Should Sellers Use Amazon Sponsored Products Bid+?
Introduction to Amazon Sponsored Products Bid+
Sponsored Products Bid+ is a beta feature currently available to select advertisers to increase the opportunity to display ads in the top placement (aka the top row of search result pages).
When Sponsored Products Bid+ is turned on, Amazon will increase the maximum CPC bid for all ads that are eligible to appear in the highest traffic placements at the top of Search results.
Sellers can select the Bid+ option within the SP Campaign Settings tab (as seen in the example below):
The Sponsored Products TOP placement is the placement that shows Sponsored Products ads in the top row of the search result pages.
You can identify Sponsored Products from normal search results by looking at the “Sponsored” label right above the product title (pictured below).
According to Amazon, “Bid+ is a feature that increases competitiveness of your SP ads with high traffic. We encourage the use of Bid+ in campaigns that have a satisfactory ACoS, in order to potentially increase sales in these campaigns without increasing advertising costs.”
Additionally, you can measure the impact of Bid+ by comparing performance with the feature off and then on.
Experts on Sponsored Products Bid+ Beta
“I’ve seen success with Bid+ since my early skepticism when it was released,” Joe Selzer, Lead Marketplace Channel Analysts at CPC Strategy said.
“It can be a great strategy to employ when you have a group of keywords that you know convert consistently for a product (“core” keywords), or when you’re trying to boost a product’s rank for a given keyword search or searches.”
“I’ve only used it in those types of situations, when the number of keywords in the campaign/adgroup is relatively small and there’s prior data to support their relevancy and effectiveness, or when the desire to rank for those keywords warrants the increased spend and possible reduced ROI.”
“Even in the latter situation, it’s key that the advertised product converts for the keywords selected on a consistent basis in order for any progress in organic rank to be realized. Simply sending as much traffic as possible to your product for a given keyword search doesn’t guarantee results, and can even hurt organic rank if the product converts poorly.”
“The primary situation I have seen Bid+ most effective in is around helping a new or struggling product gain the top SP ad placement spot to help artificially rank the product at the top of the SERP page and boost exposure,” Ethan Pilkenton-Getty Manager, Marketplace Channel Operations at CPC Strategy said.
“This can be powerful for high traffic keywords that sellers are really interested in gaining higher rank on.”
“However, the key here is setting the expectation that this type of campaign is one that is more promotional in nature and not specifically the best for ROI focused sellers/products.”
Sponsored Products Bid+: What Advertisers Should Know
- According to Amazon, at this time there is no reporting that shows top of search ads that were Bid+ enabled. However, advertisers can measure the impact of Bid+ by comparing performance with the feature off and then on.
- The winner of an auction is not solely determined by the CPC Bid+, but also by other factors such as the ad’s relevance score. It is not possible to determine which will win by only looking at the Bid+ setting
- Unfortunately advertisers cannot enable Bid+ straight from the SP Ad Builder. Bid+ is only a setting advertisers can activate in the Campaign Settings tab, once your campaign is active.
- Bid+ is only available for manually targeted campaigns. Automatic campaigns are not eligible for Bid+ at this time.
- It’s important for advertisers to know that Bid+ is designed only for the TOP placement and that bids will not be increased for any other placements.
- The daily budget constraint will remain as you set it, regardless of Bid+.
- If the Bid+ setting is on and your ad is clicked in the TOP placement, it is expected that your CPC will increase.
About Sponsored Products:
Although Sponsored Products is one of the most powerful tools for driving discoverability and incremental sales for Amazon sellers, with so many levers to pull it can be difficult for sellers to know where to start.
The most frequent Sponsored Products inefficiencies stem from bid levels, keyword matching and optimization, campaign differentiation and structure. Because Amazon is a constantly evolving marketplace, remaining stagnant in your marketing strategy is no longer an option.
In our recent Amazon series we walk through the 3 phase Sponsored Products Campaign development process including:
- Product Content Evaluation
- Automatic Campaign Implementation (Phase 1 & 2)
- Manual Campaign Creation (Phase 1 & 2)
To learn more about Sponsored Products or the Bid+ beta, email [email protected].
Additional Sponsored Products Resources
How Amazon Sponsored Products Can Drive Sales Growth
Advanced Advertising with Sponsored Products Manual Campaigns
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