1. Frederick Vallaeys

Short Bio: Frederick (Fred) Vallaeys is a Silicon Valley entrepreneur, author and leading influencer inpay-per-click search marketing. One of Google’s first 500 employees, he helped pioneer PPCmarketing as the company’s first AdWords Evangelist. Today he serves as Co-Founding CEO of Optmyzr, a leading and award-winning PPC management platform. A sought-after industry thought leader, he contributes to leading marketing publications and conferences, and is routinely called upon by journalists, writers and podcasters for his industry insight and vision.

1. What are the most important e-commerce advertising trends in 2022?

There is a trend towards ever-more automated search marketing driven by improvements in AI and machine learning. Google in particular is rapidly improving automated bidding which they call Smart Bidding and that helps advertisers with a target return on ad spend (tROAS) reach their goals better. 

And with the arrival of Performance Max campaigns that will replace Smart Shopping Campaigns, Google is also automating which products are shown to which users and what exactly appears in these ads. But all this automation comes with a loss of control and that is frustrating to many ecommerce advertisers.

2. What advertising strategies you've implemented till now gave you the best results?

The strategy that we’ve seen work well for most advertisers is based on Automation Layering, something I described extensively in my 2022 book “Unlevel the Playing Field, the Biggest Mindshift in PPC History”. The idea is that advertisers can maximize the benefits from advanced machine learning like smart bidding and Performance Max by overlaying their own controls on these systems. It’s been shown repeatedly that machines + humans are better than machines alone and Automation Layering is the strategy that allows advertisers to bring their unique insights, creativity and ability to contextualize information to improve the performance of the machines. It’s also a way to make sure that the outcomes are determined in part by advertiser rather than being completely determined by Google.

One example is to create multiple Performance Max campaigns where each campaign contains products based on a range of historical ROAS performance. Creating this structure that helps Google’s machine learning perform better is tedious when done manually but becomes quite easy when done with tools like Optmyzr’s Shopping Campaign Builder and Refresher. Then as the performance of a product changes, due to factors like sales or shifts in consumer behavior, these same automation layering tools can restructure the campaigns on the fly so that results continue to benefit from the advertiser’s own data.

3. Share with us some of your best-performing ads

Shopping Ads on Google are the clear winners when it comes to ecommerce advertisers we work with. And when advertisers have optimized their feed, set ROAS targets that factor in product margins, and use advanced conversion tracking systems like conversion value adjustments or conversion value rules, they see the best results.

2. Jessie Healy

Short Bio: Jessie Healy is an eCommerce Agency Founder & CEO at Webtopia and she advises eCommerce brands on how they can grow their profits through Social Media Advertising, Google Ads and Email Marketing. After years of running multi-million pound digital campaigns for the likes of Etsy, Future Publishing and Trinity Mirror, she got fed up with the status quo and set out to create her own ‘anti-agency’ Webtopia. She enjoys sharing her knowledge, actionable insights and strategies with audiences via events and podcasts.

1. What are the most important e-commerce advertising trends in 2022?

The biggest trend is for organic, tiktok style advertising created by real people using their phones, known as UGC ads. 

2. What advertising strategies you've implemented till now gave you the best results? 

We have always focussed on first principles - develop clear personas and craft your message to be relevant to them with a clear marketing hook that pulls them in. Your creative should visually illustrate that hook. 

3. Giles Thomas

Short Bio: Giles Thomas is a CEO at Whole Design Studio - Shopify design & marketing agency founded in 2012. It’s focused on growing eCommerce businesses and works with 100+ brands monthly. Their team of 35+ designers & marketers are experts in Shopify growth.

1. What are the most important e-commerce advertising trends in 2022?

A move away from unboxing / testimonial UGC to something more authentic, less scripted and less polished.

2. What advertising strategies you've implemented till now gave you the best results?

Very high tempo of creative testing in Meta. You can't sit on a winning creative for months on end anymore.

Perf Max on Google for Shopping ads. Basically still using Smart Shopping sneakily within Perf Max.

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4. Anders Hjorth

Short Bio: Anders Hjorth is a digital marketing strategist, writer and agency founder. He is the author of the State of Retail Media report, Search Strategies Report, the Amazon Marketing Report and of the ebook "Search Engine Advertising". He is the founder of Innovell, a Digital Marketing Insights consultancy researching trends in Digital Marketing.

1. What are the most important e-commerce advertising trends in 2022?

AI is getting better fast. We see it in the way platforms such as Amazon is capable of predicting which individual users are in the market

for certain products, and then propose them to advertisers as targetable audiences for their campaigns.

Tracking and measurement challenges are increasingly important. As cookies are ending and privacy measures are restricting tracking options, a lot more advertisers are beginning to accept that everything can't be tracked. In a funny way, this can have a positive impact on campaign outcome, as marketers are forced to build better strategies.

2. What advertising strategies you've implemented till now gave you the best results?

2-stage strategies where each stage has a distinct and exclusive objective are among the best current advertising strategies. The first stage is about reach and will test audience responsiveness and exclude existing brand audiences. The second stage is synchronized with the consideration period for a purchase and will focus on converting audiences exposed in stage 1 to strong sales-focused narrative and imagery.

3. Share with us some of your best-performing ads

In our current setup, our best performing ads for reaching new audiences are 30 second videos showing the advertised products in a functional setting to then expose the products features and end with a brand message and call-to action on the end card.

For conversion campaigns (stage 2), the best performing ads are those with the closest resemblance to product listings but where we insert real user reviews highlighting one or more of the product's USPs.

5. Dave Bryant

Short Bio: Dave Bryant has launched and sold multiple ecommerce brands and also runs the ecommerce blog and podcast ecomcrew.com.

1. What are the most important e-commerce advertising trends in 2022?

One of the biggest trends right now is turning to third party software to try and solve some of the reporting and conversion gaps that the iOS update created to 'complete the circle' so to speak. Also, we've seen advertising prices drop slowly as 2022 progresses.

2. What advertising strategies you've implemented till now gave you the best results?

We've been spending a lot of time on owned-media specifically stand-alone authority blogs we run and maintain. It helps lessen the unpredictability of ad prices and also is a long-term asset we get to create.

3. Share with us some of your best-performing ads‍‍

We're continuing to have a lot of luck with Free Plus Shipping offers. Our free offer is generally a product that we develop specifically in house for the goal of being able to offer it as a Free Plus Shipping offer. The primary goal is to get the person on to our email list but we also offer upsells during checkout as well.

6. Sergio Felix

Short bio: Sergio Felix is Paid Media Specialist & CEO at Felix Media and that help brands increase revenue through paid advertising. It can get overwhelming to think of how to profitably scale with paid media. People might not be sure of which platforms to advertise on, how to track the success of their paid campaigns, and what would be the best ad strategy for their business. Sergio is there to help you effectively spend your ad budget and scale your business with measurable marketing strategies that drive profitable results. When he’s not strategizing or managing ads for clients, he likes to go to the gym, hike, learn about crypto, read books, learn about real estate investing, or just hang out with friends and family in his home state of Arizona.

1. What are the most important e-commerce advertising trends in 2022?

A great ecom trend for 2022 and beyond is having the option to buy now and pay later. Especially if your ecom store has a higher average order value. This also improves conversion rate, which leads me to my next important trend. Conversion rate optimization is the probably the most important trend and will continue being important because you want your ecom store to convert your traffic at a higher percentage. I will also add augmented reality, if your product is a great fit for AR, I would take full advantage as more and more people are going to make decisions if they can see your product in AR.  

2. What advertising strategies you've implemented till now gave you the best results?

The best advertising strategy I have done involved both facebook and Google running with a full funnel strategy. For example, on Facebook I will create a campaign for awareness, consideration, and decision (ready to buy) and on Google I will create any search intent campaigns or at least a branded term campaign. 

I think using both platforms sets you up for success, because social helps build awareness for the product and search allows to capture any traffic that is found out about the ecom brand. 

3. Share with us some of your best-performing ads.

The best performing ads by far have been a smart google shopping campaign, once you have enough data, Google does a really great job of optimizing to show to the right audience with the right keywords. Optimizing your google merchant center to have a high percentage of approved products, good titles, and have products categorized for Google will set you up for success. Another best performing ad is setting up a dynamic catalog ad on Facebook/Instagram for remarketing. This will show people what they added to cart along with similar products in a catalog. 

To Wrap Up

With predicted CAGR of 14.7% from 2020 to 2027 in eCommerce niche, only businesses that are adapting fast are going to survive this period.

It’s up to you to use these great experts’ advice, learn from it and implement it within your strategy to get a real benefit from this roundup.

We hope you enjoyed these expert insights, and we hope they gave you a better understanding and ideas about paid ads strategies in eCommerce  that you’re going to implement immediately.