Client Growth Story – Transforming Global Paid Search for Abcam

Abcam is a global leader in life sciences, supplying antibodies, reagents and assay kits to research organisations, biotech and pharmaceutical companies.

Client

Abcam

Date

March 18th, 2026

All work

The following results were achieved over a 5 year period, from 2020 – 2025.

+334%

Revenue Growth

+267%

Increase in Spend

+38%

Ecommerce Growth

Background

Abcam is a global leader in life sciences, supplying antibodies, reagents and assay kits to research organisations, biotech and pharmaceutical companies. Its catalogue spans 120K+ SKUs supporting advanced applications across proteomics, cell biology and drug discovery. The business operates in over 60 international markets, serving a highly technical audience of scientists whose purchasing decisions depend on experimental precision and validation data. Ecommerce already played a significant role in revenue generation, but Abcam had a clear ambition to accelerate online sales further. Achieving this required a scalable, performance-driven marketing approach capable of handling both catalogue complexity and global demand.

Challenges

Abcam’s paid search program was operating at a level of complexity that traditional PPC approaches could not support. The business targets over 60 global markets, each with different search behaviors, demand levels and competitive dynamics. This made it difficult to maintain consistency in structure, optimisation and budget allocation.

The scale and technical nature of the product catalogue added another layer of difficulty. With more than 120K SKUs linked to specific proteins, pathways and experimental applications, effective keyword coverage required scientific accuracy. Standard keyword strategies were not sufficient, as researchers use highly specific and technical search queries that demand deep domain understanding.

Attribution was a major barrier to growth. Scientists typically use Google to research products, validate performance data and shortlist options. Purchasing is then completed by procurement teams, often offline or through separate systems. This meant a large proportion of revenue influenced by paid search was not visible within the platforms, limiting optimisation and underrepresenting performance.

Internally, Abcam had a junior PPC team with limited experience managing large-scale, high-SKU accounts in life sciences. This created a gap between ambition and execution, restricting the ability to scale efficiently and increase ecommerce contribution.

Solution

We rebuilt Abcam’s paid search operation to deliver scale, accuracy and commercial impact. The first step was creating a clean account structure organised by product category and geography. This aligned campaigns with how scientists search and how the business operates globally, enabling more effective targeting and budget control.

We worked directly with product managers to map the full catalogue into high-intent keyword sets. This ensured coverage of complex scientific queries linked to specific proteins, applications and experimental use cases. To maintain this at scale, we developed automated tools that allowed product managers to generate new keywords as products were launched. This created a direct link between scientific knowledge and campaign execution.

To solve the attribution challenge, we built a revenue propensity model using real sales data and website engagement signals such as datasheet views, protocol downloads and quote requests. This model estimated the likelihood of a user driving revenue and was integrated into Google Ads through a Propel-hosted server-side connection. Campaigns could then optimise towards true commercial value using automated bidding.

Abcam also used Propel as an extension of their team, applying our expertise across data engineering and automation to support initiatives such as competitor price monitoring, CRM enrichment and website migration.

Results

From 2020 to 2025, spend increased by 267% while revenue grew by 334% and ROI improved by 25%. Ecommerce contribution rose by 38%. Paid search became a scalable, profit-driving channel that supported Abcam’s acquisition by Danaher and delivered sustained EBITDA growth.