Dynamic Product Ads:How to optimize your campaigns during set-up

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Contents

Introduction ....................................................................................................................................... 3

Executive summary .................................................................................................................... 4

Key events .......................................................................................................................................... 5

Target audience.............................................................................................................................. 7

Deep links ............................................................................................................................................ 9

Product catalog .............................................................................................................................. 11

Ad frequency .................................................................................................................................... 13

The road ahead .............................................................................................................................. 14

With more personalized ads appearing on our screens year-over-year, user expectations have drastically changed. Few users will still respond to one-size-fits-all ads cluttering their screen space, so it’s important to offer an experience tailored to their individual needs. In this e-book, we’ll show you how to optimize your campaigns when implementing Dynamic Product Ads (DPAs).

With the right resources, any marketer can set up DPAs, but it’s how those ads are incorporated into an air-tight strategy that makes them successful. Take Booyah for example, the Denver-based digital agency who decreased cost per order by 71% with DPAs; or CPC Strategy, who found that clients increased ROAS by almost 250% with DPAs. Behind these results are savvy marketers who, prior to implementation, roadmapped how this technology could assist their needs. There are four key components that you need to understand when incorporating DPAs into your marketing strategy: your key events (what you’ll track), your target audience (who you’re targeting), your product catalog (what you’re advertising) and deep links (how the user will find what you’re advertising). This e-book explores best practices and common pitfalls for each component.

Introduction

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When defining key events, you need to become a “product person.” Before your DPAs can be implemented, you must define each stage of the user funnel and ensure that each step is tracked using the correct parameters.

A marketer can’t get far without a target audience. In the case of DPAs, it’s important to build your hypothesis upfront to evaluate success efficiently. Fortunately, this step is familiar territory for marketers experienced in retargeting campaigns.

Using deep links to simplify the path to purchase is an essential part of your DPA set-up. For this, you need to set up deep links for each stage in the user funnel.

Ensure that the heavy lifting, such as connecting the user to a specific product, is manageable on a large scale. For this, you need to set up your catalog to update automatically.

Nobody likes to feel like they’re being followed by an ad, so remember this when deciding to serve DPAs. Be sure to monitor and control the frequency of your ads.

Executive summary

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Key events

As a marketer, it’s your job to understand your product and identify the main funnels you want users to follow. Only then can you calculate the potential value of the users you have acquired, and DPAs are no exception. As a golden rule, marketers should define each stage of the user funnel and ensure they are tracking every step with the correct parameters before spending a cent on DPAs.

Parameters are dynamic macros used to deliver raw data via real-time callbacks (here’s our documentation to get you up to speed). Custom parameters, such as “product id,” can also be set to receive specific information for targeting purposes. Without this, you’re failing to identify every way you can (and should) be retargeting users. This oversight prevents marketers from utilizing the dynamic capabilities of DPAs – which is where you can leverage your understanding of your product from the beginning.

Start by defining your funnel, ensuring you have parameters for each step. Here’s an example of how this could look for an e-commerce app:

When defining key events, marketers need to become a “product person”

CHECKOUT

ADD TO CART

VIEW PRODUCT IN DETAIL

BROWSING PRODUCTS

User funnel

Contextual information

Category (e.g. male, shoes etc.)

Product ID

Price

Size, color, etc.

Time added

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As marketers will be aware, those who have added items to their cart are further down the funnel than those who have only browsed products – a simple yet essential logic that must be applied to your DPAs. This contextual information identifies users at different stages of the funnel, optimizing the targeting capabilities of your DPAs.

The immediate benefit of this practice is that your DPAs can distinguish and retarget users who are more likely to convert, targeting low-hanging fruit to optimize ROI. Although the steps in your funnel may differ, tracking each stage of the funnel is a must, regardless of vertical. Case in point: the Gaming app vertical. Two gamers who churn will appear equally likely to be retained unless you’re tracking the right contextual information. Distinguishing users that churned at level 10 from users who churned at level 3 allows your DPAs to target users most likely to reopen the app or reinstall, thus allowing you to optimize ROI.

It also ensures your DPAs present users hyper-relevant creative based on contextual information tied to that user. (We’ll cover this in more detail on page 10, where we explore the uses of a product catalog).

Tracking granular information can also be used to increase advertising relevancy and identify areas of improvement, such as where the most users drop off.

As you’ll see in our next section, tracking key events enables you to define the audience you want to target.

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Target audience

Understanding the technical process of setting up DPAs is paramount, but you won’t get far without a target audience. Just like retargeting with static ads, it’s important to learn which metrics to improve on (session time, retention, revenue, etc.). You also need to establish a baseline for organic and paid users.

When targeting users with DPAs, your choice of audience must be informed by sessions and conversion data. You can increase ROI by analyzing the actions you want users to take and learning the signals that indicate a user has lapsed. This can be done via cohort analysis for paid and organic users.

First, you need to establish a baseline for organic users. By tracking relevant events, your data can reveal metrics such as how long it takes to convert from step A to B, step B to C, and the conversion rate for each step. This should be performed for paid and organic users, (and could be performed region by region, by acquisition cohorts, etc.), giving you a point to compare. This analysis will inform how your DPAs can be implemented for best results.

Build your hypothesis upfront to evaluate success efficiently

CHECKOUT

ADD TO CART

VIEW PRODUCT IN DETAIL

BROWSING PRODUCTS

User funnel

Conversion rates

90%

80%

15%

5%

As a simplified example, let’s say these are your conversion rates (from step to step) for users who have had your e-commerce app for two days:

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But on day 3, only 2% of users with items in their cart complete the purchase. This metric informs the optimal setting for your time-sensitive trigger (mentioned earlier). If you see that the majority of users checkout within two days of adding to their cart, setting your DPAs to trigger before day 2 wouldn’t make sense. (In fact, you’d be paying additional ad spend for a conversion that may have happened anyway.) But optimizing the conversion step from “add to cart” to “checkout” after day 2 could more than double the number of purchases.

With a defined target audience and event tracking in place, the next challenge is connecting users with the relevant in-app destinations using deep links.

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Deep Links

When implementing DPAs, think of deep links as your users’ yellow brick road. Without them, your app is an unfamiliar place where the user must work hard to convert. Your deep link paths must be intuitive and easy to navigate, leading users to the exact point in your funnel where they lapsed. Having defined each stage of the funnel, you now need to ensure that users can be deeplinked to every relevant in-app location.

Using our earlier e-commerce example, this means the user must have pathways to their cart, specific product pages, and checkout. No matter what your vertical, your key events and contextual information will highlight the areas your users may need to access.

Using deep links to simplify the path to conversion

CHECKOUT

ADD TO CART

VIEW PRODUCT IN DETAIL

BROWSING PRODUCTS

User funnel

Contextual information

Category (e.g. male, shoes etc.)

Product ID

Price

Size, color, etc.

Time added

“Deep links send users straight to specific locations, saving users the time and energy spent locating a particular page themselves – significantly improving the user experience.”

- Adjust | Mobile Marketing Glossary

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User 1(App installed)

User 2(App not installed)

App store

CART

CARTYOUR CART

AD

YOUR CART

AD

It’s an essential practice to prepare for any reason your links wouldn’t function. For example, deep linking to an in-app location only works when the user has the app. For this, you need deep links that can send the user to the relevant page in the store. The genius of deferred deep linking is that once installed, it can take a user to the desired in-app location upon opening your app.

How to make sure your links function

Deep linking is a complex process, but a necessary step in making sure users aren’t left in the dark. Adjust can help you at every step (learn more here). We also have an ebook designed to

help marketers learn all about the uses and implementation of deep links.

Now that your users can easily return to any step in the user funnel, the next challenge is building a product catalog that ensures users are served relevant creative.

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Product catalog

Your product catalog is essentially your retargeting cookbook, giving your ad partner all the necessary ingredients. It needs to include all the basic information, such as product name and ID, as well as everything relevant to your corresponding DPA, such as ad copy, ad images and the correct deep link.

With your campaign running, here’s how DPA creative is sourced for ad inventory:

The user enters an ad partner’s app and the contextual information, used to identify the user’s previous intent, is sent to the server.

The server then pulls the relevant row from your product catalog, which includes ad copy, ad images, the correct deep link, and so on.

Your campaign settings determine whether the ad should be served (for example, when the user has not completed their purchase within two days).

The in-app dynamic product ad is delivered. If the user clicks on your ad, they will be deep linked to the specific product in your app. If they have uninstalled the app, they will be deferred to the app store, then taken to the correct in-app location upon opening the app.

Set up and periodically update your catalog

+ Product ID+ User ID+ Size+ Color

User Product

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Server

AD

+ Size+ Color

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Product catalog

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Just like with deep links, it’s smart to make allowances for every scenario that may occur at this stage. When building your product catalog, there are several fallbacks that need to be considered. For example, what happens when you’re retargeting a user but the product added to their cart has sold out? To avoid this, create an update loop that includes vital information (such as stock amount) on a regular basis. However, that doesn’t make retargeting this user redundant. Your product catalog can be used to refer them to a similar product (e.g., in a different color) or an associated product.

Similarly, if a product is almost out of stock, this can be displayed on your DPA to remind the user to convert before it’s too late. Automating these processes as much as possible offers your retargeted users a seamless experience with hyper-relevant content.

Consider the fallbacks specific to your app

Building your product catalog will take a lot of work initially, which is why it’s important to automate the process at every opportunity. You should also give your event data to networks a few weeks ahead of running your campaigns.

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Ad frequency

We’ve covered the who, what, where and how of DPAs, but hyper-relevant ads also require a certain mindset. Because you are delivering ads that have a calculated value to the user, it’s important not to be overly aggressive in your approach. Imagine this were a face-to-face scenario, where a returning customer (who had previously shown interest in a product) enters a store. How often can customer services mention this product before the value of their service diminishes? One too many attempts can frustrate the customer, creating a negative user experience – and this also applies to DPAs.

To avoid this, there are a few things to keep in mind about the user experience when setting up your campaigns.

1. DPAs perform best when they serve as a genuine reminder for users, such as “your new sneakers are still in your cart” or “last chance to book those flights to Hawaii.”

2. Judging the optimal ad frequency ensures that your campaign is of service to the user, not just the advertiser.

3. Just like with frequency caps on push notifications (which should be used to avoid irritating users), capping the frequency of your DPAs maintains their relevance and provides a user experience which will translate into greater success for your campaigns.

Hyper-relevant ads should serve the user – not just the advertiser

DPAs are now standard practice in mobile marketing, meaning users are exposed to them multiple times every day. Using them to enhance the user experience, rather than to intrude, will allow you to gain loyal customers and reap long-term rewards.

The road ahead

In Nicole Martin’s TEDx talk, “Bridging the gap: Personalized marketing”, the digital marketing expert explains that 94% of marketers believe personalization is critical to their current and future success. From this, we can draw two conclusions. Firstly, users and marketers alike expect ads to be hyper-relevant – this is now the standard, not a step above. Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, that means your competitors are already personalizing the user experience, even if you aren’t.

By incorporating DPAs into your overall marketing strategy, you’re keeping up with mobile marketing’s rapid pace and challenging your competition. That means considerably strengthening your marketing arsenal, improving the user experience and simplifying the path to purchase. With DPAs in your playbook, you have everything you need to push forward with your most ambitious targets.

To find out more about how Adjust can help you with dynamic product ads, get in contact with our team.

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