On Shopee, buyers often use search keywords to find shops and products. The search results page is an important place for sellers to display their products and shops. Search Ads helps sellers manage ad exposure in this search scenario.

1. What is Search Ads?

Search Ads is Shopee's search advertising product. When buyers search for keywords related to your products or shop, Search Ads can help your ads appear in premium positions on the search results page, such as Shop Card or Item Slot placements.

Compared with the previous Shop Ads, Search Ads introduces premium Item Slot placements and a new Share of Voice (SOV) metric.

Search Ads provides the following capabilities:

1. Premium Item Slot placements at the top of the search results page.
2. Support for both shop-level and product-level exposure management.
3. Keyword-based campaign management.
4. Exposure management for target search keywords.
5. A new Share of Voice (SOV) metric to help you understand your search visibility relative to competitors.

What is an Item Slot?

An Item Slot is the product card shown on Shopee’s search results page. It usually displays key product information such as product image, title, price, and other product details. With Item Slot placements, Search Ads can help sellers manage product-level ad exposure directly within search results.

Search Ads	Item Slot

2. Why Use Search Ads?

Improve search results page exposure

The search results page is where buyers actively look for products. With Search Ads, sellers can increase their display opportunities under relevant search terms.

Manage core keywords

Different sellers have different important keywords, such as brand terms, category terms, product terms, or campaign-related keywords. Search Ads helps sellers run ads around these keywords and monitor exposure performance over time.

Understand the competitive environment

Under the same search term, multiple sellers may compete for premium display positions. Search Ads helps sellers understand their exposure under core keywords and adjust campaign settings based on competition changes.

Use new metrics to understand search presence

Compared with the previous Shop Ads, Search Ads introduces SOV as a new metric. With SOV, sellers can more easily check their exposure share in premium search positions and understand whether their ads are receiving enough search display opportunities.

3. How to Set Up a Search Ads Campaign

Before launching a campaign, first clarify your campaign focus:

1. Which keywords do you want to manage?
2. Which products or shops do you want to improve search exposure for?
3. Do you need stronger search exposure during campaign periods?
4. Do you need to monitor exposure share for brand or category keywords?
5. Do you prefer manual control, or do you want the system to optimize automatically?

After clarifying your goal, choose the campaign mode that fits your needs.

Mode 1: Manual Mode

Manual Mode is suitable for sellers who want to choose keywords and manage bids manually.

Use Manual Mode if:

1. You already know which keywords to advertise on.
2. You want to manually add brand, category, or product keywords.
3. You want to set different CPC bids for different keywords.
4. You want more detailed control over campaign settings.

Setup steps: 

1. Complete the Basic settings (including Ad Name, Budget, and Duration).

1. Add the keywords you want to advertise on.

1. Set bid price for your keywords (we recommend setting the Bid Price at or above the Suggested Bid Price to increase the likelihood of receiving clicks).

1. Manual Mode with eCPC (Compared with pure Manual Mode, eCPC is more flexible. It helps ads compete for relevant search exposure opportunities more efficiently and reduces the risk of missing valuable impressions due to delayed manual adjustments.)

1. Launch the campaign.

Tips: Manual Mode gives sellers stronger control, but it also requires regular monitoring and manual optimization. If bids are too low, budget is insufficient, or keyword coverage is too narrow, the ads may not receive enough exposure.

Mode 2: Auto Bidding

Auto Bidding is suitable for sellers who want to reduce setup complexity or are not sure which keywords to use yet.

Use Auto Bidding if:

1. You are new to Search Ads.
2. You do not have a clear keyword list yet.
3. You want the system to explore relevant search traffic automatically.
4. You want a simpler setup process.

Setup steps: 

1. Choose Auto Bidding.

2. Complete the Basic Settings (including Ad Name, Budget, and Duration)

3. Let the system match relevant search traffic automatically.

4. How to Read the SOV Metric

SOV stands for “Search Share of Voice”. It can be understood as your ad’s search exposure share in premium search positions.

Compared with the previous Shop Ads, Search Ads introduces SOV as a new metric. It helps sellers understand how much exposure share their ads receive in premium search positions.

You can read it this way:

1. Higher SOV means your ads have a higher exposure share in relevant search positions.
2. Lower SOV means similar ads or competitors may be receiving more exposure.
3. Increasing SOV means your ad presence on the search results page is improving.
4. Decreasing SOV may be related to stronger competition, insufficient budget, low bids, or limited keyword coverage.

Suggested ways to use SOV:

Read SOV together with other ad metrics: SOV mainly reflects exposure share. Sellers can also review impressions, clicks, spend, CPC, and other metrics to understand overall ad performance.



5. Recommended Usage

If you are new to Search Ads, you can start with Auto Bidding to understand overall search traffic and keyword performance.

If you already have clear core keywords, we recommend using Manual Mode with eCPC. This mode keeps keyword and budget control while allowing the system to help your ads participate in search exposure opportunities more flexibly.