Performance marketing ยท Shopping and Performance Max ads
Shopping and PMax Run on Margin, Not Clicks.
Feeds, structure and reporting on margin. Google Shopping and Performance Max, run for profit and not just revenue.
Feeds, structure and reporting on margin. Google Shopping and Performance Max, run for profit and not just revenue.
Google Shopping and Performance Max sell products straight from search results and across Google's channels, and the product feed decides how well they perform.
Route Ignite builds the feed, structures the campaigns and reports on margin, so you see which products earn their ad spend and which only look busy.
We are a Google Partner and have worked on 150+ Shopify stores, so feed and catalogue problems are familiar ground.
When someone searches for a product, Google shows a row of product ads with image, price and store name above the text results. For many ecommerce categories, that row captures a large share of clicks, and the shopper arrives already knowing the product and price.
That makes Shopping one of the most direct routes from search to sale. It also makes it unforgiving. The ad is built from your product data, so the quality of that data decides everything.
Titles, images, categories and attributes in your Merchant Center feed decide when and where your products appear. A title missing the words shoppers use means you do not show for those searches. A wrong category puts you in front of the wrong audience.
We clean and enrich the feed first, because incomplete data silently suppresses products. Many stores are paying for ads while a share of their catalogue is not eligible to show at all.
| Standard Shopping | Performance Max | |
|---|---|---|
| Where it shows | Product ads in Google search and Shopping | Search, Shopping, YouTube, Display, Gmail, Discover and Maps |
| Control | More control over products and queries | More automation, less visibility |
| Creative needed | Product feed only | Feed plus images, video, headlines and descriptions |
| Best for | Clear control and reporting | Reach and scale with enough conversion data |
| Risk | Limited reach | Spend drifting to low-value placements and branded searches |
Performance Max is powerful and opaque. It decides for itself where to show your ads across Google's channels. That can find customers you would never have targeted, and it can also spend on things that look like conversions and are not.
We structure it so you can see what it is doing, protect branded searches from being claimed as new customers, and guide it with asset groups built around real product themes.
Most stores group products by category because that is how the catalogue is arranged. Profit does not follow categories. A best-seller with thin margin and a slow item with fat margin deserve different treatment.
We split campaigns and product groups by margin and demand, so bids and budgets follow profit. That is how Shopping stops being a revenue chart and becomes a profit tool.
Return on ad spend can look healthy while the business loses money on returns, discounts and low-margin items. We report with margin in mind wherever your data allows.
Our post on ROAS versus POAS explains why the difference matters. When we can see product costs, we report profit on ad spend, not just revenue.
Shopping depends on a healthy Merchant Center account: verified website, correct shipping and returns information, valid structured data and a feed that updates reliably.
We set this up and monitor it, because a suspended account or a broken feed stops sales without any warning in the ad account.
They work best for ecommerce stores with a clean catalogue. If you sell a few high-value services instead, Search and lead generation will usually serve you better, and we will tell you so.
For stores that also run Meta, we look at both together, so Google and Meta are not both claiming credit for the same sale.
| Step | What happens | What you get |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Feed and account audit | We review Merchant Center, the feed and existing campaigns | A list of suppressed products and fixes |
| 2. Feed rebuild | Titles, images and attributes improved | A catalogue Google can match to searches |
| 3. Campaign structure | Products grouped by margin and demand | A structure built for profit |
| 4. Launch and learn | Campaigns live with brand exclusions and assets | Early results against a clear plan |
| 5. Optimise | Weekly review of products, queries and placements | Reporting on margin, not just revenue |
We cannot promise a return on ad spend before a catalogue has run. Margin, competition and demand all move the number.
We promise a clean feed, a structure that follows profit and reporting that shows you what each product actually earned.
Shopping shows product ads in search. Performance Max runs across Search, Shopping, YouTube, Display and more from one campaign, using automation to decide where to show.
Yes. It is where your product feed lives. We can set it up and connect it.
Yes. We have worked with 150+ Shopify stores, and the Shopify and Google integrations are a common starting point.
By structuring asset groups carefully, using brand exclusions and reviewing placements and search terms regularly.
Often feed problems: missing attributes, disapprovals or poor titles. A feed audit usually finds them.
Shopping is for products. For services, Search and lead generation usually fit better.
It can produce sales within days of launch, but optimisation takes weeks of data.
Yes. Feed management is a core part of the work.
Tell us what's broken. We'll tell you whether we're the right people to fix it, and if we're not, we'll say so.