding the desire to view multiple currencies when connecting to Looker Studio without needing multiple connections.
What's Next & What We're Still Exploring
While these updates are incredibly promising, there are ongoing discussions and areas Google is still addressing, which we at Croud are closely monitoring:
- The full support for DCO Video on YouTube is "Not Yet", but it might be on the roadmap.
Google enforces strict advertising policies for YouTube Kids and actively identifies minors to apply country-specific rules for advertising to children. However, the ongoing challenge, and an area of continued development for DV360 and YouTube, is the nuance of brand suitability, particularly within dynamic and live streaming content. While safety is a given, achieving highly granular brand suitability controls for advertisers across this evolving content landscape remains a key focus for Google which we will keep an eye on.
Partnering with Croud for a Future-Ready Strategy
The advancements across DV360, CM360, and SA360 signal a more intelligent, integrated, and efficient future for digital advertising. At Croud, our expertise in standardised naming conventions, consistent tracking & tagging, and centralised measurement & reporting workflows positions us perfectly to help you leverage these new capabilities.
We can help you navigate these updates, from implementing AI-powered targeting templates to optimising your CTV and YouTube strategies, and ensuring your creative and measurement workflows are streamlined.
Ready to transform your digital advertising? Get in touch with Croud today to discuss how we can put these Google innovations to work for your brand
