How to Scale your Amazon Campaigns Using Product Targeting

Even if you’ve spent years managing paid media campaigns on Google, Bing, Facebook and other platforms, Amazon marketing is a totally different beast. The advertising platform has its own modus operandi, so in order to get the best ROI, it’s important to understand exactly what sponsored products are, how they work, who to target and more.

Amazon offers a few targeting options, but recently the platform introduced product targeting, a different way of telling Amazon who should see your ads. Below, you’ll find a quick intro to Amazon ads, along with a more in-depth look at how to use product targeting.

What are sponsored products?

First, a short look at sponsored products.

Sponsored Products are what Amazon calls ads for specific, individual product listings on Amazon. These are cost-per-click ads, meaning you only pay when someone clicks on your ad, and they are displayed on search results pages and product detail pages. The goal of sponsored products is to increase sales and product visibility.

How do sponsored products work?

Amazon advertising and sponsored product campaigns are built in Seller Central. Through Amazon’s advertising platform, you can choose which products you’d like to advertise, how much you’re willing to bid, and which keywords, products, brands or categories you’d like to target. Then, you’re ready to launch your campaign!

Want to make changes to your campaign? Amazon makes it easy to edit the duration and budget for all scheduled and active campaigns, and you can also add or remove keywords to target as you see fit.

What is product targeting? How is it different from keywords?

In the past, all Sponsored Product campaigns were based on manual or automatic keyword targeting. However, at the end of 2018, Amazon introduced a new option: product targeting.

Product targeting allows you to set up campaigns that target users searching for specific products, categories, brands or other product features that are similar to the products in your ad.

This is in stark contrast to keyword targeting, which relies on keywords that relate to your product and the terms shoppers use to search for products similar to yours.

Should I use product targeting in my Amazon advertising campaigns?

While doing keyword research and bidding on keywords is much more effective, product targeting is excellent when you’re ready to scale up your advertising. It’s ideal for helping shoppers find your product when browsing detail pages and categories or when searching for specific products on Amazon, including your competitors’ products. If your listing is already converting well (above 15%), the extra exposure has the potential to increase your sales velocity, which is a crucial part of organic rankings.

Note that Amazon allows you to get fairly specific for these campaigns; for example, if you are targeting a certain category, you can refine it by brand, price range and review star ratings, or if you are targeting a product, you can choose between suggested individual products similar to yours, or specific products you determine to be relevant.

Amazon provides the same bidding strategies for product targeting as for other targeting options; the only difference between product targeting campaigns and keyword targeting campaigns is how you tell the platform to choose which shoppers see your ads.

How should I set up my first sponsored product campaign using product targeting?

If you are already running automatic campaigns, or even manual ones, you can download your search term report. In it, you’ll see product ASINs. Use these ASINs to figure out which competitors, categories, or brands have generated sales for your products. Start targeting these first and if it’s working, feel free to include more.

This is a safer approach to testing product targeting. Just guessing won’t be very effective.

If you aren’t advertising and selling your products on Amazon, chances are high you’re missing out on a big opportunity. At Enventys Partners, we know the world of Amazon advertising can be complex and overwhelming, which is why we exist; to help businesses grow through ecommerce and Amazon marketing. To learn more about how we can help your business find success on Amazon, get in touch today.