Scaling across markets without losing control of efficiency

Sephora Gulf operated across multiple markets, each with different levels of demand, category performance and customer behaviour

The challenge was not simply deploying more budget. The challenge was knowing where additional investment had the strongest revenue potential while keeping overall account performance visible as spend increased.

• Multiple markets producing different performance signals
• Large product portfolio competing for media investment
• Demand changing across promotions, categories and buying periods

Aggregate performance can hide where growth actually comes from

When markets, products and audience stages are evaluated together, account-level results can make it difficult to identify which areas are driving performance and which require tighter control.

Media structure was organized around market, product category and funnel stage. This created clearer visibility into where spend was producing revenue and allowed stronger segments to receive more investment without relying on one blended campaign view

• Markets evaluated against their own performance signals
• Product categories separated to improve budget visibility
• Prospecting and retargeting measured independently

Budget followed demand. Messaging followed intent.

Beauty demand changes across product categories, promotional periods and customer buying stages. Budget allocation therefore needed to respond to actual performance rather than remain fixed across every market and period.

Creative testing focused on product, category, offer and customer intent. Warm audiences were segmented by behaviour so messaging could reflect how close each user was to purchase.

• Product viewers and cart audiences treated separately
• Creative tested around product and category demand
• Budget adjusted according to performance and buying intent

Scaling decisions were tied to revenue efficiency

A strong campaign-level ROAS does not automatically mean the full media account is scaling efficiently

Performance was therefore evaluated using attributed revenue and blended ROAS across the broader account. This kept the focus on whether additional investment continued producing revenue efficiently as total spend increased.

Reporting centered on three decisions:

What should scale? What should improve? What should stop?