What is Brand Term Targeting?
As of January 2024, Brand Term Targeting is available on Walmart.com. This targeting strategy can be applied to the following ad units: Sponsored Products, Sponsored Brands, and Sponsored Video. This opens up opportunities for advertisers to defend their brand presence, gain new customers, and increase visibility.
Advertisers can now advertise their items on competitor brand keywords. Traditional relevancy hurdles don't apply to this strategy, meaning that as long as the item you're advertising is relevant to the category of the competitor keyword you would like to bid on, it can serve. Here's some things you should know before launching:
The only placement in Sponsored Products that can be impacted is search in grid, and the first 2 ad slots will always be protected from brand term targeting
Brand Term Targeting can only be applied to exact match keywords within the manual campaign. Your auto campaign will not start automatically targeting competitor's brand keywords
CPC's to serve on a competitor keyword can be very high. Especially if the brand is actively protecting their own brand keywords
Best Practices for Brand Term Targeting
We recommend taking a cautious approach when trying out Brand Term Targeting. It is important to note that CPC's on branded keywords can be much higher than on unbranded keywords, so be thoughtful and strategic with the brands you're targeting.
Actively review the competitor ad strategy before targeting their keywords.
Are they using a brand defense strategy? If competitors are bidding on their own brand keywords, the CPC will be higher, and therefore you will need to bid more aggressively to place
Are they competitively priced? You want to show a compelling alternative or complimentary offer to your competitors item. If the brand you wish to target is selling a similar item to you, at a cheaper price, you may run the risk of not converting on their brand keywords
What do their listings look like? If you have stronger listings than the competitor you wish to target (ie. better ratings/ reviews, stronger content that showcases the item better, more information on the item in your product details section), there is more opportunity for you to target them. However if their listings are stronger, you might be at a disadvantage by placing beside them
Since this is an exact match only capability, brands will know when they are being targeted, and bidding wars can begin fast. Therefore it is important to:
Be open to bidding aggressively. Targeting brand terms will not be cheap. In order for your keywords to spend, you will likely need to bid at a higher starting point than you are used to for unbranded terms. We recommend $1.80 - $2.00 as a starting bid
Keep an eye on your own branded terms. If you notice other brands actively targeting your own terms, this will likely introduce a need for you to have a brand defence strategy, and start bidding on your own keywords
Monitor your bids on competitor terms closely. While it is important to give your keywords and new targeting strategy time to test the effectiveness, keep an eye to make sure you're not wasting spend, and be ready to try new brands to target if need be.
How to Launch Brand Term Targeting in Perpetua Sponsored Products
We recommend launching a new separate goal in Perpetua for Brand Term Targeting. Follow the steps below:
Navigate to the Walmart marketplace in your account, click "New Goal", and select your products.
Keep in mind that the items you select will be the items that place beside your competitors items. We recommend using items with the strongest content, and the most ratings/ reviews.
Select a Universal Goal type, and enter your goal settings
Create a universal goal, enter your goal name, target ROAS, and daily budget. We recommend setting a low target ROAS to allow the ad engine to bid aggressively.
Toggle off the auto campaign segment in the advanced settings
This step is important since Brand Term Targeting is only available through the manual campaign, so the creation of an auto campaign in this goal is not necessary.
Toggle off Auto Add Targets in the harvesting section
This is to ensure that no unbranded keywords are automatically harvested into the campaign by the ad engine, so that this campaign remains strictly for Brand Term Targeting.
Add your keywords and set your bids
Remember you can only target competitor branded terms with exact match. There will be a default bid of $1.00 set for this match type. We would recommend setting your starting bid at $1.80 - $2.00
Once you have completed all the fields and are satisfied with the settings for your goal, you are ready to click "Launch Goal".
How to Launch Brand Term Targeting with Sponsored Brands / Sponsored Video
Brand Term Targeting is also available for Sponsored Brands and Sponsored Video ad units.
To add brand / competitor keywords to an existing campaign, follow these steps:
Navigate to the Sponsored Brands section of your Walmart account, and click into the goal you wish to edit. Click on the targets tab, and select the plus sign in the top right corner to add targets.
Add the brand / competitor keyword as an exact match keyword, with your desired bid, and add it to the goal.
Keep in mind that adding new keywords to your campaign will send your campaign back into review with Walmart, so the changes will not be pushed right away. Check back in 24-48 hours to confirm the campaign has been published with the added keywords.
To add brand / competitor keywords to a new campaign, follow these steps:
Launch a sponsored brands headline goal, or a sponsored video goal as you normally would, add just add your brand / competitor keyword as a target amongst the rest of your keywords. Remember to enter the keyword as exact match, and set a higher bid.
Article last updated January 23, 2024. If you find this information to be out of date, please contact hello@perpetua.io.