Goals

Superfood Lab is a Japanese cosmetics brand under George & Oliver, Co. Ltd., known for blending ancient health practices with modern science to enhance beauty. The brand started selling on the Amazon store in early 2020, managing its Amazon Ads independently to boost sales. However, in 2023, Superfood Lab sought a partner to reduce the complexity and time required for ad management.

To streamline ad operations and boost performance, Superfood Lab partnered with Shirofune in March 2024. Shirofune, headquartered in Japan, offers a digital advertising tool that automates ad management across major e-commerce companies, including the Amazon store. Its algorithm was developed over 20,000 hours to replicate the decision-making of a skilled ad manager in various scenarios. The company’s proprietary bidding algorithm, refined over 10 years, played a key role in enhancing in-house ad operations. Superfood Lab’s goal was to improve ROAS and drive more visitors to their Amazon store by optimizing ad distribution, performance tracking, and campaign analysis.

Approach

During the 30-day trial period for their software, Shirofune took time to educate Superfood Lab’s teams on how to effectively use their ad management tool. They conducted multiple onboarding calls to explain features, demonstrate settings, address questions, and verify that the tool was configured correctly.

Automated bidding was a key feature in improving ad distribution. Bid optimization, a labor-intensive yet essential task, is where Shirofune’s tool excelled. Shirofune’s algorithm was programmed over 20,000 hours to replicate the decisions a skilled ad manager would make in various scenarios. The algorithm automatically set bid amounts for Superfood Lab’s keywords and targets by specifying the budget and target ROAS. Based on real-time performance metrics, they adjusted bids to match high-visitor days and time slots.

To increase brand exposure, Shirofune used Sponsored Products ads to capture shoppers’ attention during product searches and convert them into customers. This approach was particularly effective given Superfood Lab’s limited product recognition, helping drive visibility and sales.

Previously, Superfood Lab manually analyzed ad insights, but this approach was less accurate and more time-consuming. To enhance tracking and analysis, Shirofune provided Superfood Lab with detailed reports, featuring natural language explanations on campaign performance, keywords, and search queries. With a single click, these reports displayed insight trends over the past 13 months. The Change Analysis report, for instance, identified and explained the reasons behind performance improvements or declines.

In addition to bid and report automation, Shirofune also automated budget management to ensure optimal allocation and utilization. The software improved the accuracy of ad management by setting minimum ROAS targets for each campaign and budget. Users could choose to manually manage these tasks or review AI recommendations as needed.

Results

Since implementing Shirofune, Superfood Lab has freed their teams from complex and monotonous ad management tasks while improving ad effectiveness. Through automation of key processes including bidding, report creation, and budget management, Shirofune allows Superfood Lab to focus on more strategic planning and creative aspects of marketing.

Comparison data over a 3-month period before and after implementing Shirofune revealed a 1.67% increase in ROAS,¹ 64% higher acquisitions,² and 20% more clicks³ on Superfood Lab’s Amazon store.

Sources

^1-3 Superfood Lab, JP, 2023–2024.