X (Twitter) Dynamic Product Ads: Catalog Retargeting and Prospecting

DPA Retargeting vs. DPA Prospecting on X

DPA Retargeting shows a product to users who interacted with it on your site, for example by adding it to their cart without buying. The audience is small and intent is high. DPA Prospecting shows the most relevant products in your catalog to users who have never visited your site; it's used to find new customers. X says that using DPA with the Website Conversions objective can improve cost per purchase and ROAS, so we launch campaigns under the Conversions objective.

We run the two types in separate campaigns with separate budgets. In Retargeting, the expected cost per conversion is low, while in Prospecting it runs higher in the first weeks. When they share one budget, retargeting with its cheap conversions pulls in all the spend and the new customer side never grows.

X Shopping Manager catalog and X Pixel setup

The catalog is kept in X Shopping Manager. Manual uploads are limited to 100 MB, while scheduled feeds can use files up to 8 GB and can sync once or several times a day. We prefer a scheduled feed so the ad changes as price and stock change. We split product sets with filters by category, price range or campaign.

If a retargeting campaign isn't delivering or is showing irrelevant products, the first thing we check is product ID matching. If the ID in the pixel event isn't the same as in the catalog, the ad can't find the product the user viewed. The problem usually comes from the site using variant IDs while the feed uses parent product IDs. Before setup, we check the following points one by one:

• The X Pixel base code is on every page of the site, and view content, add to cart and purchase events each fire separately.
• The product ID in the events is exactly the same as the ID in the feed.
• Out-of-stock products are correctly flagged in the feed.
• Product images carry no price or discount text, so an image doesn't show outdated information when the price changes.
• Events are managed through Google Tag Manager and carry the same values as GA4 e-commerce events.

Selling mainly on marketplaces? Read this first

In Türkiye, many brands make most of their sales through the country's leading marketplaces. For DPA to work, however, add to cart and purchase events need to land in the X Pixel on the brand's own site. A store that sells only on a marketplace can't collect these events, so X DPA isn't a fit. For these brands, we use X for product promotion and to drive traffic to the marketplace store, comparing the sales impact periodically with the marketplace's own reports.

For brands with their own site but little traffic, the retargeting audience also stays small. In that case, we first drive traffic to the site with Prospecting or Collection and Carousel Ads, then switch on Retargeting once the audience is large enough. At this stage, we also separate audiences that overlap with catalog ads on other channels, such as Criteo Dynamic Retargeting.

Dynamic Product Ads: when do we recommend it?

How we manage Dynamic Product Ads

1. Catalog checkWe check product IDs, prices, stock status and images against catalog rules.
2. Shopping Manager setupWe create the catalog and enable daily sync with a scheduled feed.
3. Pixel matchingWe test that the product IDs in X Pixel events match the catalog.
4. Margin-based setsWe build sets based on profit margin, category and stock status.
5. Two campaignsWe launch Retargeting and Prospecting under the Conversions objective with separate budgets.

Dynamic Product Ads: metrics and requirements

The Brand Move X Team

To learn more about Dynamic Product Ads or other X ad formats, contact The Brand Move X team today.

Contact us now