Once Covid-19 hit, everyone knew that online sales were going to explode. However, this happened much quicker than most brands had enough inventory for.
Statista shows us the growth of online sales from March 1 - May 26 when we saw the largest shift from in-store sales to online sales than ever before (including holiday shopping).
As the shift to online shopping continues to grow, it is essential that brands know what tools they have on Amazon to help them grow as the online market rises; specifically through Amazon’s various ad products.
Amazon has 3 main advertising products: Sponsored Products, Sponsored Brands, and Sponsored Display. For a new user, these different campaigns might seem confusing, so we will walk you through the differences and uses for each of three ad campaigns.
Sponsored Product Ads
Sponsored Products are a mid-funnel advertising strategy that gives visibility to products above the top organic listings (see example below). It uses custom keywords to get products in front of the consumers who are searching for them, however it can be used to capture new audiences as well. These pay-per-click ads require no additional copy or images, but usually receive the most interaction of the campaigns and need to be monitored closely.
As you can see, these ads look just like an organic listing, however they say, “Sponsored,” on them. These types of ads can be really effective forms of advertising because they tend to blend in with the organic results around them. These ads can help you get your products in front of qualified customers who are searching for your product in a way that doesn’t make them feel like they are being served an advertisement.
Sponsored Brand Ads
Sponsored Brand Ads are a top-of-funnel brand awareness tool and function on keywords. Commonly used to promote product lines or best sellers, a Sponsored Brand ad shows up as a banner above the search results (see example below). This type of ad requires at least three separate products.
Unlike other campaigns used on the Amazon platform, Sponsored Brand ads require ad copy and a unique logo. These ads also can take consumers to a custom landing page, or a page on the brand store, which makes them stand out.
Competition for these ads are high, due to the prime real estate location and limited available space.
Sponsored Display Ads
Sponsored Display ads can be a tactic for top, middle, or bottom of the funnel due to its varying targeting abilities. Although most commonly found under the bullet points of a detail page, these ads can also show in emails, newsletters, and even more locations off platform.
Unlike the previous ad campaigns discussed, sponsored display ads can target shopping behaviours, like repeat purchasers, similar product purchasers, and even people who viewed the detail page but did not buy. This helps them stand out from other ad products.
You can see in the example above that this is just one of the many placements Sponsored Display has.
Rather than competing with each other, each of the three ad products focus on a different section of the sales funnel, allowing you to target your customers no matter where they are in the buying process. Marketers are most successful when they learn to use these different types of campaigns in tandem, and with a consistent marketing message.
If you want to learn more about how to wield Amazon’s advertising products so you can grow sales on the Amazon marketplace, reach out to a Pattern representative. At Pattern, we help brands build successful advertising and digital marketing campaigns so they can beat competition, keep ad spend down, and ultimately build sales and hit their goals.