Amazon Ads for business: Sponsored Products, Brands and display

This guide is built from Amazon Ads' official pages: the Amazon Ads FAQ, Sponsored Products, Sponsored Brands and A simple guide to effective targeting with Sponsored Products. If you sell from your own shop as well, our guides to Google Shopping campaigns and the ecommerce launch checklist cover that side.

Who can advertise

Amazon Ads says it serves "registered sellers, vendors, book vendors, Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) authors, app developers, and/or agencies", with eligibility set per product. The first question is how you sell on Amazon:

• Sellers "sell products directly to Amazon customers" and manage products in Seller Central.
• Vendors "sell their items directly to Amazon, who then sells them to customers", and manage products in Vendor Central.
• Businesses that don't sell on Amazon can still buy display, video and audio ads: Amazon says businesses can buy them "whether or not they sell products on Amazon."

Campaigns are managed in Amazon Ads Agent, which Amazon describes as "one ad platform for all of your advertising with Amazon"; it brought sponsored ads and the former Amazon DSP together.

Sponsored Products

Amazon describes Sponsored Products as "cost-per-click (CPC) ads that promote individual product listings on Amazon and select premium apps and websites." Ads appear in and beside shopping results and on product pages, and link to the product's detail page. Amazon calls it "the simplest way to start advertising": "No images or custom copy are needed, and ads go live immediately", and it also offers a video version.

To use it, sellers need an active professional seller account, the ability to ship to all addresses in the marketplace, new products in available categories, and listings eligible for the Featured Offer. Vendors need to be in one of the listed vendor types. Two limits matter in practice:

• Amazon doesn't support "adult products, used products, refurbished products, and products in closed categories."
• "If your product isn't the Featured Offer or is out of stock, your ad will not display."

Sponsored Brands

Sponsored Brands show your brand with video, image or collection creatives at the top of search results and on product pages, linking to product pages or a landing page such as a Store. They are available to vendors, agencies, book vendors, KDP authors and professional sellers enrolled in Amazon Brand Registry. Enrolling needs "a registered and active trademark submitted and approved by Amazon"; vendors don't need to enrol.

Display, video and audio ads

Amazon's Sponsored Display page now says "Sponsored Display is now known as display ads". Existing Sponsored Display campaigns keep running, and new ones are created under Display, Video and Audio in Amazon Ads Agent. According to the FAQ:

• Display ads appear on Amazon websites, apps and devices and on sites and apps Amazon doesn't own, using Amazon-generated creative or your own.
• Video and audio ads include streaming TV, out-stream video and ads on the free tier of Amazon Music.

Self-service users can run display and video campaigns themselves. Amazon says the managed-service option "typically requires a minimum spend of $50,000 (US)", and audio ads "typically require a minimum spend of $25,000 (US)". Streaming TV ads are covered in our Amazon streaming TV ads guide.

Automatic and manual targeting

Sponsored Products has three targeting options: automatic, manual and negative. You choose when creating the campaign, and Amazon says that once it is live "you will not be able to change the campaign targeting", so a change of strategy means a new campaign.

• Automatic targeting matches your ad to keywords and products similar to yours, based on past shopping queries and your product information. It uses four strategies: close match, loose match, substitutes and complements, each of which can have its own bid.
• Manual keyword targeting lets you pick keywords from Amazon's recommendations, your own list or both.
• Manual product targeting targets specific products, categories or brands, refined by attributes such as price range, ratings and Prime shipping eligibility. Your ad can then appear on the targeted product's detail page.

For new advertisers, Amazon suggests starting with an automatic campaign and letting it run "for about two weeks before creating a manual campaign", then using its search term report to pick manual targets.

Keyword match types and negatives

Sponsored Products and Sponsored Brands keywords use three match types:

• Broad: the widest reach. Terms can come in any order and include plurals, synonyms and related terms.
• Phrase: the search must contain the keyword's words in the same order, plus its plural.
• Exact: word for word and in the same order, plus the plural; Amazon says it "tends to result in the highest conversion rates".

Keywords aren't case-sensitive and can have up to 10 words and 80 characters. Negative keywords and products can help "reduce costs by excluding keywords where an advertiser might be overinvesting." The same idea on Google is in our guide to search terms and negative keywords.

Cost per click and bidding

Amazon says "Sponsored Products, Sponsored Brands, and display ads are cost-per-click ads, meaning you pay only when customers click your ad". Pricing is "auction-based": your bid is "the maximum amount you are willing to pay when a customer clicks an ad", and "The more competitive your bid is, the more likely it is that your ad will be displayed." Amazon's cost per click guide adds that the final CPC "is usually determined by an auction and is based on your adjusted bid plus additional factors", so you often pay less than your maximum. Amazon publishes no average price per click; the campaign builder suggests bids.

Amazon's Sponsored Products best practices list three bidding strategies: "dynamic bids - up and down", "dynamic bids - down only" (Amazon adjusts your bid in real time) and "fixed bids". You can also raise bids by placement, top of search, rest of search or product pages, with adjustments of up to 900%.

Budgets and billing

• Sponsored Products uses a daily budget, averaged over the calendar month: Amazon's example is a $100 daily budget allowing "up to $3,100 worth of clicks" in a 31-day month.
• Sponsored Brands can use a daily or a lifetime budget, and you can't switch between them after choosing.
• The minimum daily budget is $1.00 (or the local equivalent) for both.
• Daily budgets "are not paced throughout the day", so a small one can run out in minutes when demand is high. Lifetime budgets are paced.

You pay either from your seller or vendor account balance or by credit card. Amazon charges you after your first $1.00 of clicks, each time clicks reach your credit limit (which starts at $50 and rises step by step to $500 as payments succeed), and on the third day of each month for any balance from the previous month.

ACOS and the reports

The main Amazon Ads efficiency metric is advertising cost of sales (ACOS): ad spend divided by ad revenue, as a percentage. Amazon's example: spend $50, earn $100, and ACOS is 50%. ROAS is the reverse, ad revenue divided by ad spend. Amazon's guide ties a good ACOS to your profit margin and break-even point. The best practices page lists the reports to watch:

• Search term report: the shopping searches that led to at least one click.
• Targeting report: sales metrics by keyword and product target.
• Advertised product, placement and performance over time reports.

How we start an Amazon Ads account

This is our own practice, not Amazon's guidance:

• Before any ads, we check the listings: in stock, Featured Offer, good images and a clear title.
• We start with one automatic Sponsored Products campaign per product group and let it run about two weeks.
• We move the search terms that sell into manual exact and phrase campaigns, and add the ones that don't as negatives.
• We agree a target ACOS from the client's margins before we judge any campaign.

If you want help with Amazon or other ecommerce advertising, see our services.

Frequently asked questions

Can I advertise on Amazon if I don't sell on Amazon?

Yes, with display, video and audio ads. Sponsored Products and Sponsored Brands are for sellers, vendors and authors.

How much do Amazon ads cost?

They are cost per click: you set a maximum bid and a budget, and the auction sets the price. The minimum daily budget is $1.00.

Do I need Brand Registry to advertise on Amazon?

Not for Sponsored Products. Sellers need Amazon Brand Registry for Sponsored Brands and Brand Stores; vendors don't.

Should I use automatic or manual targeting?

Amazon suggests new advertisers start with automatic targeting for about two weeks, then use the search term report to build manual keyword or product campaigns.

What is ACOS on Amazon?

Advertising cost of sales: ad spend divided by ad revenue, shown as a percentage. $50 of spend that brings $100 of sales is an ACOS of 50%.

For how the main retail media networks compare and where to start, see Retail media networks.

For other ad platforms, see our guides to Microsoft Shopping campaigns, Pinterest shopping ads, Spotify ads, Walmart Connect ads, Instacart Ads, eBay ads and GA4 ecommerce tracking.