How to Use Ads

Last updated: 9 January 2024

This feature is still in beta mode, and is only available to selected sellers.

Choosing the right bidding type can help you achieve your business goals. You have the option to use Shopee’s Auto Bidding feature or select Manual Bidding to manually set up your Shop Ads keywords and cost-per-click (CPC) bids by yourself.

What is Auto Bidding for Shop Ads?

1. With Auto Bidding*, Shopee will manage your keywords and CPC bid for you based on your ROAS target so you no longer have to 
2. Shopee will automatically match your Shop Ad with keywords searched by shoppers or to relevant shoppers browsing to find products similar to yours across the platform. 
3. Your bid prices are determined by the likelihood of your ad driving sales
4. When there is a strong possibility of a shopper making a purchase, a higher bid is set to increase your ad’s visibility. Conversely, if the likelihood of your ad converting into a sale is low, the bid may be lowered.if it appears that your ad may not lead to a sale, the bid may be lowered
5. The bid prices are determined to provide a healthy Return On Advertising Spend (ROAS) for your ad

Note*: When Auto Bidding is selected, Audience Targeting option will not be available 

Who should use Auto Bidding?

Choose Auto Bidding if you are:

1. New to Shop Ads, or to Shopee ads in general
2. Unsure about which keywords to select and the right bid price to set and prefer a hassle-free experience when setting up your ads
3. Do not have the time to monitor performance and optimise manual keywords bids
4. Unsure about how to optimse your Return On Advertising Spend (ROAS)

How do I get started on Auto Bidding? 

When creating your Shop Ad, you may select Auto Bidding under the Bidding Method section. With Auto Bidding, Shopee will help you bid for keywords automatically.

1. You also have the option to let Shopee set the optimal ROAS target automatically or set your Custom* ROAS target

* Currently only available for whitelisted sellers

What is Manual Bidding for Shop Ads?

1. With Manual Bidding, you have full control over selecting your keywords and setting your own bid prices 
2. Shopee will match your Shop Ad with keywords searched by shoppers with the keywords that you have bidded on.
3. You will be able to adjust your bid prices based on the performance of the keywords

How do I get started on Manual Bidding?

1. Select Manual Bidding 
2. Click on Add Keywords 
3. Add your selected keywords
4. Choose the Match type for each keyword
5. Set the Bid Price for each keyword, you can refer to the Suggested Bid Price to benchmark the bid price if you are unsure of what bid price to set

How can I better set up and optimise my Shop Ads?

It is highly recommended that you run your ad for a minimum of 2 weeks without making any changes to your ad settings to gather an adequate amount of data before optimising your ad.

When setting up your Shop Ad:

1. Ensure sufficient ads credit in your ads balance to allow your ads to run for at least 2 weeks (Daily budget x 14 days)
2. Use Broad match for keywords to enhance visibility of your Shop Ads across more search queries
3. Use more than 10 keywords with high search volume and high relevance to your shop to

To monitor and improve performance of your manual keywords for your Shop Ad, here are some factors you can consider: 

To increase exposure

Monitor these metrics for your Shop Ads, on both ad and keyword level: 

1. Impressions and Clicks to understand how effective your Shop Search Ad is at driving exposure and traffic to your shop

1. If you experience low Impressions:
2. Add keywords with high search volume and high relevance to your shop
3. Switch keyword match type to Broad Match (if you are using Exact Match) to increase the probability of your Shop Ad showing up
4. Increase bid prices gradually for keywords with zero impressions, and consider removing if there is no improvement in impressions or if the cost exceeds your budget

1. If you experience low clicks:
2. Review your Shop Ads’ picture and tagline to ensure that it is relevant to the keywords you bidded for
3. Consider removing keywords or lower bid prices gradually for keywords with low clicks and impressions

To increase profit

Monitor these metrics for your Shop Ads, on both ad level and keyword level:

1. GMV to see the sales revenue from your Shop Search Ad.
2. ROAS to understand which keywords are bringing revenue effectively per dollar spent on advertising.

How to optimise your Shop Search Ads if profit is your goal:

a. For keywords with high ROAS

1. Maintain competitive bid price to ensure your Shop Ad displays on the corresponding ad locations. You can track the trend of Impressions over time to check if your ad is being shown. 
2. If your Shop Ad is not showing, consider bidding more competitively and monitor if the number of impressions improves. Use the suggested bid price as a benchmark to understand how other sellers are bidding.

b. For keywords and discovery locations with low ROAS:

1. Switch keyword match type to Exact Match (if you are using Broad Match) to restrict the display of your Shop Ad to only the specific keyword you are bidding on. 
2. Gradually lower the bid price to reduce your advertising costs. If your ROAS does not improve, consider removing the keyword.

c. For keywords with no ROAS

1. Monitor the trend of Impressions over the past 7 days 
2. If there are zero Impressions, your Shop Ad is likely not displaying. Consider increasing your keyword bid prices gradually to assess whether Impressions and ROAS improve
3. If there are Impressions but zero clicks, consider removing the keyword to reallocate your budget to other keywords

d. For low ROAS across all or most of your keywords

1. Review your product listings and ensure that they are appealing and relevant to your keywords
2. If product prices are too low to compensate for bidding costs, consider creating a new collection of higher-priced, popular products and using it as your landing page