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Overstock seals more deals with Microsoft Audience Ads

  Article , Retail , AI insights , Success stories

Microsoft Advertising helps online retailer boost revenue

Overstock.com logo

Style and comfort

If you’re an online shopper, chances are you’ve spent time on Overstock.com. As one of the leading online retailers, Overstock has built a reputation as a go-to destination for people in search of home furnishings and decor. In 2017, the Midvale, Utah-based company closed $1.7 billion in revenue with traffic of more than 30 million unique site visitors each month.

Overstock lives and breathes the internet. That makes paid search with Microsoft Advertising a valuable piece of its overall marketing strategy. “The key is to get in front of people when they first start searching for furniture,” says Steven Sun, senior paid search manager at Overstock. “We want to be in people's minds when they journey down the purchasing funnel.”  

The Bing Ads team really helps us think about ideas that can give us a competitive edge in our expanding industry. If there's a new feature, we definitely want to jump on it and see how it performs.

— Steven Sun, senior paid search manager, Overstock

What’s in a name?

Furniture-buying has historically been a hands-on process, where people test a chair or couch for comfort in person. For that reason, the industry has trailed many others in transitioning to digital shopping. That’s changing, with people willing to buy items based on how they align with their search and preferences. “Most people can't name the brand of their couch or chair,” says Sun. “They just search with broad terms like ‘leather couch.’” 

 

A new channel for growth

Overstock’s marketing team is always on the lookout for new marketing ideas. Sun likes that Microsoft Advertising representatives come to him with innovative solutions all the time, making them one of his favorite teams to talk to. “The Bing Ads team really helps us think about ideas that can give us a competitive edge in our expanding industry. If there's a new feature, we definitely want to jump on it and see how it performs.” One such example is Microsoft Audience Ads.
 
The goal of these types of ads is to get the right message to the right customers at the right time, by blending naturally into consumers’ experiences on premium sites like MSN, Outlook.com and Microsoft Edge, as well as other partner sites outside of search. Sun sees a lot of potential with this solution. He also finds it easy to extend his existing search campaigns to include Microsoft Audience Ads. “You just need to set a bid modifier, add images via Image Extensions and that's it.” 
 
Additionally, the solution offers easy scalability. For example, with the help of the Microsoft Advertising team, Overstock can collect a basic inventory of images for every single product it sells. The images can be applied to ads that blend into native locations across different online properties. “We had a living room campaign that had a picture of a living room — a broader, more generic image — with all different home furnishings,” shares Sun. “This way, if someone saw it, they’d be able to spot the item that's associated with the ad within the image.”

 

Bigger and better

In the year since Overstock implemented Microsoft Audience Ads, it has seen impressive results:

  • Click volume up 576% (weekly)
  • Revenue up 1,247% (weekly)
  • Return on ad spend (ROAS) up 33% (quarterly)
Overstock has achieved performance improvements in multiple metrics, leading to a 1,247% increase in revenue (weekly).

Overstock has achieved performance improvements in multiple metrics, leading to a 1,247% increase in revenue (weekly).

In fact, the ROAS, conversion rate and cost per acquisition have met or surpassed traditional search campaign performance. As a result, Overstock has increased its weekly investment in Microsoft Audience Ads by more than 1,000%, and click allocation on the Microsoft Search Network has increased by almost 200%.

Overall, Overstock is very impressed with Microsoft Advertising and the performance of Microsoft Audience Ads. Sun highly recommends it to other businesses. “If they're looking at any kind of win, any kind of incrementality when it comes to clicks and additional conversions, I would definitely suggest Microsoft Audience Ads,” says Sun. “That's something we’ll be doing more of in the future to help us increase conversions and our ROAS.”  

If [businesses] are looking at any kind of win, any kind of incrementality when it comes to clicks and additional conversions, I would definitely suggest Microsoft Audience Ads.

— Steven Sun, senior paid search manager, Overstock

See a summary

View or save the infographic to see how Overstock achieved a 33% increase in quarterly return on ad spend and a 1,247% boost in weekly revenue using Microsoft Audience Ads.

  Read about boosting revenue