Retention goals widen, percentage multipliers arrive

Retention goals, three modes

"Following successful betas," the article says, retention goals are becoming "available more broadly across campaigns." It names three modes:

• Re-engagement Mode prioritizes "customers that haven't placed an order in a while, while still running your ads for your main target audience."
• Loyalty Mode is for members of your customer loyalty programs. It's "built to allow you to show member-only pricing, or specific messages."
• Retention Only Mode runs campaigns "fully dedicated to customer retention, only reaching the key segments of your customer base that you specify."

The help page explains how lapsed customers get defined: you decide what counts as lapsed, and you can upload lists of those customers and assign them a higher bid value using Customer Match.

High Value Mode in Shopping

New Customer High Value Mode already ran in Search and Performance Max. It's rolling out this month in Shopping campaigns. The help page describes it as bidding "higher for high value new customers than regular new customers and existing," on Target ROAS or Maximize conversion value, with at least one Purchase conversion goal required.

Percentage multipliers

The article says that with products that range in value, "a flat dollar boost for your bids might not always give you the right balance." Percentage multipliers, "a new option from beta," scale with the cart instead. Google's example: a shop sets a 20% (1.2x) boost so it can "bid just as aggressively for a $500 cart as they would for a $50 cart."

The article does not say which bid strategies or lifecycle settings the multiplier works with.

The help page hasn't caught up

Google's "About customer lifecycle goals" page still lists High Value New Customer for Performance Max and Search only, and Re-engagement for Performance Max only. It doesn't mention percentage multipliers or a Retention Only Mode.

What I'd do with it

This is my advice, not Google's.

Before you turn on Re-engagement or Retention Only, look at the customer lists behind them. The help page says you define who counts as lapsed and can upload those customers as Customer Match lists, so an old list means bidding on the wrong people.

Be careful with Retention Only Mode. By the article's own description it only reaches the segments you specify, so run it as a separate campaign next to your normal ones, not in place of them.

If you already use a flat dollar value for new customers and your order sizes vary a lot, test the percentage multiplier on one campaign first and compare it with the flat value over a full conversion cycle.

In Shopping, High Value Mode is worth a look if you already run New Customer Value there and can tell high value customers apart in your own data.