The Google Ads Playbook: 13 Campaign Types And What to Expect From Them

The Google Ads Playbook: 13 Campaign Types And What to Expect From Them

12/31/2020

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• Set flexible budgets as low as $5.
• Pay per click (in most cases), so you’re only charged when someone visits your site.
• Turn spending on or off at will.
• Get fast, measurable feedback on campaign performance.
• Target a specific audience based on specific behaviors, how they’ve interacted with your site or brand before (from visiting a certain page to abandoning their cart), demographics, interests, and other traits.
• Achieve tremendous scale with your campaigns.

• Impressions: The number of times an ad is viewed.
• Cost: The amount of money a campaign spends on paid advertising.
• Clicks: The number of times your ad was clicked on by a user.
• Conversion: The specific goal you are tracking (a sale, a view of a high-value page, an email sign up, etc.).
• CPM (cost per thousand impressions): The ad buyer’s cost to have their ad seen 1,000 times.
• CPC (cost per click): The ad buyer’s cost per click. CPC can be as low as a few cents or as high as a few hundred dollars, depending on competition, your industry, and audience relevance.
• Cost per conversion: The ad buyer’s cost per purchase, order, acquired customer, or another conversion goal you’ve set.
• CTR (click-through rate): The percentage of users who clicked on your ad out of the total number of impressions it received. Your click-through rate is the most significant signal of relevancy in Google’s search auctions.
• Conversion rate: The number of conversions divided by the number of clicks, expressed as a percentage.
• Budget: The total amount of money allocated to an ad campaign.
• Revenue: The total value, in dollars, generated by an ad.
• Profit: The total value, in dollars, generated by an ad after subtracting expenses, such as advertising costs and cost of goods.
• ROAS (return on ad spend): Revenue generated from an ad divided by the advertising cost to show the return on that ad. For example, $5 made for every $1 spent yields a ROAS of 5:1.
• AOV(average order value): The average dollar amount a customer spends on a site. AOV is calculated by dividing the total revenue by the number of orders.
• CLV (customer lifetime value): The predicted total value of a single customer (sometimes called LTV) for the entirety of their relationship with a company, including future purchases.

• Campaign: A campaign contains a single advertising objective, such as traffic or conversions, for one or more ad groups. Budgeting is done at the campaign level and if you expect certain things within a campaign will perform differently (better or worse) that’s a good indication it should be a separate campaign.
• Ad group: An ad group contains one or more ads and your targeting. A good ad group set up has a unique set of ad messages that directly match your targeting.
• Ad: The creative ( text, image, video, etc.) that users will see.
• Keyword: The phrase or word(s) a user enters into the search engine.
• Keyword match type: Keyword match type involves controlling how broad or exact the chosen keywords (synonyms, related searches, etc.) must be to trigger an ad.
• Negative keywords: If you want to prevent your ad from being triggered by a certain word or phrase, you would add it to your negative keywords list. This helps you exclude similar but irrelevant keywords (e.g. “apple cider” for Apple the brand).
• Quality score: The relevancy of an ad to the search term or audience being targeted. Generally, the higher the quality score, the lower the cost per click and the better the ad position.

• Goal: What does this campaign type accomplish and how? Should it drive sales by focusing on past visitors to your site? Should it sell to existing customers or acquire new ones? Should it raise awareness among a certain audience segment?
• Relevance to audience: Your business and products may or may not be relevant to a certain search term or audience. Generally, the more relevant your product or service is to a targeting method, the lower your cost and the higher your likelihood of driving traffic to your website and making sales.
• Estimated cost per click: This is a general estimate of how much you will be spending for each prospective shopper and will vary depending on your industry. Remember that you will often be paying for every click, and ongoing optimization is necessary to maximize the value of your spend.
• KPIs (key performance indicators): What measurable values should you use to set goals for this campaign and measure its performance? We all want our campaigns to generate sales, but you can expect most visitors to your store won’t convert the first time they visit. That’s why KPIs like traffic and impressions are more important for campaigns focused on raising awareness and creating consideration versus direct sales and ROAS.
• ROAS Expectations: What kind of return on ad spend should you realistically expect from a campaign relative to other campaign types? This will be expressed as a range (e.g. 0:1 to 5:1) that is meant only as a guideline to help you prioritize tactics. There are many variables that will affect your actual ROAS.
• Scalability: Some campaigns may target users looking specifically for your branded products, or users who have already visited your site. Other campaigns target users based on their general interests or search history for a specific category of products. Each type of campaign will have a different ceiling or "scale" (i.e. the extent to which you can spend more to get more from the campaign).
• Recommended for: When does this tactic make sense and for what businesses? We’ll try to make recommendations based on different types of merchants, but use the above criteria to make the best call for your unique business.
• Ease of implementation: How easy or difficult a campaign will be to undertake, based on a variety of factors. Some campaign types are relatively easy to set up, while others require more expertise and ongoing management.

• Goal: Capturing searchers actively looking for your brand by name.
• Relevance to audience: High. (They’re searching for you.)
• Estimated cost per click: Low (~$0.25 to $3.00).
• ROAS Expectations: High (3:1 to 30:1). These searchers are looking specifically for your brand.
• KPIs: Profitability, number of orders.
• Scalability: This will depend on how established your brand is. It also will depend on how many people search for you, which can be driven up by other marketing efforts that increase brand awareness.
• Recommended for: All businesses, regardless of size and industry, will likely make sales when there is search intent for their specific brand. Prioritize this campaign if resources permit.

• Goal: Generating qualified intent-based traffic, and possibly new customers, by advertising to people who may buy your products but aren’t necessarily familiar with your brand.
• Relevance to audience: Low to medium.
• Estimated cost per click: Medium to High ~($1 to $20).
• ROAS Expectations: Medium (0:1 to 3:1, depending on competition, product/market fit, etc.).
• KPIs: New customer acquisition, revenue, traffic, number of orders.
• Scalability: Potentially large, depending on search volume from users and the type of terms.
• Recommended for: Everyone, but don’t prioritize this method before some of the more profitable campaigns on this list. For brands looking at growing top-line revenue and new customer acquisition, however, generic non-branded search should be a top priority.

• Goal: Acquiring new customers from niche audiences that match up with your niche products.
• Relevance to audience: Medium to high. (The more niche the audience and the better your product addresses that niche, the more relevant you will be to your audience.)
• Estimated cost per click: Medium to High ($1 to $20, depending on the competition and value of customers/orders to other advertisers.)
• ROAS Expectations: Medium (0:1 to 5:1).
• KPIs: New customer acquisition, revenue, traffic, number of orders.
• Scalability: This will depend on how many users search for these terms, which have naturally smaller audiences, especially compared to wider non-branded searches without these niche modifiers.
• Recommended for: Brands with a niche product or that are targeting a niche market within a non-branded product category, such as “vegan deodorant” or “used NFL game memorabilia.”

• Goal: Acquiring new customers who might not know your brand or product by getting your brand in front of shoppers searching for your competitors.
• Relevance to audience: Low. (Users are searching for a specific competitor, not your brand.)
• Estimated cost per click: Medium to High (~$1 to $20).
• ROAS Expectations: Medium (0:1 to 3:1, depending on the competition and whether your competitors, or their competitors, are bidding on the same branded keywords).
• KPIs: Traffic, new customers, number of orders, ROI.
• Scalability: This will depend on how big your competitor’s brand is, how many users search for them, and other campaign efforts that drive awareness for them.
• Recommended for: Merchants already running profitable campaigns and interested in new customer acquisition. Also, merchants with a high LTV or who are actively testing different customer acquisition campaigns.

• Goal: Capturing searchers who are specifically shopping for your products/product categories using your branded keywords.
• Relevance to audience: High. (They’re searching for you.)
• Estimated cost per click: Low (~$0.25 to $3.00).
• ROAS Expectations: High (3:1 to 30:1).
• KPIs: ROAS, number of orders.
• Scalability: This depends on how many users search for your brand and branded products.
• Recommended for: Companies selling physical products that have already invested in brand awareness and those who feel comfortable tweaking within Google Ads to set up this type of campaign.

• Goal: Capturing searchers looking specifically for the types of products you sell but not necessarily your branded products by name.
• Relevance to audience: Low to medium (They’re searching for your product categories, not necessarily your products.)
• Estimated cost per click: Medium (~$0.25 to $20.00).
• ROAS Expectations: Medium (0:1 to 5:1).
• KPIs: New customer acquisition, revenue, traffic.
• Scalability: Generally high, but it will depend on how many shoppers search for your products/product categories.
• Recommended for: Most companies that sell physical products. However, this type of campaign should not be prioritized over more profitable campaign types unless you have specific new customer, growth, or top-line revenue goals.

• Goal: Advertising specifically to potential buyers who have previously visited your site, browsed a specific category page, added items to their cart, or already made a purchase.
• Relevance to audience: High (They’ve at least visited your site already.)
• Estimated cost per click: Low (~$0.25 to $3.00).
• ROAS Expectations: High (3:1 to 30:1).
• KPIs: ROAS, orders.
• Scalability: This will depend on site traffic or the size of the audience that has engaged in the behavior you’re targeting.
• Recommended for: All businesses, especially those that aren’t doing any retargeting, despite driving traffic to their site.

• Goal: Increasing awareness around your product or service by advertising on sites in the Google Display Network that relate to a specific topic or interest category.
• Relevance to audience: This will depend on the interests and the topic themes you are targeting and how relevant they are to your product/messaging.
• Estimated cost per click: Low to Medium (~$0.25 to $3.00).
• ROAS Expectations: Low (0:1 to 2:1).
• KPIs: Impressions, clicks, general brand awareness, micro-conversions (email sign-ups, multiple page views, time on site, visiting your physical location if you have one), number of orders.
• Scalability: Generally high, but it depends on the categories you’re targeting and the number of sites or users that match that criteria in the Google Display Network.
• Recommended for: Brands that specifically want to get their product/service in front of a certain user segment to drive awareness, or have found a perfect topic/interest fit for their target demographic and market.

• Goal: Driving increased awareness around your product or service, and potentially driving sales, by displaying your ads on webpages in the Display Network that contain a specific theme based on a grouping of keywords.
• Relevance to audience: This will depend on the keyword themes you are targeting and how relevant the site topics/users are to your products and messaging.
• Estimated cost per click: Low (~$0.25 to $3.00).
• ROAS Expectations: Low (0:1 to 2:1).
• KPIs: Impressions, clicks, brand awareness, micro-conversions (email sign-ups, multiple page views, time on site, visiting your physical location if you have one), number of orders.
• Scalability: Generally pretty high, but it depends on the content keywords you’re targeting and the amount of content available for those keywords in the Google Display Network.
• Recommended for: Most brands could make the case that this should be one of the first upper-funnel campaigns to test, since you can get your product in front of users as they’re researching specific products or topics relevant to your brand. However, this type of campaign is not for brands that haven’t found success with other high-intent campaigns first, have a very low LTV, or have low interest in driving awareness or new customers.

• Goal: Using ad space on a specific website to drive awareness about your product/service/business for that site’s specific audience.
• Relevance to audience: This will depend on the placement being chosen, how broad or specific the site’s topics/visitors are, and how well your product and messaging speaks to them.
• Estimated cost per click: Medium (~$1.00 to $10.00).
• ROAS Expectations: Low (0:1 to 2:1).
• KPIs: Impressions, traffic (increased brand awareness), orders, and micro-conversions (email sign-ups, multiple page views, time on site, visiting your physical location if you have one).
• Scalability: Generally lower but will depend on the site and its traffic (not all sites are targetable).
• Recommended for: Brands that want to get their product/service on a specific site to drive awareness after identifying the perfect site for their demographic and market.

• Goal: Generating profitable orders through Google Shopping, remarketing, and display placements through machine learning.
• Relevance to audience: Varies, since it rolls multiple campaign types into one.
• Estimated cost per click: Low to medium (~$0.25 to $5.00).
• ROAS Expectations: Medium to High (0:1 to 12:1).
• KPIs: ROAS, orders, new customer acquisition.
• Scalability: Generally high, since non-branded traffic and display placements will be in your mix of traffic.
• Recommended for: Shopify merchants not currently using any retargeting and/or Google Shopping campaigns who want minimal involvement in managing them.

• Goal: Generating repeat business or converting your subscribers into profitable orders by targeting customers who have already purchased from you or opted into your email list.
• Relevance to audience: Extremely high. (They’ve already given you their business or their information.)
• Estimated cost per click: Low ($0.25 to $5, depending on how aggressive you want to be with targeting.)
• ROAS Expectations: Extremely high (5:1 to 60:1).
• KPIs: ROAS, profitable orders, traffic.
• Scalability: Low, depending on the size of your customer base/email list and customer match rate (not every email you upload will be available to target in Google’s system).
• Recommended for: Any brand with more than 1,000 users in its email list and/or customer base.

• Goal: Generating new customers and increasing awareness by advertising to users who have similar interests or characteristics to your existing customer base.
• Relevance to audience: This will depend on how similar your customers on your original list are and also how relevant your product/service is to the audience you’re trying to reach.
• Estimated cost per click: Low (~$0.25 to $3.00).
• ROAS Expectations: Low (0:1 to 2:1).
• KPIs: Clicks, impressions, traffic, orders, ROAS.
• Scalability: Generally large, depending on how many more users have similar interests. But since it will target all potential users on display, this campaign should have a high ceiling.
• Recommended for: Merchants who already have their most profitable campaigns set up and optimized and are looking to test new customer acquisition campaigns. A seed list of emails will need to be uploaded to Google to base your “similar audience” on.

• Goal: Generating orders from search keywords automatically generated by Google.
• Relevance to audience: Low to high, depending on the keywords Google’s spider makes for your campaigns.
• Estimated cost per click: Low to medium (~$0.25 to $5).
• ROAS Expectations: Medium (0:1 to 12:1).
• KPIs: Orders, ROAS, traffic.
• Scalability: Generally high, since dynamic search ads will capture non-branded as well as branded traffic, but will depend on the type of keywords that are on your website for Google to crawl.
• Recommended for: Anyone who does not have the expertise to run a search campaign and wants to get something off the ground to see how it works, without making a larger investment.

• Branded search
• Branded shopping
• Retargeting (especially visitors who abandoned their carts)
• CRM
• Niche campaigns that generate more sales, revenue, and higher profits than they cost

• Non-branded search (niche)
• Non-branded search (competitor)
• Non-branded search (generic)
• Similar audience targeting
• Contextual campaigns
• Interest targeting

• No long-term contracts: If it's not going well, you should be able to back out when you want.
• Ownership of all accounts, campaigns, and work: Everything should be fully transparent, and you should be the one to own the account, even if you aren’t managing it.
• Know your account manager: You ideally want to know and trust the person actually managing your account every day, rather than a salesperson or the CEO of an agency.
• Align on goals/expectations: You want a sense of what campaigns your agency wants to run, how it will budget, expected ROAS, and how long it’ll take to get it up and running.
• Understand the fee structure: Generally, you’ll either pay a flat fee or fees based on a percentage of your ad spend, with a minimum spend requirement. Be aware of how fees change as the spend changes and know that sometimes there can be additional setup charges. It’s a competitive space, so it doesn’t hurt to shop your business around to different providers.
• Consider specialized vendors: While it’s not impossible that the talented development shop that designed your website can also do your Google ads well, it often pays to work with more specific experts for the types of services or campaigns you’re going to run. There are pros and cons to working with a vendor that consolidates many outsourced services, so consider how much time you save from managing one vendor vs. the expertise and ROI you’re getting in each individual service.

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