Amazon product listing requires optimizing keywords, delivering compelling content, and engaging visuals. By focusing on these elements, you can create a strong and memorable product page that drives sales and attracts potential buyers.
The way to be a successful seller on Amazon in 2023 and afterward is to develop a fantastic Amazon PPC management strategy. Nowadays, there is massive competition on Amazon, and every seller tries to get a spot on page one. Amazon product listing image design. Nevertheless, no one goes beyond page one to purchase what they seek. Hence, you need a killer Amazon PPC strategy to rank your item on the first page.
Amazon Pay-per-Click (PPC) is essential to the world’s biggest platform’s internal advertising system. Agencies, brands, and third-party sellers can target relevant keywords for creating product advertisements. As a result, they will appear in Amazon’s top search results and competitor product listings.
Amazon sellers can show their current customers the relevant products they are ready to buy and measure the performance of ads. Thus, it is a way to determine which ads bring sales, and three out of four Amazon sellers utilize the following effective marketing technique.
This write-up is the ultimate guide to Amazon PPC for Amazon sellers that covers all you need to know about Amazon PPC.
What is Amazon PPC?
Amazon has an advertising platform for third-party sellers known as Amazon PPC. It enables its sellers to hold advertising campaigns by indexing keywords to their product to increase their visibility in search results or competitor’s listing. Pay-per-click, the name speaks for itself, suggests that the platform charges sellers every time a potential prospect clicks on their advertisement.
Once you start receiving orders from the keywords you use for advertising, Amazon will index them to your product. Amazon product listing image design. Due to PPC, you can organically rank on your selected keywords. Amazon PPC is significant for boosting your sales and gaining a higher organic ranking for your product when you have good sales and exposure.
Why is Amazon PPC Essential for its Sellers?
After the lockdown due to the Covid-19 pandemic, Amazon made sales of $108.5 Billion in the first three months of the year. So, Amazon sellers and e-commerce brands have several chances to appear in front of their audience. However, many new sellers and agencies joined the platform, which means the competition is tough, and a PPC strategy is essential for every business.
Amazon has millions of listings and products, and standing out requires a specific framework. When your competitor wants to grab customers’ attention, your products must rank organically. Organic ranking refers to where your product naturally appears in the search results.
How Does Amazon PPC Work?
Amazon PPC is more straightforward than it appears because consumers type small specific terms but mostly long strings of words for specific results. The long string of keywords is known as long-tail-keywords; if they are specific terms, we call them keywords. Once buyers type them, Amazon’s algorithm starts to work on a list of search results that match their search terms.
The products appear in search results at the top through two sources or reasons that are organic and paid. Amazon copywriting services. Amazon PPC is about developing a strategy to rank your paid sponsored products on top, but paid results can be visible in multiple places.
The paid sponsored products can appear above organic results or among or on either side of the search results. They can also appear on the selling page of an organic product. Therefore, Amazon PPC works because of an elevated auction-based approach. Sellers and vendors bid on keywords their audience may use to search for their products. The platform sets a day-to-day budget for every keyword, and you can select them yourself.
Amazon can decide on relevant keywords if you don’t enter them manually. As you bid higher, the chances of your ads displaying increase, and if you bid less on keywords, your ads display less. You can manage your keyword bids between campaigns according to the profit you generate from them.
What are some Important Amazon PPC Terms?
Learning about Amazon’s key metrics is essential before diving deep into PPC.
- Advertising Cost of Sales (ACoS): The percentage of attributed sales sellers spent on advertising. You can calculate it by dividing the total ad spend by attributed sales. Suppose you spend $4 on advertising, leading to attributed sales of $20; your ACoS will be 20%. ($4/ $20 = 0.20)
- ASIN Number: Amazon Standard Identification Number (ASIN) is an alphanumeric code containing ten digits for identifying e-commerce products. The platform assigns a unique number when a seller creates a new item in Amazon’s catalog. All products on the platform have an ASIN except the books since they use International Standard Book Number (ISBN). Get ASINs for your products before selling them on Amazon.
- Attributed Sales: These are the total product sales you generate in one week of ad clicks. Your sales data may take at least 48 hours to add to the record, so you will not find them in the “Today” period or delayed to the “Yesterday” period. You can check the sales total for advertised and other products in your campaign performance report.
- Impressions: Impressions are the number of times a consumer views your ad. It takes nearly three days to remove invalid clicks from reports. Clicks from the previous three days are adjusted because of click invalidation.
- Clicks: Clicks are the number of times a consumer clicks your PPC ad. When you identify them, it takes at least three days to remove invalid clicks from reports. Clicks from the last three days are adjusted because of click invalidation.
- CPC (Cost-Per-Click): Cost per click or CPC is the average amount a seller pays for each click on their ad.
How to Create an Amazon PPC Campaign?
Here are the following steps you should follow to create an Amazon PPC campaign.
- Research: Conduct in-depth keyword research using several keyword tools and consider the related keywords and your competitor’s products.
- Experimentation: Check all PPC ad campaigns and experiment with automatic and manual keyword targeting to check what works best for your brand.
- Budget: As a beginner seller on Amazon, fix your daily budget and default bids at least 50-100% higher than Amazon’s recommendation.
- Duration: Run ad campaigns for two weeks before you run reports and start adjusting.
- Campaign types: You can find keywords for your manual campaigns by observing the ad reports from your automatic campaigns. Ensure the keyword has a minimum of 10 clicks before adjusting or removing it from a manual campaign.
- Review: Review your weekly ad reports to add, subtract and adjust keywords.
How Can You Find the Right Keywords for Your Amazon PPC Campaign?
Keyword research plays an essential role in building an effective and accurate listing. You can use reliable, high-ranking, and up-to-date keyword tools to find the best keywords for your Amazon PPC campaign. Once the keyword tools give you the list, you can select the keywords of your choice by observing your competitor’s keywords.
Also, you can filter out the keywords having high search volume, more sales, or top organic rankings. There must be three keyword lists that define the categories of keywords, such as most relevant, mediocre relevant, and least relevant for your PPC Campaign.
What are the Three Kinds of Keywords for Your Amazon PPC Campaign?
Exact Match Keywords
Exact match keywords are like what their name suggests: your customer’s search term should accurately match your keyword so your ad can show up on the search results page. Amazon product listing image design. For example, if your keyword is “metal coffee table” and your customer searches for “coffee metal table,” your ad will not appear. While using an exact match, plan your keywords and avoid spelling mistakes.
Phrase Match Keywords
Phrase match keyword deals with long-tail keywords that are three words or longer than that. When a customer uses a long-tail keyword to search for a product, they have decided to purchase it. Thus, long-tail keywords result in more purchases even though their search volume is less. It also ignores the linking words keeping the exact sequence of keywords. For example, if your keyword phrase is “metal coffee table for living room” and your audience types “metal coffee table living room,” the listing appears on the search results page.
Broad Match Keywords
Broad match shows up every product related to your indexed keywords. Hence your ad will appear when a shopper types a phrase related to your keyword. Let’s suppose that you sell leather bags. If you include the keyword “leather bag” in your ad campaign, then your ad may show up if the customer searches for “bag leather,” “women’s bag,” “women’s purse,” or even a synonym like “black leather carrier” or a misspelling like, “leather bag.”
What are the Types, and Where can you target Your Amazon PPC Ad?
Whenever you open Amazon, you see ads featuring several brands and products appearing in several styles and places. Every ad style differs due to cost, position, CTR, and varying conversion rates. Amazon product listing image design. Amazon provides sellers with the following three ways to target their advertisements. When creating a PPC campaign for the first time, three ad types appear, and they all have different purposes.
Sponsored Product Ads
Sponsored Product Ads are the most popular ad typethat 70 % of third-party sellers use to appear on the top of Amazon’s organic search results page. Amazon buyers can see a small “Sponsored” tag on the products. Two targeting options are available for sellers who want to create a Sponsored Products ad.
- Automatic Targeting: Amazon utilizes automatic targeting for deciding keywords to target based on the keywords of your listing. The platform gets data by analyzing the shoppers’ behavior and adjusting the bids to increase conversion and improve targeting. It is the best option if you want to start selling a product and have no keywords to target yet. The different targeting groups for automatic campaigns are loose matches, close matches, substitutes, and complements.
- Manual Targeting: Manual targeting gives you more control over your ad campaigns because you can choose keywords from automatic campaigns. Also, you can find relevant keywords with high volume and set custom bids on all keywords. You can break down manual targeting into product and keyword targeting.
Sponsored Brand Ads
Sponsored Brand ads were before known as “headline search ads.” They are advanced Amazon ads; only brand-registered sellers and vendors can access them. These ads help your business increase brand awareness, generate better ROAS, and show at the top, bottom, and side of search results. Sponsored brand ads include your brand’s tagline, logo, and products from your brand. You can choose from the three following three formats.
- Product Collection: You can promote three products simultaneously and drive traffic from your ad to your landing page or custom-branded Amazon storefront. It is an excellent way to gain visibility and conversion by bringing traffic to your product.
- Store Spotlight: If you have a brand that sells different products of several categories or subcategories, you can promote your three product categories in your store spotlight ads. Your brand will display three different categories of products in a single ad.
Sponsored Brand Video Ads
Amazon Sponsored Brand ads show videos, too, because videos can boost your brand’s visibility and help you stand out amongst your competitors. But before creating a video ad, read Amazon’s Sponsored Brand video ad guidelines. Amazon product listing image design. Your video length should be informative but 15-30 seconds without sound. Add captions that describe your product.
Sponsored Display Ads
Sponsored Display Ads appear on phone applications like Facebook, Instagram, Google, or Amazon Affiliate sites. These ads enable sellers to interact with buyers in their shopping journey and boost conversion. Amazon introduced video creatives so sellers can grab their audience’s attention with attractive visuals. Amazon product listing image design. It improves sales by targeting high-intent audiences and converting them to your customers. But you cannot target keywords and can choose from the following two targeting options.
- Contextual Targeting: Using contextual targeting helps sellers show ads to buyers who visited a specific product or category. These ads appear on third-party websites, product details pages, and Facebook and Amazon search result pages.
- Audience Targeting: By using audience targeting, you can select the specific shopper audience to whom you want to show your Sponsored Display ads.
How to Create a New Amazon PPC Campaign?
- Open Amazon Central and then log in and select advertising and then-campaign manager.
- Scroll down, and below the graphs, there is an option “Create a campaign,” so click on it.
- Find “continue” under the Sponsored Products and click on it.
- The next step is to fill information in the Settings portion of the Create campaign page. Choose a campaign name, start and end date, daily budget, and targeting.
- Select a bidding strategy for your campaign, such as Dynamic bids (down only, up, and down) or fixed bids.
- Now create an ad group, enter your name, and choose the products for advertising.
- You can set your bid now by default bid or by targeting group.
- There is an option for negative keyword targeting.
- Now you are all set to launch your campaign.
How to Create a PPC Report?
- Go to Seller Central and then Reports, and then Advertising Reports.
- Now you can create a PPC Report.
- Choose Configuration.
- Now you can type your Report name and the Delivery Timings.
- Afterward, run the Report.
- Finally, you can download the Report.
What If Your Amazon PPC Campaign Fails?
- When You Get Impressions but No Clicks
When your PPC campaigns are getting impressions but no clicks, there are some reasons behind it. For example, Amazon has a $2 bid for a keyword you bid at 0.55 cents. Hence, your listing will appear on the back pages, and buyers will view it but buy from the first page of products.
Consider the relevancy of products, and if you select a keyword with less relevancy, the chances that people will search it becomes less too. For example, your “metal coffee tables” product is indexed with a less relevant keyword, “table.” The first-page search results will not list all tables made of metal.
Moreover, your listing can also be incorrect such as you listed your metal coffee tables in the outdoors category. Amazon product listing image design. Also, select the proper subcategory after selecting the right category. Ensure your phrase matches and the exact keywords in your campaign are in a similar order to your listing. Using low search volume keywords can be a reason behind your listing getting impressions but no clicks. Only a few people are searching for the keyword you are using.
- When You Have Clicks but No Sales
Your listing needs improvement when consumers click on your product and leave without purchasing. You can create a listing that provides essential information and matches the lifestyle of your buyers. Include eye-catching images, quality content, and good reasons why someone should purchase your product.
An attractive listing won’t increase sales if your product can’t stand out. Focus on each aspect of your Amazon PPC ad because small things like your image can help you generate sales.
- When Your ACOS is Too High
Your advertising cost of sales must be less than your profit margin. If your ACOS is around 10-20%, that’s good. Don’t worry about your ACOS just 10-30 days after launching your product. A good technique is to decrease your bids on low to medium-relevant keywords since they will cost you money and less return.
If a keyword isn’t bringing sales as it should, there’s no use in spending money on it. You can choose the suggested bid or lower it so it can fit. Select the correct match type for your product keywords. An irrelevant selection of the keyword’s match type can lead to high ACOS because you advertise in the wrong area. Check where and how you spend money to manage ACOS effectively.
- CTR Scale (Click-Through-Rate)
0.7-1% CTR is minimum; 1-2% CTR is good. But if your CTR is 2-5%, it is excellent, and the 5% CTR is extraordinary.
When is the Right Time to Stop PPC and Rely on Organic Sales?
You can lower the bids once you achieve higher organic rankings, but stopping a PPC Campaign isn’t correct. When you are in the top 10 search results, your product performs exceptionally, and you can lower your PPC expenses. But if you are in the top 5, that is the ideal state though it depends on your category.
How to Measure Your Amazon PPC Performance?
- The Amazon Advertising Reports
Checking your sales data is the best way to check your customer’s reaction. Any seller can access sales data by going to Seller Central, clicking on reports in the navigation menu, and then advertising reports. After selecting the Report’s filters and parameters, you can create the Report and download the Excel file. Now you need to understand the crucial statistics and know Amazon PPC key terms.
- A/B Testing
Your Amazon ad’s success highly depends on the pictures of your product along with your titles and prices. Using Amazon’s design service is a good idea, but you can test your pictures with your target shoppers to check which ones match them. Every buyer has a different taste, so test all your target demographics for accurate results.
- Collaborate or Work Under Amazon Advertising Specialists
Check your advertising reports and A/B testing aren’t enough to modify your campaigns and increase your sales. But there is ample work to do as an Amazon seller, so outsourcing some tasks to an Amazon ads agency is a good strategy. While some agencies handle your Amazon PPC management, you can handle more significant business issues. Additionally, you can also learn from Amazon advertising specialists.
Final Thoughts
Once you understand Amazon PPC and start implementing all the strategies and techniques we discussed, start advertising on Amazon now. There will be no best time to start it, but whenever you do and follow this guide, you can make your mark as an Amazon seller. This guide will help you on each step, and you can bookmark it to check anything during your Amazon PPC journey.
A simple method to drive traffic to your product listings is Amazon PPC. If you can handle your account’s Amazon PPC yourself, that’s awesome, and you can also explore our services instead of worrying. We offered our PPC services to hundreds of clients, and made proper advertising campaigns for them and they were happy with the impressive results. Hence you can turn your goals into reality by trusting Ecommphics regarding your PPC management because we stay updated with Amazon features and updates.
