The Google Shopping Network has always been a valuable channel for ecommerce and product-focused companies. Recently, Google delivered a number of new features and updates to the Shopping Network. Suddenly, this ad channel is not just a valuable “good idea,” but a necessary platform that product companies need to utilize.
That said, advertising on the Google Shopping Network is a competitive strategy. There are a lot of other brands and companies vying for the same ad space as you. While having a basic Google Shopping strategy is important and helpful, you may need some advanced, out-of-the-box ideas to elevate your campaigns past these pesky competitors.
Here are 5 advanced Google Shopping Strategies to explore:
Strategy #1: Narrow Product Groups
Google Shopping Campaign Optimization is key in PPC marketing. When you can create optimal bids, ad messages and targeting preferences, you see greater results. The problem that stands in the way of many PPC marketers is too-broad product groups.
Some marketers even include their entire product selection into a single ad group! If that sounds familiar, then it is time to start cutting your larger group(s) into narrow, sub-groups. This will unlock better ad performance and more accurate reporting.
While a large product group may be producing positive returns, it doesn’t mean that it is well optimized. That positive ROAS may be almost entirely on the shoulders of just a handful of products. With everything under one roof, it’s hard to identify what products are producing these positive results and what items may be bringing your performance down!
Look through your Google Ads account and identify your largest product groups. Then, see if there are common threads between small groups of products within that broader selection. The more closely related you can make your groupings, the easier it will be to identify opportunities to raise your ROI.
Some advertisers even use single-product ad groups to maximize results with their best products!
Strategy #2: Capitalize On High Intent
Intent is everything. Ideally, you want your ads to land in front of prospective customers that are in-market and about to make a purchase. These are the most qualified leads that produce fast conversions. Thus, they are more valuable than shoppers that are in the earlier stages of their buying process (researching, comparing, etc.)
How do you identify intent? It’s all in the keywords. For example, a search for “headphone types,” doesn’t suggest that the individual is ready to make a purchase. If that search was “find bluetooth headphones,” or better yet, “buy bluetooth headphones,” now you’ve got a qualified prospect.
Advertisers need to look at the specific search queries that the target audience is inputting and identify the ones that are oozing intent. Then, you can segment these high intent queries into their own group to bid more aggressively on the prospects that are ready to buy today.
Strategy #3: Remarketing Is A Must
Every ecommerce store agonizes over the customers that got away. Cart abandonment in particular is a nightmare-inducing metric that shows you the customers that were so close to purchasing, but then clicked away. Wouldn’t you love to know what happened? Better yet, wouldn’t you love to get them back in your online store to complete their purchase?
Remarketing is the answer. It is an effective strategy in marketing and advertising. By entering remarketing code snippets into your webpages, visitors will download a small tag in the background during their time on these pages. This tag will allow you to re-target them with other ads that recognize that they are a repeat customer.
You can segment activities by cart abandonment, return visitors or even loyal customers. Then, target each segment with messages that encourages them to return and complete their purchase or buy again.
Strategy #4: Bidding By Location
Aside from segmenting by product category, intent and remarketing lists, you can also look at the locations of your customers. Some products may sell better in some areas than others. Or, your brand may just have more followers in certain parts.
Geo-targeting is a popular and effective strategy that allows advertisers and marketers to modify bids based on specific locations. This is ideal if your company operates through an online store and a physical, brick-and-mortar shop. You can use location targeting to ensure that you’re the #1 brand on the Shopping Network in your area, which may even drive in-person visits to your physical store!
What’s nice is you can get as detailed as you want, even down to individual towns and zip codes! If it makes sense to segment your campaigns by very specific locations, then this can be an impactful tactic.
Strategy #5: Review Your Data Feed And Monitor For Errors
This isn’t really an advanced strategy, but it seems to be one that a lot of marketers skip over. Since your Shopping Ads rely on your data feed information, it is crucial that every detail in your data feed is 100% accurate.
Inaccuracies in your data feed can lead to a number of problems. Imagine you own an online shoe store. When a customer searches for “blue running shoes,” your ad displays, but shows a picture for orange shoes instead. These silly and embarrassing blunders can all be fixed by routinely updating and reviewing your data feed.
Worse than having crossed wires in your product images or description data is having incorrect quantities entered for your inventory. You could be spending money on Shopping Ads that connect to out-of-stock items without realizing it!
You need to always be checking that your actual inventory matches what you’re telling Google you have in stock. If there are discrepancies, it can cost you money and damage your advertising reputation! The key is to keep this data feed as organized as possible.
Conclusions
With these 5 advanced Google Shopping strategies, you’re ready to elevate your existing campaigns. That said, the Google Shopping Network is undergoing a lot of changes and new features are being added.
If you are looking to automate your ppc campagin then explore the best ppc automation tool.
If you need one more advanced Google Shopping strategy, it is to pay attention to what’s changing and being added to the platform! New bidding options, features and access to YouTube and Gmail are changing the way that product companies advertise on the Shopping Network.
