Dynamic Product Ads
Overview
Dynamic Product Ads (DPAs) are auto-generated ad formats designed to showcase relevant products to shoppers across display environments. The goal was to improve ad relevance and performance for e-commerce brands by combining dynamic feeds with responsive creative templates.
Category: API Integration Ads
Role: Lead Interactive designer
Year: 2023
Brands that have selected this format includes:
Problem
Advertisers struggled to efficiently promote large product catalogs with personalized messaging at scale. Static templates lacked flexibility, and manually creating variations was time-consuming and error-prone. The challenge was to design a scalable solution that automatically generated high-quality, relevant product ads while maintaining brand consistency.
User Research
We conducted interviews with seven e-commerce marketers managing large-scale campaigns across the U.S. The research revealed that manual feed setup is time-consuming and error-prone, often delaying launches. Marketers emphasized the importance of clear, consistent product information to drive clicks and trust, especially when showcasing multiple SKUs dynamically. Finally, they needed tools to easily customize and preview geo-targeted ad variations, ensuring localized relevance without sacrificing brand consistency.
Persona The Performance-Driven Marketer
Key Questions
Can you walk me through how you currently set up product ads for large campaigns?
What challenges have you experienced when managing or uploading product feeds?
How do you currently run campaigns targeting multiple regions, and what challenges do you face when customizing ads for different audiences?
Name: Emily
Age: 34
Role: Digital Marketing Manager
Behaviors:
Manages large e-commerce campaigns targeting multiple U.S. regions
Oversees product feeds with thousands of SKUs and frequent price changes
Tracks performance metrics like ROAS, CTR, and regional engagement
Needs:
Fast, automated feed setup that minimizes manual data cleanup
Templates that clearly display product details without clutter
Simple tools to preview and manage geo-targeted ad variations
Frustrations:
Wasting hours validating feed formats and fixing errors
Ads that look inconsistent or confusing due to poor information hierarchy
Difficulty keeping localized offers accurate and up to date
Key Insight
Marketers spend a significant amount of time setting up and validating complex product feeds, creating friction in launching dynamic campaigns quickly.
When product information (e.g., pricing, availability, descriptions) isn’t formatted consistently, ads look cluttered or confusing, reducing engagement.
Advertisers want to leverage geo-targeting to personalize offers across regions, but struggle to manage creative variations efficiently at scale.
How might we automate and simplify product feed setup, design templates that present product details clearly and consistently at any scale, and enable marketers to geo-target audiences across the U.S. while maintaining brand consistency and relevance?
Product Feed Design Decisions
The product feed was structured to separate dynamic ad variables (text and pricing) and dynamic image variables to enable flexible, automated ad generation across product catalogs.
Structured Data Columns: The feed includes distinct fields for Product Name, Offer, Price, and Product Image, making it easy to map each attribute to specific visual elements in the ad template. This reduces manual setup and ensures consistent formatting.
Dynamic Image Integration: The design supports dynamic image slots that update automatically based on the product SKU. This enables accurate visual representation of each product without requiring separate creative assets for every variation.
Clear Offer and Pricing Display: Offers (e.g., “$60 OFF”) and current pricing are prominently surfaced in the layout, using distinct typographic treatments and contrasting backgrounds to highlight promotional messaging. This decision helps users quickly understand value and encourages engagement.
Real-Time Sync Compatibility: The feed structure was designed to support real-time syncing with inventory and pricing systems so ads always reflect the most current product data, reducing the risk of outdated information.
Scalable Mapping Logic: By aligning each data column to specific design modules (e.g., price badge, product title, callout bubble), the system can dynamically populate multiple product variations while maintaining a cohesive, branded look across all creatives.
This approach ensures the ad system is scalable, efficient, and easy to maintain, while delivering a consistent, high-quality experience for end users.
Design Versions for Mobile and Desktop
To support dynamic product advertising across devices, I designed responsive templates optimized for both desktop and mobile environments:
Responsive Layouts: Each template adapts automatically to the user’s device, ensuring clear, legible product information whether viewed on a large desktop display or a small mobile screen.
Prioritized Visual Hierarchy: On both platforms, product images are given prominence to attract attention, while pricing and promotional offers are styled in high-contrast elements that quickly communicate value.
Modular Design System: Templates use a modular structure where each component—image, product name, offer, and price—maps directly to dynamic feed variables. This ensures that large product catalogs can populate ads automatically without manual resizing or reformatting.
Consistent Branding Across Devices: Colors, typography, and spacing were standardized so that campaigns maintain a cohesive brand presence, regardless of screen size or format.
Touch-Friendly Interactions on Mobile: Mobile units were specifically designed with larger tap targets and simplified layouts to reduce friction and improve engagement on smaller screens.
Flexible Offer Presentation: The templates accommodate different types of promotions (e.g., percentage off, dollar off, limited-time offers) without requiring separate creative assets, making it easier for marketers to manage frequent updates.
As we focus on CORE (creative once run everywhere), we brought DPA into all screens.
Outcome