Amazon marketing is a critical piece in the long-term success of your eCommerce business.
Utilizing Amazon advertising allows you to gain an edge over the competition through calculated targeting to ensure your products are visible to the demographics searching for your product. Additionally, these ads help you brand and your products stand out in search results, on detail pages, and more.
As you set up your ad campaigns you will need to decide whether to go with Amazon's Automatic Targeting or Manual Targeting. There are pros and cons to each, depending on your goal.
Amazon Ads: Automatic Targeting
Automatic Targeting enables Amazon to decide when and where to display your ad. This is automatically calculated based on the keywords that Amazon identifies from the title, description, and other sections of your product listing.
Who Should Use Automated Campaigns?
Automatic targeting campaigns are generally the most beneficial for those new to advertising.
Auto-targeting campaigns are simple to setup, and really do the research for you on keywords. These campaigns connect your product listing with shopper search terms, and will display your ad accordingly.
If you are new to Amazon PPC, Auto Campaigns can give you a start on which keywords to use, and what bidding strategy to implement. For brands or aggregators with too many products or categories, auto campaigns can help you do the keyword research or discovery but with a bit of ad spend.
Potential Loss with Auto-Targeting Campaigns
Amazon auto campaigns focus on finding relevant keywords, not necessarily high growth or peak profitability. With auto campaigns, you have no control over your bids, which means you will bid equally for high-, low-, and even zero-converting keywords.
This will ultimately raise your ACoS (Advertising Cost of Sale) as you will be wasting ad spend on keywords that won’t convert. The ultimate goal is to have a low ACoS.
How to Use Auto Campaigns
Most Amazon sellers use auto campaigns in the initial stages for keyword discovery, then use the high-performing keywords in the manual campaigns for better control and bidding strategy.
Nevertheless, Amazon is a marketplace where all kinds of brands can hit and exceed sales targets if the accounts are consistently being monitored and optimized.
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Amazon Ads: Manual Targeting
Manual Targeting is when Amazon sellers determine their own keywords and bid rates for their ad campaigns. Manual campaigns have a more specific target audience since each keyword is decided manually and selected by the advertiser.
Who Should Use Manual Campaigns?
Manual Targeting Ad Campaigns are best for Amazon sellers who understand paid advertising or may have a better understanding of their high-converting keywords. They also require a lot of time and effort to be done effectively.
To understand and be successful with Manual Campaigns, you should either be a Pay-Per-Click (PPC) expert who can analyze and optimize campaigns regularly, hire an agency who can be that expert for you, or close the gap by utilizing a PPC software that can automate and make recommendations.
Implementing Manual Campaigns
When you know about your keywords and competitors, manual campaigns are likely to have a more desirable Advertising Cost of Sales (ACoS) and control over your bidding strategy.
Moreover, if the advertiser deeply understands the product and purchase behavior through experience, ad spend and bidding strategy are used better.
Manual campaigns are also useful for seasonal products or trends, as high-converting keywords are always changing. Manual Targeting requires an in-depth strategy to ensure you are constantly in the loop on seasonal trends.
The Cons Manual Campaigns
Many business owners are not Amazon Pay-Per-Click advertising experts. While Amazon sellers can become experts in understanding their own business, it can become overwhelming to constantly micromanage and harvest new keywords to ensure your ads are optimized.
If you have a larger catalog or a wide range of products and don’t know what to focus on, manual targeting can be counterproductive. Moreover, if you already do not have the resources, time, and expertise, auto campaigns can get you started quickly.
Optimizing all aspects of multiple product ad campaigns regularly means compromising precious time as a business owner.
Nevertheless, if you have the time and expertise to utilize Amazon’s Manual Targeting Campaigns for your brand, all the power to you. However, you may want to see how Amazon's manual targeting stacks up against Trellis.
Amazon Automatic vs. Manual Targeting: Which is Better?
Like most things in the world of Amazon, it depends. Nether advertising type is inherently better than the other.
Automatic Targeting is an easy way to set up your Amazon Ads and find new keywords. However, your profit margin and ACoS are at higher risk as you have less control..
Manual campaigns offer you more control, but at the cost of human capital or an additional software charge. They require research and expertise that can be a quick time-suck.
Even though it’s not easy to keep up with every detail of your Amazon Advertising strategy, the most successful businesses we encounter use both automated and manual campaigns together.
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Our platform will help you increase your sales by 10-30% (depending on your products), save time on manual work, and focus on business growth. Book a demo to see it in action!