How moving up the funnel can build smarter campaigns

E-commerce marketers face a lot of pressure to show immediate results. This often leads to optimizing solely on lower-funnel conversion objectives such as “add to cart” and “complete payment.” This kind of singular focus can result in limited short-term returns and difficulties with scale over longer periods of time.

By moving towards a mid-funnel strategy and launching traffic campaigns initially optimized toward clicks, marketers can take advantage of performance signals, providing the auction platform with learnings that can in turn increase conversion optimizations in lower-funnel campaigns.

In this article, we’ll look at an e-commerce brand that did just that. Through mid-funnel traffic campaigns, this brand was able to scale their lower funnel conversion activity and maintain an efficient cost per result.

Case Study: Beauty e-commerce brand scales with custom audiences

Wonderskin, an e-commerce brand in the makeup and beauty space, looked to upscale their performance investment by maximizing the total of “complete payment” actions on their campaigns. They knew peak gifting season was fast approaching, but without better audience targeting, their aggressive goals would be out of reach.

To ramp up performance, the brand was guided by their Client Solutions Manager (CSM) at TikTok to first launch a traffic-focused campaign, optimized towards clicks. This strategy opened up the possibility to scale their conversion campaign activity on subsequent campaign flights. By targeting a broad audience with their traffic campaign, the brand built up prospects for their conversion campaigns, all within TikTok Ads Manager.

Using three different user engagement metrics, Wonderskin and their TikTok CSM created auto-refreshed custom audiences. These audiences powered three distinct ad groups in their conversion campaigns, with each ad group aligned with engagement metrics from the traffic campaign:

▸ Page View

▸ Clicked (180d)

▸ Video Views 100% (180d)

Wonderskin retargeted these audiences with custom creative designed for their engagement experience and prior exposure to the brand through the traffic campaign. This strategy allowed them to drastically scale their level of investment for their best performing campaigns.

As a result, conversion campaign investment grew by 3x over the course of the two-month campaign,* while also improving cost efficiency with an 8% lower cost per acquisition (CPA).

Key takeaways

▸ Traffic campaigns focused on engagement provide valuable information that can directly inform ad creation and help to develop custom audiences.

▸ Retargeting segmented audience groups, when combined with custom content and messaging, offers stronger opportunities for conversion rate success.

▸ Programs that take time to develop audience learnings, to inform conversion-focused strategy and spend, are easier to scale and can see increased conversion and more efficient CPAs.

TikTok is an impactful platform for e-commerce brands across all stages of the marketing funnel. Brands that work closely with their Client Solutions Manager to maximize the features and capabilities of TikTok Ads Manager see powerful results.

Ready to aim for your target? Learn more about custom audiences in our Business Help Center.

*Campaign took place through November - December 2021.