Customer lifecycle goals are a suite of goals designed to reach your customers at every stage of their purchase journey within Google's Performance Max, Search, and Shopping campaigns to help you grow lifetime value. There are several configuration options depending on whether your objective is to acquire new customers, retain your highest value customers, reach lapsed customers, or all of the above.
This article explains how to set up different types of customer lifecycle goals to achieve your business objective.
On this page
- Define your customer lists
- Configure your lifecycle goals
- Activate lifecycle goals in your campaign
- Set up new vs returning customer reporting in your Google tag (optional, but recommended)
- Monitor your campaign performance
Instructions
Step 1 of 5: Define your customer lists
We strongly recommend implementing durable first-party data with Customer Match lists (via lists powered by Google Ads Data Manager, GA4 Audiences, Conversion Based Customer Lists, and/or direct uploads) for all lifecycle goals for the most durable and accurate setup and existing customer detection. Customer Match lists supplement Google autodetection by capturing conversions that autodetection cannot, such as offline conversions, and allowing for further segmentation of your customers (e.g. high value and lapsed).
All the lifecycle goal modes below can be used together with the exception of New Customer Only Mode which is not compatible with other modes.
If you use a manager account (MCC) and are using any of the lifecycle goals, make sure continuous audience sharing is on. If you don’t turn on continuous sharing, your campaign will likely not serve.
| Lifecycle goal | Mode | Customer segment reached / prioritized | Customer list type | Customer lists options |
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
New Customer Acquisition |
New Customer Value Mode |
New customers | Existing customers |
Options:
|
|
High Value New Customer Mode (Beta) |
High value new customers | High value existing customers |
Options:
You can only upload lists via the methods above to identify customers in this segment. Autodetection and Tag-based Remarketing Lists and other Customer Match options are not compatible with this mode. |
|
| New Customer Only Mode | New customers | Existing customers |
Options:
|
|
| Customer Retention | Win-Back Mode (Beta) | Lapsed customers | Lapsed customers |
Options:
You can only upload lists via the methods above to identify customers in this segment. Autodetection and Tag-based Remarketing Lists and other Customer Match options are not compatible with this mode. |
| High Value Win-Back Mode (Beta) | High value lapsed customers | High value existing customers* |
Options:
You can only upload lists via the methods above to identify customers in this segment. Autodetection and Tag-based Remarketing Lists and other Customer Match options are not compatible with this mode. |
*Note that High Value Win-Back Mode and High Value New Customer Mode both use the same customer list, i.e. ‘High value existing customers’. As a result, if you’ve already set up one of these modes, your high value existing customers list will be automatically applied to the other mode as well, once enabled. This is because both modes rely on a list of high value existing customers to reach the desired customer segment, although the list is used differently in each mode. In High Value New Customer Mode we use your high value existing customer list to predict which new customers are likely to be high value, whereas in High Value Win-Back Mode we use your high value existing customer list, in combination with your ‘Lapsed customers’ list, to understand which lapsed customers are high value.
Learn more about all of the ways you can create a customer list using Customer Match and use audience customer types.
Step 2 of 5: Configure your lifecycle goals
Having a "Purchase" conversion goal is required to optimize campaigns to all lifecycle goals, except New Customer Only Mode which can be used with non-Purchase conversion goals:
| Customer Lifecycle Modes | Eligible Conversion Goal Types |
| New Customer Value Mode High Value New Customer Mode (Beta) Win-Back Mode (Beta) High Value Win-Back Mode (Beta) |
Purchase conversion goal is required |
| New Customer Only Mode |
Purchase conversion goal is not required |
Depending on what type of conversion goals you have, there are 2 options:
- Configure Lifecycle Goals using Purchase conversion goals
- Configure New Customer Only Mode
Option 1: Configure Lifecycle Goals using Purchase conversions
If applicable, you can set up a new "Purchase" conversion action or if you’ve already set up your conversion action, ensure that you set the goal type to "Purchase" with Website as the conversion source and the conversion action set to Primary.
If you haven’t configured your lifecycle goal yet, use the following steps to set it up. If you use cross-account conversion tracking, configure your lifecycle goal from the main account where conversion tracking is set up.
- In your Google Ads account, click the Goals icon
.
- Click the Conversions drop down in the section menu.
- Click Summary.
- Under the “Customer acquisition” panel, click Set Up.
- Depending on which modes you have access to (some modes are still in beta) you’ll find one or more of the following options:
- New customers
- New customers (high value) - Beta
- Lapsed customers - Beta
- Lapsed customers (high value) - Beta
- For each mode you wish to use, add the relevant audience lists as detailed in the table in Step 1. Your audience lists may include:
- Existing customers
- High value customers
- Lapsed customers
The definitions for each customer segment are business specific, so use your own definitions to organize your first-party data into each of these customer segments.
- Set the value assigned to your customer segment. This is used in the New customer value mode. This is used in the New Customer Value Mode, High-Value New Customer Mode, Win-Back Mode, and High-Value Win-Back Mode. It is added to a customer's purchase conversion if they fall into one of your defined segments, which is reflected in reporting, but also helps Smart Bidding to optimize towards your desired customer segments. The higher this value is, the more the campaign will be optimized towards your specified customers. This value will be used by default in all campaigns that optimize to new customer acquisition or retention goals. Review the table below for our value-setting guidance.
- If you’re unsure what your customer value should be, you can use the recommended value that’s suggested when you select the lifecycle goal. This recommended value is based on your average order value across your prior campaigns. Or, use the value-setting guidelines below.
- Proceed to the next step.
We recommend setting values for your customer segments according to the guidelines below as a starting point and adjusting as needed based on performance.
| Mode | Customer Segment | Value Setting Guidance |
| New Customer Value Mode | New customers | 2x of a regular customer |
|
High value new customers |
Higher than the new customer value |
|
| Win-Bade Mode | Lapsed customers |
Lower than the new customer value, higher than existing customers |
|
High value lapsed customers |
Higher than lapsed customers, lower than new customers |
The values set for each customer segment are business specific, so the above guidance is directional to help you set the right values for your business.
Option 2: Configure New Customer Only Mode
If you are tracking conversions other than Purchases, you can enable New Customer Only Mode to optimize towards new customers. If you use cross-account conversion tracking, configure your new customer acquisition goal from the main account where conversion tracking is set up.
- In your Google Ads account, click the Goals icon
- Click the Conversions drop down in the section menu.
- Click Summary.
- Under the "Customer acquisition" panel, click Set Up.
- Define your existing customers by choosing one or more audience lists that include your existing customers. This will be used to identify which customers are new.
Step 3 of 5: Activate lifecycle goals in your campaign
- In your Google Ads account, click the Campaigns icon
.
- Click Campaigns.
- Select the campaigns that you want to enable lifecycle goals for (currently available for Performance Max, Search, and Shopping campaigns) using the checkboxes next to the campaign name
- Click Edit
- Click Update customer acquisition beside the campaign name to open the 'Settings' panel.
- Enable lifecycle goals in your campaign:
- To enable New Customer Acquisition goal:
- Expand the "Customer acquisition" row
- Select Optimize campaign for acquiring new customers.
- Choose whether you want to:
- Bid higher for new customers than existing customers (recommended)
- This option lets you optimize for new customer acquisition while helping you drive overall sales by targeting all customers.
- Note:
- This is only available for max conversion value/target ROAS bid strategies.
- If you want to further optimize towards high value new customers, you’ll need to enable this option.
- Only bid for new customers
- This option limits your ads to only new customers regardless of your bid strategy.
- Bid higher for new customers than existing customers (recommended)
- Choose whether you want to:
- If you’re setting up a Retention goal:
- Expand the ‘Customer retention’ row
- Select Adjust your bidding to help win back lapsed customers
- To enable New Customer Acquisition goal:
- Values used in New Customer Value Mode and Win-Back Mode are configured in your lifecycle goal settings at the account level. If you need to make adjustments, click Change value and you’ll be taken to your account goal settings.
- Note If you want to optimize towards lapsed and high value lapsed customers, you’ll need to ensure both modes are toggled in UI
Step 4 of 5: Set up new vs returning customer reporting in your Google tag (optional, but recommended)
In order to accurately report on new vs returning customers in your campaign reporting, we strongly recommend setting up the new vs returning customer parameter in your Google tag. Refer to this article on how to set it up.
Note: Lifecycle goals do not require that you set up this tag parameter, but doing so will greatly improve the accuracy of your reporting.
Step 5 of 5: Set up new vs returning customer reporting in your Google tag (optional, but recommended)
Refer to measuring your lifecycle goals campaigns to learn more about how to view reporting and assess performance.