Microsoft Advertising is the platform most UK accounts ignore and most of my search clients should run. The audience is older, more desktop and more B2B, the clicks usually cost less than Google's for the same terms, and campaigns import from Google in minutes. The reason it's been easy to ignore is that it lagged Google on controls and measurement. The October 2026 product update, published on 28 October, closes a lot of that gap.
Conversions API, generally available
The headline for me. Microsoft's Conversions API sends conversions from your website, app, CRM or point of sale to Microsoft server to server, alongside the UET tag in the browser. Set-up is direct, through Google Tag Manager, or through partners including Stape. It's the same idea as Meta's Conversions API: browser tracking misses a growing share of real conversions, and a server-side feed fills the gap.
Microsoft's October post doesn't go into deduplication, but its integration guide on Microsoft Learn does, and the rule is the same as Meta's: pass the same event ID through UET and the Conversions API so a conversion isn't counted twice. If you set this up, that's the detail to get right first.
Performance Max gets the controls it was missing
Performance Max on Microsoft has been even more of a black box than Google's. October adds:
- Age and gender targeting, generally available, to include or exclude groups.
- Device targeting, rolling out to all advertisers over the following weeks.
- Search term reporting and auction insights, now available, so you can see which searches triggered the ads and how you compare in the auctions.
- Search term landing page reporting, rolling out from mid-November, showing where each search was sent.
- Audience exclusions, in open pilot.
- Brand exclusions for text ads only, being refined, so product ads can still show on brand searches while text ads are kept off them.
Search term reporting is the one that changes whether I'd run it. Without it, there's no way to cut wasted searches, which is where most of a search budget's savings sit. With it, Performance Max on Microsoft becomes something I can manage with the same fortnightly discipline as a search campaign.
Messaging guidelines for AI-written ads
An open pilot that lets you give up to 40 guidelines steering the AI-generated copy in Performance Max and in search campaigns with AI Max enabled: wording to avoid, preferred phrases, themes and tone. Google added the equivalent to AI Max this year. For regulated clients, or any client with a claim they can't make, this is what makes automated copy usable.
AI-powered campaign creation
Builds a first Performance Max campaign from your website and brand materials, with an editable business snapshot to review before launch. Useful for a quick first draft. I'd still check every asset and every setting before it spends.
Why this matters for UK lead generation
Microsoft reaches Bing, Yahoo, DuckDuckGo and the search box built into Windows and Edge, which skews towards the kind of person who searches for a solicitor, an accountant, a fit-out firm or a care provider from a work laptop. For B2B and professional services in the UK, that's a cheaper second search channel than most people assume, and it now has conversion measurement and controls worth trusting.
What I'd do in order: import the best-performing Google search campaign, set up UET and the Conversions API with shared event IDs, run it for a month, then compare cost per lead with Google on the same terms. If it holds, Performance Max with the new reporting is the next test.
If your Google search campaigns are producing leads and you've never run Microsoft, this is the quarter to try it. I'm Microsoft Advertising certified and happy to look at whether it fits your account.
Checked against Microsoft's announcement on 4 November 2026.
I run paid ads on Meta, Google and TikTok across the UK, the Gulf and Pakistan, and build the tracking and pages around them. Get in touch or find me on LinkedIn.