Maximize conversions
The Smart Bidding strategy that gets as many conversions as it can within your budget. Every conversion counts the same, so it goes after the leads that are cheapest to get.
Why it matters
It is where most lead-gen accounts start, and why so many end up with plenty of cheap leads that never buy. Nothing in it can tell a lead worth ten thousand from one worth nothing.
What goes wrong
It works well when every lead really is worth about the same. It fails quietly when they are not, because the leads that are easiest to win are often the least likely to buy: people filling in forms for free guides, students, competitors, buyers with no budget. Cost per lead falls, the report looks better, and sales complain about lead quality.
The usual next step is Maximize conversion value, fed with values that tell good leads from bad ones.
How to check it on your own account
Compare your cost per lead with your close rate over the last year. If leads got cheaper while fewer of them closed, the strategy is buying the easy ones.
Next to this
- Target CPAGoogle AdsMaximize conversions with a cost target attached.
- Maximize conversion valueGoogle AdsThe bid strategy that spends the budget to bring back the highest total conversion value rather than the highest count.
- Value-based biddingBidding on what a conversion is worth rather than on how many conversions arrive.
Where this comes up
How it applies in your trade
The same method, worked through for each kind of business: what a lead is worth, what is known on arrival and what to prepare.
The rest of this step
- Value-based bidding
- Target CPA
- Smart Bidding
- Maximize conversion value
- ROAS
- Target ROAS
- Learning period
- Conversion volume threshold
- Portfolio bid strategy
- Journey-aware bidding
- Lead Intent Scoring
- Data-driven attribution
- Value optimisation
- Advantage+
- Value-Based Optimization
- Smart+
- Performance Max
- AI Max
- Aggregated Event Measurement
Measure this on your own data
The diagnostic reads a CRM export in your browser and reports your volume, your match rate and the spread between your leads against the thresholds in this glossary. Nothing is uploaded and no account is needed.