Chapter 01
What changes past $100K monthly spend
Performance becomes a control problem, not a media-buying one.
Most brands think scale is about testing more creatives or pushing more budget. Past $100K monthly spend, the game changes. The biggest risk isn't the platform. It's operational chaos: too many SKUs, too many campaigns, too many people touching the account, signals everywhere.
Your job stops being "performance" and starts being "control". This case study is a snapshot of one account that crossed the threshold cleanly.
Five operational moves that held the system together
- 1
Restructured campaigns by product margin
Prioritised high-profit items in top placements rather than chasing volume on low-margin SKUs. POAS targets, not ROAS, drove allocation.
- 2
Optimised Merchant Center feeds weekly
Visibility and approval rate are leading indicators of Shopping efficiency. Weekly cadence catches drift before it hits performance.
- 3
Vertical scaling on proven winners
Doubled budget on asset groups with proven ROAS rather than spreading new spend across uncertain campaigns. Compounded what worked.
- 4
Horizontal scaling into adjacent categories
Expanded into product categories with similar buying intent. Reused the structure and learning from the original winners on related catalogue.
- 5
Search-term sculpting
Filtered low-intent queries out via systematic negative-keyword work. Reduced wasted spend without limiting eligible auctions on the queries that mattered.