An outdoor-gear store moving from revenue to profit
Shopping and Performance Max rebuilt around product margin, a cleaner feed, and category pages that can rank on their own.
Sample campaign walkthrough (illustrative)
This is a hypothetical business, not a client. It shows how we would structure the account and what we would measure. It contains no client data and makes no claim about results. Your own plan comes from your own data, in your free Yield Audit.
Where this account starts
- The business
- A hypothetical online store selling tents, packs and camp kitchen gear across the US and Canada.
- The goal
- Grow new-customer revenue while keeping every ad-driven order profitable after shipping and returns.
- Sample budget
- A sample budget of $25,000 a month across Google and Microsoft Ads.
- Starting point
- One Performance Max campaign covering the whole catalogue, a blended ROAS target, and category pages sitting on page two for their main terms.
What the Yield Audit looks for here
The checks we would run first on an account like this, the kind of issue we expect to find and the fix.
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Bidding signal
Finding: Conversion value is revenue, so low-margin items look as good as high-margin ones.
Action: Send margin-adjusted conversion values and set targets by margin tier.
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Product feed
Finding: Titles lead with the brand name, and size and capacity attributes are missing.
Action: Rewrite titles as type + key attribute + brand, and fill the missing attributes.
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Brand traffic
Finding: Performance Max takes credit for branded searches that would convert anyway.
Action: Separate brand campaign, brand exclusions in PMax, and new-customer reporting.
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Search terms
Finding: Repair, rental and “used” queries trigger ads for new products.
Action: Shared negative-keyword lists, reviewed every week.
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Category SEO
Finding: Category pages are product grids with no buying guidance, so they lose to retailers that explain.
Action: Add short buying guides, FAQs and internal links to the top categories.
How we’d organise the budget
Starting allocations for the sample budget. They move every week toward whatever returns the most.
- 40% PMax: high-margin hero products Scale the products that earn the most per order
- 30% Shopping: core catalogue Controlled bids by margin tier
- 20% Search: category intent Capture “best 4-person tent” style queries
- 5% Search: brand Protect branded terms at low cost
- 5% Testing reserve New products, new creative, new markets
Sample ad groups
Tight themes, one landing page per intent. Brackets mean exact match and quotes mean phrase match. Words in square brackets inside quotes stand in for a real name.
| Campaign / ad group | Sample keywords or audience | Landing page |
|---|---|---|
| Search: category intent Backpacking tents | [backpacking tent], "lightweight backpacking tent", "2 person backpacking tent" | /tents/backpacking/ |
| Search: category intent Family camping tents | [family camping tent], "6 person tent", "best tent for family camping" | /tents/family/ |
| Search: category intent Camp kitchen | "camp stove", "camping cookware set", [backpacking stove] | /camp-kitchen/ |
| Search: brand Brand + product | [brand name], "brand name tent", "brand name discount code" | / |
Sample ads
Headlines lead with the searcher’s intent, then a reason to choose this business. Each asset is written to stand on its own, because the platform mixes and matches them.
Sponsored example.com/tents/backpacking
Lightweight Backpacking Tents | Pitch in Under 5 Minutes | Free Returns for 60 Days
Ultralight 1–3 person tents with full specs, packed weights and honest reviews. Compare capacity, weight and weather rating side by side, then order with free returns.
All headline and description assets
- 29/30 Lightweight Backpacking Tents
- 24/30 Pitch in Under 5 Minutes
- 24/30 Free Returns for 60 Days
- 23/30 Ships in 1 Business Day
- 79/90 Ultralight 1–3 person tents with full specs, packed weights and honest reviews.
- 87/90 Compare capacity, weight and weather rating side by side, then order with free returns.
Sample landing page wireframe
The page continues the promise in the ad, answers the questions that stop people converting and makes the next step obvious on a phone.
- Hero Category name, one-line promise, filter by capacity and weight
- Top picks Three products with packed weight, capacity and price
- Buying guide How to choose: weight, season rating, floor size
- Full product grid Sortable, with in-stock and shipping time shown
- Reassurance Returns, warranty and shipping policy in plain words
- FAQ Questions pulled from search terms and support tickets
What we track, and where it comes from
| Event | Source | How it is used |
|---|---|---|
| Purchase with margin value | Store platform → Google Ads via enhanced conversions | Primary bidding signal |
| New vs returning customer | Customer match list | New-customer value rules and reporting |
| Add to cart, begin checkout | GA4 | Diagnostics only, never bid on |
| Refunds and returns | Store platform export, weekly | Adjust margin by product line |
The scoreboard
- Contribution margin after ad spend
- New-customer revenue and acquisition cost
- ROAS by margin tier (not blended)
- Non-brand organic revenue from category pages
- Feed health: approved items and impression share
- Days 1–7 Access, tracking checks, negative keywords, brand split, margin tiers agreed
- Days 8–30 Feed rewrite, new campaign structure live, category page briefs approved
- Days 31–60 Margin-based targets tuned, first buying guides published, creative tests
- Days 61–90 Budget reallocated by marginal return, quarterly plan and next tests set
Want this level of detail for your account?
Your free Yield Audit applies the same checklist to your real accounts, and you keep the findings whether or not you hire us.
Or call (866) 360-RANK ((866) 360-7265), Mon–Fri, 9am–6pm Eastern.