For many, Amazon PPC elicits feelings of being overwhelmed and confused. Some struggle to hone in on the right keywords, and ad budget is left on the table. Some are overspending on key terms that are expensive and not converting. Some are confused whether to do manual or automatic campaigns. Plus, things are always changing in the Amazon landscape. We totally understand the confusion and we want to help get you on the right path.
Our #1 tip is to hire an expert. You can’t possibly become an expert in PPC, when your time and attention is divided doing so many other tasks as an Amazon seller. We talk to a lot of people who feel really confident with off Amazon marketing, but on-Amazon their experience is limited. There’s no reason to spend hours learning the ins and outs of Amazon PPC, plus spend hours every week managing it, when you could hire an expert to do it for you the right way. While this is a critical part of a seller’s Amazon business, it is truly one of the first things you should relinquish to an expert.
If hiring an expert isn’t in the cards at the moment, here are three more tips for executing at a high level with your PPC.
- Focus on the right keywords. We recommend running manual and automatic campaigns with the same keywords. This seems counterintuitive, but when Amazon runs automatic PPC campaigns for you, it’s based on their extensive knowledge of their own algorithm. Once you see which automatic campaigns are working well, plug in those same keywords in manual campaigns, and adjust the bids according to your goals. That way you can trust it’s a strong keyword for the product AND you have more control over the budget than you do with automatic campaigns..
- Test out various PPC features. Amazon has recently rolled out a series of new Amazon PPC features — among them the intriguing options ‘Campaign Bidding Strategies’ and ‘Adjust Bids by Placement’. For example, with dynamic bidding, Amazon adjusts your bid according to the probability of a sale. This means you have the opportunity to: Bid Down, Bid Up and Down, or do Fixed Bids. If you are looking to more effectively utilize PPC, trying out new features could be the change you’ve been looking for.
- Listing Optimization. While everything we’ve discussed above is important, the #1 most important thing for successful PPC campaigns, is having a fully optimized listing. Regardless of your budget, without a great listing, the clicks you drive from Amazon PPC won’t convert, and you’ll have a high ACOS. Click here to learn more about our PPC management (which includes listing optimization), apply for our services, and make sure you’re set up for success.
While hiring an expert ASAP is always our recommendation for ensuring that you are competing at the highest level on Amazon, give these three tips a try and see what a difference they can make. Unlike our competitors, when we manage PPC for clients, auditing their listings and making sure they are fully optimized is our first stop. We want to make sure that if you are spending money to drive traffic to your listings, that once a potential customer arrives on your page, they are going to be sold! Good luck!