Generic pet keywords attract pet enthusiasts browsing content, not product buyers. 'Dog training tips' searchers rarely convert to product purchases.
Example: Paying $0.80 CPC for 'how to train puppy' with 0.3% product conversion
Pet products often serve specific breeds or pet types. Generic 'dog food' campaigns waste money on mismatched traffic.
Example: Large breed dog food ads showing for chihuahua owners
Pet consumables (food, treats, litter) are perfect for subscription, but ads don't emphasize recurring savings and landing pages bury subscribe-and-save.
Example: 85% one-time purchases vs. 60% for email-driven traffic
Searches for vet-recommended products attract window shoppers who want information, not e-commerce purchases—they'll ask their vet instead.
Example: 'Vet recommended dog food' converts at 1.2% vs. 'buy dog food online' at 3.8%
Pet product shoppers price-compare heavily. Clicks go to your site, research happens, purchases happen on Chewy with auto-ship discounts.
Example: 35% of traffic bounces to Chewy within 2 hours
With a single asset group, Google optimizes for aggregate ROAS by heavily favoring your top 5-10 products. The rest of your catalog gets almost no impressions. Worse, low-margin products drag down profitability while appearing successful in aggregate.
Fix: Segment products by performance tier: Winners (scale), Potentials (test), Underperformers (cut or fix). Create separate asset groups for each.
PMax claims credit for brand searches that would've cost $0.30 through a dedicated brand campaign. Without exclusions, you're paying 3-5x more for customers already looking for you.
Fix: Add brand exclusions to PMax and run a separate Brand Search campaign with exact match keywords.
Missing GTINs, generic titles, no custom labels, and missing sale prices hurt your Shopping ad performance. Missing breed/pet size info
Fix: Include breed or size designation in product titles
Your 5x ROAS might look great until you realize 70% of sales are repeat customers who would've bought anyway. You're paying to acquire customers you already have.
Fix: Segment reporting by new vs returning customers. Set up customer match lists and analyze true CAC.
Not all campaign types work for pet products stores. Here's what to skip:
Information intent, not purchase
Worried owners, not buyers
Attracts enthusiast, not buyer traffic
Follow these best practices to maximize your Pet Products Google Ads performance:
Budget: 40-50% • Target ROAS: 4-6x
Budget: 15-20% • Target ROAS: 6-12x
Budget: 20-25% • Target ROAS: 3-4x first-order (high LTV)
Budget: 15-20% • Target ROAS: 5-8x