Google quietly reprices Performance Max — SMB CPCs jump 14% overnight

Google rolled out an unannounced adjustment to Performance Max auction dynamics this week, and the impact landed hardest on accounts spending under $25k per month. Aggregate data from agency dashboards shows average CPCs climbing 14% in a single 24-hour window, with some verticals — home services and local retail in particular — seeing spikes above 20%.

The mechanics appear tied to how PMax redistributes budget across surfaces. With fewer signals to lean on, smaller accounts get pushed toward more expensive inventory while larger advertisers with deep conversion histories absorb the change with minimal friction.

For founders and small business owners, the immediate play is defensive: carve out 20% of your PMax budget and move it into exact-match search campaigns where you control the auction directly. Keep PMax running for discovery, but stop letting it own your bottom-of-funnel spend until pricing stabilizes.

Longer term, this is another reminder that black-box campaign types price small advertisers as a segment, not as individuals. The accounts that weather these repricings are the ones with owned channels — email lists, communities, direct traffic — that don't reprice overnight.