Learn effective strategies to optimise your Amazon PPC campaigns, reduce ACoS and boost sales with actionable guidance on bid optimisation.
Jens Vittrup
If you do not monitor your Amazon PPC campaigns properly, you are literally burning money. You launch your campaigns with high expectations, but after a few weeks you see a sky-high ACoS and minimal results. Plenty of clicks, but barely any sales.
Amazon is happy to take your advertising budget, regardless of whether you see a return or not. Without the right Amazon advertising strategy, poor targeting, incorrect bids and ignored reports can quickly drain your budget.
In this guide, we dive into how you can optimise your Amazon PPC campaigns for better results, lower ACoS and higher conversion rates. We cover actionable strategies for bid optimisation, campaign structure and continuous improvements, so you can maximise the return on your advertising investment.
Amazon PPC advertising is not a “set and forget” process. Without ongoing optimisation and adjustments, you risk wasting your budget on irrelevant clicks and keywords that do not convert to sales. An effective Amazon selling strategy must include regular optimisation of your PPC campaigns.
A thorough Amazon PPC audit can reveal where your advertising spend is being wasted and where you can improve your results. This involves analysing your campaign performance, identifying high and low performing keywords, adjusting your bids, and optimising your campaign structure.
Although the process may seem overwhelming, Amazon PPC optimisation is a necessary part of running a successful business on the platform. With the right strategies and tools, you can reduce your advertising costs while increasing your sales.
Before we delve into optimisation strategies, it is important to understand the basic structure of Amazon PPC campaigns. A well-organised campaign structure is the foundation for effective advertising and makes it much easier to organise Amazon advertising in a way that makes sense and delivers results.
An optimal Amazon PPC structure typically consists of:
By organising your campaigns logically, you can more easily see which products and keywords are performing well and where adjustments are needed. This is the first step to optimising your Amazon advertising and achieving better results.
To achieve the best structure, consider organising your campaigns by product category, brand or profit margin. This way, you can allocate budgets based on which products deliver the best return.
A thorough Amazon PPC audit is the starting point for any serious optimisation process. It gives you a clear picture of what is working and what needs adjusting in your campaigns. Here are the steps for conducting an effective audit:
During your audit, you should identify opportunities to improve your ads by focusing on the keywords and products that deliver the best return. At the same time, you must find and eliminate waste, where you are spending money on clicks that do not result in sales.
An Amazon consultant can help conduct a professional audit, identifying improvement opportunities that you may not have noticed yourself. This can be especially valuable if you have complex campaigns with many products.
Understanding how to manage your bids is essential for controlling your advertising costs. Many sellers wonder how to change bid on Amazon ads or how to edit the cost per click bid in Amazon advertising. Here are the basic steps:
How to adjust your bids in Amazon Advertising:
But the important question is not just how, but when and how much you should adjust your bids. This is where strategy comes in.
When you work with the default bid in Amazon advertising, you set a standard starting bid for all keywords in an ad group. This should be based on:
After the campaign has run for a while, you should adjust your bids based on performance. Increase bids for keywords with a good conversion rate and low ACoS, and reduce or pause keywords with poor performance.
An effective keyword strategy is at the core of optimising Amazon ads. You should organise your keywords in a logical structure based on their match type and performance.
Here is a recommended approach to keyword organisation:
Start with a broad research campaign to identify which search terms lead to sales:
Based on your research campaign, set up a performance campaign with the most promising keywords:
This Amazon SEO approach ensures you gradually refine your keyword strategy and focus your budgets on the search terms that actually drive sales.
To effectively optimise Amazon Sponsored Ads, you need to learn how to understand and analyse your campaign data. Amazon provides several reports that can help you make data-driven decisions about your campaigns.
The most important reports to focus on include:
When analysing this data, focus on key metrics such as:
By regularly analysing these metrics, you can identify trends and patterns that help you improve Amazon advertising through strategic adjustments.
Once you have mastered the basics, you can implement more advanced strategies to optimise Amazon advertising at a higher level. These strategies can help you fine-tune your campaigns and achieve even better results.
With Amazon’s newer tools, you can now schedule when your ads appear and adjust bids based on the time of day:
In addition to keyword targeting, you should also take advantage of product targeting:
These advanced strategies require constant monitoring and adjustment, but can deliver significant improvements to your Amazon marketing and campaign effectiveness.
To achieve long-term success with Amazon PPC, it is essential to establish a routine for ongoing optimisation. This ensures your campaigns are continually improved and adapted to changing market conditions.
Here is a recommended schedule for continuous optimisation:
By following this systematic approach to optimisation, you can ensure your campaigns are constantly refined and improved to deliver maximum value from your advertising budget.
One of the challenges of optimising Amazon PPC ads is adapting your campaigns to seasonality and special events such as Prime Day, Black Friday or the Christmas shopping period.
Here are some strategies for managing these periods:
By having a strategy for seasonality, you ensure your campaigns are ready to capitalise on periods of high demand without letting your budget run wild.
Sometimes it may be necessary to turn off sponsored ads on Amazon, either temporarily or permanently. This can be relevant in the following situations:
How to pause or stop your Amazon ads:
Remember, pausing campaigns can affect your product visibility and ranking. Therefore, you should have a clear plan for when and how to reactivate your ads.
To effectively learn how to optimize Amazon advertising, you can benefit from various tools and resources that automate and enhance your optimization process.
These tools can save you time and provide deeper insights into your campaigns’ performance, leading to better decisions and optimization. Many of these tools offer Amazon courses or training on how to best utilize their features.
Even experienced sellers make mistakes when trying to optimise Amazon ads. Here are some common pitfalls you should avoid:
By being aware of these pitfalls, you can avoid costly mistakes and ensure your Amazon FBA business’s advertising budget is used effectively.
Although many sellers start by managing their own Amazon PPC campaigns, there comes a point where professional support can add significant value. Here are signs that it might be time to seek expert help:
A professional Amazon PPC manager or agency can provide expert knowledge and dedicated resources for your advertising, often resulting in lower ACoS and higher sales.
Experts often have access to advanced tools and data, as well as experience with various product categories and market conditions, giving you a competitive advantage.
Learning how to optimise Amazon advertising is an ongoing process that requires patience, attention to detail, and a strategic approach. By implementing the strategies and techniques described in this guide, you can improve the effectiveness of your campaigns and ultimately drive more profitable sales.
Remember, successful Amazon PPC optimisation is not about quick fixes, but about consistently applying best practices and continually improving based on data and results.
Start with a thorough audit of your current campaigns, implement a logical campaign structure, and establish a routine for regular optimisation. Over time, you will see improvements in your key metrics and a better return on your advertising investment.
By investing time in understanding and mastering Amazon PPC, you can not only reduce your advertising costs, but also increase your visibility and sales on Amazon’s ever more competitive marketplace. Every step in the optimisation process brings you closer to a more efficient and profitable Amazon business.
If you find the process overwhelming or want to accelerate your results, it may be worth considering professional help from an experienced Amazon agency or PPC specialist who can help take your advertising strategy to the next level.
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