Hourglass Unlocks $1M in Global Expansion via AI Search Strategy
Tinuiti helped Hourglass adapt its successful U.S. model to each market, use first-party data to reach new customers, and automate bidding around local demand—generating $1 million in revenue across Canada, the U.K., Australia, and New Zealand.
The Challenge
Hourglass Cosmetics, part of the Unilever Prestige Division, had built a prestigious luxury beauty presence in North America. The next frontier was to expand from a regional brand to a dominant global position—beginning with an expansion into the U.K., Australia, and New Zealand (ANZ).
Tinuiti identified a critical gap in “discovery-to-decision” journeys in those markets: Local competitors had higher top-of-mind awareness, and simply replicating North American campaigns wouldn’t be enough to win. Hourglass needed to penetrate these high-intent markets with a strong Google Search and Shopping approach while adapting to regional search nuances, currency fluctuations, and different product demand cycles.
The goal was to drive sustainable customer acquisition and growth under a strict efficiency threshold, building a global growth engine that respected local realities.
Expanding into new international markets required more than replicating our North American strategy. By combining AI-powered solutions, first-party audience insights, and market-specific optimizations, Hourglass successfully scaled growth and customer acquisition across Australia, New Zealand, and the U.K.
Veronica Montemayor
Growth Marketing Manager, Paid Media, Hourglass Cosmetics
Results
Across Canada, the U.K., Australia and New Zealand, Tinuiti generated $1.1 million in H1 Search and Shopping conversion value—equal to 60% of the $1.83 million generated in the U.S. over the same period.
$1.1M
or 3.31 ROAS / H1 Search and Shopping conversion value across Canada, the U.K., Australia and New Zealand
$504K
or 5.7 ROAS / Australia conversion value and ROAS—55% higher than the U.S. over the same period
$399K
or 2.96 ROAS / U.K. conversion value and ROAS
Building a Global-to-Local Framework With Performance Max at the Core
Tinuiti used a “Global-to-Local” framework anchored in Performance Max and Search to scale Hourglass in Australia, New Zealand, and the UK while continuing to grow profitable demand in Canada. Campaigns were structured at the product-category level, and PMax audience signals were used to overcome the limitations of keyword-only strategies and unlock incremental demand beyond traditional search intent.
By activating PMax across Australia and New Zealand, Hourglass unified Search, Shopping, YouTube, and Display within a single goal-based framework. Google’s AI processed thousands of real-time signals to identify high-intent, luxury-seeking audiences that might never be captured by legacy keyword setups alone. Each product category was supported with tailored creative, audience signals, and campaign settings to maximize relevance and performance, while PMax search term insights were converted into scalable, high-intent keyword expansions in Search.
Integrating First-Party Data and New Customer Acquisition Bidding
To fuel Performance Max with stronger intent signals, Hourglass’s lower-funnel data was woven into the framework: past purchasers, page viewers, add-to-cart users, and cart abandoners all fed into PMax. Customer Match lists were used across markets to accelerate expansion, mirroring high-lifetime-value audience segments from the US account into ANZ.
Tinuiti then implemented New Customer Acquisition (NCA) bidding strategies, allocating incremental bidding tactics to target net-new users more aggressively. This combination of first-party data and NCA bidding enabled Tinuiti to rapidly scale growth in Australia and New Zealand.
Scaling Search with Broad Match, Brand Inclusion, and Value-Based Bidding
Beyond PMax, Hourglass’s Search strategy moved past traditional keyword matching. Tinuiti deployed Broad Match paired with Brand Inclusion and value-based bidding via target ROAS (tROAS), allowing Google’s algorithm to bid into high-intent long-tail queries that had not been manually identified.
This ensured Hourglass appeared for discovery searches unique to each new territory—especially important in English-speaking markets with local nuance, where terms like “moisturizer” in the US become “moisturiser” in AUS/NZ. Localized keywords and ad copy reflected these differences, while the AI-driven bidding structure aligned product-focused responsive search ads (RSAs) with individual user requests at scale.
Custom market-specific product catalogues and ad copy also ensured ads displayed the appropriate local currency for each territory, creating a more seamless local customer experience.
Outcomes
Australia and the U.K. emerged as Hourglass’s strongest expansion markets during H1, generating more than $900K in combined conversion value at a 4.05 ROAS. Australia alone generated $504K at a 5.71 ROAS—55% higher than the U.S. over the same period.
The expansion also gave Hourglass a repeatable framework for entering new markets without rebuilding its strategy from scratch. By adapting first-party audience signals, product catalogs, search language and value-based bidding to local market conditions, Tinuiti created a Global-to-Local playbook Hourglass can apply to future expansion while maintaining a consistent global brand strategy.
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