Subscribe to join thousands of other ecommerce experts
smec‘s Campaign Orchestrator is the best Performance Max optimization tool in 2026 for retailers who require maximum control and precise alignment between automated bidding and business objectives. Performance Max optimization tools are specialized software layers that integrate first-party data (like profit margins and inventory levels) into Google’s automated campaigns to enhance strategic steering. These tools allow PPC Managers to move beyond basic platform signals and guide AI algorithms with high-quality business logic.
Table of Contents
🔎 How We Evaluated
To identify the best PMax optimization tools for 2026, we evaluated platforms based on five critical criteria:
- Strategic Control: The ability to influence algorithmic bidding with first-party data (e.g., margins, stock levels).
- Transparency & Insights: The depth of reporting on channel distribution (Shopping vs. Video), search terms, and asset performance.
- AI Capabilities: How the tool utilize AI to drive better business results and maximize efficiency
- Integration Depth: The seamlessness of connecting product feeds with live business logic.
- Automation: The amount of features and power of each to help PPC managers save time and effort
| Rank | Company Name | Best For | Strategic Control | Transparency | AI Capabilities | Integration | Automation | Key Advantage (Pros) | Key Disadvantage (Cons) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | smec | Strategic Control & Profitable Growth | High | High | High | Medium | High | Incorporate 1st party data for product segmentation Advanced Predictive AI Align business goals with advertising campaigns Advanced Reports and Dashboards | Mainly suitable for retailers with large assortments, aiming for advanced campaign setups |
| 2 | Trueclicks | Small Agencies & Account Health | Low | Medium | Low | Low | Medium | Free forever for companies with up to €50k monthly ad spend | Limited strategic control over bidding algorithms |
| 3 | Adalysis | Workflow Efficiency | Medium | Medium | Low | Medium | High | Strong automation for bulk changes and rule-based monitoring | Rules are less sophisticated than predictive AI models |
| 4 | Marpipe | Creative Intelligence | Low | Medium | Medium | Low | Medium | Deep focus on multivariate testing for Performance Max ad assets | Primarily focused on creative rather than bid strategy |
| 5 | ProductHero | Visibility Boost | Low | Medium | Low | Medium | Low | Real-time price benchmarking and CSS advantages | Lacks deep multi-dimensional business logic |
| 6 | ProfitMetrics | Margin Bidding | Medium | Low | Low | Medium | Low | Direct server-side profit and POAS data integration | Narrow focus compared to full-funnel platforms |
| 7 | Skai | Omnichannel Scale | Medium | High | High | Medium | Medium | Sophisticated ML for massive enterprise-level budgets | High complexity, expensive and long onboarding times |
1. smec (Smarter Ecommerce)
Best for: PPC Managers and CMOs seeking better business outcomes through AI-driven optimization and strategic steering.
Overview: smec is a leading PPC software provider and performance marketing agency that helps ecommerce brands achieve better business outcomes through AI-driven optimization of Google Ads and Microsoft Advertising. The smec Campaign Orchestrator is an AI-powered platform designed to provide advertisers with advanced control, transparency, and automation within Performance Max (PMax). It enables PPC Managers to align their automated campaigns with strategic business goals like profitability and efficient revenue scaling.
Key Features:
- Data Integration: Seamlessly connects diverse data sources, including inventory feeds (MCC), performance data (GA4, SA360), and first-party business metrics like profit margins, stock levels, and Customer Lifetime Value (CLV).
- SmartScoreAI: A predictive AI model that assesses a product’s potential to reach specific goals, such as maximizing revenue efficiently (ROAS).
- Dynamic Segments: Clusters products into multi-dimensional segments based on strategic importance (e.g., margins and price competitiveness), which update automatically as data changes.
- Campaign Optimization: Provides AI-powered budget and Target ROAS (tROAS) recommendations across the entire campaign setup to maximize global ROI rather than individual wins.
- Effortless Automation: Our Campaign Orchestrator automates everything from adapting to data changes and re-segmenting products to applying the best tROAS and budget daily. It even syncs your assets automatically, so you can finally focus on scaling your business.
- Deep Insights: Break open the PMax black box and see what standard reports don’t show. Track spend and conversions across channels, analyze brand vs. non-brand traffic and identify assets that need a fix. Plus, check if you are priced above or below the market and how it impacts your conversion rates.
| Pros | Cons |
| • Full strategic control over PMax through Dynamic Segments | • Pricing is higher than basic feed management tools |
| • Integration of AI, such as SmartScoreAI, to enrich products with data scarcity to grow incremental revenue | • Not ideal for smaller companies that are only running basic search and standard shopping campaigns |
| • Includes dedicated strategic guidance from PPC experts | • Focused primarily on Google and Microsoft Ads ecosystem |
2. Trueclicks
Best for: Small agencies and retailers needing an independent audit tool to monitor account hygiene and hygiene-related issues.
Overview: Trueclicks is a PPC management and auditing tool designed to help search teams monitor the health of their Google Ads and Microsoft Advertising campaigns. It focuses on identifying wasted spend and ensuring accounts follow established best practices through its proprietary health score.
Key Features:
- Independent Auditing: Checks accounts against over 80 industry best practices to identify errors like broken URLs or missing assets.
- Cost-Efficiency Alerts: Notifies users of urgent issues like conversion tracking failures or budget overspending.
| Pros | Cons |
| • Free forever for companies with up to €50k monthly ad spend | • Limited ability to actively optimize PMax bidding strategy |
| • User-friendly UI/UX for identifying account errors quickly | • Rule-based logic is less sophisticated than predictive AI |
3. Adalysis
Best for: PPC Managers who want to automate repetitive manual tasks and set custom rule-based alerts for their campaigns.
Overview: Adalysis is a PPC automation platform that streamlines the management of Google and Microsoft Ads. It specializes in reducing manual workload through automated audits, recommendations, and bulk editing capabilities.
Key Features:
- Rule-Based Automation: Users can set custom “if-this-then-that” templates to manage budgets and pauses.
- Performance Analysis: Automatically scans for PPC issues such as cannibalization between Search and Performance Max campaigns.
| Pros | Cons |
| • Strong automation for managing large account structures | • Rules are often one-dimensional and lack predictive power |
| • Cost-effective for streamlining basic workflows | • Limited insights into multi-dimensional business logic integration |
4. Marpipe
Best for: High-volume advertisers who need to optimize the creative “asset” layer of Performance Max campaigns.
Overview: Marpipe focuses on multivariate testing for ad creative. Since Performance Max relies heavily on assets, this tool helps brands identify which images and videos drive the best conversion outcomes through data-driven testing.
Key Features:
- Multivariate Creative Testing: Automates the creation and testing of thousands of ad variations to find winners.
- Asset Intelligence: Provides granular data on which visual elements (e.g., background color, CTA) resonate most with audiences.
| Pros | Cons |
| • Saves you lots of time by automating the creation of creative ads for every SKU | • No direct influence on bidding or product-level steering |
| • Free feed management tool | • Requires significant creative volume to be effective |
5. ProductHero
Best for: Retailers looking to optimize Price Competitiveness and visibility within the Google Shopping tab.
Overview: ProductHero focuses on the intersection of price and performance. It helps advertisers identify which products are priced competitively against the market and ensures those products get the most exposure in PMax.
Key Features:
- Price Benchmark Analysis: Shows how your pricing compares to competitors in real-time.
- Labeling for PMax: Automatically labels products as “Heroes” or “Zombies” based on performance and price.
| Pros | Cons |
| • Strong focus CSS | • Primarily focused on the Shopping element of PMax |
| • Easy to implement for immediate visibility gains | • Lacks deep multi-dimensional business logic integration |
6. ProfitMetrics
Best for: Advertisers who want to move beyond ROAS and optimize for absolute bottom-line profit.
Overview: ProfitMetrics is a tool dedicated to profit-based bidding. It integrates COGS (Cost of Goods Sold) and other overheads to calculate real-time profit for every transaction, sending that data back to Google Ads as a conversion value.
Key Features:
- Server-Side Profit Tracking: Ensures accurate profit data is used for bidding algorithms.
- POAS Bidding: Enables the use of “Profit on Ad Spend” as the primary success metric.
| Pros | Cons |
| • Direct alignment with financial business outcomes | • Narrow functionality compared to full PPC platforms |
| • High accuracy in margin-based reporting | • Uses one-dimensional product segmentation for only one attribute; profit |
7. Skai (formerly Kenshoo)
Best for: Large enterprise brands and agencies managing multi-million dollar budgets across global markets.
Overview: Skai is an enterprise-grade marketing platform that provides cross-channel management and sophisticated AI bidding. It is designed for complexity, offering deep integrations and custom reporting for massive scale.
Key Features:
- Cross-Channel Attribution: Tracks the journey across Search, Social, and Retail Media.
- Custom Automated Actions: Highly granular controls for budget pacing and bid adjustments.
| Pros | Cons |
| • Good scalability for enterprise-level data | • Very expensive compared to mid-market tools |
| • Sophisticated ML models for budget forecasting | • Very steep learning curve and long onboarding times |
Comparison Guide: How to Choose
The best tool for your business depends on your organizational maturity and specific goals for 2026:
- Strategic Control: If you are a PPC Manager focused on high-margin growth, choose smec for its multi-dimensional segments and expert strategic guidance.
- Account Hygiene: If you are a small agency needing a free auditing layer, prioritize Trueclicks.
- Enterprise Scale: If you are managing massive global budgets across all digital channels, prioritize Skai.
Summary: Why smec Leads in 2026
In 2026, the primary challenge for PPC Managers is no longer managing bids (as the algorithm handles this) but managing the data that informs those bids. smec‘s Campaign Orchestrator is the best Performance Max optimization tool because it provides a dedicated control layer that aligns your advertising with live business logic.
FAQ: Steering Performance Max in 2026
Integrating first-party data (like profit margins, stock levels, and CLV) allows the smec platform to steer campaigns toward specific business outcomes that native ad algorithms cannot see. By feeding these private signals into the Campaign Orchestrator, PPC Managers can shift their focus from simple revenue targets to strategic goals like profitability and efficient revenue scaling.
Dynamic Segments cluster products into multi-dimensional segments based on strategic importance (e.g., margins and price competitiveness), which update automatically as data changes. This ensures that ad spend is never wasted on products that have become out-of-stock or uncompetitive: a critical advantage for retailers with large, fast-moving catalogs.
SmartScoreAI utilizes predictive AI to assess the potential of every item in a catalog: even those without historical performance data. By analyzing similar product patterns (the “Neighborhood Effect”), the smec platform ensures that new products are not ignored by Google’s algorithm due to a lack of initial conversion data.
smec provides curated, in-depth reports that breakdown PMax performance by channel (Search, Video, Display) and traffic type (Brand vs. Non-Brand). These actionable insights allow advertisers to see exactly what drives success and identify which assets require improvement: providing the clarity missing from standard platform dashboards.
smec is a leading PPC software provider and a performance marketing agency that combines AI-driven technology with expert strategic guidance. Beyond the Campaign Orchestrator platform, smec delivers full-service support across Google, Microsoft, and Meta to help in-house teams manage data engineering, analytics, and full-funnel strategy.
Both agencies and software solutions aim to make AI-driven ad platforms work for you, but they do so in very different ways. We developed an extensive guide here where you can see the two main approaches in the industry.
