I’ve been in Digital Marketing for 13 years, and I’ve never learned as much as quickly as I have over the last few months. But Travis, why?? What’s been going on? Well, during this time, thanks to Cro Metrics’ diverse clients, our partnership with Google, and my position as the Director of Performance Marketing, I’ve had the unique opportunity to engage with numerous marketing directors about their biggest Google Ads challenges. Across industries and objectives, one common campaign type consistently leaves advertisers throwing up their hands and feeling defeated: Performance Max (or PMAX for those of us who love to abbrev [abbrev is short for abbreviate]). More than 50% of companies Google introduced us to for support cited PMAX as the most challenging portion of their media spend. Performance Max is a goal-based campaign type that allows advertisers to access all of their Google Ads inventory from a single AI-based campaign – placements include Search, Display, YouTube, Discover, Gmail, and Maps. Even though it’s one of Google’s more recent campaign types, it has a definite impact on account performance. According to Google, advertisers who use PMAX experience an average of 18% more conversions at a similar cost per action vs. other Google campaign types.
From a marketers perspective, there is something about the nature of PMAX that users often find unsettling, beyond struggles to scale performance. For an industry that has long championed its abilities to make data-backed decisions and leverage granular control over investments as difference-makers versus old-school media, the lack of control inherent to PMAX’s raison d’etre makes it feel as if it is more foe than friend.
As a result, PMAX is often called a ‘black box’ and advertisers do not spend much time setting up or optimizing their campaigns outside of occasional bid strategy tweaks. As an industry expert, I’ve identified three consistent mistakes marketers make with PMAX.
Mistake #1:
Under Utilizing Audience Signals
Due to the aforementioned ‘black blox’ reputation, many advertisers ignore the audience signals in their account. This is a mistake, however. By layering in custom audience signals by asset group, you can help Google directly retarget to your most relevant customers and enhance PMAX’s lookalike prospecting capabilities.
Let’s Fix It:
Include / Exclude Applicable Audiences: Breaking out audience segments that interacted with relevant parts of your site can be a big help in improving Google’s ability to recognize a quality user, reducing learning windows and improving spend efficiency. Whether you are uploading first party data, segmenting PDP users, or excluding converters from a new customer acquisition campaign, there are many levers at your disposal.
Build out Search Themes: These are relatively new, and if you set up your PMAX campaign a while ago, you may have missed them. These do not function in the same way as Search keywords, but still provide important direction for the engine.
Mistake #2:
Segmenting by Campaigns Rather Than Asset Groups
While we fully support breaking out creative and targeting by product groups or funnel stage, it is important to ensure that your campaigns are hitting necessary volume thresholds for PMAX to function at its full potential. The ability to tinker with ads and targeting at the asset group level means that you can still cultivate custom messaging and user journeys at the product or product group level without sacrificing your overall campaign volume.
A few example instances in which you should consider segmenting campaigns include New v. Returning User campaigns, High v. Low AOV campaigns, and Top Product v. Catchall Breakouts.
Let’s Fix It:
The baseline for recommended PMAX volume is approximately 60 conversions per 30 day period. Make sure your campaigns hit at least this level of volume… but as with any algorithmically based tool, the more data available, the better.
Mistake #3:
Ignoring the (Dreaded) Feed
We get it… feeds aren’t sexy. In fact, they’re kind of a pain. Especially when products are constantly in and out of stock and no one can quite agree on if the new turtleneck is mauve, periwinkle, or lavender. But the simple fact is that the delineations and naming conventions within your feed determine when your ad shows, where they show, and what many of the users see.
Did a user search for an extra large periwinkle turtleneck, and your ad sent them to a medium? Well, that’s an extra click, added friction in the customer journey which may prove a death sentence! Ok. So maybe that’s dramatic. But if you had seen as many crucial products ‘ineligible to run’ due to feed negligence as I’ve seen, you’d know that the feed’s importance to your performance is no laughing matter.
Let’s Fix It:
Take a look at the product tab in your Google Ads account for a quick look at reported issues.
Give yourself a secret shop to see how hard it is to find exactly what you’re looking for
Study how your competitors’ products appear, and if there’s anything you can improve.
Roll up your sleeves, review and optimize your feed, prioritizing your most “important” products.
Once your PMAX campaigns are optimized and set up for success, you can take them to the next level with integrated conversion rate optimization-PMAX testing. To qualify for a free audit of your PMAX Performance, fill out this form and someone from our team will reach out shortly!
