Criteo vs Google Ads

Choose Criteo if your retail media work needs new audiences resembling converters or past site visitors for acquisition campaigns. Choose Google Ads if display campaigns need schedules by hour and weekday and geographic limits by country, region, city or radius.

Retail teams seeking prospects beyond existing site visitors can use Criteo's lookalike expansion to find people resembling converters or visitors. Its contextual targeting places ads by page topic, keyword or category instead of user identity or cookies. The campaign interface and controls can be difficult to use or feel limited, which is a reported constraint for teams managing campaigns.

Search planners can use Google Ads' Keyword Planner estimates of volume and cost for new keywords, then inspect the queries that triggered ads. It schedules display delivery by hour and weekday and narrows it by country, region, city or radius. Its interface, setup and frequent changes can make campaigns difficult to manage. Costs can rise quickly and require close budget management.

Criteo advertisers praise campaign performance, revenue or return when campaigns work for their business, while some find the interface and controls difficult or limited. Criteo users report that account, setup and billing support can be slow or ineffective. Google Ads users praise its ability to bring targeted traffic, leads and sales, though results vary by campaign. Reviewers say interface, setup and frequent changes make management difficult, and costs can rise quickly, requiring close budget management.

In Criteo's story, a fashion retailer serving Australia and New Zealand personalizes shopping across devices and re-engages existing customers with display and in-app retargeting. The retailer reports driving revenue and customer orders at scale. Google tells of a small premium tea business that used Google Ads to reach online customers for its tea business. Performance Max campaigns contributed to a sharp rise in ecommerce sales.