We're spending $18K/month retargeting AirPods Max page visitors but conversions have been flat for 6 weeks. What's going on?
Your retargeting pool is essentially the same ~14,000 people seeing the same ad on repeat, and you've long passed the point of diminishing returns.
The core issue:
• Average frequency is 22.3 this month. That means each person in the pool has seen your AirPods Max ad roughly 22 times
• Conversion rate by frequency shows the cliff: impressions 1–3 convert at 2.1%, impressions 4–8 at 0.6%, impressions 9+ at 0.08%
• 91% of your retargeting spend is going to people who have already seen the ad 9+ times — effectively wasted
Why conversions are flat instead of declining:
New visitors trickle into your retargeting pool daily (~180/day from organic and paid sources). These fresh entrants convert at the normal 2.1% rate during their first few impressions, masking the fact that the rest of the pool is completely exhausted. You're essentially paying $16K/month to reach dead impressions and $2K to reach the fresh ones.
What I'd recommend:
• Set a hard frequency cap of 8 impressions per user per 30-day window. Based on the conversion curve, everything above 8 is noise
• Reallocate the freed-up budget (~$14K) to prospecting campaigns for AirPods Max — your prospecting CPA is currently $67 with plenty of headroom to scale
• Test a sequential retargeting creative strategy: show the lifestyle ad on impressions 1–3, the comparison ad on 4–6, and a limited-time offer on 7–8
Expected impact: Total AirPods Max conversions should increase roughly 35% at the same spend, because you're replacing dead retargeting impressions with productive prospecting ones.
2:13 PM
Results are based on causal inference models applied to your campaign data. Always verify critical decisions with your team.