SMART Poor Performers are products on which Google spends an excessive budget relative to their true contribution. They occupy auction slots and consume spend at the expense of products with higher potential.
How the segment is built
Every day, the model evaluates each product across the same signals as Top Performers. Products that score consistently low across all of them become Poor Performers.
Signals
Google Product ROAS — primary signal Low or zero despite sufficient spend, measured from web or app analytics rather than Google Ads attribution. A product that has had enough spend to demonstrate its value and hasn't — is a strong candidate for the segment.
All Traffic RPDV — fallback signal Where sales data is limited, All Traffic RPDV (Revenue Per Detail View) is used instead, capturing how much revenue each product detail view generates across all traffic sources.
Cross-sell revenue Minimal or zero — the product not only fails to convert on its own, but also doesn't drive purchases of other products in the inventory. (Available only for markets where cross-sell revenue data is present.)
CTR and CPC — supplementary signals A consistently low click-through rate indicates limited shopper interest. A high cost per click means the product is expensive to promote relative to the traffic it attracts.
Deadstock — These products have already had sufficient time and spend to demonstrate performance and haven't. Rather than continuing to allocate budget to them, the model flags them for exclusion in favour of products that are actually working.
Why relative scoring matters
Manual poor performer filters use absolute thresholds (e.g. spend > €500 and ROAS < 2). During a seasonal dip or market-wide performance drop, 40–60% of the inventory can suddenly meet those criteria, emptying your campaigns.
SMART Poor Performers always represent the relative bottom of the inventory, typically around 15% by scoring. Even when overall market performance is low, the segment maintains a consistent size. Additionally, cross-sell revenue is factored in — a product that looks like a poor performer by ROAS alone, but reliably drives purchases of other products, will not fall into the segment.
How to use them
Exclude SMART Poor Performers from all campaigns. This frees up the auction slots they previously occupied, redistributing budget and visibility toward higher-potential products. They remain in the inventory and can still appear organically.
Optional: salvage campaign You can run a single salvage campaign with a high target ROAS to give underperforming products one final chance to prove their value before being fully excluded.
For step-by-step setup instructions, see Recommended Setup for Google SMART Segments.
Related articles: What are Google SMART Segments? · SMART Top Performers · Recommended Setup