advanced google shopping: data insights from behind the scenes

#SMX #11B @AndreasReiffen

Data Insights from Behind the Scenes

AdvancedGoogle Shopping


About…

• Data-driven online advertising strategist

• Online retail expert

• Entrepreneur

• Over €3 billion in customer revenues

last year

• SaaS product for Google Shopping &

Search

• 130 true experts in their field

• Offices in Germany & UK, new office in

NYC

… me … crealytics & camato


Topics we will cover today..

Economies of

Google shopping Role of price Image testing

Product title

testing

How does price

influence

performance?

How big a role

does price play in

product ranking?

CPCs have

decreased!

What will happen

next?

How can you test

images properly?

What is the effect

of image

changes?

Can you

manipulate titles

and get more

relevant user

queries?


Global Shopping growth 2016 Shopping Click Share 2014 - 2016

In 2016 Shopping clicks kept increasing while CPCs decreased –why?

Clicks CPC

-15%

36%

*Alphabet earnings report

74%

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

100%

Q2Q1 2016

Q2 Q4 Q4Q4Q3 Q3 Q3Q2Q1 2015

Q1 2014

Shooping

Text Ads

*Internal data US + EU


Click Share by device YoY

Increasing mobile click share

As predicted by Google, mobile click sharein Shopping has increased massively overthe past few years, so that since 2016 themajority of clicks is generated by mobile

rather than desktop

100

84

16

49

51

30

2016

100

70

100

62

38

100

2015

Desktop

20172014

Mobile


Ad space pushing organic space Resulting in stronger growth

More advertising space

Paid

+78%

+16%

Organic


Impression volume for generic terms (M)

More Shopping results for generic queries

In 2016 Google startedincreasing the amount ofShopping Impressions forgeneric terms, leading toan overhead in available

queries.

Q4 2015

Q3 2016

66

Q4 2016

Q3 2015

Q1 2015

Q2 2016

8

Q1 2016

10

9

6

7

4

Q2 2015

2

6

2

Q1 2015

5

Q4 2015

Q3 2015

3

Q2 2016

5

Q2 2015

2

Q1 2016

Q4 2016

Q3 2016

5Category termsDesigner terms


Paid sessions per user YoY

Navigation happening on Google rather than website

46% shopping conversions have 3+ shopping clicks

29% text ads conversions have 3+ text adsclicks

GoogleWebsite

Purchase1.39

1.48

1.73

2014

+17%

2016

1.41

Text Ads

Shopping


Shopping vs Text Ads CPC & RPC CR by device

Shopping more profitable despite higher overall CPCs

100100

162

121

+21%

+62%

RPCCPC

Text Ads

Shopping

97%

Text Ads Mobile

61%

189%

Shopping Mobile

Text Ads Desktop

Shopping Desktop

100%


Your key take aways

Strong ongoing growth

of ad inventory supply is

leading to CPC deflation

Be faster than your

competition!

Move budget to

Shopping now!

CPCs still higher than

on Text Ads but due to

high CR Shopping

more efficient than

Text ads


Pricing


Impressions and clicks in Google Shopping are often very sensitive to price changes

Clicks drop off after product price increase Chart Info

5% price increase coincides with a 60% decrease in clicks

0

20

40

60

80

100

120

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

Pri

ce in

£

+5%

clicksown price Google product category: Apparel & Accessories > Shoes > Sneakers

Brand:

Days

Clicks

Price


Cheap products generate the lion‘s share of total traffic

Traffic of similar products within one shop Key insights

Cheap products generatedmuch more traffic despitesimilar number of productsin both groups

Imps

134%

4.282.611

1.828.412

103.803

135%

Clicks

44.122

2.047

9%

# of products

1.876

expensive products cheap products


Despite getting more traffic, the performance of the cheaperproducts is much more efficient.

Performance of similar products within one shop Key insights

Number of orders throughcheap products almost 3 times higher.

Higher CR resulting in CPO being ~30% lower

40

28

-29%

CPO Conversions

1,042

+280%

274

61%

0.6%

CR

1.0%

expensive products cheap products


Price is very important in terms of ranking but there areother factors as well

$Retailer Rating

New retailers will be rateddown, seller ratings help

Performance History

More history leads to more impressions

Price

Users favor cheaperproducts, so these achievebetter positions on google

Bid

Bid is important but can be outweighed by product

price

According to Google, price is not an explicit factor in their algorithm,but maybe taken into account through machine learning if users favor lower prices


Position of cheapest offer

Product price has a massive impact on position!

Pos 1

Pos 2 14%

65%

Cheapest

Pos 5 +

Pos 4 4%

7%Pos 3

11%

* Data from price comparison provider based on > 3000 queries

Is Google shopping a price race to the bottom?

In 65% of all cases in our sample, theproduct with the most competitiveprice was ranked on position 1, no

matter the retailer!


The way out: We analysed what people actually boughtwhen they clicked on a product ad

Same Designer Different Designer

purchaseclick

34%

16%

14%

15%

21%

36%

Dif

fere

nt

Ca

teg

ory

Sa

me

Ca

teg

ory


Your key takeaways

Don’t overbid on

expensive

products, rather

consider price

changes

Price and bid

management will

be merged one

day

Discounting only a

few select

products could be

a killer strategy

$.47$.47-50%


Image Testing


Challenges to image testing

Do I have cassified

images? Time lag

SERPs vs shopping

tab

A B Shopping tab:

Products clustered intoone offer list.

Not necessarilyyour image!

Time to index new image:

• Up to 72 hours when URLs are changed

• Up to 6 weeks if URLs remains the same (server-side image swap)

Know when you measure “A”. More data required. Long testing cyle.

Change images consistently from A to B across entire category


About the data

1

2

3

2 fashion retailers: 1800 images changed in total

> 40m impressions

Products were ignored if not available at all times

target metrics: CTR (user), impressions (Google)


Change images in “test“, use “control“ as baseline. Compare KPIs throughout test to eliminate seasonality.

Test

Control

Before During After


Model image 2.6% stronger CTR Model image 27% stronger CTR

Two tests, only one has a clear positive result

100.0%127.0%100.0% 102.6%

Images

CTR

Images

CTR *

Not significant Significant

* CTR test vs control, with original image set to 100%. First test > 5m imps, second test >40m imps.


Image test seems to work when image sets you apart

Images

Competition

Images

Competition

Image type varies no effect Stand out positive effect

BA BA


Your key take aways

Image testing can havean effect:

Stand out when many offer the same product

There are areas where testing can have a more significant

impact and the return on effort is much bigger.

Images are important for Google to match

queries

mountain


Feed Title Optimization


In feed optimisation, titles are most promising.

Product titles Google CategoryProduct description

Evening dressby TFNC…

before destroyed

100% 98%

Baseball capby Nike…

Shoes > …> Athletic Shoes

118%100%

destroyedbefore

Clothing > …> Rain Suits

Lipsy Lace DressNavy blue..

Party DressesNavy Blue Lipsy…

title changed

original

100%

960%

Imps Imps Imps


Testing further strategies to determine impact of title changes

1

2

3

4 accounts from 3 clients & 3 verticals

16.8k titles changed

5.2m Impressions generated in total


What we found out:

Unrelated Terms

Terms with volume on google but no relation to product - therefore don’t

show up in product titles.

Seasonal terms: Christmas/ Black Friday General terms: gift/ fashion/ online

Google is too smart: Unrelated terms have no impact

Existing Queries

High share of voice existing queries, not included in titles.

Synonyms: Laptop Notebook

Trainers Sneakers

Slight impact but not worth the effort.

Under-Represented

Queries1. Low share of voice existing, not

included in titles.

2. High traffic Text Ads terms, not receiving Shopping Impressions

Success: Significant increase in volume


Under-represented queries – Strong positive impact

100100

111

134

+34%

+11%

Account LevelQuery Level

After

Before

Impressions

This strategy has proven to be the mostsuccessful.

As the high text ads traffic on these termsalready indicated, the impression volume

on Shopping had potential for growth.


Low/mid-level traffic queries with market potential are thebest choice

Title change:

+Designer Trainer

Share of available

volumeImpressions on query

Reebok Z Pump Fusion Training - Men

Designer Trainer by Reebok Z Pump Fusion Training

across 39 products KW planner Traffic / m before

Traffic / m after

Example

100100 116

7.100

Query Level

+16%

+7.000%

Account Level

After

Before


Including existing queries can be succesful

Jordan 1 Flight 4 Premium Space Jam

Jordan Kids - Jordan 1 Flight 4 Premium Space Jam

across 26 products

Example

100100120

167

Query Level

+20%

+67%

Account Level

After

Before

KW planner Traffic / m before

Traffic / m after

Title change:

+Jordan Kids

Share of available

volumeImpressions on query


Your key take aways

Title optimisation works.

Up to 30% more Impressions!

Don’t overwrite important terms!

(it will eat up your gains)

Focus onproduct-related

andlow share of voice


For a detailed step by step guide on how to define which terms to add to your titles,

visit our blog at:

www.crealytics.com/blog/title-changes-how-to/

http://www.crealytics.com/blog/title-changes-how-to/


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advanced google shopping: data insights from behind the scenes

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