Low eCommerce ROAS? 31 Tested Ideas to Boost Conversions

Wondering how to improve ROAS for your eCommerce store? Pick either of these two paths:

• Predictable: Inexpensive, on-site improvements that drive more repeat buyers, bigger carts, and better LTV
• Unpredictable: Expensive ad-side hacks that might pay off – but you’ll never really have control

We’ll cover both, but spoiler alert: the ‘Predictable’ path gives you control and consistent wins.

Here’s what we’ll cover: over 31 really smart ways to increase ROAS for your eCommerce store:

31 Tested Ideas To Increase Return On Ad Spend (ROAS)

On-Site Customizations to boost ROAS

1. Generate higher quality intent signals within the store

2. Optimize landing pages for ad traffic

3. Use tactical surveys to identify the best channels for ad spend

4. Get shoppers to spend more time on your site

5. Feed more UGC & founder-led content into the funnel

6. Make seasonal marketing *more exciting*

7. Start 1-click upsells post purchase

8. Optimize SEO to offset paid ad costs

9. Get your mobile optimization right

10. Incorporate key conversational commerce elements

11. Craft your value proposition with care

12. Make your UX super smooth

13. Target repeat customers more effectively

14. Convert first-time visitors

15. Personalize by tapping into geolocation

16. Use psychological nudges more strategically

17.  Feature offers that prompt purchases instantly

18. Optimize social proof display across the site

19. Don’t forget to tell a great story!

INCREASE ROAS WITH YOUR AD STRATEGY

20. Create lookalike audiences on high spenders

21. Supercharge your ad copy with emotional triggers

22. Creative testing > Audience testing

23. Perform A/B spend testing to improve ROAS

24. Use negative targeting to stop wasting spend

25. Scale your campaign structure to improve ad relevancy

26. Test ad placements like your margins depend on it

27. Test creatives on channels that demand smaller spends

28. Tighten geographic, device, and time-of-day targeting

29. Invest in lifetime value (LTV) modeling, not just ROAS

30. Blend paid with owned channels across campaigns

31. Get a jump on Google Shopping campaigns

Wait – What’s ROAS again?

ROAS is simply the revenue you make back for each dollar of ad spend (not to be confused with ROI, though, which measures the profitability against all the costs your business makes as a whole).

ROAS = Revenue ÷ Ad Spend (tracks top-line efficiency)

ROI = (Revenue – Total Cost) ÷ Total Cost (tracks real profit)

Do keep in mind: ROAS and ROI should both be calculated by campaigns. ROAS measures revenue, while ROI measures profitability.

What’s a good ROAS for eCommerce brands?

The average eCommerce ROAS benchmark? Anywhere above 2.05:1 (Firstpage). But averages lie. Ask yourself: Can you afford a 2:1 ROAS when your repurchase rate is zero?

So, a good ROAS depends on how much bank you make once shoppers land. This is why we begin with the inexpensive and predictable way (always the easiest lever to pull):

▶ On-Site Customizations to Improve ROAS

1. Generate higher quality intent signals within the store

Too many eCommerce stores end up spending $$$$ just because they’re depending heavily on how platforms read intent on their behalf. 

Instead: 1) create ways to generate intent signals within the store and 2) make ad platforms work with these intent signals more intelligently.

✔ Build your own zero-party intent signals: Use a number of different assets mapped to the customer journey to collect these signals (from funnel quizzes to pop-ups to exit-intent surveys). Instead of using exit-intent pop-ups as just email list building, use them as preference centers to sharpen targeting.

✔ Use server-side tracking & conversion API to pass stronger signals: Implement tools like Meta CAPI, Google Enhanced Conversions, TikTok Events API. WIth these, you can establish privacy-compliant ways of sending data on customer actions to ad platforms (instead of relying on pixels).

✔ Turn high-intent pages into audience sources: The idea is to stop running retargeting campaigns on “every site visitor”. Instead, look at the following:

Product pages → signal that a visitor is interested in a specific product / bundle.

Pricing pages (for higher-ticket eCommerce categories & products) → signal that they’re evaluating cost, a strong buying signal.

Cart or checkout pages → highest-intent signal available short of actually purchasing.

Here’s how intent signals can look like across product page and cart on an eCommerce store trying to manage its ad spending behavior:

2. Optimize landing pages for ad traffic 

Best-converting landing pages grab people's attention, explain why a product is great, and nudge shoppers to complete the purchase. Here are some ideas you can try to improve ROAS with your landing pages:

✔ Align messaging with ad: Consistency in messaging increases trust and reduces confusion.

✔ Implement subtle micro-interactions: Animated buttons, hover effects and interactive tooltips enhance user engagement.

✔ Feature relevant social proof: Display the right reviews to the right demographics and prioritize quantifiable data over generic statements. 

✔ Look at mobile-first design: A simple landing page design with a single powerful CTA as well as crisp forms that are super easy to fill. 

3. Use tactical surveys to identify the best channels for ad spend

The idea here is to stop relying on pixel data and third-party analytics to get your ad spend going in the right direction.

The more you power up first-party insights, the more you have direct understanding on how to tap into your best-performing channels. 

✔ Place surveys only at high intent touchpoints: Place a post-purchase survey on the thank-you page or in the order confirmation email. Keep it one-click: “Where did you first hear about us?” with options like Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, YouTube, Google, Referral, Other.

✔ Use sequenced and tactical questions: If you ask “What brought you here today?” to discover intent, ask “What made you decide to buy?” to then help them reveal the conversion trigger.

✔ Create channel performance dashboards by syncing survey results: If 35% of buyers say “TikTok” but you’re only allocating 10% of budget there, rebalance your spend immediately.

Here’s the visualization of a Thank You page tactical survey for a fashion brand, which leads with a channel-specific question and later follows up with “How would you describe your style?” and “What could we improve next time?” (the latter with an open field):

4. Get shoppers to spend more time on your site

Considering almost two-thirds of all shoppers resort to weekly online shopping, you’ve got a huge opportunity waiting to tap into to improve your eCommerce ROAS. As long as you’re able to increase the time on site (TOS) on your website. 

✔ Make UX on high intent pages shine: Amongst other things, that would mean getting social proof right on the homepage, filtering & sorting sharp on category pages, highlighting the most critical info across product pages and prioritizing a sense of safety & reassurance on the checkout page. 

✔ Showcase highly specific offers: Personalize them based on past browsing, buying and even cart abandoning behavior, apart from finetuning them in context to seasonal behavior as well. 

✔ Feature engaging product content: Right from benefits to FAQs to competitor comparison charts, your visitors will love you and even buy from you when they find what they want (and don’t forget to optimize SEO!)

✔ Use the right psychological nudges: Pick the right ones based on your findings by studying purchase data, customer feedback and on-site behavior. 

eCommerce brand Warby Parker ensures sharp UX on their website apart from creating nudges throughout that support customers in their journey towards better buying:

eCommerce brand Warby Parker ensures sharp UX on their website apart from creating nudges throughout that support customers in their journey towards better buying:

Further Reading: 29 Best Examples of Nudge Marketing in eCommerce

5. Feed more UGC & founder-led content into the funnel

The idea is to remember that both UGC and founder-led content humanize the brand — and in the long run, this is how you actually improve ROAS. 

This is why on platforms like TikTok and Instagram, ads that look like organic posts get better engagement rates and relevance scores. This can lower CPMs and CPCs. 

✔ Build on the “narrative” by aligning ads & landing pages: For example, if you run an ad, ensure the click lands on a page with the same UGC clip plus additional customer reviews and a short founder note.

✔ Compare “talking-head founder videos” vs. “quick customer unboxings” vs. “montage style with captions”: We suggest methodical testing with micro-budgets ($50–$100 each) to measure CTR and CPC before scaling.

✔ Build “content clusters” around product objections: Have the founder personally address these concerns in short videos. Alongside, collect UGC that shows the concerns being resolved across products (something like “I thought this bag would be heavy—it’s actually super light!”). 

GoPro has a robust UGC strategy, which they use funnel-wide, in interesting ways like holding contests and announcing winners like in the following Instagram post:

Pro Tip: Bring the most results-based content forward. The average shopper trusts “has helped 3000+ people with cleaner gut health” more than “3000 people have reviewed our product” especially when it comes from the horse’s (erm, founder’s) mouth!

6. Make seasonal marketing *more exciting*

Seasonal promotions, done the right way, can help attract more customers, increase sales, and maximize return on ad spend during key holiday events. 

✔ Offer quality content that helps quicker, quality purchases: Make marketing campaigns complement your on-site promotions and drive traffic to your website. Create blog posts, gift guides, or holiday-themed videos that reinforce the seasonal messaging.

✔ Create an upsell / cross-sell strategy: Focus on pushing out related products, accessories, or add-ons that complement customers' purchases. See how Wayfair does it for St. Paddy’s Day:

✔ Make gift cards stand out: Incorporate seasonal designs and themes that customers would love to send to friends & family. 

✔ Make price comparisons drive buying: Recommend multiple products of differing prices, and ensure to make better offers on quantity purchases, subscriptions etc. 

Further Reading: 32 Holiday Marketing Ideas for eCommerce Stores (2025 Update)

7. Start 1-click upsells post purchase

When you increase average order value (AOV) through post-purchase upsells, you can afford to pay more for customer acquisition — all this, while maintaining the same ROAS. 

If your AOV jumps from $50 to $75 through upsells, you can suddenly bid 50% more aggressively on ads and still hit your target cost per acquisition. 

✔ Offer quantity upgrades with volume discounts: "You just bought 1 bottle of our vitamin D3. Get 2 more bottles for 40% off & forget about running out." This works especially well for consumables and creates a natural repurchase cycle.

✔ Feature a premium version upgrade: After someone purchases your standard product, offer the deluxe version for the difference in price. "Upgrade to our Pro version for just $27 more and get these additional features..."

✔ Surface extended warranties / service plans: These have high margins and genuine value. Offer installation services, extended warranties, or maintenance packages that complement the main purchase.

8. Optimize SEO to offset paid ad costs

You can reduce your dependence on paid advertising, attract more targeted traffic to your site, and ultimately offset advertising costs with better SEO results.

✔ Aim to be featured in rich snippets: These are enhanced search results that provide immediate answers to user queries. Structure your content in a format that addresses common questions, FAQs, or "how-to" guides to increase the likelihood of being featured prominently in search results.

✔ Create content optimized for long-tail keywords: Hyper-specific, layered content helps to draw more traffic—so make sure your blogs are interlinked and you show targeted content across product & landing pages. 

✔ Localize to personalize: Optimize your website for local search by creating and optimizing Google My Business listings, local citations, and location-specific landing pages. 

✔ Build landing pages based on product comparisons: You can either feature charts comparing different products of the same theme from your own brand or compare with competitor products. 

eCommerce brand Vogue Candles features a number of product variations on their paid landing pages so that visitors can make their pick more easily without having to come back later:

9. Get your mobile optimization right

Many eCommerce brands forget that high intent traffic coming from ads have high expectations around a mobile experience. After all 66% of the eCommerce orders placed, come from mobile users.

To make your average ROAS for eCommerce grow with mobile optimization: 

✔ Opt for responsive design: This will automatically adjust and optimize the layout, content, and navigation based on the user's device screen size and orientation. 

✔ Prioritize hand gestures: Especially one-handed navigation that includes clicking, tapping and other actions like pinching, zooming etc. 

✔ Simplify forms: Make use of mobile HTML5 input types that naturally integrate keyboard methods, provide inline validation for instant error correction and break down complex sections with labels. 

✔ Minimize checkout steps: Provide one-click payment methods, feature social login options and fall back on a single page checkout with a progress bar. 

Further Reading: 30 Mobile Optimization Tips For eCommerce (+ Examples)

10. Incorporate key conversational commerce elements

In 2024, conversational commerce is more than simply adding a live chat on your homepage.

Here's how you can apply conversational advertising to improve ROAS:

✔ Embed a quiz that helps product discovery: For example, if you create custom-fit shirts, interested buyers would want their actual size to be replicated as closely as possible, or which a “What’s My Size” quiz can be highly beneficial to fetch style & fit recommendations. 

✔ Feature a “chat with an expert” functionality: This trumps a simple live chat functionality any day and helps build trust for audiences who may be relatively new to the brand. To improve UX, mention the expert’s name, what they do and how they can help in a blurb while the visitor waits to chat. 

✔ Show a Whatsapp chat widget: This is a key way of improving eCommerce return on ad spend by letting shoppers access a familiar channel of communication—since it’s more personal, more shoppers are likely to use it as well!

✔ Link to your community page: Feature it as a significant callout across product pages, as a prominent link on the footer as well as your loyalty program page. 

One eCommerce brand that’s high on conversational commerce is Begin Health, which creates prebiotics for kids—apart from a FAQ-enriched live chat (that also clearly mentions staff hours), the brand features links to active community groups on Facebook as well: 

Further Reading: Conversational Commerce: 21 Amazing Real-World Examples (eCommerce Brands)

11. Craft your value proposition with care

If shoppers are to consistently choose your brand from a sea of other competitors, you’ll have to clearly establish how you’re different and what you do differently.

That’s where how you craft your value proposition comes into the picture:

✔ Look into customer feedback to track repetitive pain points: This will reveal the kind of reassurances they’re looking for and what you can realistically state based on how you produce, curate or innovate. 

✔ Identify gaps in what competitors are selling: Getting a closer look at how competitor brands are positioning their products will tell you which unsaid factors to cover in your own communication. 

✔ Zero in on how your brand / products are different: Do you source your ingredients from ethically run farms? Do you have a policy of reusing materials that you end up not selling? 

✔ Drill it down to a hyper-specific message: Avoid generic ways of acknowledging what your brand is doing right and instead, focus on quantifiable information and facts to support your claims. 

Here’s a look at how eCommerce mattress brand has figured out measurable outcomes make potential shoppers interested—and how this in turn significantly improves their returns on ad spend:

12. Make your UX super smooth

There’s a reason why micro-conversions happen faster than conversions for a lot of clients we work with. 

And it tells a promising tale about how you can grow your ROAS while giving visitors ample opportunity to browse & buy:

✔ Sort out those landing pages first: Check if the ads you float are making visitors arrive at the right landing pages. Also check if elements like the hero image, the CTAs and trust signals are optimized. 

✔ Improve your main site’s loading speed: Bring in lazy loading, compressed images and get rid of redundant files, no matter which platform you’re using to host your eCommerce shop. 

✔ Make navigation simpler: Check if categorization is easy for shoppers to understand, transactional categories are higher up in hierarchy and if the site search function is optimal. 

✔ Pay special attention to the checkout flow: After a product is added to cart, find out how easy it is for shoppers to actually checkout—consider bringing in functionalities like express checkout on the product page itself, automatic discount application and auto form fillups where necessary.

13. Target repeat customers more effectively 

Repeat sales happening actually depend on how repeat customers feel about coming back to your store. 

And the more it is, the better are your profit margins, and the better your chances of offsetting your eCommerce ad spends. 

✔ Offer better value on subscriptions: For example, if your one-time purchases are available at $X, put a 20% discount on subscriptions and ensure you mention the value they’re deriving (“Valued at $200, subscribe for $170). 

✔ Talk about channel-specific deals: Increase the impetus of certain actions like email sign-ups and app downloads by declaring channel-only deals and discounts. 

✔ Have customer support stay up-to-date: You don’t want shoppers to repeat their pain points to customer support if they’re especially trying to resolve something across channels—so, maintain a centralized customer data platform and pick the right tool for omnichannel data integration. 

✔ Celebrate brand & customer milestones: Whether it’s your 10th year or the customer’s 2nd birthday spent buying with you, milestone offers go a long way in developing great relationships that in turn improve eCommerce ROAS considerably. 

Clothing brand The Limited is known to honor repeat customers by sharing special discounts on their birthdays:

Further Reading: 26 Brilliant Ways To Boost eCommerce Repeat Sales

14. Convert first-time visitors 

Every eCommerce brand knows how tough it can get to convince a potential customer to shop before they actually have—especially if they don’t have high intent or the brand operates in a crowded market. 

But to really max out on ROAS, it’s the first-time visitor you’ll need to court and coax into action:

✔ Focus on building trust: Since many of your first-time visitors won’t know your brand differently from competitors’, how you get them to see results, nudge them towards bestsellers and get their buy-in on your brand story becomes everything. 

✔ Let ‘em build their own bundle: Shoppers find more value in being able to make an informed choice when they’re first buying from a brand, making this a great starting point. 

✔ Feature first-time only offers: Mention it as microcopy on the product page or show it up as a pop-up when they first enter your site. 

✔ Make your welcome email powerful: Getting your first-time visitors to believe that you can be their go-to for a long time to come, is what will move them towards a purchase. 

Makeup brand Glossier sends welcome emails that tell first-time visitors what the brand’s vision is and what they can expect to get if they engage with the brand:

Further Reading: 18 Brilliant Ways To Convert First-Time Visitors Into Buyers (eCommerce)

15. Personalize by tapping into geolocation

This can especially make a fundamental difference to improving your eCommerce ROAS during high-spending seasons.

Localizing your selling efforts could mean a bunch of things, though we’ll suggest only those we’ve really seen fly with clients:

✔ Go hyperlocal with recommendation updates: Factor in local weather conditions, cultural biases and language preferences to make these more on-point. For example, the same clothing store targeting residents in Colorado and residents in Nevada, would take different weather hooks into account (while Colorado shoppers would take more to winter clothing, those from Nevada would appreciate lightweight, summery recommendations.)

✔ Send inventory-based promos: With the help of geo-fencing it’s possible to trigger messages to shoppers when they enter a relevant area—something like “You’re close to our <enter name> warehouse. Order today to get an instant delivery and save 30% on your purchase!” can be compelling. 

✔ Show up payment methods preferred in that area: Incorporating geo IP tracking can help you do this, especially if you do crossborder commerce. 

✔ Allow them to choose a preferred language on live chat: A “chat in…” dropdown prompt right at the top of the chat window can create instant reassurance for shoppers. 

16. Use psychological nudges more strategically 

Ultimately, even if shoppers love the products you’ve got on your site, most of them need that last bit of push to actually buy. 

So, how you use psychological nudges across your site can contribute to your ROAS:

✔ Live purchase notifications on product pages: New shoppers on your site are always looking for extra reassurance when it comes to the first purchase, something live purchase updates can help to a great extent—consider using a “<Enter customer name> from <Place name> just bought <product name of the featured product on the page>” format. 

✔ Feature countdown timers alongside CTAs: Even if you’re not showing an actual countdown timer, ensure your microcopy drives urgency through statements like “Hurry Up! The sale ends tonight” and “Only 3 pieces left in stock!”

✔ Draw attention to the best-loved products: Though more subtle, recommending the “trending” and “bestseller” products on your site through prominent visual hierarchy can have a huge impact on your eCommerce return on ad spend. 

✔ Create value while showing nudges: Apart from the transactional assistance with deals & discounts, shoppers also look to brands for non-transactional help like blog guides, a money-back guarantee or a limited time risk-free trial. 

One eCommerce brand that specifically uses pop-ups as a psychological nudge to make messaging more targeted for paid ad visitors is Bille, a women’s grooming brand—here’s an example from their landing page when we went looking for “men’s grooming gifts for Christmas”, clearly targeting those who’re looking for gifts for multiple genders:

Further Reading: 29 Best Examples of Nudge Marketing in eCommerce

17.  Feature offers that prompt purchases instantly

As a CRO agency that works continuously on helping clients achieve more on-site conversions, we wish we could say all kinds of discounts help improve ROAS in eCommerce, but that wouldn’t be true. 

✔ Go for those quantity & tiered discounts: Shoppers love it if you're able to feature multiple quantity sizes and help them see they’ll get better discounts when they opt for the larger sizes. 

✔ Display bundles that “complete an experience”: The more complementary the products in a bundle, based on a shopper’s preferences, the more chances they’ll sell and improve eCommerce ROAS. 

✔ Feature a super-short flash sale: And make it exclusive to only your repeat customers—this way, you can even send them more targeted information on the sale. 

✔ Personalized deals based on browsing & buying behavior: Consider milestone offers as well as browse & cart abandonment deals to wheel shoppers back. 

18. Optimize social proof display across the site

While you may have great product reviews on your site, shoppers may still be looking for other kinds of social proof for a quick glance—so, to enhance return on ad spends, consider showing social proof on high intent pages like this:

✔ Highlight review snippets from diverse segments on the homepage: Alongside, mention the reviewer’s name, what they do, what they bought and the price point of the product. 

✔ Feature use cases along with reviews on the product page: Highlighting phrases like “great for a Sunday ritual” or “ideal for last-minute gifting” can draw attention from shoppers who’re actually looking to buy. 

✔ Show an overall category rating snapshot on the category page: This is ideal when you place it right below the banner image & a short banner description.

✔ Display shipping/ delivery related snippers on cart & checkout: This can act as last-minute assurance for those with complex customer objections or even the tendency towards cart abandonment.

Sephora is an eCommerce third-party aggregator brand that knows social proof can override a whole lot else to create confidence in customers across the funnel—here's an example of how effectively the brand uses different kinds of social proof (including numbers and UGC images) on their membership program page:

19. Don’t forget to tell a great story!

Last but not the least, eCommerce brands that see better ROAS and continued growth in customer lifetime value, have one thing in common: almost all of them tell a story that helps shoppers emotionally connect with the brand. 

✔ Embed customer pain points into your narrative: After all, customers need to know what they will experience differently with your brand to be able to make a purchase!

✔ Talk about the impact purchases create: Even if you don’t use cause marketing as a year-round tactic, telling shoppers if you’re donating a part of the cost to a charity or helping an NGO reforest a region, helps the “community” mindset of a typical shopper. 

✔ Set the standards in a buyer’s mind through BTS content: This is a great way to repurpose content that comes from either the UGC space or from your own employees to build trust and in turn, improve eCommerce ROAS. 

Outdoor Voices is an eCommerce brand that weaves its entirely storytelling around their values, which are about helping people connect with the “fun” element in being outdoorsy:

▶ AD STRATEGY OPTIMIZATION TO INCREASE ROAS 

20. Create lookalike audiences on high spenders

You’re not scaling if you’re only fishing in the same pond. When you’re trying to reduce ad spends and improve ROAS, targeting high-spending behavior is a must. But how will you know which areas specifically work? Here are a few suggestions:

✔ Look for buyers across categories: This indicates shoppers who’re genuinely interested in exploring your brand at a greater depth, helping you make note of which categories are most bought from as well!

✔ Find and target customers who spend 3× your average order: This is a clear indicator that such shoppers are already happy with your brand and may even be part of your loyalty program to be able to earn better deals & offers. 

✔ Target the top 5% of shoppers: Pull your top 5% of customers by total spend (or those with LTV > $500 or what’s a high LTV for your vertical) into a seed audience. Then, build 1%, 3%, and 5% lookalike audiences and run identical campaigns against each tier till each ad set reaches 5k impressions (do ensure you set exclusion rules).

✔ Look for those who’ve purchased X times every month: Consistency is key in identifying who purchases, let’s say, twice at least in three months across a year’s time. 

✔ Tap into referrals in your ads: Launch a referral ad loop → one campaign to attract new buyers, another to activate existing buyers to refer (with rewards). Keeps CAC low and ROAS tight.

Pro Tip: Measure the lift in Cost per Acquisition (CPA) and Purchase Rate against your broad targeting ad sets – CPA shouldn’t increase by more than 10%, and the purchase rate should be at least 20% (or else you might keep seeing low ROAS).

21. Supercharge your ad copy with emotional triggers

Even the best-targeted ads fall flat if the why behind a purchase is missing. Meta often pushes you to rely on automated targeting or broad interest groups, but that rarely captures emotional intent. To improve ROAS, speak to what your shoppers feel, not just what they do. Here’s how:

✔ Map emotional triggers to your product: A skincare brand doesn’t just sell a serum, it sells confidence. A sustainable snack brand isn’t about granola, it sells trust in ingredients. So, even before you decide on a strategy, understand specific emotions that pull people in.

✔ Turn those triggers into angles: Use your ad copy and creative to frame benefits emotionally, for example, “feel proud of what you feed your kids” beats “organic, gluten-free certified.” Or, “feel like yourself again” in awareness + a “dermatologist-approved” angle in retargeting just performs better.

✔ Target related topics and behaviors: Instead of just targeting “organic food,” target behaviors, communities, or influencers tied to those emotions, e.g., natural parenting groups, anti-fast-fashion communities, or mental wellness pages.

✔ Test emotional hooks vs. feature-based hooks: Run A/B tests with emotional-first messaging (e.g., “Build back your glow – and your confidence”) against your standard benefit-led copy in awareness ads. You’ll often find that emotion pulls better at the top of the funnel, while features help close the sale further down.

Here’s one awesome example of how Colorescience uses this tactic to appeal to two entirely different audiences in different funnel stages, to hype up their product launch:

Pro Tip: A/B test hooks in a 50/50 split for 5,000 impressions minimum. Look for a +15% bump in CTR and a 5 to 10% bump in conversion rate, for emotional over feature hooks. If emotion pulls a higher CTR, that’s just more clicks you didn’t have to increase ad spend for.

22. Creative testing > Audience testing

Especially after third-party cookie loss, ad testing platforms are already using a ton of machine learning systems to identify likely buyers — and it’s way better than manual segmentation. 

Which means that as an eComm business if you’re spending on this aspect, you’re creating a resource drain. 

On top of that, studies have proved that “creative” has a bigger impact on CTR and conversions. In paid social, the creative often accounts for 70%+ of performance variance (Meta and Nielsen studies have confirmed this). If your creative isn’t engaging, even the perfect audience won’t respond.

✔ Create different creatives for different customer stages: Here’s a quick lowdown across niches - 

Cold prospects: Broad lifestyle or problem-solution videos.

Mid-funnel browsers: Product demos, reviews, UGC comparisons.

Hot prospects: Retarget with offer-based creatives or urgency.

✔ Repurpose high-performing content across formats, not just audiences: When you find a winning creative angle (say, a “before/after” clip), test it as:1) a 6-second reel, 2) a 15-second TikTok and 3) a carousel ad with the same theme.

✔ Make new versions of existing creatives: Take your top product ad. Make 3 new versions changing only the first 3 seconds of the video hook, keep everything else the same. Let the platform pick the winner automatically.

Here’s a look at how creative testing objectives & framework for the awareness stage of customers may look like:

23. Perform A/B spend testing to improve ROAS

Here’s the truth: ad performance doesn't scale linearly with spend. You might get great ROAS at $100/day, decent returns at $300/day, but terrible efficiency at $500/day due to audience saturation or algorithm strain.

And this is why A/B spend testing is as important as testing all other elements that make your ad strategy bring in conversions. 

✔ Gradually increase spend on high-performing audiences: This identifies your audience's spending ceiling. Along with that, you’re also able to detect & reduce spending on saturating segments.

Pro Tip: Split your ad spend by funnel like 60% TOF (cold), 30% MOF (engaged), and 10% BOF (cart & past purchasers) – and keep calculating the ROAS by stage on a daily basis.

✔ Test different budget allocations across time periods: You might discover that 70% of your budget performs better in a 6-hour window than spread across 24 hours.

Pro Tip: Scale with caution. Increase budget on winning ad sets by 10 to 15% every 3 to 5 days to avoid resetting the learning phase – a 50% jump in daily budgets is a great way to lower your ROAS (but make sure you let your campaigns learn first).

✔ Test whether certain creative types perform better at different spend levels: For example, user generated content might excel at low budgets while high-production ads need larger budgets to find their audience effectively.

Pro Tip: Create clone ad sets. Instead of editing a high-performing ad set, duplicate it and test variations. Focus on creative hooks, lookalike tiers, or placements that offer the biggest delta in ROAS, and increase the budgets by 10% (if CPA goes up > 10%, scale back ad spend by 5%).

Here’s a visual example of how A/B testing audience saturation may look like when it comes to spending on lookalike audiences:

24. Use negative targeting to stop wasting spend

Great targeting isn’t just about reaching the right people – it’s also about avoiding the wrong ones. Here’s what we mean:

✔ Block existing customers from awareness ads: If they’ve bought in the last 60 days or performed an action in your store, exclude them unless you’re cross-selling something fresh.

✔ Avoid refining personas, just target locations and leave it to the algo: Ad algorithms (especially Meta) are getting good at finding shoppers based on your creative, but make sure you limit the locations to limit your ad spend.

✔ Keep your abandoners separate from your core audience: This way, you don’t bombard them with irrelevant ads, which might take them away from the core goal.

✔ Block low-intent audiences: Exclude users with < 10s average session duration on the site, or those who had a page scroll depth < 20%.

25. Scale your campaign structure to improve ad relevancy

If you keep blasting the same ol’ ad across the funnel, you're just gonna have low ROAS. Cold leads need a nudge. Warm leads need clarity. Hot leads need a push. Structure your campaigns to reflect where people are in the funnel. Here’s what we mean:

✔ Set up ad sequencing on behavior: Simply cast a wide net with any ad, create separate segments, and retarget with personalized creatives:

• 75% video viewed → showcase influencer quotes, before/afters, or quick user stories
• Cart page exit → show product benefit recap with shipping perks, or offers
• Viewed other categories → lead back with a product recommendation quiz (so you can nurture over email)
• Ad click with no scroll → switch creative format entirely

✔ Get your tracking into form: This means you shouldn’t lose data when shoppers move from your cart to checkout to thank-you page (or when they come back after 30 days).

✔ Re-engage abandoners: Keep dynamic ads that trigger for: browse abandoners (but after like within 3 days), cart abandoners (within 3 hours), and checkout abandoners (after 1 day, if they don’t engage with your emails).

✔ Set a limit for your ad frequency: Once frequency hits 4–5 and CTR starts dipping, switch creatives or rotate in a new offer. No one wants to see the same ad 12 times in a week.

✔ Run one campaign: Instead of 10 campaigns, have one campaign – break the ad sets down by funnel stage, creative format, and audience type.

Pro Tip: Always break your ad campaigns into ad sets to move shoppers through three stages: awareness (up to 4 weeks) → scale (up to 2 months) → sustain (after 3 months).

Also read: 12 Critical eCommerce Segmentation Mistakes (+ Ways to Fix Them)

26. Test ad placements like your margins depend on it

Not all ad placements are created equal, and sometimes the lowest CPCs come from the least valuable eyeballs. Here are some ideas you can try out:

✔ Run separate campaigns by placement type: Set up a static or video ad creative and use it to launch mini campaigns across all channels like Meta Stories, Instagram Reels, Google Display, and YouTube Shorts. Run each till each reaches 5k impressions (and then measure the effectiveness).

✔ Compare Shopping vs. Search vs. Video: Measure which form of ad campaign gets the highest number of cart abandonments and retains shoppers (will usually show you which platform actually balances cost for conversions).

✔ Skip partner placements for end-of-the-funnel ads: Display and YouTube ads are great for reach, terrible for conversions. At the bottom of the funnel, intrusive formats kill performance. Stick to in-feed placements (like Meta) where people can’t immediately tell they’re seeing an ad.

27. Test creatives on channels that demand smaller spends

The beginning of eCommerce ad spend reduction often happens when businesses begin to understand which ads actually make sense. 

The way to go is to run low-budget tests on cheaper traffic sources or formats to check which creative themes, hooks, or visuals generate engagement / conversions.

✔ Use niche or emerging ad platforms to validate angles: For example, hyper-specific subreddits give cheap engagement to test messaging with enthusiasts.

✔ Keep one winning concept and tweak small variables: Look into elements like hook, CTA wording, background color, but one at a time. Run A/B/C/D tests at $20–$30 per variant on cheaper platforms.

✔ Repurpose organic posts as test beds: Post UGC, memes, or educational snippets organically on TikTok, Instagram Reels, or YouTube Shorts. Let natural engagement (shares, comments, saves) tell you what wants to be an ad — before you spend anything.

eCommerce brand Skinceuticals, for example, chooses to test out new product ads on subreddits that are related to skincare, like fashion in the following visual:

28. Tighten geographic, device, and time-of-day targeting

Showing ads only when and where they're most likely to convert, is the core ad spend reduction strategy here. 

This is where you really go beyond people who loosely fit your audience profile, and in turn cut wasted impressions and clicks.

✔ Start by analyzing your conversion data by state, city, or postal code: You'll often find that 20% of locations drive 80% of profitable conversions. Tiered bidding strategies where you bid aggressively in your top-performing markets can cut costs by 30-50% especially for local / regional brands.

✔ Consider nuances while studying mobile vs desktop performance: For example, many e-commerce brands find mobile drives more traffic but desktop converts at higher values. You might bid lower on mobile for awareness campaigns but higher for retargeting campaigns when customers are ready to purchase.

✔ Analyze your conversion data hourly across different days of the week: You might discover that Tuesday afternoons and Sunday evenings drive the highest-value purchases, while late-night hours generate clicks but few conversions.

Pro Tip: Combine all three targeting methods for maximum impact. For instance, run higher bids for desktop users in high-performing geographic areas during peak conversion hours. This creates a "sweet spot" targeting approach.

29. Invest in lifetime value (LTV) modeling, not just ROAS

There’s a huge danger in getting obsessed about ROAS that almost no one talks about.

If you only optimize for ROAS, you tend to underinvest in high-value customers (who may buy repeatedly, subscribe, or make larger purchases later).

On the other hand, LTV modeling is all about spending upfront so that you garner better long-term customers — since it’s all about relationship-driven acquisition. 

✔ Build predictive LTV cohorts from your CRM: Use tools like Triple Whale or Lifetimely to segment by source channel, product purchased first and finally, behavior within the first 30 days.

✔ Adjust CAC (customer acquisition cost) targets to reflect LTV: If a segment’s 6-month LTV is $150, you can afford a $50 CAC even if day-one revenue is only $25. Run ROAS vs. LTV dashboards so your marketing team sees true profitability over time.

✔ Design retention triggers to lock in predicted high-LTV buyers: Set up automated flows once you identify the most high-value customers — they can look something like:

Day 7: send onboarding content or cross-sell offers tailored to them.

Day 30: invite to loyalty program or VIP early-access sales.

Day 45: subscription upgrade or refill discount.

30. Blend paid with owned channels across campaigns

This idea has made it to this list for just how effective it is, and here’s why:

The blended approach has a multiplier effect where paid channels drive initial awareness and owned channels handle nurturing and conversion at much lower costs.

✔ Set up Facebook/Google ads that offer lead magnets: These can be discount codes, buying guides or even product samples. As a follow-up, you can set up automated sequences that do the heavy lifting of education, objection handling, and conversion over 5-7 touchpoints.

✔ Use paid ads to amplify the highest-performing content pieces: This approach reduces content creation costs and ensures you're only promoting content that already demonstrates organic engagement. Post educational content on your blog or social channels, identify which pieces get the most organic engagement and shares, then create paid campaigns driving traffic to those specific pieces.

✔ Let owned channels get first crack at converting visitors before paid retargeting kicks in: When someone visits your site but doesn't convert, immediately trigger email or SMS sequences, push notifications, and personalized on-site messaging before spending money on paid retargeting ads.

One eCommerce brand that has managed to use this eCommerce reduced ad spend strategy to the hilt is Glossier. When they began “Into the Gloss,” a digital magazine to drive community and interest, little did they know that it would become their organic-first method of driving traffic to the site. This blends with Instagram ads & Google Shopping ads, where many high intent shoppers come with awareness about the brand:

Further Reading: Convert Organic Traffic Into Customers: 16 Ideas for eCommerce Stores

31. Get a jump on Google Shopping campaigns

For eCommerce stores, Google Shopping often brings in the most purchase-ready traffic, but only if you’ve optimized the feed to match real search behavior. Here’s what we mean:

✔ Enrich your product titles with search intent: Instead of “Comfort Runner 5,” use “Men’s Arch Support Running Shoes – Comfort Runner 5.” Mention materials, fit, brand, and delivery perks like “Ships in 24 hours.” It helps Google better match your product to the right queries.

✔ Update the offers in your product feed and set the offers to auto-apply: Set up feed-level promotions through Google Merchant Center and use the “auto-apply” setting so discounts are reflected directly in the cart (making it a great way to reduce drop-off and improve your ROAS in one go).

✔ Check your search terms report regularly and update keywords: Your search terms report shows which keywords shoppers actually search for and where ads get triggered. Once you get the data, group the keywords and find which product groups actually drive search volume (all while giving you real-time data on what to include in your product pages and product feeds).

KEEP READING:

23 Secrets to Running Successful Facebook Ads (For eCommerce Stores)

Convert more paid traffic—9 strategies that always work (eCommerce)

30 Underutilized Strategies For Increasing Customer Lifetime Value In eCommerce

eCommerce businesses also ask:

How to calculate ROAS?

Return on Ad Spend (ROAS) is a key metric in e-commerce marketing that measures the revenue generated from advertising relative to the amount spent on those ads. 

It's calculated by dividing the revenue generated from ads by the cost of those ads. 

For example, if you spend $1000 on advertising and generate $5000 in revenue, your ROAS would be 5:1, meaning you earned $5 for every $1 spent on ads. 

ROAS is a critical indicator of the effectiveness of your advertising campaigns in driving sales and is used to assess the profitability of your marketing efforts.

What contributes to low eCommerce ROAS?

Even if you have really great product offerings and also a decent ad budget, your ROAS could still remain low, and here are the top 5 reasons why:

❌ Poor targeting: Since every segment of your larger audience is crucial to ad success and returns, if there’s no match between the messaging / offer and what a particular segment really cares about, ROAS is going to suffer. 

❌ Misaligned landing pages: Imagine a situation where the ad talks about a specific product, but when the visitor gets into the landing page, they see multiple listings and the product (& possibly offer) they want right away, is nowhere in sight!

❌ Value & pricing mismatch: When shoppers see that the price of a product is either too low or high compared to the value they perceive of the product, the tendency is to either find it too cheap or too expensive for purchase, leading to low eCommerce ROAS. 

❌ Ad copy not reflecting the value proposition: Typically, because a shopper will anyway see multiple ads when they key in a query, your ad copy has to differentiate from them effectively for the ad to make sense to the shopper. In the absence of that, shoppers will not click on the ad at all. 

❌ Lack of trust signals at key junctures: New visitors to an eCommerce store need multiple layers of trust building, period. This is why lower levels of social proof are always tied with poor eCommerce ROAS. 

Which hidden factors are preventing me from improving my eCommerce ROAS?

While most eCommerce stores habitually deal with the above problems, there are still others that are less apparent to the eye. These *hidden factors* often need an additional look-see so that they’re not causing ROAS leaks the business isn’t aware of. 

🥴 Poor post-purchase funneling: Many brands make the mistake of putting all their focus into acquiring for first purchases. This often leaves the post-purchase funneling, especially through emails weak. Lack of strategizing around cross-sells, upsells and post-purchase bundles leads to many first purchasers never coming back.

🥴 Ads not reflecting “unique hooks”: When you have to improve returns on ad spend, you’ll have to say more than “this brand is great” in your ads. While your ads may still be stating advantages like “free shipping” and “fast delivery,” shoppers may not see a problem it can solve or feel a sense of personalization based on values or beliefs. This reduces both click-throughs as well as eventual conversions. 

🥴 Abandonment closer to checkout: A lot of eCommerce businesses get stuck in early funnel attribution when it comes to the success of ads. However, the truth is, 

🥴 Lack of proper tracking: Post iOS-14, ad platforms like Meta and Google are able to show ads to high-intent shoppers only when event feedback on actions like add-to-cart and subscription buys is top notch. If pixels aren’t firing properly, the algorithm suffers and ends up showing ads to random audiences. Inaccurate attribution can also lead to businesses not identifying which campaigns, ad sets or creatives are really working as opposed to what seem to be working.

🥴 Lack of deeper variations in A/B testing: Superficial tests run by brands that change the ad headline but not the core messaging almost always end up in the same failure pool as their predecessors. Actual improvement in eCommerce ROAS, on the other hand, comes from variants with different solution framing and storytelling hooks.

How do I know what a good ROAS is for my store?

There’s no one-size-fits-all ROAS you have to hit. Instead, think of your target as a sweet spot that sits at the intersection of three things:

⭕ Your margins: If you’re selling a $100 product that only nets you a $20 profit (20% margin), you need a 4:1 to 9:1 ROAS just to break even. But if you’re sitting on a cushy 50–80% margin, a 3:1 ROAS can still make some bank.

⭕ How often do people buy: Got consumables like coffee or snacks (or a subscription)? Folks come back every month, so even a 2:1 to 3:1 ROAS pays off over time. Selling high-end sofas, electronics, or fine jewelry? If someone only buys from you every couple of years, you need 4x+ to cover the long wait.

⭕ Your pricing and cash flow: If you make your ad spend back in under 30 days, you can get away with a leaner 2:1 to 3:1 because you can reinvest quickly. If it takes 90 days or more to see that first dollar of profit, you’ll want 4:1 or higher just to keep payroll and rent afloat in the meantime. And if you have low-ticket items ($10–$30),  you’ll need higher volume, so a 5:1 to 6:1 ROAS can make sense because each dollar here can make you sweat bullets.

Pro Tip: For mid-ticket items ($50–$150), you get a bit more cushion, so a 2:1 to 3:1 ROAS often works. However, for high-ticket items ($200+), you get fewer purchases (+ higher risk), so aim for a 3:1 to 5:1 ROAS to cover acquisition and overhead.

How does ROAS differ from ROI (Return on Investment)?

ROAS specifically focuses on the return generated from advertising spend, while ROI considers the return on overall investment, which may include factors beyond advertising, such as operational expenses or product development costs. ROAS provides a more targeted view of the effectiveness of advertising efforts.

Effective UX precedes high ROAS

98% of visitors who visit an eCommerce site—drop off without buying anything.

Why: user experience issues that cause friction for visitors.

And this is the problem ConvertCart solves.

We've helped 500+ eCommerce stores (in the US) improve user experience—and 2X their conversions.

How we can help you:

Our conversion experts can audit your site—identify UX issues, and suggest changes to improve conversions.