{"id":26081,"date":"2025-06-04T23:02:18","date_gmt":"2025-06-04T17:32:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.karooya.com\/blog\/?p=26081"},"modified":"2025-06-04T23:02:19","modified_gmt":"2025-06-04T17:32:19","slug":"ppcchat-seasonality-in-ppc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.karooya.com\/blog\/ppcchat-seasonality-in-ppc\/","title":{"rendered":"PPCChat | Seasonality in PPC | 3rd June 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

While most advertisers experience some degree of seasonality, it\u2019s a topic that often doesn\u2019t receive the attention it deserves. In this week\u2019s PPCChat session, host Julie F Bacchini<\/a> led a discussion on how seasonality impacts the brands experts manage, how to better understand seasonality in PPC, useful tools for managing it, and more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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Q1: Do the brands for which you manage advertising have distinct seasonality in their businesses that THEY recognize? If so, what general industries are you working in?<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
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B2B – it depends! Some of our clients have definite seasonality, while others see pretty consistent performance and demand from month to month. @beyondthepaid<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yes although different brands handle it in different ways. The healthiest relationships have campaigns oriented around seasonality. @navahhopkins<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some of the lead gen areas I have worked with definitely had significant seasonality and knew it. Examples include: home services (think HVAC where tons of calls at start of winter or summer or during major cold snaps or heat waves), education, a lice treatment company (school year) @NeptuneMoon<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

B2C – Finance, mortgages and credit reports specifically. Downtick in Q4; big uptick in Q1. @JeffreyHain<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I should clarify that for B2B, December is pretty much useless for lead gen. @beyondthepaid<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

yes! resto, travel, even Gov. My wildfire ads are live already. @JuliaVyse<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I think summer can be slower for B2B as well with decision maker vacations. @NeptuneMoon<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

One thing is for certain, seasonality and smart bidding is one of the biggest missed opportunities. Not enough people enter the seasonality settings for conversion goals and it 100 impacts the success (or lack there of) of smart bidding. @navahhopkins<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

@beyondthepaid<\/a>  And you can\u2019t just turn advertising off in December like you could in the old days and not lose ground\u2026@NeptuneMoon<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

And the other way @navahhopkins<\/a> – not managing activity correctly when going into your down time and then the smart bidding keeps trying to push for more increases your CPCs looking for demand because of your prior data. @Meriem<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

@NeptuneMoon<\/a> right – you’re kind of screwed either way in December. Stay running, get terrible results; or pause and all smart bidding starts over, ruining your January…@beyondthepaid<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Absolutely, as an agency, it is also challenging to be aware, updated, and strategically adapted to each client\u2019s specific seasonality. @Jefersonvenancio<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Q2: Do you see a seasonality in the brands for which you manage advertising  that the business really does NOT? And if so, how do you categorize it? What general industries are you working in for this type of situation?<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
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Thankfully no – though it will be interesting to see if this remains true as I fully become Microsoft first. @navahhopkins<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I would argue that most brands have some seasonal element. @NeptuneMoon<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you mean does the advertising show seasonality but the business doesn’t see it generally then no. The clients I work with tend experience seasonality at the same time as the ads do. @Pete_Bowen<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Not every brand is aware of the more subtle seasonality. @NeptuneMoon<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

When I was in the mortgage space, the marketing team was aware of the Q4 downtick in quality leads, but sales wanted the same lead volume, so we ended up paying more to satisfy them. @JeffreyHain<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

@JeffreyHain<\/a> When there is not an acknowledgement of any seasonality, it can certainly make our jobs harder. Because expectations get unrealistic, as in the scenario you described. @NeptuneMoon<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sad part @NeptuneMoon<\/a> is the pattern was repeated YoY. @JeffreyHain<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Right\u2026 so it should have been built into the business planning. But sometimes businesses think that PPC is a magic faucet that has eternally strong water pressure 365 days a year! It is times like that where I have my big \u201csearch captures demand – it does not generate it\u201d talk. @NeptuneMoon<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I have some B2B clients who still don’t think there is seasonality when December goes quiet. “Clearly we’re not doing something right with our ads” @Meriem<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

@Meriem<\/a>  \u201cYes Diane, it is a mystery as to why the click and conversion volume dips every December\u2026\u201d @NeptuneMoon<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

We have one client who insists there is no seasonality to their business, despite multiple data points showing there is (including data directly from Google). We just don’t bring it up with them anymore…@beyondthepaid<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Not really, but I do wish sometimes we could take more advantage of seasonal changes in creatives and activations. @JuliaVyse<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Interesting question – how could ad platforms help make this more clear for clients\/stakeholders. @navahhopkins<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

@navahhopkins<\/a> That question is coming up! @NeptuneMoon<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I love you @NeptuneMoon<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It started this way – with us seeing seasonality the clients wouldn’t acknowledge – but we’ve been successful using data to show them that the seasonality isn’t waht they thought, and now theyr’e more on the same page. @revaminkoff<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Q3: Do you do anything special in your campaigns to account for or manage seasonality?<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
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Budget heavy ups for holiday mostly. @JuliaVyse<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lots of budget changes. @revaminkoff<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

We planned Black Friday\/Cyber Monday promotions (heavy discounts) to spur sales and get a head start on Q1. @JeffreyHain<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Offers for Ecom + Budget\/Bid Controls. @alimehdimukadam<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Also, we’ve started adding in ad groups for seasonal creatives, so they’re easier to compare to the control and to turn on\/off. @revaminkoff<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Also added promotion details and deadlines to control ads. @JeffreyHain<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of the things we do is ensure our rules are working in the feeds for stock during the big summer and January sales (and other sales too). @Meriem<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lower Q4 budgets and little to no spend in the last 2 weeks of the year. @beyondthepaid<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

With today\u2019s automation, you have to make sure you have ad groups flowing where you plan to do your seasonal adjustments. You can\u2019t just spin up a new ad group or unpause one that has been dormant for months and get peak performance in a day. I still don\u2019t think experienced search advertising companies quite fully get that search has learning periods like social has always had. @NeptuneMoon<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I think the learning periods the platforms want don’t always align with what’s realistic\/possible for the advertisers and promotions though. @revaminkoff<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I also think making notations in the platform or in your analytics about seasonal changes you make in the account is a good practice. @NeptuneMoon<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

So many clients want to use PPC to support short-term sales…@revaminkoff<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

@revaminkoff<\/a> That is an underreported issue. Because in the \u201cold days\u201d you could spin up a new campaign and hit the ground running day one. Now you can\u2019t. I had a home services client years ago and we used to turn campaigns on and off ALL THE TIME based on how far out they were booked for certain types of work. No way that would work now. @NeptuneMoon<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Q4: Do any platforms handle seasonality better than others? If so, what makes it better or worse?<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
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In my opinion, Google handles it better than Meta. Meta has had frequent issues right around peak season of overspending\/some features not working, etc. @alimehdimukadam<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meta also has too long of a learning period time – makes it hard to do anything quickly. @revaminkoff<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

@alimehdimukadam<\/a> Social media is full of PPCers talking about Meta issues during peak holiday season it feels like every year! Google Ads lets you note something as an anomaly too, which I think is helpful in this area too. @NeptuneMoon<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Agreed – while Google isn’t perfect, it does have seasonality adjustments and other feature that help. @beyondthepaid<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here is how to do it on Google Ads: https:\/\/support.google.com\/google-ads\/answer\/10370710?hl=en<\/a> @NeptuneMoon<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

We have a client who ideally would do a series of highly funded and efficient short campaigns, and it’s so frustrating to feel like the platforms won’t really accomodate that. (and by short, I mean a month or less, possibly even 2 weeks or less) @revaminkoff<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Totally agree. We need the ability to turn things on and off quickly without being penalized by awful performance while it “learns” I mean, there’s always manual bidding, but who knows how long that’ll be around. @beyondthepaid<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Or in most cases \u201cre-learns\u201d @NeptuneMoon<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yes – re-learns! @beyondthepaid<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Q5: What do you wish clients or stakeholders understood better about seasonality and PPC?<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
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Learning periods exist. They stink. There’s not much you can do about the fact that they exist or are easily triggered. @revaminkoff<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Plan & Prepare in advance. They have all historical data. And we have Search Trends data. As marketers, we need to let them know & they need to plan for dips or scale accordingly. (Inventory, Offers, Retention, etc.) @alimehdimukadam<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

That search advertising of today is not the search advertising of 5 years ago. Yes, you can turn things on and off, but there are consequences that linger from doing that. You do not just jump immediately back to where you were before the pausing. @NeptuneMoon<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

One does not simply enable a campaign. @Pete_Bowen<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

And if you want a campaign to really hit during a certain period, you have to take it live sooner so it can be out of learning for your target dates. @NeptuneMoon<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Right but you can’t take it live sooner if the seasonality isn’t in place yet – i.e. the offer hasn’t started or it’s not spring, etc. @revaminkoff<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is sort of seasonality adjacent, but big happenings in the world or in the world of people who buy what you sell will impact your campaign performance. @revaminkoff<\/a> I think these days you almost have to have a 2 week buffer for your seasonal campaigns – which sucks and is hard to explain to businesses @NeptuneMoon<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tell me about it. I have a client in immigration law in the US. In the months leading up to the election his CPA dropped down to $30 (typically around $60) now, it’s around $80 and the volume is really constrained. @Pete_Bowen<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

For short burst campaigns, we launch our ‘coming soon’ messages with the promo ad groups on pause. It helps force the machine to review the whole campaign in a live state and then turn on the promo ones on the right date. no guarantees of course. @JuliaVyse<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Q6: Is there anything you wish was available to help manage seasonality – either in ad platforms or in reporting tools?<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
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A way to say, ” we need this to ramp immediately – this is a 3 day long promo” – or something to that effect. @revaminkoff<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I wish there was like a \u201cBlitz\u201d setting for campaigns where you could get performance right away for campaigns with limited durations. @NeptuneMoon<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

(and no matter how well it performs, it is still only a 3 day long promo — I think Google and Meta assume if something is working you will always be willing to put more money into it, and that’s just not reality) @revaminkoff<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hindsight & Foresight – something platforms can\u2019t really share. At times, I do like some Google Insights that point towards rising search query. @alimehdimukadam<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It will be interesting to see if any of the AI being incorporated into platforms will start to surface seasonality more, particularly the more subtle variety. @NeptuneMoon<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I’d love Meta to have a notation that indicates they’ve stopped serving your campaign because they think it timed out, etc. versus having to monitor impression volume every day to determine if the algorithm has had enough and needing a few days to determine the data isn’t an anomaly. @revaminkoff<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yes! a high-noise, accelerated learning period to get stuff going quick. @JuliaVyse<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It would be great if the system would prompt you to consider adjusting your bidding parameters if it knows you are heading into a stronger or weaker season too. I suppose theoretically it is doing that for you behind the curtain, but asking for an active step would be interesting. @NeptuneMoon<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

A \u201chow aggressive do you want us to be\u201d scale would be nice too. Because you could almost dial that down in times where volume is already super high and dial it up when it is low if the client doesn\u2019t understand seasonality\u2026 @NeptuneMoon<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

When Google provides recommendations that the budget will be limited by seasonality after x date and asks if you want to increase the budget, I wish they would be clear about whether you’d be increasing the budget immediately or whether you could set it to increase a month from now, when it’s saying the seasonality will go into effect. @revaminkoff<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

A “quick learn” or “promo” setting that would either make smart bidding learn faster or just let it rip – that would be nice. @beyondthepaid<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Honestly, having the option for a separate learning budget would be nice too. So if you need it to take off fast, you could have a bigger learning budget and then a budget level you want for the \u201creal\u201d campaign. @NeptuneMoon<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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PPCChat Participants<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n