If you run Google Ads, there's a good chance Google is building, editing or borrowing video ads for your brand right now, and nobody had to approve them.
Here's how it usually surfaces. Someone at your company is watching YouTube and sees an ad for your business that looks off: a choppy slideshow of website photos, awkward cropping, maybe a robotic voice-over. They ask the agency where it came from. The agency checks the creative folder and the account, and the ad isn't something anyone produced.
In most of these cases, Google's AI made it. Over the past year Google has rolled out a string of features that generate or pull in video creative automatically. Most are switched on by default, so unless someone goes in and turns them off, they run. Google's latest email to advertisers, about how Demand Gen ads are built, pushes further in the same direction.
What Google's Demand Gen Email Changes
New Demand Gen ads will be built as a single "mixed media" ad, and Google, not you, will decide which version of a video shows where. There's no opt-out: the email says no action is needed because the old controls are simply going away.
- One mixed-media ad replaces separate image, video and carousel ad types. This applies to new ads only. Existing ads keep running, and single-media ads can still be created until January 2027.
- Video-level creative preferences are removed for new ads. You can no longer choose which video shows on which YouTube surface within an ad. Google places each video by its shape.
- Horizontal and square videos can run on YouTube Shorts. Without a vertical version, Google may show them on Shorts with blurred bars above and below.
- Google recommends turning on "resized videos." That lets Google's AI create the missing shapes for you, which is creative your team hasn't reviewed.
It reads like housekeeping, but the net effect is that Google has more say over how your video looks on YouTube, especially Shorts. Two things keep control with you: supplying your own vertical, square and horizontal cuts, and putting surface-specific videos in their own ad group with channel controls turned on.
The Features Making Video for You
Beyond the email, four Google Ads features can put video in front of your customers that your team never made or reviewed. All four are on unless someone turns them off.
- Auto-generated videos (Performance Max, Demand Gen, App campaigns): Google builds a video ad from your images, logo and headlines. In Demand Gen it can also animate a still image into a 10-second clip. In Performance Max it kicks in whenever an asset group has no video of your own.
- Demand Gen video optimizations: Google trims your videos into shorter cuts, creates other shapes with AI, and since October 2026 can lay text overlays on top of your video. Shorter and resized videos are ticked by default on new ads, and text overlays appear to be on by default too.
- Sourced videos (Performance Max): Google finds videos on your social accounts, landing pages and linked YouTube channel, and adds up to 10 per asset group. It's on by default for new campaigns since late October 2026, and may have been switched on for some existing ones.
- Video enhancements (Performance Max): Google re-cuts your uploaded videos into other shapes and lengths with generative AI, and adds an AI voice-over to silent videos. Voice-overs began March 20, 2026, and AI resizing was announced in August 2026.
The detail that trips up most brands: these videos usually don't live on your YouTube channel. Google hosts them on a Google-owned channel that carries your business name and logo. That's why an ad can be live on YouTube while your team can't find it anywhere they'd normally look.
Sources: PPC Land on sourced videos · PPC News Feed on auto-generated videos · Search Engine Watch on AI resizing · Search Engine Land on Demand Gen text overlays · Google Ads Help on Demand Gen creative enhancements
Why It Matters for Your Brand
Google's pitch is reasonable: more video means more placements, with no production budget. The problem is that you give up the final say on what represents your brand.
- Quality you'd never sign off on: Template slideshows built from website photos, awkward crops and synthetic voices can make a polished brand look cheap.
- Old or wrong information: A sourced clip can be a year-old social post with an expired promotion, a former location or a price that's changed.
- Rights you may not have: Organic social videos often use licensed music or creators who agreed to organic use only. Google hasn't said how that's handled once a clip becomes a paid ad.
- AI labels and muddy reporting: In some places, including the EU, India and New York State, ads with these AI-optimized assets are labeled as created or edited with AI. And when Google's videos sit in the same report as yours, it's harder to tell which creative is actually working.
None of this means automation is bad. It means it should be a decision your team makes on purpose, not a default you discover from an awkward YouTube moment.
How to Find the Ad and Switch These Off
Every one of these controls lives at the campaign or ad level, not the account level, so each campaign needs its own check. Here's the order we work in.
- Find the exact ad. Go to Google's Ads Transparency Center, search your business name or website, and filter to YouTube and Video. It shows every video running under your verified advertiser name, including ones Google built.
- Look for videos you didn't upload. In Google Ads, open the Assets view for each Performance Max and Demand Gen campaign. Any video your team doesn't recognize came from one of the features above.
- Review every Demand Gen ad. Edit each ad and open Asset optimization. Turn off Generated videos, and decide deliberately on Shorter videos, Resized videos and Overlay on videos. A Disable all option switches them off together.
- Give Demand Gen a vertical cut. Upload vertical, square and horizontal versions so your video doesn't land on Shorts with blurred bars. Videos meant for one surface only go in their own ad group with channel controls on.
- Turn off sourced videos. In each Performance Max campaign's settings, open Asset optimization in the asset group section and uncheck Sourced videos. Use Manage sources to remove any social account, page or channel you don't want Google pulling from.
- Turn off Performance Max video enhancements, and fill the video slot. Switch off video enhancements in each campaign's settings. Auto-generated videos have no switch in Performance Max; they stop once you upload your own videos in every shape.
- Remove what's already running. Turning a setting off stops new videos, but existing ones can keep serving. Remove them from the asset group, and pause or remove any Demand Gen ad Google created. Pausing alone isn't enough, because Google rebuilds it while the setting is on.
One more lever: if you delete a video from where it was originally posted, such as your YouTube channel, Google removes it from your ads too. That's worth knowing for old clips you'd rather retire everywhere.
How We're Handling It at Zeller Media
We're treating every one of these settings as a creative decision that belongs to our clients, not to Google.
- Audit: We're reviewing every Performance Max and Demand Gen campaign we manage for these settings and for videos nobody on our side approved.
- Launch checklist: New campaigns now get these controls checked before they go live, since Google switches them on by default.
- Real video in every format: Where video makes sense, we supply horizontal, vertical and square cuts so Google has no gap to fill on its own.
- Ongoing checks: This list keeps growing. Google has already said landing page image extraction will be on by default for new Performance Max campaigns from December 4, so we're reviewing these controls monthly, not once.
The bottom line: Google's AI can be a useful tool, but it shouldn't be the one deciding what your brand looks like on YouTube. If you've spotted an ad you don't recognize, or just want to know where your campaigns stand, reach out and we'll walk through it with you.
Why Businesses Choose Zeller Media
If you’ve read this far, you can probably tell we have a strong opinion about what a paid search consultant and paid search agency should be.
That opinion comes from experience.
Bradley has spent more than 15 years managing paid search and paid social campaigns, including $100M+ in annual advertising budgets across ecommerce, healthcare, Medicare, finance, legal, hospitality, B2B, SaaS, and consumer brands. Before founding Zeller Media, he built and managed large-scale programs for major agencies and national advertisers, and he now applies that same performance discipline to mid-market businesses that need senior-level attention without enterprise bureaucracy.
Since launch, Zeller Media has worked with 35+ brands across DTC, B2B, and ecommerce, and our philosophy is simple: no layers, no junior handoffs, no bloated agency process. Clients work directly with the senior strategist managing the account.
That approach is reflected in our public reputation. Zeller Media currently holds 12 verified five-star reviews on Clutch, with clients consistently highlighting responsiveness, hands-on management, lead quality, and measurable business growth.
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