Client: Mid-size D2C home décor brand based in Jaipur | Campaign Duration: 90 days | Total Ad Spend: ₹2,52,000 | Final ROAS: 8.1X
When this client first reached out, they were running Google Ads in-house with a 1.8X ROAS — spending ₹80,000/month and getting back ₹1.44L in revenue. They’d tried broad match keywords, Performance Max, and even hired a freelancer. Nothing moved the needle. Within 90 days of taking over the account, we hit 8.1X ROAS. Here’s exactly how.
The Problem: Why Their Google Ads Were Bleeding Money
The first thing I do with any new Google Ads account is a full audit before touching a single setting. What I found was a classic case of the three most expensive Google Ads mistakes Indian e-commerce brands make:
1. Zero negative keyword management. The account was spending ₹18,000/month on search terms that had nothing to do with their products. “Décor ideas” (informational, zero buying intent), competitor brand names (waste), and irrelevant category terms were eating 22% of the budget with 0 conversions.
2. Shopping feed with 47 errors. Their Google Merchant Center had 47 product disapprovals — mostly missing GTINs, incorrect product categories, and price mismatches. Disapproved products can’t show in Shopping ads. They were effectively advertising only 60% of their catalogue.
3. Bidding on the wrong keywords. Their top-spend keywords were broad match terms like “wall art” and “home décor” — extremely competitive, dominated by Pepperfry, Amazon, and Myntra. These terms cost ₹45–₹80 per click and convert at under 0.5% for a newer brand.
Month 1: Foundation — Fix Before You Scale
Before increasing spend by a single rupee, I spent the first 3 weeks fixing fundamentals. This is unglamorous work, but it’s what separates a 2X ROAS account from an 8X one.
Merchant Center cleanup: Fixed all 47 product disapprovals. Added missing GTINs using the brand’s product catalogue, corrected product type taxonomy, and resolved price mismatches by syncing the feed directly to their Shopify store using a DataFeed Watch integration. Within 10 days, 100% of products were approved and showing.
Negative keyword audit: Built a 340-keyword negative list across the account. Added broad and phrase match negatives for informational queries (“how to”, “DIY”, “ideas”), competitor terms, and irrelevant categories. This alone reduced wasted spend by ₹16,000/month.
Campaign restructure: Shut down the generic broad match Search campaigns entirely. Replaced with a tight exact + phrase match structure targeting high-commercial-intent queries like “buy wooden wall art online India”, “handmade photo frames Jaipur”, and “canvas wall art under 2000”. These keywords cost ₹12–₹18 per click — 60% cheaper — and convert at 3–5%.
Month 1 result: Spend ₹62,000 → Revenue ₹2,17,000 → ROAS: 3.5X. Not 8X yet, but we’d already doubled performance in 30 days just by fixing the foundation.
Month 2: Google Shopping Dominance
With the feed clean and the Search campaigns profitable, Month 2 was about making Shopping the growth engine.
Product segmentation by margin: Not all products deserve equal budget. I pulled their product-level margin data from their Shopify backend and segmented campaigns into three tiers: High margin (40%+), Medium margin (20–40%), and Low margin (under 20%). High-margin products got 70% of the Shopping budget. Low-margin products were paused unless they had exceptional conversion rates.
Smart Bidding calibration: Switched from Manual CPC (which they’d been on) to Target ROAS bidding — but only after we had 45+ conversions in the last 30 days, which is Google’s minimum threshold for Smart Bidding to work reliably. Set initial tROAS target at 400% (conservative), then stepped it up 15% every 2 weeks as the algorithm learned.
Product title optimisation: Google Shopping ranks products by relevance to the search query — and relevance is determined largely by your product title. Rewrote titles for their top 80 products using the format: [Material] + [Product Type] + [Key Feature] + [Size/Colour] + [Brand]. Example: “Handmade Mango Wood Wall Clock 30cm Round Antique Finish — Rajcraft” vs. their original “Wall Clock WC-047”. CTR on Shopping ads increased 34% within 3 weeks.
Month 2 result: Spend ₹95,000 → Revenue ₹4,75,000 → ROAS: 5X.
Month 3: Layering Remarketing and Scaling Winners
By Month 3, we had clean data, profitable campaigns, and a clear picture of which products and audiences converted best. This is when we scaled.
Remarketing via Display + YouTube: Set up a 3-tier remarketing funnel. Tier 1: Cart abandoners (last 7 days) — shown dynamic Shopping ads with the exact products they viewed. Tier 2: Product page visitors (last 14 days) — shown lifestyle Display ads. Tier 3: All site visitors (last 30 days) — shown brand awareness YouTube bumper ads (6 seconds). Combined remarketing CPC was ₹4.80 — 75% cheaper than prospecting — and converted at 6.2%.
Scaling the winning products: Identified the top 12 products driving 68% of revenue and built dedicated Single Product Ad Groups (SPAGs) for each. Isolated budget, isolated bidding, isolated negative keywords. This prevents your star products from competing internally with weaker ones for budget.
Seasonal budget spike: Month 3 overlapped with Gudi Padwa and Ugadi — major home décor buying seasons in South and West India. Increased daily budget by 40% for 8 days around these dates and pre-loaded inventory of gifting SKUs in the feed. Those 8 days generated ₹1.1L in revenue alone.
Month 3 result: Spend ₹95,000 → Revenue ₹7,70,000 → ROAS: 8.1X.
The 90-Day Results Summary
| Metric | Before (Month 0) | After (Month 3) | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Monthly Ad Spend | ₹80,000 | ₹95,000 | +19% |
| Monthly Revenue | ₹1,44,000 | ₹7,70,000 | +435% |
| ROAS | 1.8X | 8.1X | +350% |
| Cost Per Conversion | ₹1,240 | ₹287 | -77% |
| Approved Products | 60% | 100% | +40% |
| Wasted Spend | 22% | 3.2% | -85% |
The 3 Things That Actually Drove the 8X ROAS
If I had to isolate the three highest-impact moves from this entire engagement, they would be:
1. Fixing the Merchant Center first. You cannot scale a Google Shopping campaign with disapproved products. Every brand I audit has feed issues — usually 15–30% of their catalogue is invisible to Google. Fix this before anything else.
2. Keyword precision over volume. Indian e-commerce brands consistently overbid on head terms they have no chance of winning against Amazon and Flipkart. The money is in the long tail — specific, high-intent searches where smaller brands can compete and convert profitably.
3. Margin-aware budget allocation. Not every product deserves the same ad spend. Identifying your highest-margin, highest-converting SKUs and building campaigns around them is the fastest way to improve ROAS without increasing total spend.
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