D2C eCommerce
(CRO)
Turning eCommerce Advertising Spend Into Profitable Growth
- For an eCommerce business, generating sales is only part of the equation.
- The real challenge is generating those sales efficiently enough to protect margin and create sustainable, profitable growth.
- Our D2C eCommerce client was investing in Google Shopping campaigns, but the return wasn’t strong enough. With ROAS sitting at 1.8x, advertising spend wasn’t delivering the commercial performance the business needed.
- Rather than simply increasing budgets or chasing more traffic, we focused on improving the economics of the existing activity.
- The objective was straightforward: make every pound of advertising spend work harder.
The Challenge: Shopping Campaigns Were Underperforming
Google Shopping can be one of the most powerful acquisition channels available to eCommerce businesses, but performance depends on far more than simply uploading products and setting a campaign live.
The client’s existing Shopping activity was consuming budget without generating a sufficient return.
A
The problem therefore wasn’t simply one of traffic.
We needed to improve how products were presented to Google, how campaigns prioritised different products and how effectively visitors converted after arriving on the website.
Looking Beyond Advertising Metrics
- One of the biggest mistakes in eCommerce marketing is treating every product as though it has equal commercial value.
It doesn’t. - Products can have different margins, sales velocities and levels of demand. Driving the same level of advertising investment towards every product can therefore produce very different commercial outcomes.
- Our strategy looked beyond clicks and impressions and focused on the underlying economics of the product range.
That meant asking a more important question:
Which products and campaigns could contribute most effectively to profitable growth?
Restructuring the Shopping Strategy
→ We optimised the product feed to give Google stronger information about the products being advertised and segmented products according to margin and sales velocity.
→ This allowed the campaign strategy to better reflect the commercial value and performance of different parts of the product range rather than treating the entire catalogue in the same way.
→ The objective was to create a more commercially intelligent advertising structure – one designed around business performance rather than traffic volume alone.
Using First-Party Data to Improve Bidding
Campaign restructuring was supported by a smarter approach to bidding.
First-party data was incorporated into the strategy to help inform automated bidding and give the advertising platform stronger signals for optimisation.
This allowed bidding decisions to become more closely aligned with actual customer behaviour and commercial outcomes.
For an eCommerce business, this is particularly important.
Advertising shouldn’t simply generate more clicks. It needs to attract customers with a realistic likelihood of purchasing while ensuring acquisition costs remain commercially viable.
Improving the Experience After the Click
- Optimising the advertising campaign alone would only solve part of the problem.
- Once a prospective customer clicked an advert, the website still had to convert that interest into a sale.
- Conversion Rate Optimisation therefore formed an important part of the strategy, with particular attention paid to the mobile landing-page experience.
- By connecting paid media optimisation with CRO, we could improve performance at both ends of the acquisition journey:
Better advertising → More relevant traffic → Stronger on-site experience → Greater commercial return
- This prevented the campaign from being optimised in isolation from the website responsible for converting the traffic.
The Results
1. ROAS Increased From 1.8x to 9.5x
Return on ad spend increased from 1.8x to 9.5x, representing a 428% improvement in ROAS.
2. Revenue Per Session Increased 3.2x
The value generated from website sessions also increased substantially, with revenue per session rising by 3.2x.
3. Record Q4 Sales
The business went on to achieve record Q4 sales.
“Same budget, completely different results.”
Why eCommerce ROAS Is About More Than Google Ads
Product feed quality influences how effectively products can appear within Shopping results. Campaign structure influences where budget is invested. Bidding strategy influences which opportunities are prioritised.
Conversion Rate Optimisation influences how much revenue is ultimately generated from the traffic acquired.
When these areas work together, an eCommerce business can improve advertising efficiency without simply relying on larger budgets.
From Revenue Growth to More Profitable Growth
→ A campaign can generate additional sales while simultaneously placing pressure on margin if customer acquisition costs are too high or advertising spend is concentrated on less profitable products.
→ That’s why our approach considered product margin and sales velocity as part of the Shopping strategy.
→ It shifted the emphasis from simply selling more products towards creating a more commercially effective acquisition model.
→ The results demonstrate the difference that can make: the same advertising budget can deliver dramatically different outcomes when campaign structure, product data, bidding and conversion performance are working towards the same commercial objective.
Looking to Improve Your eCommerce Marketing Performance?
At AIM Internet, we help eCommerce businesses turn digital marketing investment into measurable commercial growth.
Our approach brings together Shopping Ads, product feed optimisation, Conversion Rate Optimisation and data-led paid media strategy to improve acquisition efficiency and maximise the commercial value generated from marketing spend.
Whether your objective is to improve ROAS, increase online sales or create a more profitable customer acquisition strategy, we focus on the metrics that matter to the wider business – not simply clicks and traffic.