How To Optimize Amazon PPC Campaigns: 6 Profitable Strategies

Amazon PPC (Pay-Per-Click) is an impactful marketing instrument enabling sellers to spotlight their offerings on Amazon via keyword bidding. Harnessing the power of PPC campaigns, sellers can escalate product exposure, funnel more traffic to their listings, and in turn, amplify sales.

However, tapping into the true potential of this tool requires one to understand how to optimize Amazon PPC campaigns. This encompasses leveraging data analytics to pinpoint crucial metrics, selecting appropriate targeting choices, crafting strategic bids and diversified ad versions, and persistently steering the campaign based on data-centric insights to enhance performance. By doing so, sellers can truly unlock the transformative power of Amazon PPC.

1. Conducting Keyword Research

Keyword research is crucial in optimizing Amazon PPC campaigns. Identifying high-performing keywords can help improve campaign performance and increase sales. 

1. Brainstorm: Start by brainstorming a list of relevant keywords related to your product. Use tools like Google Keyword Planner, MerchantWords, or Helium 10 to find relevant keywords.

2. Analyze competitor keywords: Check what keywords your competitors are targeting. You can use Amazon analytics tools like Jungle Scout or Viral Launch to see the keywords they are ranking for.

3. Evaluate search volume and relevance: Use tools like Google Keyword Planner to evaluate each keyword's search volume and relevance. Look for keywords with high search volume and highly relevant to your product.

4. Check for relevance to customer search terms: Make sure the keywords you select are relevant to your customers' search terms. You can use search term reports to identify customers' search terms to find your product.

5. Refine your keyword list: Refine your keyword list by eliminating irrelevant or low-performing keywords. Focus on high-performing keywords with a good search volume and highly relevant to your product.

In addition to manual research, several keyword research tools are available for sellers to use. These tools can help identify high-performing keywords and provide insights into search volume, competition, and related keywords.

Some popular keyword research tools for Amazon PPC campaigns include Jungle Scout, Helium 10, and Sellics. These tools can help sellers save time and effort in keyword research and optimize their campaigns for better performance.

2. Creating A Targeted PPC Ad Campaign

Choosing the right campaign type is crucial for optimizing Amazon PPC campaigns. The two main campaign types are Sponsored Products and Sponsored Brands. Sponsored Products ads are best for promoting individual products, while Sponsored Brands ads are better suited for promoting a brand or product line.

Choose the most ideal campaign type. This ensures your ads target the right audience, and are displayed correctly. This entire process effectively leads to higher click-through rates, better conversions, and more sales. 

Setting Up Targeting Options

Setting up targeting options is a critical step in optimizing Amazon PPC campaigns. 

1. Determine your campaign type: Decide whether you want to run sponsored products, brands, or display campaigns. Each campaign type has different targeting options. Scale Insights features Fully Managed Campaigns which automatically creates customizable campaigns to your needs. Leverage this to take the legwork out of process that can be automated.

2. Choose your targeting method: You can choose between automatic targeting, where Amazon selects the relevant keywords and products for your ad, or manual targeting, where you choose the keywords and products yourself.

3. Select your targeting options: For manual targeting, you can select keywords, ASINs, categories, and brands to target. You can choose between close matches, loose matches, complement matches, and substitutes for automatic targeting.

4. Refine your targeting options: Once your campaign runs, you can use the search term report to see which search terms trigger your ads. Use this information to refine your targeting options by adding or removing keywords and adjusting bids.

Compelling Ad Copies And Setting Competitive Bids

Crafting effective ad copies attracts potential customers, persuading them to click on your ad. Make your ad copies clear, concise, and relevant to your target market. It must also clearly highlight your product’s USP (Unique Selling Point). Add a high-converting Call-to-Action as well.

Adding competitive bids is equally important. They enable your ad to appear at the top of the search results page. If you set your bid way too low, there’s a high chance the ad might not display (or may appear in later pages). This reduces visibility and the chances of getting clicks and conversions. Too high a bid is not optimal either, as it can result in wasted ad spend.

Take advantage of Amazon’s suggested bid feature. Suggested Bidding estimates the bid you need to place in order for your ad to appear in the top/a prominent position. However, it’s highly suggested to monitor and adjust bids based on campaign performance. This will ultimately help optimize results.

Let Scale Insights take the guesswork out of setting bids. Its Dynamic Bidding Algorithm dynamically assigns bidding rules and targets ACoS based on your keyword or product’s target performance.

Effective ad copy is essential because it attracts the attention of potential customers and persuades them to click on the ad. It should be clear, concise, and relevant to the target audience. It should also highlight the product's unique selling points and include a call to action.

3. Refining Campaigns With Negative Keywords

Negative keywords are an essential aspect of Amazon PPC optimization. They allow you to exclude specific search terms from triggering your ads, which helps you target your ads more effectively and avoid wasting ad spend on irrelevant clicks. Scale Insights is a useful tool which can help you automate keyword negation based on a customizable criteria.

1. Conduct search term analysis: Review your report regularly to identify any irrelevant search terms that triggered your ads.

2. Identify negative keywords: Once you have identified irrelevant search terms, you can add them as negative keywords to your campaign. Negative keywords can be added at the campaign level or ad group level.

3. Use phrase and exact match keyword: Negative keywords can be added as a phrase or exact match. Adding negative keywords as an exact match ensures that your ads are not triggered by the exact search term, while adding negative keywords as a phrase match ensures that your ads are not triggered by search terms that contain the phrase.

4. Refine your negative keyword list: Review your negative keyword list regularly and remove any negative keywords blocking relevant traffic.

4. Monitoring Campaign Performance

Monitoring campaign performance is essential for optimizing Amazon PPC campaigns. Sellers should track key metrics, such as:

1. Impressions: the number of times your ad was displayed to shoppers

2. Clicks: the number of times shoppers clicked on your ad

3. Click-through rate (CTR): the percentage of shoppers who clicked on your ad after seeing it

4. Cost per click (CPC): the amount you pay each time someone clicks on your ad

5. Spend: the total amount spent on your campaign.

6. Conversions: the number of times a shopper purchased your product after clicking on your ad

7. Conversion rate: the percentage of shoppers who purchased your product after clicking on your ad

8. Advertising cost of sale (ACoS): the ratio of advertising spend to sales generated by your ads, expressed as a percentage

9. Return on advertising spend (ROAS): the ratio of sales generated by your ads to advertising spend, expressed as a percentage.

10. Total sales: the total amount of sales generated by your ads.

Amazon Advertising Console provides a wealth of data and reports to help sellers monitor their campaign performance. Sellers can use the console to track their advertising spend, identify high-performing keywords, ensure profitable campaigns, and optimize their bids. Additionally, sellers can use third-party analytics tools, such as Google Analytics, to gain additional campaign insights.

To monitor campaign performance effectively, sellers should regularly review their performance data and make necessary adjustments to optimize their campaigns for better results.

They should also set up automatic campaign optimization rules within the Amazon Advertising Console to streamline the optimization process.

Take the guesswork out of manually analyzing your campaign through Scale Insights’ Ads Insights module. It monitors the performance of portfolio, ASINs, campaigns, ad groups, and keywords.

5. Making Data-Driven Decisions

Data analysis helps you make data-driven decisions which is ultimately crucial in optimizing your Amazon PPC campaigns. Sellers are able to pinpoint trends, patterns, and areas requiring improvement in terms of campaign performance. All of these allow sellers to decide on key aspects of their campaigns and make changes that lead to favorable results.

Sellers often need to gather and analyze data based on the following (but not limited to) key metrics:

• Click-through rate (CTR)

• Conversion rate

• Cost-per-click (CPC)

Gathering data based on these metrics is possible through the use of tools like Amazon Advertising, Advertising Console, Google Analytics, and other third party analytics tools. Sellers can then utilize data to identify both low and high-performing ads and keywords.

Data analysis is also instrumental in bidding strategies and audience targeting. For instance, if a seller notices their ad isn’t performing well, they can make a couple of changes, like adjusting their targeting options to exclude the unintended audience, or refining their ad copies to better appeal to the right market.

Ultimately, data-driven decision-making is vital in achieving success on your Amazon PPC campaigns. Better if you use a data-driven Amazon analytics software to make performance monitoring seamless and less cumbersome. 

6. A/B Testing Ad Variations

A/B testing, or split testing, is an important practice for optimizing Amazon PPC campaigns. It involves creating two ad or landing page versions and comparing their performance to determine which version is more effective in achieving the campaign goals. Here are some best practices for A/B testing:

1. Set a clear goal: Start with defining your goals before A/B testing. Do you want to increase CTR? Improve conversion rates? Setting a goal helps you determine which metrics or performance indicators to track. Alternatively, you can use proprietary, rule-based software like Scale Insights to customize your rules and objectives. This allows you to freely do A/B testing to assess low, and high-performing ad campaigns.

2. Test one variable at a time: Test variables in piecemeal to help you determine the impact of your changes. For example, if you want to see which ad copies perform better, craft two versions with the same heading, image, and targeting.  

3. Test a large enough sample size: Get measurable results by statistically testing a large sample size. The number varies based on the size of your campaign and the metric you are testing. As a rule of thumb, however, aim to get at least 100 clicks per variation. 

4. Monitor results over time: Monitor the results of your A/B test to see if any changes you’ve made are sustainable and impactful. Don’t make changes based on short-term performance fluctuations. 

5. Use data to inform future tests: A/B testing is an ongoing process. The data you collect from each test should inform future tests. Use the insights gained from previous tests to develop hypotheses for future tests and refine your campaigns over time. 

Conclusion: How To Optimize Amazon PPC

Optimizing your Amazon PPC campaigns is crucial for success as a platform seller. With these techniques, you can continuously improve your campaign performance and increase your chances of success.

Take your Amazon PPC campaigns to the next level with Scale Insights! Our Amazon PPC software is fully automated and uses Scale-matic technology to ensure you have complete control over every dollar you put in your campaigns.

Try a free 30-day trial (no credit card needed), starting at $78 up to $688 monthly. Customized plans are available for up to 2,000 automated ASINs.

Frequently Asked Questions: How To Optimize Amazon PPC Campaigns

How Do I Set A Budget For My Amazon PPC Campaign?

Start by determining your overall monthly ad spend, then divide it by the number of campaigns you plan to run. Consider your target ACoS, product margins, and sales goals to allocate your budget effectively.

How Can I Improve My Keyword Targeting?

Improve your keyword targeting by conducting thorough keyword research using tools like Amazon's own auto-suggest feature and third-party platforms. Analyze your competitors' keywords and refine your list by testing various match types (broad, phrase, and exact) to identify top-performing terms.

How Do I Identify High-Performing Keywords For My Amazon PPC Campaign?

Conduct thorough keyword research using tools such as the Amazon keyword tool, Google Keyword Planner, and third-party tools. Analyze keyword performance metrics such as search volume,

What Are Negative Keywords, And How Do I Use Them In My Amazon PPC Campaign?

Negative keywords are those you don't want your ad to appear for. Use negative keywords to refine your targeting and avoid irrelevant clicks., relevance, and competition to identify high-performing keywords.