Associate audiences with ad groups or campaigns

Once you have created or selected an audience, you can associate it with one or more ad groups or campaigns.

Important

Campaign-level audience associations are not available for audience ads.

Once you have created or selected an audience, you need to associate it with an ad group or campaign, or with multiple ad groups or campaigns. The association can increase bids for, target, or exclude the people included in your audience.

Should I associate audiences to my ad groups or my campaigns?

Scenario	You should associate audiences to
You're using different audiences and bids for different ad groups in the same campaign.	Ad groups: That way, you can manage and optimize each audience individually.
Your account is segmented at the ad group level, or you otherwise want to keep precise control over each ad group.	Ad groups: For example, you could test a particular audience in one ad group before applying it to other ad groups.
You're using the same audience and bid for each ad group in your campaign.	Campaigns: You just need to set them up once, and don't have to create a new association each time you create a new ad group.

Create associations

Create a targeting association expando image

From the collapsible menu on the left, select All campaigns > Audiences.

If you're using the new Microsoft Advertising navigation, from the navigation menu on the left, hover over Campaigns and select Audiences.
Select Create association.
In the drop-down menu, select either Campaign or Ad group.
Select the appropriate ad group or campaign.
Select Add targeting.
In the Select audience drop-down menu, select the appropriate audience type.
Select the appropriate audience.

Choose your Ad group targeting setting or Campaign targeting setting:

Targeting setting	What it means
Bid only	Ads in this ad group or campaign can show to everyone but the bid adjustment will apply to people included in the audience.
Target and bid	Ads in this ad group or campaign will only show to people included in the audience.

Set a Default bid adjustment for new targeting associations. By default, your bid adjustment is set to 15%, however, the bid adjustment can range from -90% to +900%.
Select Save.

Notes

You will need to remove any ad group-level audience targeting associations within a campaign before you can create a campaign-level targeting association for that campaign.
Similarly, you will need to remove any campaign-level audience targeting associations before you can create an ad group-level targeting association within that campaign.

Create an exclusion association expando image

From the collapsible menu on the left, select All campaigns > Audiences.

If you're using the new Microsoft Advertising navigation, from the navigation menu on the left, hover over Campaigns and select Audiences.
Select Create association.
In the drop-down menu, select either Campaign or Ad group.
Select the appropriate ad group or campaign.
Select Add exclusions.
In the Select audience drop-down menu, select the appropriate audience type.
Select the appropriate audience.
Select Save.

Associate audiences with multiple ad groups or campaigns expando image

From the collapsible menu on the left, select All campaigns > Campaigns > Campaigns or Ad Groups.

If you're using the new Microsoft Advertising navigation, from the navigation menu on the left, hover over Campaigns and select Campaigns or Ad Groups.
Select the ad groups or campaigns you want to associate with the audience.
Select Edit and then Associate with audiences.
Follow the same steps above for targeting or exclusion associations.

Notes

You will need to remove any ad group-level audience targeting associations within a campaign before you can create a campaign-level targeting association for that campaign.
Similarly, you will need to remove any campaign-level audience targeting associations before you can create an ad group-level targeting association within that campaign.

Audience targeting and exclusion rules

A campaign can't have targeting associations at both the campaign and ad-group level. Exclusions are allowed at both levels regardless of whether any targeting associations are set.
The same audience can't be both targeted and excluded at the same level.
The same audience can be excluded at both campaign and ad group levels.
If an audience is targeted at the campaign level, it can't be excluded at the campaign level, but it can be excluded at the ad-group level.
If multiple audiences are associated with one ad group, then the most recent ad group targeting setting (Bid only or Target and bid) will be applied to all of these audiences. Learn how to edit the targeting setting for an association.