Sponsored Product bidding strategies

A bidding strategy refers to the method advertisers use to determine how much they are willing to pay in real-time auctions. There are 3 bidding strategies for Sponsored Product Ads: Optimize for ROAS, Max Sales, and Manual bidding.

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Note:

Each campaign bidding strategy can be turned on or off at the platform level. It is not possible to adjust the bidding strategy for a set of individual advertisers or groups of advertisers.

Choosing a Bidding Strategy

If you are a new advertiser or have never advertised your products before, we suggest starting with a Manual bidding strategy first. Then run a Manual bidding campaign for at least 2 weeks before starting an Optimize ROAS or Max Sales bidding campaign.

Running a Smart bidding campaign enables advertisers to achieve stable sales and expand reach with a minimum ROAS goal. This option is simple to use as it does not require optimization tuning, advertisers can simply start the campaign and monitor progress.

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Note:

Running a Manual bidding campaign first is important as the Optimize ROAS strategy uses the Manual bidding campaign’s performance history to optimize for conversions.

Optimize ROAS (Target ROAS)

Optimize ROAS is an automated bidding strategy designed to streamline the bidding process, eliminating the need for guesswork. It utilizes your target ROAS (tROAS goal) to automatically determine the CPC bid. Advertisers are charged at the time a click is registered on the ad.

Max Sales

Max Sales is an automated bidding strategy that focuses on delivering the highest revenue for advertisers by targeting the most relevant and high revenue potential impressions based on budget and item set. Max sales supports automatic placement targeting and manual targeting to maximize your advertising campaign.

Manual Bidding

Use this strategy to set a maximum cost-per-click (CPC) bid for every relevant ad impression. The advertiser decides the max CPC they are willing to pay and MCM optimizes for clicks, at or within, the CPC and the advertiser's budget. This approach gives advertisers full control over their bid amounts, but requires ongoing monitoring and adjustment to optimize performance. Advertisers are charged when a click on the ad occurs.

Advertisement Targeting

Placement Targeting

Placement targeting is a feature that allows platform owners and advertisers more control over where ads will be displayed and allows advertisers to reach a specific audience. Advertisers can choose one of the following 2 options for placement targeting.

Automatic targeting

• Automatic targeting utilizes sophisticated machine learning algorithms to determine the optimal timing, and placement for displaying your ads to maximize your advertising campaign.

Manual targeting

Manual targeting provides controls to specify when and where an ad campaign appears. Campaign performance can vary depending on the manual settings below:

• Search

  • Select All to bid on all search keywords related to the campaign items automatically. This option allows ads to be displayed on any search page associated with the item, regardless of the specific search keywords. It provides broader exposure as the ads can appear on any relevant search result page.

• Target Keywords

  • Target Keywords control when an ad appears by matching keywords with a shopper's search term. The bid amount to be determined is based on the campaign target. (e.g. Target ROAS)
  • Negative Keywords control when an ad should not appear by filtering out search terms that include negative keywords.

• Placement

  • Allows control over what page types should be prioritized for displaying ads. MCM supports the following Placement types:
    • Home
    • Product Detail
    • Category Home
    • Cart
    • Checkout
    • Search
    • Search all (optional: Negative keywords)
    • Target Keywords (optional: Negative keywords)

Audience Targeting

Audience targeting is an advanced targeting solution that is designed to show advertisements only to customers of a desired group for developing audience specific ad strategies. This feature allows an advertiser to leverage their own 1st party data or bring in 3rd party data elements. Audience targeting provides several benefits, including increased campaign effectiveness, improved ad relevance, and enhanced user experience. The specific group targeted is segmented by characteristics of the shopper's behavior.

Audience targeting offers 2 options: Automatic targeting and Manual targeting for both new and existing shoppers.

Automatic targeting

• Automatic audience targeting leverages advanced machine learning algorithms to automatically identify and target the most relevant users for each ad campaign. This approach optimizes ad performance by dynamically adjusting the target audience based on user behavior and other relevant data points.

Manual targeting

Manual targeting offers greater control over budget allocation by allowing advertisers to specify the type of audience to target. Manual audience supports the following two options:

• Existing Customers

  • This option identifies shoppers who have made a purchase from the ad account within N number of days. (e.g., 60 Days).

• New customers

  • This option identifies shoppers who have not made a purchase from the ad account within N days. (e.g., 90 Days)

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Questions?

Please see our FAQ for answers to common questions on campaign options.