Amazon Sellers and Brands have paid campaigns support for increased visibility - Amazon Marketing Services (AMS)
Amazon has developed its own set of marketing solutions for brands/sellers listed on its platform to help improve their performance aka generate additional Sales. The solution is very promising as it helps its existing sellers get exposed to right set of potential customers.
In the world of Digital Marketing, Google and Social Media (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn) dominates Digital Marketing Solution's landscape as well as budgets allocated to the overall pie. (Well we can look at their revenues to be sure of the same 😊)
Digital marketing as a domain, since inception has seen rapid innovation, new solutions emerging as well as continuous updates to industry leading solutions already present such as Google Adwords (now Google Ads), Facebook etc.
Another digital giant, Amazon has developed its own set of marketing solutions for brands/sellers listed on its own platform to help improve their performance aka generate additional Sales. The solution is very promising as it helps its existing sellers get exposed to right set of potential customers.
It is branded as “Amazon Marketing Services (AMS)” and provides Paid campaigns on CPC basis for brands to increase their reach as well as Sales. Given that Amazon is one of the biggest E-commerce player worldwide with a huge listing of products across number of product categories, a lot of sellers/brands can make use of AMS solutions to generate sales.
A paid marketing solution support for brands will help drive traffic as well as increase sales while potential customers are browsing for information and eventually buying products on Amazon.
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The solution may be a good alternative for brands listed on Amazon
- But without much digital spend on other performance marketing channel such as Paid Search, Shopping Ads etc.
- Also will be a great supplementary solution to expand the multi-channel digital marketing effort with paid campaigns on Amazon where the product is listed along with detailed information.
Given that the brands already invest a lot on Amazon to create their product listings as in their content, products images, creating feeds and maintaining a team for the same. It comes as a natural thought to increase the visitors and potential for sale by grabbing a share of huge quality traffic which Amazon generates daily.
As the clicks on ads take a user to the product details page as maintained on Amazon, so the solution can be very helpful to increase sales for quality products with well-maintained product’s detail page and good reviews/ratings.
Amazon has devised multiple ways for sellers to reach their potential audience. Here we discuss the three paid campaign types to get better understanding about them.
1. Sponsored Product Ads
Placement: Sponsored Product Ads appear on the search results page as well as on relevant Product Details pages.
On Clicking the user lands on the respective Product’s detail page on Amazon.
Targeting Method: Keyword based Targeting
When you type in relevant product Keywords in the search box to search for the products available on Amazon, the Sponsored Products Ads will show for Brands who are targeting that particular Keyword through its Campaigns.
The Ads are available on Cost-Per-Click (CPC) basis.
For e.g. Sport Shoes for women.
If you are targeting this keyword with high-enough bids, your sponsored products will show in the search results along with organic results and may also appear on relevant product details pages.
Here is how your ad will look for the Keyword -- Sports Shoes Women
On Search Results Page the Paid results have “Sponsored” written along with the listings.
On Product Details Page
Among various Paid campaign types which AMS provides, the Sponsored Products Ads, seems to have lower bids (lower CPC) as well as highest number of potential impressions/reach.
The competition for winning auction varies by product-categories, number of brands doing paid campaigns as well as their respective bids.
Solution is simple as compared to paid Search Campaigns on Google Adwords.
2. Sponsored Brands (Headline Search Ads)
Placement : The Ad unit (as shown in images below) for the “Sponsored Brand Ads” appear on the top of the search results, has a single placement and provide a larger cover area.
It provides the option to display
- Main image on the right-hand side linked to Amazon Store page or Custom Landing Page
- At least 3 product images linked to Product Details Pages
- A tag headline to display along with the right-hand side Main Image
Targeting Method : Keyword Based Targeting
When a user types Keywords in the search box to get the product listings, Headline search ads will show if we are targeting that keyword in our Sponsored Brands campaigns.
For e.g. Top Loading Washing Machine
If you are targeting this keyword with suitable bids, your Sponsored Brands ads will show at the top of search results page with one main brand image and 3 product images along with branded tag headline.
Here is how your ad will look for the Keyword – Top Loading Washing Machine
Sponsored Brands/Headline Search Ads are comparatively costly i.e. Higher CPC as compared to Sponsored Products Ads. Given that there is a Single Placement (above search results) makes it more competitive to win auction. Also there are minimum daily budget and minimum bid restrictions to run these Campaigns.
This is a good solution to increase Brand Visibility, as well as drive customers to your Amazon Store page.
3. Product Display Ads
Placement: The ad unit for Product Display Ads are shown on Products Detail Pages. There are two ad-units available for the same.
- Below the “Buy Now” Button
- Below the “Products Description” on the product detail pages
On Clicking the Ad-Unit, the customer lands on the Product’s Details Page.
Targeting Method: These Ad-Units are targeted in two ways
- Product Targeted: To be shown on specific product’s details pages
- Customer Interest Targeted (Customer’s Interest are deduced by Amazon based on factors such as browsing behaviour)
Here is how your Ad will look as a Product-Display Ad Unit
1. Below the Product’s Description
2. Below the “Buy Now” button on the Product’s Detail Page
Product Display Ad-units are good to
- Cross-sell and Up-sell your own brand products
- Target Competitors products
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All the above Campaigns run on Desktop and Mobile both.
Note that the search behaviour is very different on the Google Searches than on Amazon. So choose keywords very carefully.
For e.g. “Buy T-shirts Online” is very high traffic keyword on Google but is irrelevant when it comes to Amazon searches. Where as “T-shirts for men” is a very popular keyword when it comes to searches on Amazon.
Also the default conversion attribution period on Amazon is 14 days, as compared to 30 days on Google Ads.
It is easy to get started on AMS if you already have quality description/content as well as images on your product details pages.
So that was a brief introduction to AMS.
Good Luck for setting up more digital marketing campaigns and sales.
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Note: Saurabh Sharma is a digital marketing professional. He has used Amazon Marketing Services (AMS) campaigns professionally and is currently not related to Amazon.
