Google Expands AI Audience Personas to All Display & Video 360 Users
Google opens AI Audience Personas to all DV360 users Sept 18, 2025. Describe your ideal customer, and DV360 suggests editable audience lists for faster, more consistent targeting.
Google opens AI Audience Personas to all Display & Video 360 users
Google has expanded its AI-powered Audience Persona feature to every Display & Video 360 customer, effective September 18, 2025. You can now describe your ideal customer in plain language and let DV360 turn that into audience lists and demographic targeting-no manual taxonomy hunting.
For marketers, this means faster campaign setup, more consistent targeting across teams, and the chance to uncover segments you might miss with manual selection.
What changed
Audience creation in DV360 no longer requires deep knowledge of its audience categories. Type a persona-age range, location, interests, lifestyle, values-and Google's AI maps it to relevant audience lists and demographic filters you can review, edit, and apply.
Why marketers should care
- Speed: Build segments in minutes using natural language instead of endless menu clicks.
- Coverage: AI can surface combinations you might overlook manually.
- Consistency: Standardize personas across teams with varying DV360 experience.
- Privacy-forward: Supports precise targeting as the industry moves beyond third-party cookies.
- Control: You approve, edit, and layer recommendations before they go live.
How it works inside DV360
The feature lives in the Line Item targeting workflow. Look for the banner "Help me select audience lists and demographics."
Input supports demographic and psychographic details: gender, age, geo, occupation, household income, activities, interests, values, and lifestyle characteristics. Google's AI parses the description and proposes audience lists and demographic targets sourced from first-party data, third-party partners, and behavioral signals across Google surfaces (search, sites, YouTube).
Suggestions appear as an editable list. You can tweak, add, remove, and then apply them like any standard DV360 audience configuration.
Step-by-step setup
- Open your DV360 campaign and go to Line Items.
- Select an existing line item or create a new one.
- Under Line Item details, open Targeting.
- Click "Help me select audience lists and demographics."
- Describe your audience (e.g., age, life stage, interests, values, income, location).
- Review AI suggestions; edit via the pencil icon if needed.
- Apply selected audiences, then save your line item.
- Optionally layer with geo, device, inventory, and frequency controls as usual.
Example persona
"Females, 25-49. Mothers with children. Top 10% household income. Health-conscious, focused on personal and family well-being. Value safety and reliability. Proactive about maintaining a healthy lifestyle."
DV360 will translate this into relevant demographic filters and audience lists you can approve and refine.
Policy safeguards
The tool blocks prohibited and sensitive categories. If your description touches restricted topics, you'll see limited or no suggestions. That keeps recommendations within Google Ads policy and regulatory guidelines.
Strategy tips to get better results
- Be specific, not verbose: use concrete traits (age ranges, life stage, key interests, purchase drivers).
- Start broad, then narrow: test a wider persona first, refine with performance data.
- Run persona variants: change one dimension (e.g., income or life stage) to see lift by segment.
- Layer with intent: add contextual inventory, keywords, or YouTube placements where appropriate.
- Use exclusions: remove overlap with existing first-party lists or current customers if needed.
- Document winning personas: standardize naming and share across teams for faster replication.
Where it fits in your stack
The feature works with DV360's existing audience tools. You can combine AI-generated personas with geographic and device targeting, frequency caps, and inventory strategies. Editing is iterative, so adjust based on in-flight performance.
Timeline
- September 18, 2025: Audience Persona available to all DV360 customers
- January 26, 2025: DV360 introduces new tools for privacy-focused advertising
- April 30, 2024: Google unveils DV360 updates at NewFront 2024, including initial persona capabilities
- April 30, 2024: DV360 announces Audience Profile Analysis deprecation
- March 6, 2024: DV360 deprecates Audience Profile Analysis
- January 31, 2023: DV360 updates Combined Audiences to allow AND combinations
Get started
Bottom line: describe your audience, pressure-test the AI's suggestions, ship faster, and iterate with data. That's the advantage.
