Optimization is the core of media buying. Your reaction to the past, current, and future situation is what you are there for. Your ability to adapt and react adequately is what separates good and bad media buyers. So, this time, let’s talk about what you actually can do and should do, and what you need to understand to make the right decisions in your Google Ads campaigns.
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Step 1: How long has your campaign been running?
Time is one of the most critical factors when evaluating the performance of a campaign. A campaign that has just started might behave unpredictably, while an older campaign may show consistent trends. Understanding how long your campaign has been running helps you put its performance into perspective and make data-driven decisions.
A campaign’s lifecycle can be divided into distinct time windows—24 hours, 72 hours, a week, a month—and each of these offers unique insights:
1. First 24-72 hours: This period is all about establishing baselines. Early fluctuations are normal as the system optimizes ad delivery and matches your content with potential audiences. Resist the temptation to make drastic changes during this time. Instead, focus on ensuring that your tracking, budgets, and targeting are set up correctly. Use this window to confirm that your ads are running smoothly and your audience targeting is functioning as expected. Any major adjustments too early can disrupt the system’s learning phase.
2. Weekly trends: Weekly data provides a broader view of your campaign’s consistency. Are there specific days when performance peaks or dips? These patterns can help you optimize scheduling and budget allocation. Weekly reviews also allow you to test adjustments in ad copy, targeting, or bidding strategies without the immediate pressure of daily fluctuations.
3. Monthly analysis: Monthly reviews give you a big-picture perspective. They help identify sustained trends, seasonal patterns, or long-term issues like audience fatigue, creative fatigue, or possible funnel problems like drop-offs. These insights are very useful for planning the next steps, like refreshing your creatives, fixing issues in the customer journey, or scaling successful ad groups.
• Recognizing patterns: Monthly analysis allows you to step back and see patterns that daily or weekly checks might miss. For example, are certain audiences consistently underperforming? Are there specific times of the month when performance dips? By spotting these trends, you can make more informed decisions.
• Refreshing creatives: Creative fatigue can severely impact performance. If the same ad has been running for a while, your audience might lose interest, leading to a drop in engagement and conversions. Monthly reviews are the perfect time to assess ad performance and decide when it’s time to introduce new designs, headlines, or videos to keep your audience engaged.
• Analyzing funnel performance: Your funnel is only as strong as its weakest point. By reviewing metrics like click-through rates, landing page conversions, and cart abandonment rates, you can pinpoint where prospects drop off. This insight allows you to fix bottlenecks, whether it’s a confusing landing page, a lengthy checkout process, or unconvincing call-to-action messaging.
• Testing and scaling: Monthly reviews are also an excellent time to evaluate your testing strategies. What’s working? What’s not? Identify the ad groups or campaigns with the best performance and consider scaling them. Conversely, pause or rework underperforming campaigns to avoid wasted spend.
• Strategic adjustments: Seasonality can have a huge impact on campaign success. Use monthly data to prepare for upcoming trends. For instance, if you notice a spike in demand during certain months, you can plan your budget and creative strategy accordingly. Similarly, if performance drops, you might need to adjust targeting or messaging.
4. Goal alignment: Monthly analysis helps ensure your campaigns stay aligned with your overall marketing goals. Are you on track to meet your KPIs? If not, what adjustments need to be made? This regular check-in keeps your strategy focused and adaptable.
5. Conclusion: Monthly reviews are an essential part of a successful advertising strategy. They give you the clarity and insights needed to make smart decisions, improve performance, and stay ahead of potential issues. By dedicating time to a thorough monthly analysis, you set your campaigns up for sustained success.
In short, the longer the time span you analyze, the more reliable your insights will be. However, don’t ignore real-time monitoring, as it helps identify potential trends or issues before they escalate.
Step 2: Measuring success—Beyond direct performance
Campaign success is not just about generating conversions or achieving a high ROI. A well-optimized campaign can provide indirect benefits that might not be immediately visible. Understanding these layers of success can help you maximize your campaign’s potential.
• ROI (Return on investment): While ROI remains the gold standard for measuring profitability, it only captures direct financial returns. For example, a campaign that generates $5,000 in revenue from a $1,000 ad spend has an ROI of 500%. However, focusing solely on ROI may lead you to overlook other important contributions. When scaling, it’s worth considering lowering your ROI targets, as this can positively impact your overall revenue. For example, achieving a 1.1 ROI goal on a $100,000 ad spend is often far more valuable than maintaining an ROI of 2 on just a $3,000 ad spend. Scaling with realistic ROI targets allows for greater growth potential and long-term success.
•Incrementality: Incrementality measures the additional conversions your campaign drives beyond what would have occurred organically. For example, a YouTube campaign might not lead to direct purchases but could increase brand awareness, resulting in more organic traffic and conversions over time. This broader view helps you assess the true value of your ads.
• Cross-channel impact: Campaigns don’t operate in silos. A strong performance in one channel, such as Display or Video, can positively impact others like Search. For instance, video ads often lead to a rise in branded search queries. Analyzing these interdependencies can help you allocate budgets more effectively.
Step 3: Responding to campaign performance
Campaign performance is rarely consistent; it evolves based on audience behavior, competition, and market trends. Knowing how to respond effectively to both strong and weak performance is a vital skill for maintaining and improving results.
When things are going well:
- Double down on what works:
- Identify high-performing elements such as keywords, audiences, or creatives in your campaign. Analyze why they’re working—is it the messaging, timing, or targeting? Use these insights to scale up these efforts by increasing budget allocation or expanding targeting within the same theme.
- Test similar ideas to see if you can replicate success. For example, if one ad headline is driving significant engagement, test variations of that headline to uncover additional winning combinations.
- Focus on efficiency:
- Review your campaign’s cost-per-click (CPC), cost-per-acquisition (CPA), and return on ad spend (ROAS) metrics. Are there opportunities to optimize? For instance, refine your bid strategy to allow the campaign to spend more and generate more success
- Evaluate your landing pages for potential improvements. A/B test page elements such as headlines, images, call-to-action buttons, and forms to boost conversion rates. Even a small increase in conversion rate can have a substantial impact on overall performance.
- Analyze audience overlap and segment your campaigns to ensure you’re not bidding against yourself, which can unnecessarily drive up costs.
- Refresh your creatives:
- Don’t wait for performance to decline. Proactively refresh your ads by updating visuals, testing new offers, or highlighting different product benefits. Regular creative updates prevent audience fatigue and help maintain engagement levels.
- Experiment with different ad formats, such as video, carousel, or interactive ads, to keep your campaigns dynamic and appealing.
- Monitor seasonal trends or upcoming events that you can leverage in your messaging to stay relevant.
When things are going poorly:
- Identify problem areas:
- Dig deep into your data to locate the source of underperformance. Use metrics like CTR, bounce rate, and conversion rate to pinpoint specific issues:
- A low CTR might indicate weak ad copy, irrelevant targeting, or unappealing visuals.
- High bounce rates on landing pages could suggest a disconnect between the ad and the page content or technical issues like slow load times.
- A low conversion rate despite high traffic may highlight issues with pricing, trust signals, or the checkout process.
- Dig deep into your data to locate the source of underperformance. Use metrics like CTR, bounce rate, and conversion rate to pinpoint specific issues:
- Test and experiment:
- Approach underperformance as an opportunity to improve. Create a hypothesis for the problem and test solutions systematically. For example:
- If your CTR is low, test new ad copy emphasizing urgency or exclusivity.
- If landing page performance is lacking, experiment with simplified layouts, alternative offers, or more compelling visuals.
- Use A/B testing to measure the impact of your changes. Start with small, manageable tests to isolate variables and avoid disrupting the entire campaign.
- Approach underperformance as an opportunity to improve. Create a hypothesis for the problem and test solutions systematically. For example:
- Analyze the funnel:
- Look beyond the immediate metrics and examine the entire customer journey. Questions to consider include:
- Are users dropping off at a specific step in the checkout process? Look for break points in the funnel to improve customer retention until the very end
- Is your retargeting strategy effective? If not, refine your messaging and offer assets to bring back users who didn’t convert.
- Ensure consistent messaging across the funnel. For instance, if your ad promises free shipping, make sure it’s prominently displayed on the landing page and throughout checkout.
- Look beyond the immediate metrics and examine the entire customer journey. Questions to consider include:
- Seek feedback and insights:
- Review competitor ads and strategies to identify gaps or opportunities you may have missed.
- Gather user feedback through surveys or focus groups to understand what might be turning potential customers away.
- Consult your team for a fresh perspective on the campaign. Sometimes, an outside viewpoint can uncover overlooked issues.
By actively responding to your campaign’s performance with detailed analysis and a willingness to adapt, you’re not just managing ads—you’re creating a flexible, growth-oriented strategy that ensures continued success.
Step 4: Understanding your customer avatar
You might think you know your audience, but the data often tells a different story. Successful campaigns are built on continuous learning about your audience and refining your strategies to meet their needs. Here’s how to dive deeper:
Dive into the data:
Leverage your analytics tools to uncover who’s actually responding to your ads. Are they the audience you initially targeted, or are they a completely different group?
• Identify demographics: Break down age, gender, location, and interests.
• Analyze behavior: Look at how these users engage with your content—are they browsing, converting, or dropping off?
If the data reveals unexpected insights, use it as an opportunity to adjust your messaging and targeting to better align with your true audience.
Adapt your messaging:
Once you know who’s converting, tailor your ads to speak directly to them. Address their specific pain points and aspirations by highlighting the benefits and features they care about most.
• Speak their language: Use tone and vocabulary that resonates with your audience.
• Showcase relevant benefits: Focus on what matters most to this group—be it affordability, quality, or convenience.
Explore new segments:
Sometimes, you’ll find that an unexpected audience segment is engaging with your ads—like older age groups responding to a dating offer. Instead of overlooking this opportunity, create dedicated campaigns for these emerging groups.
• Develop targeted ads: Craft messaging and creatives specific to these new segments.
• Test and learn: Experiment with these campaigns to see how they perform compared to your original audience.
By continually analyzing and adapting to your audience, you’ll keep your campaigns relevant, effective, and engaging.
Step 5: Additional angles for optimization
Optimization doesn’t stop at tweaking performance metrics. Effective campaigns require an approach that considers multiple variables. Let’s explore some powerful angles for optimization:
Seasonality:
Your audience’s needs evolve throughout the year. Anticipate these changes to maximize impact during key times.
• Prepare seasonal ads: Tailor your messaging for holidays or industry-specific peak periods. Highlight how your product or service meets seasonal demands.
• Adjust budgets: Increase spend during high-demand periods and scale back during slower times to optimize ROI.
Competitor analysis:
Keeping tabs on your competitors can give you a strategic edge.
• Spy on their ads: Use tools like VidTao or SEMrush to review your competitors’ campaigns. Identify gaps or opportunities they’re overlooking.
• Differentiate yourself: If competitors emphasize free shipping, highlight your unique offerings, such as faster delivery, exclusive features, or better quality.
Creative fatigue:
Even the most engaging ads lose their effectiveness over time. Prevent this by regularly refreshing your creatives.
• Rotate visuals: Swap out images, videos, or graphics every few weeks.
• Test new headlines: Experiment with attention-grabbing headlines and CTAs to maintain interest.
• Introduce new offers: Keep your audience intrigued by periodically introducing discounts, bundles, or limited-time deals.
Budget strategies:
Scaling effectively isn’t just about increasing your spend. Thoughtful budget management can drive massive growth.
• Lower ROI targets: If you aim for an ROI of 1.1 but scale to a significantly higher budget, the additional revenue can far outweigh the slight dip in efficiency.
• Reinvest in winning campaigns: Allocate more budget to top-performing campaigns while pausing underperforming ones.
By addressing these angles with a structured approach, you can refine your campaigns to drive better results and achieve sustained growth.
Final thoughts
Optimization is about constant improvement. You’re not just tweaking numbers; you’re learning what makes your audience tick and adjusting to meet their needs. Every test and every adjustment gets you closer to building campaigns that perform better and drive more results.
Want to brainstorm with our team on new ways to scale your business with YouTube Ads (and other performance video platforms)?
Join us for a free YouTube ad brainstorming session👇
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Dejan Bovan, Senior Media Buyer
Having started out at Inceptly as a tracking whizz and a certified GTM, GDS, and Segment expert, Dejan then transitioned into media buying. His background and analytical mindset now help him spot and take advantage of untapped opportunities for our clients.
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