If your #1 Google Shopping goal is to improve your return on ad spend (ROAS) or cost/sale, think like an investor. That’s according to one marketing manager from a billion-dollar, U.S.-based department retailer. He handles the company’s Google Shopping initiative and other paid marketing programs.
“Intelligent allocation of spend is critical to success in Google Shopping,” he told me when I spoke to him about his Google Shopping strategy. “You have to put the right amount of weight into each product, and continually adjust that weight to maintain your return goal.”
Think Like an Investor: A Case Study
Full disclosure: The marketing manager has been partnering with Sidecar to develop and execute this approach through a combination of our team’s strategic planning and our technology, Sidecar for Google Shopping.
Among many other results, the marketing manager’s investment-based approach improved Google Shopping returns by 34% in the first 60 days. For all of 2016, ROAS improved by 27% and revenue grew by 44% year over year.
Evolving Google Shopping to Meet Evolving Business Goals
What’s also especially interesting about this story is how the marketing manager has evolved his Google Shopping approach with his business goals. Now that he’s conquered ROAS improvement and revenue growth, he’s working with us to take his Google Shopping strategy to the next level: maximize profitability through margin-based bidding.
You might have read about this emerging approach in Sidecar’s case study with wehkamp, a Netherlands-based apparel retailer that is partnering with us to manage its Google Shopping campaigns by margin.
We’ve recently taken a similar approach for the department retailer, where campaigns are based on margin and have a fine-tuned ROAS goal appropriate for every product in a given campaign. More details are in — you guessed it — our case study with the department retailer.
All told, our work together demonstrates the role that Google Shopping can play to support larger business objectives and positively impact both the top line and bottom line. Not only is this retailer ensuring that every dollar of spend is generating greater return, but it’s also ensuring that the return is profitable.
