The Paid Search Podcast

Episode 501: Demystifying Performance Max
Host: Chris Schaeffer | Guest: Joey Bidner
Date: February 23, 2026

Episode Overview

This episode dives deep into Google Ads' Performance Max (PMAX) campaigns, aiming to clarify common misconceptions and provide practical strategies for using PMAX effectively. Guest Joey Bidner shares honest, field-tested advice, including both the strengths and limits of PMAX, and offers specific guidance for different types of accounts. Additionally, host Chris Schaeffer wraps up with actionable tips about the often-overlooked Google Ads Editor tool, maximizing efficiency for advertisers and agencies.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Introduction & Setting Context

• Chris introduces the “head-first” discussion on Performance Max, promising both do’s and don’ts and hands the main segment to Joey Bidner for his deep-dive.
  • [00:19]

2. Understanding Performance Max (Joey Bidner)

A. PMAX Is Not a “One-Size-Fits-All” Solution

• Joey emphasizes that "Performance Max sort of broke this idea of best practices," making it impossible to rely on a single strategy for all accounts.
  • [04:58]

B. PMAX’s Main Strength: Lead Nurturing, Not Acquisition

• PMAX is best at nurturing traffic already in your marketing pipeline and “closing” conversions, but not at cold traffic acquisition.
  • Memorable Analogy:
    • "Performance Max is like the net that's scooping up the fish by the boat... It does a good job of closing traffic that is already on your line, circling the boat." — Joey Bidner [06:02]
• Initial PMAX results often look outstanding due to closing existing, warm leads—but numbers can quickly dwindle as the existing pipeline is exhausted.
  • “[Performance] is incredible in the first couple weeks... then they dwindle away. And why is that? Because it is nurturing and closing all that traffic that's already in your pipeline.” — Joey Bidner [07:00]

C. The “Feeder Strategy”

• Best practice is to feed PMAX with parallel Search and Shopping campaigns to attract new (cold) traffic, while PMAX nurtures and closes.
  • Search/Shopping should have a lower target ROAS; PMAX can have a higher one to focus on closing.
• Holistic measurement is required:
  • "Performance Max is always going to look better, right? It's always going to look better, it's always going to have that stronger return on ad spend. But we need to have the discipline to not necessarily react to the [individual campaign] numbers... You have to look past that time frame." — Joey Bidner [09:22]

D. PMAX for Small Budgets & Accounts

• For small accounts, Search and Shopping alone often deliver better results.
• If testing PMAX with a small budget, avoid running multiple simultaneous campaigns—test one, mark start date, evaluate over at least three months.

E. Budget Distribution Caveats

• PMAX splits spend across multiple channels (Search, Shopping, Display, Discovery, Gmail, YouTube).
• Small budgets get spread thin; substantial investment and patience are needed to judge results.

F. PMAX Asset Groups & Audience Signals

• Only create multiple asset groups when there are materially different creative assets, not based on audience signals:
  • "Structuring asset groups by audience signals is completely useless." — Joey Bidner [15:24]
• Audience signals are merely directional hints to Google—actual targeting isn't strictly limited to those signals.
  • "We don't see data at the audience level. We can just speculate on its impact."
• In most cases, asset group consolidation is favored; in-depth structures don't deliver more control due to limited visibility.

G. PMAX "Feed-Only” Campaigns Are Outdated

• Joey now avoids feed-only PMAX campaigns (those with no additional creative assets). If you don't want PMAX to use all channels, it’s better not to use PMAX at all:
  • "If you don't want Performance Max to be on display and video and YouTube, don’t run Performance Max. I personally do not see a benefit anymore in a feed-only campaign." — Joey Bidner [14:15]

H. Recent Improvements: Channel Insights

• New Channel Reporting tabs in PMAX allow advertisers to see spend allocation; Google has improved, with most PMAX spend now on Search and Shopping.

Notable Quotes:

• "PMAX is the net scooping up the fish; Search and Shopping are your lines... measure it holistically and see how leveraging these campaigns pushes the top line account goals." — Joey Bidner [18:37]
• "Your Performance Max campaign is going to remarket no matter what... it's always going to be a big soup mixture of cold and warm traffic." — Joey Bidner [17:10]

3. Practical Segment: Google Ads Editor (Chris Schaeffer)

Starts: [19:59]

A. What Is Google Ads Editor?

• Free, downloadable tool by Google for making bulk changes in any account, supports multiple accounts via MCC.

B. Who Should Use It?

• Anyone managing multiple/large accounts, or constrained by time.
  • "If you only have 24 hours in the day, then I'm talking to you because using the Google Ads Standard UI... it's never been worse." — Chris Schaeffer [20:53]

C. Why Use It?

• Speed: Allows rapid creation and editing (example: building a new campaign “in 10 minutes”).
• Efficiency: Easily clone campaigns; global search/replace for keywords or ad text.
  • "People that book me for coaching... have seen me build a new campaign from zero... in 10 minutes using Google Ads Editor." — Chris Schaeffer [25:05]
• Quality control: Provides a “snapshot” backup, highlights hidden issues like negative keywords or device bids.
• Not a reporting tool—don’t use it to check campaign metrics.

D. When Should You Use It?

• Ideal for new campaign builds, large-scale changes, ad copy updates, or account transitions.

Memorable Moments & Quotes (w/ Timestamps)

• PMAX analogy:
  “Performance Max is like the net that's scooping up the fish by the boat... It does a good job of closing traffic that is already on your line, circling the boat.” — Joey Bidner [06:02]

• Warning about PMAX’s limitations:
  “It's not all that great at traffic acquisition, at going after cold traffic, simply because it's riskier...” — Joey Bidner [08:25]

• On overcomplicating asset groups:
  "Structuring asset groups by audience signals is completely useless." — Joey Bidner [15:24]

• On Google Ads Editor’s time-saving power:
  "People that book me for coaching... have seen me build a new campaign from zero... in 10 minutes using Google Ads Editor." — Chris Schaeffer [25:05]

Timestamps for Key Segments

| Segment | Timestamp | |-------------------------------------------------------------------------------|------------| | Chris’s intro, show updates, and sponsor update | 00:19–04:58| | Joey on PMAX: context, theory, what it does | 04:58–07:30| | How PMAX works—nurturing vs. acquisition, the “feeder strategy” explained | 07:30–10:50| | PMAX in small accounts, budgets, campaign structure, asset groups, audience | 11:00–17:30| | Channel insights improvement, remarketing clarification, concluding analogy | 17:30–18:50| | Chris transitions, where to reach Joey | 19:59 | | Google Ads Editor “what, who, why, when” deep-dive | 19:59–28:30|

Summary for Non-Listeners

This episode equips advertisers and PPC specialists with honest, actionable insights around Performance Max campaigns in Google Ads—dispelling myths about its universality, clarifying when (and how) to use it, and signposting clear warnings about its limits. Joey Bidner's analogies and field-tested advice make PMAX's strengths (nurturing, not acquiring) practical, while Chris Schaeffer’s segment on Google Ads Editor delivers immediately usable productivity tips for anyone managing accounts at scale. If you want to truly understand when PMAX will make you look good—and when it might quietly fail unless used alongside other campaigns—listen to this one.