In order to help close the online-to-offline attribution gap, Google introduced store visits tracking and measurements into AdWords back in December of 2014. Since then, Google says that it measured over 1 billion store visits globally in its effort to show the impact of online advertising on in-store traffic.
Google even announced that AdWords store visits measurement is now available to 1,000 advertisers in 11 countries, including automotive dealers at their annual Performance Summit on Tuesday.
One case study that was cited during the event said that Nissan UK found that 6 percent of mobile ad clicks (including both brand and non-brand) led to a dealership visit. There was another were Seven & i Holdings found 10 percent of mobile searches lead to a store visit in Japan.
Google shared information in April of 2015 that showed US retailers saw 10 times more conversions from mobile search ads, on average, when they accounted for store visits. It was found that the US travel and auto verticals saw 2 times higher conversions when store visit data was included.
For more how AdWords store visits measurement works, see:
Google “Store Visits” Part Of Larger Movement Toward Metrics That Matter
Google’s Surojit Chatterjee: Here’s Why You Should Trust AdWords Estimated Store Visits