US Automotive E-commerce: 5.3x ROAS on $337K Managed

The challenge

A US automotive e-commerce brand was putting real money into Google Ads without a clear read on whether it paid for itself. The products are high-ticket, so every wasted click costs more than it would in a cheap-and-cheerful store, and Performance Max was quietly eating budget without proof it was actually profitable.

The solution

I ran Search and Performance Max as two separate jobs, not one blended blur. Search captured the buyers already looking for the product, holding a 10.7% click-through rate and a $109 cost per conversion, which is where the efficient volume lives. Performance Max extended reach into new demand, but only after it was fed strong product and conversion signals so it optimized on real orders instead of cheap clicks. Conversion tracking counted both online orders and phone calls, because a high-ticket automotive buyer often picks up the phone before they check out.

The results

The account managed $337K in spend at a reported 5.3x return, driving 1,783 conversions from 24.3M impressions. Search carried the efficient, high-intent volume, Performance Max scaled reach once it was earning its budget, and the store funnel turned that traffic into orders. The dashboard above is a clean read of the real account numbers, with the client kept anonymous and their total sales figures left out.