Google launched Search Funnels columns a little over two years ago (three years after first introducing Search Funnels reports), enabling advertisers to incorporate Search Funnels data into their everyday optimizations by adding the columns to their campaign, ad group, keyword and ad tabs.

Google announced on Friday that starting early next month, it is removing four Search Funnels columns from its reporting. The ones on the chopping block are: +Assist Clicks, +Assist Impressions, +Assist Clicks/Last Clicks, and +Assist Impressions/Last Clicks.

The reason Google is canning these columns is that people have apparently found them too confusing in combination with other available columns.

Google explains in a Google+ post:

In AdWords, Search Funnels show you how users search for your products before converting. When you enable Search Funnels columns in the Campaigns tab, you can see how often a particular keyword, like “nyc hotels,” assists conversions that eventually happen through other, more specific keywords, like “3 star hotels manhattan.”

AdWords currently offers two kinds of Search Funnels columns which are closely related: “Assist Clicks” and “Click-Assisted Conversions”. Many advertisers have shared feedback that the difference between these 2 kinds of columns is not very clear.

If you use any of the ones that they’re getting rid of, Google says you should switch to Click-Assisted Conversions columns, which it says are more relevant from an optimization standpoint.

“It’s more useful to know how many conversions were assisted by a particular keyword, rather than to know how often a particular keyword appeared on any conversion path,” Google says.

The changes will take effect in the Campaigns tab, the AdWords API, and in Search Funnels itself, where the Assist Clicks and Impressions report will both be removed. The Campaigns tab will have six Search Funnels columns instead of ten.

The remaining columns will include: click assisted conversions, impression assisted conversions, click assisted con version value, impression assisted conversion value, click assisted conversions/last click conversions, and impression assisted conversions/last click conversions.

The exact date when Google will cut the columns is unclear, but we’re probably talking a month max, so go ahead and say goodbye.

Image via Google+