Let me show you what a high-performing, high-spending ecommerce Google Ads account really looks like.
This is a peek behind the curtain at one of our client accounts at Big Flare where we’re spending over $100,000/month and achieving a return on ad spend (ROAS) of over 700%.
I’ll break down the exact campaign types, how we structure Performance Max, how we layer in Standard Shopping, the search campaign strategy that makes the magic happen and plenty more.
Campaign Type Breakdown
We're spending just over $200,000 NZD a month in this account (a bit over $100K USD), and that spend is spread across multiple campaign types. Here’s how it breaks down:
Performance Max and Standard Shopping are the workhorses, taking the lion’s share of the budget.
Search campaigns, particularly non-branded ones, deliver the highest ROAS at 8.74X.
Display is used solely for retargeting (not cold traffic).
YouTube ads are used to build top-of-funnel awareness.
We’re also testing Demand Gen with some early results.
Key Takeaway:
Performance Max and Shopping do the heavy lifting, but it’s search campaigns done right that push performance through the roof.
How We Structure Performance Max & Standard Shopping
We run one core Performance Max campaign that includes all products (around 160). This works well because all the products are profitable and their ROAS is well above the breakeven point.
But here’s the nuance:
If you have products with varying profit margins or performance levels, consider splitting them out into different campaigns.
If some products are performing below breakeven, pull them into a separate campaign and set a different ROAS target to let the system optimise accordingly.
New Customer Campaign
We duplicate the core Performance Max campaign and run it exclusively for new customers, using the “new customer acquisition” setting in Google Ads.
Why?
Because new customers have higher lifetime value, and we’re willing to bid more to acquire them. We target a slightly lower ROAS (around 600%) in this campaign to force the system to be more aggressive.
Best Performers Campaign
Top-performing products are pulled into a separate Standard Shopping campaign, where we can push budget and lower ROAS targets to scale results further.
Special Category Campaign
When we have a strategic product or a new product line we want to push harder, we give it its own campaign with its own budget and ROAS targets to prioritise its exposure.
Asset Group Strategy in Performance Max
Each asset group represents a single product category.
That means the assets — images, headlines, descriptions, videos — are tightly aligned with the products being advertised.
A few tips:
Include audience signals and search themes.
Don’t just run “feed only” unless you're working with very slim margins.
Rotate out underperforming assets regularly. Only keep assets marked “Good” or “Best” in the asset performance report.
Search Campaigns: The Real ROAS Engine
This account’s non-branded search campaigns are delivering the highest ROAS. But too many ecommerce advertisers ignore search or only run branded campaigns.
Here’s what we recommend.
Segment Branded vs Non-Branded
Always run branded search separately and aim for:
ROAS: 1,000%+
Impression share: 95%+
For non-branded search, we run several types of campaigns:
Product Campaign
The core non-branded search campaign. Start by using keyword insights from your Performance Max and Standard Shopping campaigns to seed your search keywords.
Broad Match Strategy
Start with phrase and exact match. Once that’s working well, launch broad match in a separate campaign. Surprisingly, broad match is working great lately, sometimes even better than phrase and exact.
Competitor Campaign
Target exact competitors’ brand terms (but don’t include their name in your ad copy). You’ll get lower quality scores, but returns can still be solid.
Dynamic Search Ads
We use DSA campaigns strictly for discovery. Keep budgets low, monitor search terms weekly, and mine new keywords to build out your core campaigns.
Bid Strategy Portfolios
Group your non-brand campaigns into a bid strategy portfolio. This lets the algorithm share conversion data across campaigns and optimise more effectively.
Display Campaign: Only for Retargeting
We don’t run cold traffic through Google Display Network. Instead, we use a single campaign segmented into funnel stages:
Homepage visitors
Category page visitors
Product page visitors
Cart abandoners
Previous purchasers
Each segment is its own ad group, and we exclude deeper funnel audiences from higher funnel ad groups to avoid overlap.
Attach your product feed so that ads dynamically show the exact products people viewed.
Keep budgets tight and use maximise conversions bidding (or Target ROAS if you’ve got the volume). Manage ROAS by adjusting the daily budget. Lower budget = higher ROAS (usually).
YouTube Ads: Embrace the Funnel
We’re running both cold and retargeting campaigns with video.
Key learning: Video ads are top-of-funnel. Expect a lower ROAS, but they’re fantastic for filling the pipeline.
We run:
Creator Partnership Campaigns via Google’s Brand Connect. Great for scaling UGC-style content that already exists on YouTube Shorts.
Testing Campaigns to try different creatives and audiences.
Winner Campaigns where we scale the best combos of creative + audience.
Advanced Tactics to Boost Performance
Here are two final strategies this client used that helped us scale so successfully:
1. Geographic Expansion
They started in New Zealand, then expanded to Australia, the US, the UK, and Canada. Campaigns are duplicated and localised for each region.
2. Product Launches
They continuously launch and test new products, giving us new content to work with and new categories to scale.
Conclusion
This client’s results, 700%+ ROAS at $100K/month spend, aren’t magic. They come from:
Smart campaign structure (core, new customer, best performers, special category)
Proper segmentation in search campaigns
Creative management within Performance Max and display
Knowing when and where to bid more or less aggressively
Constant iteration, optimisation, and keyword mining
If you’ve got a solid product and a growth mindset, these strategies will help you scale, too.