Customer retention in Google Ads is designed to drive customer loyalty and high lifetime value (LTV) within your business. This will offer multiple settings within Performance Max and Shopping campaigns, allowing you to target specific segments of existing customers. Customer retention for loyalty program members is available in both Performance Max and Shopping campaigns currently. Re-engagement is available only in Performance Max campaigns currently but will soon be available for Shopping campaigns.
Benefits
- Reduced churn rates: By re-engaging lapsed customers, you can minimize customer churn and improve customer LTV.
- Increased customer loyalty: Successful retention campaigns can reignite customer interest, leading to increased brand loyalty.
- Complements acquisition efforts: The retention goal works effectively alongside the Customer Acquisition (NCA) goal to create a well-rounded customer lifecycle strategy.
Before you begin
To use customer retention, make sure the following are in place:
- Performance Max campaign: You'll need a Performance Max campaign.
- Customer Acquisition in New Customer Value setting: Your Performance Max campaign must be optimizing toward the NCA goal in New Customer Value setting.
- Customer Match lists: Prepare Customer Match lists containing the lapsed customers you want to reach. Learn how to Create a customer list.
Only campaigns that meet the criteria above are eligible for the retention settings.
How to use customer retention
Activate re-engagement
- Create or select an existing Performance Max campaign that meets all of the following criteria:
- Optimizes toward purchase conversion goals
- Uses NCA in the New Customer Value setting
- Upload at least one Customer Match list containing lapsed customer data using the following instructions on using Customer Match. You can upload multiple lists for refined targeting.
- Go to Campaigns within the Campaigns menu
.
- Select the Performance Max campaign that meets the criteria in step 1.
- Select the Settings tab.
- Select Customer retention.
- Enable customer retention.
- Select Set up.
- Set the value of a lapsed customer. This value reflects the worth of a lapsed customer to your business.
- Note: This value should usually sit between your typical new customer value and existing customer value.
- Select the relevant customer match lists for lapsed customers and existing customers, if applicable.
- Select Save.
.Activate loyalty program member
To use customer retention for loyalty program members, you’ll need to upload and maintain Customer Match lists that represent your program members and add and maintain your loyalty program benefits in the Google Merchant Center feed. From there, you can activate customer retention for loyalty program members in Google Ads by following the steps below.
- Go to Campaigns within the Campaigns menu
- Select the Performance Max or Shopping campaign you’d like to update.
- From the Settings tab, find the Customer retention section.
- Under Loyalty program members, you can check one or both of the following:
- Show member benefits to loyalty program members in eligible countries: This setting showcases your loyalty program benefits, like price and shipping, on Shopping ads. Choosing this option as a default is recommended for all of your campaigns.
- Bid higher for loyalty program members: With this setting, your campaign can bid more competitively to show ads to your loyalty program members. Choose this setting only if you'd like to optimize your campaign towards loyalty program members by bidding higher towards them. Because nurturing loyalty program members is an always-on strategy, this setting is recommended.
- Select Save.
You can also make changes to benefits and bidding for multiple campaigns using bulk edits. After you’ve set up your goals, review the advice in Loyalty program member best practices.
Monitor your performance
Review reporting details for re-engaged and lapsed customers
Review the re-engagement ratio (lapsed customers re-engaged / total number of customers driven from the retention campaign) in your analytics platform to assess the effectiveness of your retention campaign.
Adjust your strategy, budgets, and lapsed customer value as needed to optimize results.
Review reporting details for loyalty program members
You can evaluate the success of your campaigns by leveraging Google Ads reporting or by conducting optimization experiments in Google Ads. Learn more about measurement and loyalty program members.
Best practices
Review the following best practices for re-engaged and lapsed customers. If you’re setting up customer retention for loyalty program members, visit Loyalty program member best practices
- Provide accurate values: Assign realistic values to new, existing, and lapsed loyalty customers to help Google Ads optimize bidding strategies.
- Allocate sufficient budget: Increase your budget by at least 20% initially to accommodate the focus on previously inactive customers.
- Iteratively refine: Continuously monitor performance and adjust your strategy as needed for optimal results.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Should I use customer retention with my Customer Acquisition setting?
Yes, it’s highly recommended. Customer retention complements the NCA setting by allowing you to target all stages of the customer lifecycle within a single Performance Max campaign. Both NCA and customer retention will enable you to steer AI towards your most valuable customer segments.
How do I know if my re-engagement or lapsed customer retention campaign is successful?
Measure your re-engagement ratio (lapsed customers re-engaged / total customers from the campaign) on your analytics platform along with other relevant metrics to track the effectiveness of your efforts.
How do I know if my retention campaign for loyalty program members is successful?
You can review presets and your Product Promotions reporting to determine how loyalty annotations are serving, or by conducting optimization experiments for performance comparisons. It’s recommended that you focus primarily on conversions and conversion value as your primary performance indicators, although you can review additional performance metrics like impressions and clicks, for a well-balanced picture of your campaign’s success.
My business doesn't track purchases with Google Ads conversion tracking. Can I still use customer retention?
Yes, but you must manually upload and designate a Customer Match list as your lapsed customer list.
