Top-position text ads began showing description line 1 appended to the headline

For ads shown above the organic results, Google started folding the first description line into the headline, separated by a hyphen, whenever that line reads as a complete sentence with closing punctuation. Google said the longer headline lifted click-through rate; ads whose two description lines run on as one sentence were not eligible.

Advertisers could increase eligibility by writing description line 1 as a standalone sentence ending in a period, question mark or exclamation point.