Writing AdWords copy has become a modern day art form, one that many SEM’s have refined over years to take advantage of the 4 line structure. I’m sure we have all slaved over that phrase or line which is just 1 character too long! Well, Google have recently made things more challenging – thanks very much - by adding variable line lengths to the equation.

In the past we have written ads which fit within the following structure:

Title: 25 characters max
Line 2: 35 characters max
Line 3: 35 characters max
Display URL: 35 characters max

This strict format has often seen punctuation omitted in favour of that last character and to date we have been able to get away with it because we know exactly how our ad will appear in Google. Variable line lengths change this by expanding or contracting the line length in relation to the size of a user’s browser.

The result is that an ad you may have spent ages over will now appear in a completely different way to different users thereby losing some of its advertising appeal in the process.

So what does this mean for future copy?

Good copywriters won’t be fazed by this change. A good copywriter will create dynamic copy which reads well regardless, but the correct use of punctuation will now become critical to ensure your advertising message gets through the way you intended. Reviewing existing ads and altering them accordingly would also be advisable.