Cabela’s Canada: The Great Pursuit
If you know me well, you’ll know that I am passionate about ecommerce. I wasn’t born this way, but instead, was introduced to ecommerce through my work with Cabela’s Canada and was instantly enthralled by the depth of the digital strategy and ability to do real time testing with nearly instant feedback. It is a challenging but exciting vertical, and I feel so lucky to have had a great client partner like Cabela’s over these past 8 years or so to explore this space.
Together, we have hiked many new media mountains, fished through data depreciation issues, and relentlessly hunted for unique optimization opportunities; all in the great pursuit of continuous improvement. In fact, since starting with Cabela’s in 2015, we have helped them increase overall web revenue by over 140%. More recently, if we compare 2023 revenue with 2019, we have helped drive an overall increase of 98% in online sales.
But how did we do it? Read on to learn more!
The Beginning
In the beginning, circa 2015, Vovia observed and aided with some critical issues related to analytics tracking and campaign structuring. We updated the analytics sku logic, which ultimately allowed us to optimize product categories as well as individual skews in the digital campaigns. We also observed that the Cabelas.com (USA) ads were cannibalizing Canadian online sales and traffic, and worked with the clients and stakeholders to create a geo separation and passplay strategy. These initiatives gave us our first big wins at Cabela’s, and we built upon this momentum and success as the digital optimization began.
The Middle
Much of the growth and success in the middle years (2016-2019) were related to vigorous campaign category and channel testing insights, but also due to the testing and early adoption of new Google beta products like Smart Shopping, Dynamic Search Ads (DSA), and Smart display. Due to our partnership with Google, Cabela’s enjoyed a first mover advantage on these products and they drove considerable gains for the campaigns during these years. These new tactics vastly outperformed our historical Search, Shopping, and Display campaigns, ultimately increasing revenue and return on ad spend by over 5x in the first year of implementation.
The DSA update was truly a game changer in the digital campaigns as we went from a non-brand ROAS of 2ish to 10+ as our layered DSA strategies ramped up. Not to mention making the ad copy and keyword QA process MUCH more nimble. I kid you not when I say that I used to have to review over 4000 lines of ad copy every quarter for Cabela’s (uphill, both ways)!
The End (of the Beginning)
I often refer to 2019 as “the end” because the entire ecommerce landscape changed in 2020. So, in essence, this truly was the end of an era in this space, and the birth of a new one. A more half-full way of saying this might be “a new beginning’. After some uncertainty in early April 2020, ecommerce absolutely boomed, and this created a unique opportunity for Cabela’s to capitalize on this elevated online shopping behaviour.
A New Beginning (AKA The Pandemic)
Due to years of testing and optimization, we were ready for the increased activity that came with the pandemic. Our campaign structures were well oiled and flexible, allowing for nimble product category optimization, and this allowed us to refocus the budgets and spends in real time to take advantage of massively increased demand in activities like camping, hiking, fishing and more as Canadians sought out new pastimes and activities with the mass social shutdowns that had occurred.
Beyond the elevated online shopping behaviour, our campaign testing and optimization got super sophisticated during this time. From 2020-2022 we:
- Integrated audience building tools from Cabela’s tech stack into our campaigns.
- Layered multiple DSA strategies to provide more fulsome coverage and to address price sensitive ‘bargain shopper’ needs.
- Launched Performance Max, which effectively replaced Smart Shopping, and applied similar layering techniques that we had seen success with on DSA.
- Introduced more upper and middle funnel tactics like Discovery and YouTube.
- Observed data depreciation in Google Analytics and proactively moved to ad platform optimization
When comparing raw traffic and revenue, Cabela’s website saw a traffic increase of 48% in 2020 compared to 2019, while overall web revenue increased by 110%. Taking an average from 2020-2022 vs 2019 – traffic increased by 38%, while revenue increased by over 100%.
The Now
The post-pandemic period has been very interesting to say the least. In a world where people are returning to in-store shopping, Cabela’s web revenue has continued to stay strong, resulting in overall business growth.
The 2023 CMUST study (which I look forward to every year) included this view of ecommerce growth in Canada from 2017-2023. Here we can really see visually that online shopping growth/behaviour has slowed, but still presents an elevated opportunity compared to the ‘old world’:
It’s really important to keep macro trends in mind when evaluating performance, and despite this effect seen nationwide, Cabela’s ecommerce sales remained strong in 2023. That said, we certainly had to work a lot harder for it and have had to continuously find ways to innovate within the proven channel mix.
In a new world of AI-assisted campaigns, there are far less levers to pull than conventional manual keyword and audience tactics. So, it takes even more discipline and patience to run tests and to find opportunities than ever. One important test and finding this year was within the PMax infrastructure and setups, where we found ways of layering PMax campaigns to allow them to run simultaneously. This led to more rigorous testing and optimization, and uncovered some unique executions. In fact, in 2023 we were running 12-14 Pmax setups and campaigns at any given time, which allowed us to:
- Cover the full inventory
- Apply different budgets and test to different product categories
- Breathe life into lower volume products
- Reach new customers
- Introduce digital brand building tactics and evergreen campaigns
And ultimately, this approach led to a 70% increase in attributable ecommerce revenue and a 40% increase in ROAS from this channel, when comparing year over year.
The Horizon
So, in returning to the opening statement – how did we climb this mountain? We did it together. I can say without hesitation that the strategic collaboration and data sharing with the Cabela’s team has never been stronger than it is today. Relentless testing and hunting for performance on the Vovia side marries perfectly with deep product and consumer knowledge and the willingness to explore new opportunities on the Cabela’s side. The sum here is certainly greater than the parts, and we will continue to press on in the pursuit of continuous improvement.
But don’t take it from me. I checked in with one of my faves, Angèle Young – Cabela’s marketing content & advertising manager, and she shared the following:
“Over the past 9 years, Carsen and the staff at Vovia have truly been an extension of our team. They have taken the time to learn the intricacies of our business, and have been able to provide valuable insights not only for our ads, but also our customer’s behaviours and life cycles. They have a tenacious, retail-driven mindset dedicated to driving (and proving) ROAS and year-over-year revenue. I love that they are always finding innovative ways to advertise, while continuously optimizing our tried and true platforms.“