Exposing Our £7M Ads Strategy For High-Ticket Ecommerce (Episode 149)

👉 Ready to start your own online store? Start here: https://dropshipunlocked.com/online-event?el=podcast-149-ads-strategy

🗣 In this episode, Lewis Smith and James Eardley reveal the exact ad strategy they’ve used to generate over £7 million in high-ticket ecommerce sales. 

They break down their Google Performance Max and Search Ads strategy, how to set up profitable campaigns from scratch, and the common pitfalls to avoid when you're just getting started with paid ads.

👉 Prefer to watch this on YouTube? Check it out here ➡️ https://youtu.be/Dy7dEbAKvEU

Topics Discussed:
 ★ Why Google Ads beats Meta and TikTok for high-ticket ecommerce
 ★ How Performance Max works and why it’s so powerful
 ★ The exact two-campaign setup that generated £7M+ in sales
 ★ Retargeting strategies using Meta, TikTok, and Google
 ★ Why intent-driven traffic leads to better conversions
 ★ The funnel structure that maximises ROI
 ★ Common mistakes beginners make with Google Ads
 ★ How to track conversions correctly using Simprosys
 ★ Why patience and simplicity are key when starting with paid ads
 ★ Minimum budget needed to start seeing results

Links and Resources Mentioned:
 📘 Pick up a copy of Lewis’ book: https://dropshipunlocked.com/book
🛒 Get Shopify for £1 a month for 3 months: https://dropshipunlocked.com/shopify
📞 Get a free trial with a professional phone line: https://dropshipunlocked.com/circle
🎯 Join our step-by-step program: https://dropshipunlocked.com/online-event?el=podcast-149-ads-strategy

Key Takeaways:
★ Start simple: One Performance Max campaign is all you need to begin collecting data and making profitable sales.
★ Google is king for high-ticket intent: Catching buyers when they’re actively searching leads to better ROAS than interruptive platforms.
★ Retargeting = profits: Use dynamic retargeting to mop up sales from visitors who didn’t buy the first time.
★ Patience pays off: Don’t tinker too early. Let Google learn and optimise with real conversion data.
★ Tracking matters: Set up tracking correctly from the start or you’ll be flying blind. Use Simprosys for accurate conversion data.

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★★★ Dropship Unlocked – Lewis Smith ★★★
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Transcript

0:00

You really don't want to put loads of work into building your whole e-commerce store only to then later find out. We've seen members go from zero to 6 figures in revenue, but the real difference maker in their strategy was. Those two campaign types alone are the simple but very effective ad set up combination that we've used to generate over £7 million in revenue and. When you get people on your site from that source, you're so much more likely to convert. If I was starting ads from scratch today, like for the first time, I would ignore 90% of what everyone is saying online and instead adjust today. We're going to be lifting the lid on the Google ad strategy that we've used to generate over £7 million combined in our e-commerce stores. So if you've ever wondered how is it that we get consistent, profitable sales using paid advertising and crucially how you can do the same, then this episode is the one where we're going to break it all down for you. So Lewis, let's dive straight to the heart, the core of our strategy. Why do we focus so heavily on Google Ads for high ticket e-commerce rather than something like Meta like Facebook ads? Or TikTok. It's a great question and I would say it's probably the lesser explored of the ad platforms. When you look online and you search how do you run ads, Everyone's talking about Meta, TikTok is flavour of the month, everyone's talking about how you do that at the moment. But the question really comes down to intent and automation, scalability come into it later. But really it's where are people looking for the products that we are selling. So I guess you have to kind of rewind a little bit in our strategy to understand why we see higher performance with Google specifically performance Max as a campaign type. The buyers that we're targeting, we've already validated that they exist when we went through the niche selection process. So we found out that the the products that we were thinking of selling, we didn't just guess, we didn't just think are they seem to be popular or trending at the moment. We decided that based on market demand data as well as nine other different niche validation criteria that those products are in demand. So why would we then not put our products in front of that demand if we can? And the most kind of straight line route to doing that is through Google Apps because that's where people are looking for products, whether that's through like Google's new AI search that they're now kind of baking into the search platform or just through a good old fashioned Google search. Buyers are actively searching for these high ticket products. We know they are because that was part of the niche validation process. And so when you show up on Google specifically with a high commercial intent ad. So by that I mean it's got a photo, it's got a price, it says the product's name. You're not interrupting someone's scroll. You know, they're not lying there passively going through TikTok just kind of doom scrolling. And then hopefully you pull them in and convert, convince them to suddenly part with 2000 lbs to buy your, your high ticket product. You're showing up at the point where someone is seriously ready to buy it. So maybe they're sitting there at their desk, maybe they've got their partner with them, they've got their card out, they're ready to go. They're just searching like, where do we get this this product from? And then you just show up as one of several sources. Are you going to get 100% of the sales? No, but do you need them to build a six figure business? Absolutely not. You don't because you validated that there's enough demand in that market in the 1st place. So that's kind of the summary, the performance Max campaign type, it allows Google's AI to do a lot of that heavy lifting across all of its different platforms. So Google owns YouTube, so you're able to shop on YouTube. Obviously they have the search network, they've got the shopping ads that appear at the top of Google searches display even through their AI search through Gemini and and Bard as well. Now, like all of the access to all of that is through one campaign type. So it's really powerful and it allows us to then scale up predictably in relation to how much demand there is out there for the products, which we know exists because we validated it. So once it's working, once we've got sales coming in, we've got profit coming in from that campaign type, we can then reinvest it and we can grow and we can tweak and start to target more of those customers, bring them through. And then, you know, do even do other things like launch other video assets and better, stronger video ads onto the YouTube network because we know that their demand is there. So Google just gets the products in front of the right people at the right time. Exactly. It's very, very clever system. And I like the way that you decide on Google Ads, not because you've gone with the trending Meta TikTok, it's because you you've zoomed out and you've thought we've got a choice of tools at our disposal for how we get our products in front of the right customers. So let me zoom out and think they're just not just focused on which tool was best, but actually who do you want to target? And when you ask that question, we want to target people that are already raising their hand and in the market for the products that we're selling. Rather than having to go through the more costly way of convincing somebody that they need that product, we'd rather mop up the existing demand. And so that's why Google Performance Max does such a fantastic job of showing up for people when they're going to Google to search for the products that we're selling. So that's when you think zoom out and the results speaks for themselves because it's the same campaign type that I've used to generate my sales. I'm almost at 1.5 million in sales myself now. Adam who've had on the podcast, he's doing about 80 KA month. He uses Google performance Max campaign. Jared's done over £4,000,000. He's been on the podcast. It's no secret. We make it very clear Google Ads has always been the primary method for making high ticket sales with e-commerce. And don't listen to just the reasoning, listen to the results and listen to some podcast episodes and you'll understand that that is the campaign type that's beaten the others out there for high ticket sales in the UK. Now drilling down even more specifically the people who are now sold and want to set up a Performance Max campaign. Lewis, talk to us about the structure, like what are the key components? How do you go about structuring a Performance Max campaign in Google Ads? Sure. So we'd start out with the performance Max as a campaign type because it just gathers data quickly and then it kind of allows us to to really use a full funnel approach with Google's automation. So that means like bringing in colder traffic, kind of serving middle of funnel type content to people that are in market. They're thinking about it, maybe they've just not yet decided on the exact products that they not to buy or the exact brand yet, but they're kind of certainly in the market to buy one of the things that we sell. And then also the kind of bottom of funnel like real commercially targeted like buy today style ads as well. So it kind of does all of that. We just give it the assets, the headlines, the descriptions and then it kind of goes to work. We've, we've given it the ingredients and then it just bakes the recipe of the campaign. After we've done that and kind of once we've got sales coming in from our performance Max campaign, which we can constantly optimise and tweak. By the way, we would then layer in things like search text ad campaigns in manual search campaigns for some of your best sellers, for example, like your top selling products, the brands that you can see from your own data are popular and that customers are buying maybe the collections on your site that are popular, right? There's lots of different ways we can use search text ads. And those, by the way, are just the the typical ads that are at the top of Google search and they're usually just text and they kind of rise above the organic search results. So most people you see that ad and then they click it if it's relevant. So that's definitely one of the things that we'll do as a result of having had the P Max foundations feeding us that data. But I. Also want to. Give some love to Meta and to to TikTok and other platforms because there is a place for them in our businesses. It's just a little bit further down the buyers funnel like the the journey of buying from completely unaware through to ready to go, ready to purchase now. So we'd lay it in retargeting on all of those platforms. So for example, Google, we'd set up a dynamic retargeting campaign. Now actually Performance Max does a pretty good job of that kind of in itself. So like in under the roof of a Performance Max campaign, you'll get a good amount of retargeting. But if you want to, you can also set up a specific dynamic remarketing campaign. And then in Meta, so Meta being the parent company for Facebook and Instagram from WhatsApp, you can run ads that are further down. So we can use if this then that logic to say, well, if someone visited the website but didn't make a purchase, then they're in a retargeting audience. We've we've captured their data with the pixel on our Shopify site. Therefore, now show ads to them that say like, come back, use this discount for, you know, this discount code for a discount off your purchase or make your purchase today and we'll throw in a free gift. So some kind of like deal sweetener that gets them over the line because we know where they're at. Now. We couldn't do that to cold traffic. That would be very expensive if we just ran ads like that to cold traffic. And it would just, it wouldn't really make sense because people are not, they haven't raised their hand that they're even interested in the products, but the people we're targeting have, there are much kind of smaller pool of people and we can focus in on them. And by the way, you can then replicate that strategy across any social network. You could do that on Snapchat, you could do that on TikTok. It doesn't matter because the people who are seeing it have already visited the site. So all you're then doing is showing up wherever they hang out. And that's really powerful. So that's where we want to make sure that we are on those platforms and we set up an automated system that's very Evergreen. It doesn't require you to be in there managing ads, scaling things like you just set it up and it dynamically inserts whatever product they viewed on your website in that ad and then it's it shows up. So you become omnipresent as a brand in their world. It's like they're driving down the motorway and they see all these billboards and every one of them has your brand on it. Like you've probably seen this yourself. If you've been on a website and you've looked at a new pair of trainers or something or a new TV. And then suddenly everywhere you are on social media, it's like you're seeing ads for that same thing that you viewed. It's because you got pixeled when you visited a website or get put into a an audience by the algorithm. And now they're showing you that that contextual ad everywhere you are. So that allows us to get good reach and those convert really well. We get a really high row as, but they're part of a bigger system. They're part of that system, and the top of the funnel is where we see Google traffic perform best. That's right. So it's a, it's a clever system because the only time we bring in the social platforms is when we are already confident that those people have been on our site already. So we're not interrupting their scroll in that they're already aware of us. And we're not just going to get flex straight past as you go down your feed because you'll be reminded of the exact product that you're looking at earlier that day. And those people are so much more likely to convert than a cold audience. And I like to always picture this in, in my mind's eye, I'm picturing A funnel when I think about the way that we take people from the top of the funnel. So these are customers that have a problem or a desire for our product. And at the bottom of the final, we have the end result, which is getting our products to the customer's door. And to get people from one to the other, we're going to send them straight to our website from a Google ad when they're searching for those products. And hopefully on that occasion, they'll just purchase straight away and we get to the end result and they purchase the product. But if they don't purchase the first time round, this is where you're coming in with all the other angles that you just explained there, Lewis. So we're going to mop up that that that wasted ads. Then in a way, because they didn't buy the first time, we're going to mop it up with the retargeting campaign. So when those same people go to Facebook and Instagram later in the day, they'll see the product again and be constantly reminded that they do want that product and that they're going to come back. We do that with e-mail as well, but that's a whole separate story. So yeah, love to visualise a funnel with this, but it all starts with making sure that you have in demand high ticket products for this all to work. And so if you're coming at this and you haven't yet chosen the high ticket products that you're going to sell, then check out 100 episode 143 before you go ahead and set up a campaign to make sure that you're choosing high ticket. Products that will actually sell. So with that in mind, Lewis, we've got people now that listened to the previous episode, they've got high ticket products that they're going to sell. They've got an idea of the the overall structure of the ad campaigns that we're going to set up. Give us some top tips from your lessons from doing over 5 million in sales for somebody just starting with Google Ads, What would you recommend to them? Yeah. So I think the first thing is, is probably just patience. It's it's letting the process play out when you've set everything up correctly and you've built this in in a way that is Evergreen. It's future proof. The most common early mistake that people make is that they dive in and they try and tinker with everything on Day 2. You have to let the law of averages play out. You have to net conversion data so sales purchases come through so that Google can learn who are the type of people that are making these purchases and who should we prioritise showing your ads to in the future. And it can learn, but it needs that data to go through. And that won't happen overnight. You won't suddenly launch a campaign and get 50 sales the next day, you know with these types of products because they're higher ticket and you only need one or two a day to make a really good income online. The other one is complexity and and over complicating the process. I would advise to start with just one performance Max campaign. Keep it really simple like you're targeting 1 country, usually the United Kingdom. If you're selling here and your suppliers are based here, then you can offer next day delivery to your customers. You're targeting one product range because you've picked your niche and you probably haven't yet branched out to more products within that niche. So to start with, it keeps it really simple and then you can just let it play out. Don't overbuild, don't pour ad spend into low ticket, low profit products that maybe wouldn't generate you much profit anyway if they did sell. So for example, we can exclude those from our Google Shopping product feed that we're sending through Google Merchant Centre to Google Ads. We can those from even being an advertised so we'll never spend a penny on products that are cheap and therefore don't make as much profit that way. Every single click that we get on a product is for a product that if someone were to purchase it and when they do eventually purchase it, we'll make you know, a couple of 100 if not several 100 in profit up to several thousand in profit as well depending on the the average price point of your product. So those are the things I think don't panic, just let Google learn. Give it time, give it two or three weeks to really start to optimise for the right person that it's showing your ads to. And then make sure your tracking is set up correctly. So check your conversion data is feeding in when you do make purchases, check that they're showing up in your account if they came through ads. And the app that we recommend using for that is by a team called the SIM Process team. That's their Google Shopping Feed app in Shopify. It's really good for setting up conversion tracking correctly. And otherwise you're flying blind. If you're not feeding that conversion data back to Google Ads directly, then Google's algorithm is just like what? We don't know what works, like who, who purchased, who didn't, and that's not where you want to be. You want to measure your return on ad spend and make sure you're profitable and that you scale up gradually and sustainably. Then you want to make sure that you have your tracking set up correctly from day one. But once you've done that, there are so many other needle moving activities that you can go and focus on, like signing new suppliers or optimising your website to get a higher conversion rate or lowering your page load speed, like things like that, that you can focus on. That will really increase every return of every penny that you're spending on ads. But don't be in there constantly tinkering with the ads in the first few days and there's no need. That's the key. Patience is going to pay off. Allow Google that time. Yeah, great advice Lewis. And then it will optimise using the machine learning that we couldn't even comprehend the amount of data points that it's looking at to. Show your ads. To the right people just know in the way that I do. I just trust in the power that Google has and the knowledge it has about the users on the Internet. I trust that it will find the right people, and I've been proven right over the years. There's not been a day that I've not been running ads now for almost what, four years? Oh, 4 1/2 years since I first started following the drop ship. I'm not master class. And it's been bringing in consistent sales because I've given it that trust and I've kept it simple. And that's really the key. So because a lot of people I think listening to this, when they join the programme, they are doing Google Ads for the very first time like I was when I joined. So don't try and overcomplicate it. Stick to what we know works and you can expect to see the same results. So that is the full strategy that's generated at £7 million combined unpacked. So any final words on this ad strategy for those people that are looking to get started running their first campaign? Well, once you have the right strategy and the right systems and foundations in place, I mean, you kind of have to just start it's. Like. You have to just dive into the pool and say, right, I'm going to go you don't need a massive budget to make ads work, you know, But I think people worry that like, I haven't got 10s of thousands to put towards ads. You don't need it. That's the beauty of a platform like this. It's a leveller. You, yeah, it's levels the playing field for all retailers. You can start with £30 a day and with the right structure, after the first few days, the first few weeks you make one sale and generate four £500 in profit. How many days of ad spend have you now just covered so that you now have a buffer to be able to continue spending and maybe even up that spend as you go. So it's a very, very scalable way of turning certain cash input into more cash output. It's hands off. We found a really good way to to set this funnel up by starting with Google Performance Max campaigns and then following the retargeting remarketing strategies we talked about today. I mean, we guide you through all of this stuff step by step. If you want a step by step process to do this, then the best way to for us to be able to help you is head over to drop shipunlocked.com/start and we'll show you exactly how you can get set up. Are you enjoying the podcast? We'd love to hear from you. Leave a comment or a review and we might feature it in an upcoming episode. And for detailed show notes and resources, visit dropshipunlock.com/podcast. If you found value in any episode of this podcast, please could you take just 10 seconds to leave us a quick five star review on your favourite podcast app. It helps us more than you can imagine and who knows, you might just hear your comments. Read out on the show. Thanks for being a part of our community. Your support helps us keep delivering new episodes to you every week. Now is that part of the podcast where we like to answer a question that's come in directly from a listener of the podcast? And just as a quick reminder before we do that, if you have a question that's come up while you've been listening to the episode today, simply comment beneath the YouTube video version of this episode because every episode goes live on YouTube as well as the podcast platforms. So comment there and we may feature it in an upcoming episode. So question we're going to feature today is coming from Safer and he's asked, would you recommend Google Voice or Circle Loop for a phone line for your customers? Thanks for your question. Safer. And yeah, I think we tried Google Voice many years ago. I mean, I don't know if it was that they didn't have UK landline numbers or something at the time or if the costs were prohibitive. I can't remember the reason why. But we went for Circle Loop as an app because there was a phone app for it. There's a web app like a, a desktop app that you can use. And it allows us to take calls from customers anywhere in the world. And it allows me to plug my team in so that my team of virtual assistants can answer those calls from customers. It's, I've found that it's a really solid app. Their support's really good. If ever you do have issues, you just liaise with their support team and Google Voice looks like it could be promising. I mean, especially if it's part of Google Workspace. But Circle Loop is very low fee and it just kind of depends on what you're more comfortable with. I like to use the right tool for the right job. Like if if circle loop do phones, I want to let them kind of handle the phones because it keeps it simple. It records all the calls, it transcribes things. It, it just makes it simple. So yeah, we actually have a free trial, don't we, for Circle Loop. If you want to try it for free for seven days and just make up your own mind, you can head over to drop shipunlocked.com/circle to check it out. Perfect. Great question. Important when you're setting up to have a phone line. And yeah, I've also always used Circle Loop as well. And the biggest thing for me is the support that you get from Circle Loop. I imagine if I use Google Voice, getting hold of Google is never easy at the best of times. So it'd probably be the same with the phone line if you ever experienced issues. So that'll be my final point on that one. OK, now let's highlight a recent review that we've had for the podcast recently. And a big thing, a big thank you to Michelle Bentham. And she is a regular listener because she's already been featured already with a review for the podcast in the past. But keep them coming and we'll keep sharing them. So let us know if you've enjoyed the podcast. And Michelle has said she's 60 in a couple of years but she's definitely not tech Sammy. But this course that she's on is brilliant and extremely easy to follow. If I need help I can ask on the platform and interact everyday. Amazing. Thank you so much for your review, Michelle. I guess more of a review of the programme than the podcast, but we really appreciate that you're enjoying the programme. And yeah, we are glad to have you as a member inside of Drop Strip Unlocked. So before we wrap up today. I'd love to ask you a quick. Favour, if you can, If you've enjoyed today's episode or any of these episodes, could you take just a moment to leave us a review? Your feedback helps us reach more listeners and keep improving our content. Plus, we might just be able to read your review on our next episode. Thank you for joining us on this episode of the Drop Ship Unlocked podcast. We hope you are leaving with new insights and inspiration to fuel your entrepreneurial journey. To kick start your e-commerce business, head over to drop shipunlocked.com/ start. It's the perfect place to start and get access to resources that will help you build your business from the ground up. I don't forget to hit that subscribe button for more episodes packed with strategies, tips, and success stories. Plus, if you enjoyed this episode today, a five star review would mean the world to us. And you might even get a shout out. On the next episode. Thank you for choosing to spend your time with us today. We can't wait to bring you more insights on the next episode of the Drop Ship Unlocked podcast.