Microsoft Advertising Introduces Impression-Based Remarketing, Audience Upgrades & More

Microsoft is doubling down on audience tools, campaign flexibility, and privacy-forward measurement in its August 2025 product updates. For performance marketers who thrive on signal-rich targeting and granular control, there’s plenty of promise there, albeit on a far lower scale than on Google.

Here’s what stood out to me this month and where I see a real opportunity to test and find pockets of performance and scale.

Impression-Based Remarketing: Big Potential for Upper-Funnel Strategy

One of the biggest updates: advertisers can now build remarketing lists based on ad impressions, not just clicks or site visits. Even better, these lists can span up to 20 campaigns or ad groups, making them easier to scale across the account.

This is huge for reaching people who’ve seen your ad but haven’t clicked yet, those “brand-aware but unengaged” users who might just need a little nudge. With this update, we can now re-engage based on exposure, which gives us more flexibility in how we sequence messaging and nurture users through the funnel.

It also reflects where the industry is headed: engagement no longer starts with a click. Ad platforms are recognizing that views and exposure drive influence, even if the user doesn’t take immediate action. This change aligns with shifts we’ve already seen, like YouTube’s view-through conversions and Meta’s brand lift studies.

Clicks Are Becoming Less Relevant, And That’s a Good Thing

We’ve long used clicks as a proxy for interest, but advanced marketers are dismissing that approach as outdated. Impression-based remarketing is another sign that platforms (and users) don’t operate in a strictly click-driven world, no matter how tempting it might be to rely on the linear (and inaccurate) conclusions of click-based attribution.

This shift is especially useful in industries with longer sales cycles or where users need more time and touchpoints before converting. Just because someone didn’t click doesn’t mean they’re not paying attention. The value is moving from direct actions to incremental visibility and influence.

It’s also a move that supports privacy-first marketing, since it focuses on broader, less personally identifiable engagement signals.

Planning & Reporting: A More Granular View of App Performance

Another standout update is the ability to view mobile app-level reporting, finally. Instead of seeing app traffic as one giant blob of aggregated data, we can now analyze performance for each individual app placement.

This is a game-changer for refining app exclusions. In the past, I often recommended excluding all app traffic due to low-quality placements. Now we don’t have to do that blindly. With transparency into each app, we can keep the high-quality placements and block the ones that don’t convert, which should lead to better spend efficiency.

The Audience Planner is also getting an upgrade, offering more visibility into forecasting and reach across segments. Pair this with the new diagnostics for Shopping campaigns, and it’s clear that Microsoft is investing in smarter planning across the board.

Performance Max Gets a Boost

Microsoft is continuing to evolve its Performance Max (PMax) product with several welcome additions:

• Asset group and audience-level reporting
• Share-of-voice metrics
• Support for disclaimers
• Budget suggestions
• New customer acquisition goal (in beta)
  
  

That last one is worth paying attention to, especially for B2B.

The customer acquisition goal is designed to find new users, not just re-engage familiar ones. That’s a huge value-add for brands that rely on net-new demand generation. That said, it’s not a “set it and forget it” situation. You’ll want to:

• Define clear audience criteria (e.g., job titles, company size, geo).
• Layer in exclusions to keep out low-quality traffic.
• Track lead quality after submission (consider lead scoring tools).
  
  

This could be a powerful tool, but only if paired with strong inputs and guardrails.

Modeling Is the Future of Measurement

Also notable: Microsoft is rolling out modeled conversions in select regions. These use machine learning to estimate conversions that would otherwise be lost due to privacy restrictions or missing tracking data.

It’s not surprising – this mirrors similar moves from Google and Meta – but it’s essential for advertisers who rely on full-funnel attribution. In a world where cookies are disappearing, modeled attribution is how we close the gap.

Testing Opportunity: LinkedIn Demographics in Bing

I’ve been seeing some accounts surface LinkedIn demographic data in Bing Ads, a feature that’s flown under the radar but has great potential for B2B.

If you haven’t tested it yet, now’s the time. LinkedIn’s data on job function, company size, industry, and seniority is unmatched and, used well, helps ensure you’re not wasting spend on unqualified leads.

Microsoft Ads is making smart, strategic moves that performance marketers should be paying attention to. If you’ve deprioritized Bing in your media mix, it might be time to take another look. And if you’re already running campaigns, start testing impression-based remarketing and app-level exclusions ASAP.

Want help implementing any of these? We’re already rolling out tests and would be happy to share what we’re learning.