Chain Reaction Cycles (CRC) is one of the world’s largest online bike shops. The CRC journey began in 1984 as a small family business in Northern Ireland, serving and supporting local cyclists. It’s been an incredible ride so far, with the company growing to over 450 cyclists, swimmers, runners, and passionate professionals supporting a global community of cycle and multi-sport athletes. In addition to cycling goods, Chain Reaction sells triathlon equipment, swimming products, and casual sports / outdoor apparel.
Marin allows us to optimise budget and campaign performance without the need for constant monitoring and manual campaign amends. Allowing us to focus on higher-level coordination as opposed to hands-on tasks involved in running a successful promotion. Having a single access portal to view and manage campaigns across multiple accounts and markets has been extremely helpful for us as a business which works across multiple countries and currencies at any one time. From the tool we have seen impressive results which we may not have achieved without using this.
Holly Welsh
Group Online Campaigns Manager at Chain Reaction
The Challenge
Chain Reaction Cycles continues to expand across global markets and benefit from the increasing popularity of cycling, all while promoting over 500 brands in its catalog. On top of such rising interest and rapid growth, the team tasked with driving volume found it difficult to properly manage a complicated promotional matrix where multiple sales are running simultaneously, across anywhere from six to 12 countries and time zones. As an example, a sale may be a 20% discount in the UK, but 10% in the US. The activation/evergreen times are all different, and then factor in nuances to creative copy for language and positioning—and, of course, the core duty to deliver results to hundreds of vendors who count on CRC to sell its product.
There was also the critically important task of allocating budgets to the most effective audience at any given time, across multiple interest-targeted and lookalike audiences. CRC sought a tool that would reduce manual optimization work on the account, and help them shift and reallocate budgets effectively across their Facebook audiences. The main goal was maximizing volume while reducing cost per acquisition. This was an important midsummer clearance campaign, and they needed to sell as much as possible to seize the opportunity while keeping costs low.
Solution
The CRC team applied Automatic Budget Allocation for Marin Social to automatically redistribute budgets in real time. The budget algorithm allocated ad spend between interest-targeted and lookalike ad sets based on which were performing the best. This freed up the CRC team to plan for emerging markets and focus on efforts like strategic copy testing.
Additionally, the simple yet powerful bulk creator enabled the team to quickly create multiple ad variations targeting multiple audience segments at the same time. Uploading within a single portal helped the team keep messaging consistent and created a cohesive voice around a sale while maintaining nuances to each market.
Results
After turning on Budget Allocation, conversions for the UK accounts increased by 90% relative to the the prior two months. At the same time, CPA was down by 47%. With such high volume in the spring/summer months as cyclists are gearing up for the riding season, the ability to automatically shift budgets between campaigns where they’re most effective is (unsurprisingly) very useful. Though sometimes difficult to quantify, the time saved by leveraging automation for budget allocation was substantial and allowed the team to focus on more strategic directives (and, the occasional break or late lunch).
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PPC for B2B: a Performance Marketing Survey Report for 2023
To help you stay on the leading edge of performance marketing, we surveyed over 300 B2B marketers to uncover actionable insights that will help you improve the performance of your PPC investment. Through a Marin and LinkedIn partnership, we sought out to understand what B2B marketers face right now and how they are dealing with a complicated market. Read the full report to get a better understanding of how B2B marketers are changing their approach this year.
What You'll Learn from the Report:
How budgets have changed through the years 2020 to 2023 and how budgeting complexities affect the work of advertisers this year.
What challenges are most prevalent this year and how other marketers like you are adapting.
The critical role audience targeting plays in your success, especially during a recession, and some interesting trends relating to targeting techniques.
The types of content and campaign management techniques are currently helping advertisers move buyers through the sales funnel.
What paid social or PPC channels are providing the best ROAS or conversions for B2B right now.
Enhancing Search Marketing Strategies With Generative AI
Search marketing is a critical component of a successful business strategy. With so much content available online, businesses must strive to stand out from the competition and deliver relevant results to their target audience. This is where generative AI comes into play. By leveraging the power of artificial intelligence, businesses can now elevate their search marketing strategies to new heights.
In this blog post, we’ll explore how generative AI can enhance search marketing strategies. We will delve into the potential of this innovative technology to drive more accurate and personalized search results, improve keyword targeting, and enhance content creation. From identifying patterns in customer behavior to generating engaging ad copy, generative AI has the potential to revolutionize the way we approach search marketing.
7 Ways businesses are using generative AI in search
Generative AI has found its way into the workflows of many industries. Here are seven specific ways marketers use generative AI in search.
1. Personalized search results
Generative AI algorithms trained to analyze user data and behavior deliver more tailored and relevant search results and can significantly enhance the online experience for users. Users can consistently expect to find search ads more aligned with their interests. Recent research shows that 94% of marketers believe that personalization boosts sales and more than three quarters of marketers say that generative AI helps them deliver this personalization.
2. Improved keyword targeting
Marketers must constantly analyze vast amounts of data to identify trends and correlations, allowing businesses to optimize their keyword selection and improve the effectiveness of search advertising campaigns. AI helps marketers do this more effectively by increasing the amount of data they can analyze in a limited amount of time.
3. Enhanced content creation
With generative AI, marketers can produce engaging headlines, ad copy, and social media posts based on user data and preferences, saving businesses time and resources while maintaining relevance and effectiveness. Generative AI saves marketers approximately two-and-a-half hours per day simply by optimizing time-consuming tasks such as content creation.
4. Mining customer insights
By analyzing large datasets quickly, generative AI algorithms can identify patterns in user behavior, preferences, and purchase history, providing businesses with valuable insights for targeted marketing campaigns, product recommendations, and personalized offers.
5. Automated SEO practices
SEO practices can be time consuming and highly prone to human error. Generative AI can streamline and automate certain aspects of search engine optimization, such as optimizing metadata, meta descriptions, and creating internal linking structures. This enables marketers and SEO professionals to focus on higher-level strategies while leaving technical SEO tasks to generative AI. The productivity lift that this automation can deliver for marketers has been estimated to be valued at $463 billion globally.
6. Conversion rate optimization
Call-to-action (CTA) prompts are key for driving user action and boosting conversion rates. AI can help marketers evaluate how effective each CTA is in driving customer action, and generate the most effective CTAs that incorporate insights from past successful campaigns.
7. Competitive advantage
When leveraging generative AI in search, businesses can gain a competitive edge by delivering more personalized experiences, targeting the right audience, and staying ahead of the competition in the evolving digital landscape.
Leveraging generative AI for content creation
Leveraging generative AI for content creation offers an incredible advantage to content creators. This technology opens doors to new possibilities, allowing content creators to focus on other aspects of their work while ensuring that their content remains engaging and relevant.
Headline and title generation
Modern technology can be used to analyze existing headlines and produce fresh ones for various forms of content like blog posts, articles, and more. Doing so not only saves content creators valuable time and effort, but also generates powerful headlines that truly resonate with users. Generative AI can also help marketers ensure that their titles and headlines include keywords that are most relevant to their customers to help them find these articles or blog posts easily.
Ad copywriting
Engaging ad copy is essential for search advertising campaigns and social media marketing. By analyzing user behavior and preferences, AI can generate effective ad copy that resonates with target audiences and drives conversions. Additionally, AI can help marketers repurpose old content and create new copy that is unique but has the same messaging as previous campaigns.
Social media posts
Social media data can help marketers determine the best time to post content, understand what type of posts get the most engagement, and even suggest new content ideas based on this information. Marketers can use this insight to create unique posts that are relevant for each social media platform.
Content personalization
Americans are constantly inundated with search content. A deeper understanding of customer preferences allows marketers to personalize outreach based on this insight and stand out from the crowd. Generative AI algorithms can analyze user data to personalize content for individual users. This can include customizing content based on geographic location, search history, and other factors to provide a more tailored and engaging experience.
Content summarization
Companies often create longer-form content such as whitepapers or research reports to deliver highly complex or technical information to their audience. AI can help marketers repurpose this content and generate short summaries that capture the key insights of the content. This can be useful for drawing up executive summaries or providing users with quick overviews of more in-depth content.
Video and audio content
Generative AI can also be used to create unique video and audio content. For example, it can produce custom music compositions or match stock footage with voiceover audio for ad campaigns.
Enhancing advertising campaigns with generative AI
With generative AI as a powerful tool, businesses can stay ahead in the competitive advertising landscape by delivering personalized and engaging content to their audience. Here are some ways you can use generative AI to create and execute better advertising campaigns.
Dynamic ads
Timing is crucial for the success of any advertising campaign. AI can be used to dynamically produce ads in real time based on various factors like user behavior, location, and preferences. By tailoring ad content to specific users or contexts, businesses can deliver more relevant and compelling ads, increasing the chances of generating conversions.
Target audience expansion
Generative AI can analyze customer data and identify insights and patterns that can be used to expand target audiences. By finding common characteristics among existing customers and generating lookalike audiences, businesses can reach new potential customers who are likely to be interested in their products or services.
Ad testing and optimization
Automating the process of ad testing and optimization can help marketers be more effective by quickly producing and testing different ad variations. This enables businesses to easily identify the most effective combinations of ad creatives, targeting, and messaging, leading to improved campaign performance.
Predictive analytics
Generative AI algorithms can analyze historical campaign data and external factors to make predictions about future ad performance. Leveraging predictive analytics, businesses can optimize their ad campaigns by adjusting targeting, budget allocation, and bidding strategies to achieve better results.
Stay ahead of your competitors with Marin’s cutting-edge search marketing management features
With Marin's AI-powered capabilities, marketers can gain deeper insights into the intersection of their paid search campaigns and their SEO efforts. This allows them to make data-driven decisions, refine their targeting strategies, and improve the overall effectiveness of their search marketing campaigns.
Marin's proprietary algorithms and machine learning technology are designed to help you optimize your campaigns and extract the most value from your advertising spend. Whether you're looking to target new audiences or improve your ROI, Marin's powerful AI-driven insights can help you achieve your goals.
With Marin's detailed reporting and performance metrics, you can monitor your campaigns in real time and make informed decisions about your marketing strategy. Additionally, Marin's integration with leading eCommerce platforms like Amazon and Shopify provides a seamless experience for managing your online store's advertising campaigns.
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Background
A leading distributor of components and solutions for electronic system design, production, maintenance, and repair turned to Marin Software to help optimize their paid eCommerce campaigns. They are a global technology leader with over 80 years of experience. Their multi-channel approach includes 48 transactional websites, contact centers, a field sales force, and an online community.
Whether researching a new technology, designing an electronic product, or looking for parts to repair an existing system, this merchant is the trusted global source for engineering solutions in today’s most in-demand application areas.