My Target ROAS is 2000%, but actual ROAS is 2520% — Should I increase Target ROAS or scale differently?
Hey everyone,
I’m running a Google Ads campaign with a Target ROAS set at 2000%, and over the past few weeks, I’ve been consistently hitting 25.20 Conv. value / cost, which is way above target.
Stats:
Cost: ₪13,160
Conv. Value: ₪331,674
Conv. rate: 1.15%
Target ROAS: 2000%
Actual ROAS: 2520%
Search impression share: 58.78%
Search abs. top IS: 10.64$
I’m wondering:
Should I increase my Target ROAS, or would that risk reducing volume?
Would you recommend scaling budget while keeping the same ROAS target?
How do you usually maximize performance when you’re consistently beating ROAS goals?
Would love to hear from others who’ve dealt with this. I’m trying to balance growth and profitability. Any advice appreciated 🙏
The short answer is:
You should absolutely test increasing your Target ROAS to aim for a higher profitability threshold, while simultaneously increasing your budget to try and capture more volume.
Since your actual return on ad spend (ROAS) is significantly outperforming your target (2520% vs.2000%), the Smart Bidding algorithm has room to bid more aggressively on higher-value auctions while still maintaining your desired profitability level, which may increase both your impression share and conversion volume.
You are currently leaving potential conversions on the table by underbidding in valuable auctions because the algorithm is prioritizing a 2000% ROAS, a goal you are comfortably exceeding.
The long answer is:
Your current performance is an excellent sign, and you’re right to look for ways to capitalize on it while balancing growth and profitability.
The fact that your actual ROAS is 2520% and your Search impression share is still below 60% suggests there’s a good amount of untapped volume.
If you simply increase your budget without adjusting your Target ROAS, the algorithm will likely find more low-cost volume while maintaining the 2520% ROAS, but it won’t necessarily try to capture the most valuable volume where you might be slightly underbidding currently.
Therefore, the recommended scaling strategy is to first perform a gradual test of increasing your Target ROAS – perhaps to 2200% or 2300% – and simultaneously increasing your daily or campaign budget.
This tells the Google Ads system that you are willing to spend more per conversion to capture higher-quality, more competitive auctions, while still ensuring profitability.
This approach should help raise your low Search impression share and Search absolute top IS.
Monitor the results closely over a few conversion cycles.
If the actual ROAS stabilizes around the new, higher target and volume (conversions and cost) increases, that’s a successful scale.
If volume drops too quickly, you can dial the Target ROAS back down.
For maximizing performance and ensuring the Smart Bidding algorithm is working with the best possible data to make these scaling decisions, you should also look at improving your conversion tracking.
Using the Google Ads API in conjunction with Google Tag Manager and a server-side solution like Stape or Google Cloud Platform is an excellent and cost-effective way to achieve this.
This setup allows you to send conversion data directly from your server to Google Ads, which bypasses common browser restrictions (like Intelligent Tracking Prevention or cookie limitations) that can lead to underreporting conversions.
This is called server-side tracking.
By implementing server-side tracking, you ensure a more complete and accurate count of your conversions and their value, particularly for standard events like purchase or add_to_cart.
When the Google Ads algorithm has a richer, more accurate data stream, its Smart Bidding decisions become much better, leading to more efficient scaling and a higher actual ROAS even when pushing for more volume.
Compared to using a third-party tracking platform, this solution is extremely cheap because you are mainly paying for the small amount of server resources on a platform like Stape or Google Cloud Platform, and the Google Ads API itself is free to use.
This combination gives you the data fidelity of a much more expensive enterprise solution at a fraction of the cost.
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