Leverage first party customer identity, customer behavior and product catalog data to build high-value customer segments to target with dynamic display ads with Criteo. Together with Bluecore and Criteo, brands can target customers in display to increase Return on Ad Spend (RoAS) and orchestrate targeting across other paid and owned channels at the right time to maximize the value and efficiency of their marketing efforts.
Please be sure to have your Criteo Advertiser ID ready to begin the integration. Access your Criteo ID by logging into your Criteo account. Then, locate the Advertiser ID at the end of the address bar once logged in:
INTEGRATE THE PLATFORM
1. Navigate to the data icon on the left-hand navigation.
2. Go to Integrations.
3. Click New Integration > Marketplace.
4. Select Criteo.
5. Enter the Advertiser ID.
6. Click Save.
After the Advertiser ID is added and saved, the next step is to log into Criteo using the consent URL that appears upon saving the integration.
7. Log into Criteo using the consent URL.
8. Accept the required permissions.
9. Click Connect.
After the permissions have been accepted, the integration is complete!
SYNC A BLUECORE AUDIENCE
After you’ve set up the integration successfully, the next step is to create a campaign to begin syncing audiences from Bluecore to Criteo.
CREATE THE CAMPAIGN
1. Navigate to the flag icon on the left-hand side of the navigation bar.
2. Go to Advertise.
3. Then Campaigns.
4. Click New in the upper right-hand corner.
5. Click Create New Campaign.
6. Select the Criteo Channel.
7. Click Next.
8. Enter a Campaign Name.
9. Select an Audience.
NOTE: The minimum audience size is 100,000-150,000. Bluecore recommends an audience size of 200,000 or more.
10. Configure a cadence for the campaign to sync (once, daily, weekly, or monthly). Bluecore recommends setting a daily cadence.
NOTE: Please set the sync time for 4 AM EST. This specific time ensures a successful sync.
11. Select the applicable Criteo Advertise ID from the drop-down menu.
12. Click Save and Continue.
13. Then, review the summary of the export.
14. Click Edit on the campaign settings.
15. Enter a Criteo Audience Name. This is the audience name that will appear in Criteo. Bluecore recommends this naming convention to be consistent and easily recognizable outside of Bluecore. For example, Bluecore CDP - Top 30% PCLV.
16. Click Save.
17. Click Save & Launch Campaign in the lower right-hand corner.
NOTE: Audiences synced to Criteo will not be cleaned up by Bluecore. This can be done separately within the Criteo console as necessary.
PUBLISH
Click Save and Publish to run the audience export.
One-time campaigns will sync within one hour of campaign sent.
Recurring campaigns will be synced twice a day.
USE CASES
The following use cases are not comprehensive of all the campaigns Bluecore can power on Criteo. They’re mostly focused around Bluecore’s Predictive Audience capabilities, but you can experiment with the Customer Behavior filter as well. These use cases are meant to highlight some of the more interesting options and also to point out some best practices, so you can get the most out of Bluecore Audiences on Criteo.
CATEGORY PREFERENCE
Most good Criteo campaigns are built around Category Preference. It’s great for campaigns targeting a specific product, brand, category, or breadcrumb. For example: a new product launch, a promotion on a specific brand, or an event around a category. It’s a much better option than using past purchasers or past viewers to decide how to target.
SUGGESTED STRATEGIES
The creative of your Criteo campaign should match the attribute value you chose to create the audience (e.g., the specific brand, category, etc.).
Depending on the type of category, you should consider whether to include or exclude past purchasers. Past purchasers will be included in the Category Preference audience by default, as they will likely have very high preferences for the attribute you used as an input. However, if you are looking for existing contacts that have a preference for a product or category that is rarely purchased more than once, like a refrigerator or a mattress, you should consider excluding past purchasers from the audience to avoid targeting them with your Criteo campaign. Exclude past purchasers by using the Customer Behaviors filter within the Audience Builder.
If you find your campaign is performing very well, you can consider lowering the level of preference to broaden the audience and increase the reach of the campaign. If your campaign is not performing as well as you would like, you should raise the level of preference and/or consider layering in the Predictive CLV filter to remove low CLV contacts from the audience. See PCLV best practices below for more detail.
PREDICTED CUSTOMER LIVETIME VALUE
Another commonly used filter for Criteo campaigns is Predicted Customer Lifetime Value (CLV). It’s great for when you want to divide Criteo targeting across your entire customer list. For example, events, sales, or promoting products and categories you know will appeal to your entire customer list. By splitting up your customer list by Predicted CLV, budget and bidding can be optimized to improve ROI on your campaigns.
For example, one client discovered such a low ROI on their Low Predicted CLV audience that they were able to boost overall campaign ROI by over 50% by shifting budget into higher Predicted CLV audiences.
SUGGESTED STRATEGIES
Try dividing Predicted CLV into thirds – High (Top 33%), Medium (Between 33% and 67%), and Low (Bottom 33%), plus a fourth audience for Unknown Predicted CLV contracts. These four groups encompass your entire customer list.
For a campaign targeting your entire customer list, create four identical Criteo campaigns, and target each campaign against one of the four CLV audiences.
Be sure to include Unknown Predicted CLV in your campaigns as we’ve found the performance to be higher on this group than the Low Predicted CLV folks in many instances.
Exclude high-value repeat customers from display in order to nurture in owned channels
POST-PURCHASE/CROSS-SELL
Automatically target recent purchasers with products they are likely to buy in addition to what they already bought. To create this audience, choose a preference to a specific category you think will be a good cross-sell option in general (e.g., speakers).
Create an Audience of customers who have made a purchase in the last 7 days who have NOT bought Speakers in the last 7 days but who have a High or Very High preference to Speakers. This is a group of customers that bought something other than Speakers, but have demonstrated a strong interest in Speakers. Create a Campaign with Speakers creative to target against this audience.
REACTIVATION/WINBACK
Target a win-back or reactivation offer to customers that have become At-Risk in the last 7 days. Reactivate them before they become Lost customers.
Best practices here would be to include some reason for the customer to reactivate, such as a special discount just for them or free shipping. You can make a few adjustments to improve performance here as well, such as layering in the Predicted CLV filter to remove low value customers, as well as layering in category affinity to show creative based on a customer’s personal product preferences.
DISCOUNT PREFERENCE
Separate your mark down price buyers from your full-price buyers. There are different options of how to use this segmentation. For example, you could simply offer different discounts to the two groups using promo codes within the ad creative or copy. Alternatively, if you’re doing a site-wide promotion, you could do a pre-sale event for full price buyers, and then exclude any recent purchasers when you promote the sale event to the whole customer base.
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
Q: Do I need Bluecore assistance to set up any new Criteo audience sync?
A: Please contact your CSM to enable Criteo in your account. Once this integration is enabled, you can set up the integration using the steps outlined above. Once the integration is set up, you can begin setting up Criteo audiences using the steps outlined above.
Q: What is the audience name created in Criteo?
A: The audience name in Criteo is the same as what’s configured on the campaign summary page, in step 14. In addition to the name entered, Bluecore prepends a prefix (Bluecore) before the audience name and appends date as the suffix.
Q: How often is the audience updated in Criteo?
A: Recurring audiences are synced from Bluecore to Criteo once a day, either daily or weekly or monthly based on the schedule settings set. Criteo processes Audience updates twice a day.
Q: Does the audience data in Criteo get refreshed with every sync?
A: Yes. As a part of the API sync, we remove the old audience data and add the fresh audience data.
Q: How can I retrieve the Criteo audience ID of a synced Criteo audience?
A: The name of the Criteo audience can be found on the campaign summary page. Please contact Bluecore Support for the Criteo Audience ID, if needed.
Q: Can I set up syncs to more than one Criteo destination from a Bluecore namespace?
A: Yes. Syncs can be set up to multiple Criteo ad accounts from a single Bluecore namespace. Follow the steps outlined above to also create an additional Criteo integration.