Google Ads Just Auto-Enrolled You in Automated Promotions. Here's Why You Should Opt Out (October 2026).

If you run Google Ads with location assets, check your account right now. There's a good chance Google is scraping promotions from your website and injecting them into your ads without asking permission.

Starting October 12, 2026, Google rolled out "Automated Promotions" for Search and Performance Max campaigns. The system crawls your website, identifies coupons, discounts, and deals, then automatically creates promotion extensions on your ads.

And it's opt-out, not opt-in. You're enrolled by default.

At Sotros, we discovered this across 8 client accounts before anyone noticed. One B2B SaaS client had a "free trial" offer auto-extracted and displayed as a "promotion" — making it look like a discount rather than a product feature. Another had an expired conference discount from their events page show up in their ads.

Here's what's happening, why it matters, and how to turn it off.

What Automated Promotions Actually Does

Google's system:

1. Crawls your website looking for promotion-like content (coupons, discount codes, "X% off" language, seasonal offers)
2. Extracts the promotion details (discount amount, code, expiration)
3. Creates promotion extensions on your Search and PMax ads
4. Displays them alongside your ads in search results

This happens automatically for any campaign with linked location assets. Google positions this as helping businesses "highlight high-quality promotions" — but the reality is more nuanced.

Why This Is Problematic for B2B

For ecommerce brands running perpetual promotions, automated promotions might be fine — even helpful. But for B2B companies, this feature creates several problems:

Problem 1: Wrong Context

B2B websites often have pricing pages, partner discounts, or event-specific offers that aren't meant for cold prospects. When Google scrapes these and displays them as ad promotions, it misrepresents your offering.

Example we've seen: A SaaS company had a "Partner Program: 20% revenue share" page. Google extracted "20% off" and displayed it as a promotion on their search ads. Prospects clicking expected a 20% discount and were confused when they hit the partner page instead.

Problem 2: Expired Offers

Google's crawler doesn't always catch expiration dates correctly. We've seen expired conference discounts, old webinar offers, and seasonal promotions resurface months later.

Problem 3: Brand Control

You've carefully crafted your ad copy to position your product at a premium. Now Google is slapping "SPECIAL OFFER" badges on your ads without your approval. For premium B2B brands, this undermines positioning.

Problem 4: Metric Distortion

Automated promotions can increase CTR but tank conversion quality. People clicking because of a perceived discount have different intent than people clicking because of your value proposition. Your CPC benchmarks and conversion data get muddied.

How to Opt Out

Here's the exact path:

1. Sign in to Google Ads
2. Click Settings (gear icon) in the left navigation
3. Select Account settings
4. Click Automatically created assets (or search for it)
5. Find "Automated promotions" in the list
6. Set it to "Off"
7. Click Save

Important: This is an account-level setting. You need to disable it once, and it applies to all campaigns.

If you manage multiple accounts through an MCC, you'll need to disable it in each individual account — there's no MCC-level toggle as of this writing.

Other Auto-Created Assets You Should Audit

While you're in the Automatically Created Assets settings, review everything else Google has turned on by default:

Feature	Default	Our Recommendation for B2B
Automated promotions	On	Turn Off
Dynamic sitelinks	On	Keep On (but monitor)
Dynamic structured snippets	On	Keep On (usually helpful)
Dynamic callouts	On	Keep On (usually helpful)
Automatically created assets (AI Max)	On	Audit weekly — some are good, some aren't
Dynamic images	On	Turn Off for B2B (pulls random site images)
Dynamic location extensions	On	Keep On if you have physical offices

Our Google Ads Quality Score guide covers how ad extensions and assets impact your overall ad rank.

Google's Broader Automation Push

Automated Promotions is part of a pattern. Google has been systematically shifting control from advertisers to algorithms throughout 2026:

• AI Max for Search replaced manually created assets with AI-generated headlines/descriptions. Our AI Max migration guide covers the tradeoffs.
• Broad Match expansion pushes keywords into semantically related queries. Our broad match guide explains when this works.
• Budget allocation modes (Holistic and Growth) automate budget distribution. Our budget allocation strategy guide covers the new modes.
• Performance Max automates targeting, creative, and placement across all Google surfaces. Our PMax guide covers B2B-specific considerations.

The pattern is clear: Google wants advertisers to provide goals and budgets. Google handles everything else. This works for large ecommerce advertisers with massive conversion data. For B2B companies with low volume and long sales cycles, blind automation is dangerous.

The Audit Checklist

Run through this right now:

1. Check Automatically Created Assets settings — Disable Automated Promotions and Dynamic Images
2. Review AI-generated ad previews — Google now lets you preview AI Max headlines/descriptions before they go live. Use it.
3. Pull your Assets report — Go to Ads & Assets > Assets and filter by "Automatically created." See what Google has added to your campaigns.
4. Check search terms report — Broad match expansion may have widened your targeting. Review weekly, not monthly.
5. Audit location assets — If you've linked Google Business Profile, verify the information is current.

Our Smart Bidding guide covers how to maintain control while leveraging Google's automation where it actually helps.

Business Name Policy Update (Oct 16)

While we're on October updates — Google is also changing its business name requirements effective October 16. The new policy allows your ad's business name to differ from your destination domain, provided:

• The business name accurately reflects a recognized brand
• There's a verified relationship between advertiser and domain owner
• Products/services are directly offered on the destination domain
• You are NOT a third-party reseller or affiliate

This is good news for companies whose brand name differs from their domain (e.g., acquired companies, DBAs, or brands with long legal names but short marketing names).

The Bigger Picture: Control vs. Convenience

Google's automation isn't inherently bad. Smart Bidding genuinely outperforms manual bidding in most accounts. Responsive Search Ads do find high-performing combinations. Automation works when it's backed by strong conversion data.

The problem is opt-out defaults. When Google silently enables features that change what your ads say and who sees them, advertisers lose control. And in B2B — where deal values are high, sales cycles are long, and brand positioning matters — losing control is expensive.

Our Demand Gen campaigns guide covers another area where careful control beats default automation.

The rule at Sotros: Embrace automation for how much you bid and when you bid. Maintain control over what your ads say and where they appear. Automated Promotions violates that second principle.

Need a Google Ads automation audit? At Sotros, we manage 40+ B2B accounts and know exactly which automations help and which hurt. Get your audit.