Amazon Demand Side Platform (DSP): Send Qualified Traffic To Your Product Listings

The Amazon Demand Side Platform (DSP) is a step beyond traditional advertising. However, there are many previous cases where brands have used it with success. It’s the epitome of Amazon’s advertising platform remind you to work smarter, not harder.

Below, we will get into a quick reminder of what DSP is. This article will also provide a deeper dive into applications for attracting attention to your off-platform eCommerce site.

If you are an Amazon store owner, you might ask why you want to pay for people to take a link that doesn’t lead directly to your store. It seems like a great way to tank your conversion rate.

However, advertising’s goal doesn’t always have to be direct. It’s a part of playing the long game.

For example, let’s say you host a prominent store known for selling men’s shoes. You create an Amazon DSP advertisement directing people to your site.

Upon entering your site, they see a unique store, a story about your brand, and (maybe) a blog. Thus, the visitor has a connection to your site, further incentivized to follow your site with a 20% off coupon.

You can use this opportunity to grow your email list as well.

Regardless, you are no longer contingent upon Amazon’s rules. Because you run your brand, you can choose how you want to advertise to them.

In addition, Amazon has placed much more significant weight on off-site traffic with the A10 algorithm. Therefore, in maintaining a competitive advantage, you must build your brand off-site.

The Amazon Brand Registry has an excellent suite of tools that help you maintain customers. Building a brand and managing a store is a possibility through this system. You can also directly announce the release of new store items with the latest updates.

However, you are still subject to Amazon’s stringent requirements on how you advertise. That means no time-sensitive copy and only one reminder of the release of your new product.

The result is a better customer experience, as you should never spam your customer. However, a second email where you have complete control of the copy can help drive conversions further.

Amazon DSP is best for two different groups of people:

• Amazon brands looking to build more comprehensive advertising
• Brands outside of Amazon.

You don’t have to be part of any unique programs to advertise on Amazon. Instead, you need to have a more comprehensive offering.

Below are a few examples of products and services that might benefit from DSP:

Authors are perfect for the DSP program if they are trying to get their name well known. While Amazon and Goodreads have comprehensive profiles for these groups, they don’t offer any advertising support by themselves.

Supplementing your listing with unique DSP campaigns directed to your website provide people an opportunity to follow you. Sponsored product advertising might expose your books, but they won’t focus on your website with the same effectiveness.

Regardless of our best efforts, Amazon can be a bit tricky for new sellers. But if you’ve already put in the legwork to establish an off-Amazon brand platform, you might not have to play by some of those requirements.

For example, you can’t incentivize people to give you five-star reviews on Amazon. However, you can provide them incentives to join your email list from your site. It might be a great way to increase sales for those who use multiple platforms (alongside Amazon).

This strategy is a bit easier for FBM sellers who already handle their inventory management and shipping. However, you will want to keep a close eye on inventory tracking to ensure you don’t have stockouts.

To further hammer home the point, we’ve created a list of five situations that call for an off-site presence. These apply to Amazon sellers or general advertisers. Leveraging Amazon’s broad reach is paramount to being successful in either case.

Diversifying your advertising is crucial in remaining competitive. Suppose your SEO or PPC efforts receive a challenge from another brand (which is always a possibility). In that case, you need to be able to fall back on other options for recovery purposes.

While establishing brand loyalty can help with this, Amazon DSP advertising encourages brands to combine both on and off-platform options. Based on a case study with SmartyPants children’s vitamins, you can see up to 100% growth when done correctly.

When creating these combined campaigns, it is crucial to gain brand awareness. Awareness increases the likelihood of loyalty, which means people are more likely to return for that second sale. Almost 70% of customers spend more in their third year buying from a business than the first six months.

It is easier and more lucrative to maintain your customer base because you do not have to start the sales funnel with them. They already know your product, so they’ve been through awareness campaigns to lead them down the sales funnel.

You get short-term sales by leading them directly to your store. You make long-term sales (a higher likelihood with DSP) by leading them to your email list, website, or blog.

In 2019, Bacardi was looking for ways to raise awareness of their lesser-known liquors. To address this, they worked with Amazon to create a custom landing page and a series of video-based campaigns on the Fire TV platform.

While you can create video ads on the Amazon Brand Registry platform, you cannot create custom landing pages. It is another example of the power behind using Amazon Display Side Advertising.

• Bacardi’s Awareness Campaign Using Liquor Tasting 

The Amazon Professional Services platform allows service providers to put themselves on Amazon’s platform. Thus, they on a listing like other Amazon products, the difference being that location-based factors are more important.

At the time of this writing, you cannot put yourself on this listing. Instead, you’ll have to rely on Amazon DSP.

Not having to pay Amazon’s cut is a bit satisfying in this case. However, the exposure level from being on the list of professional services is worth it. It’s important still to have your website, blog, and email list.

In one case of a financial services representative who sought to increase insurance sales, they leveraged Amazon Garage. Amazon Garage is an automotive unit that specializes in providing parts for your vehicle.

• An Example of DSP With The Financial Services Industry 

Because you are already there for vehicle-related concerns, you might be thinking about the cost of your automobile insurance. So many customers grumble about insurance when it comes to automobiles that it is the perfect opportunity to address those disgruntled customers.

If you sell products on Amazon, selling services that complement those products is also great. For example, if you have a workout website to teach people how to do yoga, you could sell your yoga mats, water bottles, or other branded content back on Amazon.

Going back to that “combined media approach,” focus on offering a complete solution. The more problems you can solve in your target niche, the better off you will be.

The idea of programmable advertising isn’t foreign to Amazon sellers. Those who place bid amounts for sponsored ads are already familiar with bid amounts and flexibility.

But when you apply that same logic outside of Amazon, it can feel a bit overwhelming. Thankfully, Amazon prioritizes transparency when it comes to creating these platforms. So you will be able to make an informed decision to hit your audience at specific touchpoints.

An important feature of Amazon Display Side Advertising is that it bids on behalf of the advertiser. Budgetary limitations are considered, so be sure to pay attention to Amazon’s suggested bid depending on your desired audience target.

Amazon allows you to target Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), including the following:

• Unique reach
• Frequency of reach
• Share of voice (compared to other advertisers)
• Brand lift/growth
• Number of views
• Completed views (not skipped)
• Number of clicks
• Site visits
• Page view count
• Engagements
• Cost per acquisition & leads
• Return on Ad Spend (ROAS)
• Return on Investment (ROI)
• Number of sales/subscriptions

The Amazon Demand Side Platform has support for these metrics. Areas you’ll want to focus on tracking depend on your overall goals.

For example, ROI, ROAS, and sales are best tracked closely with ad campaigns built to increase sales. Site visits, engagements, and reach frequency are ads focused on increasing traffic to your website to create your email lists.

Completed views are unique to the effectiveness of video advertisement. Regardless, there are stats for a variety of uses that contribute to programmatic advertising. This style of advertising is responsive to fluctuations in many of these fields.

Amazon DSP has access to the same toolsets as standard Amazon sellers. So while you will need to go through writing copy, they have pre-existing formats for video ads.

If you are already familiar with Amazon Sponsored Brands Video Ads, you know the drill. Amazon has a built-in video creator that sources your existing product images.

So yes, you’ll have to create your ads. However, Amazon does have ways to make advertising easier.

From the information above, you can see that Amazon has a wide variety of tracking insights. Much like sponsored ads or video ads, you can measure success using a built-in system.

Their dashboard allows you to take a closer look at these metrics.

To learn how to use the platform, check the Introduction to Amazon DSP learning course. It provides you a comprehensive look at this.

Be sure to log in with your Amazon Advertising account so that Amazon can provide a relatable experience. This personalization allows you to insert your brand, giving you greater ownership over the entire process.

Even if it’s fake, you’ll find comfort when you go through the real thing.

The Amazon Demand Side Platform is an excellent tool for businesses that want to take things to the next level. While it isn’t meant for those early on in their Amazon business, it provides ample opportunities to companies who already have an outside digital infrastructure.

The DSP platform is not for those who don’t spend any time developing their outside. You need to have a website and an engaging social media presence for it to be effective. Starz, Bacardi, and SmartyPants vitamins all show this to be true. However, you can use DSP to start building that audience to meet those long-term goals.

If you want to outrank the competition, Amazon DSP is a clear winner. But standard product providers shouldn’t discount the importance of paying for sponsored video and display ads.

If you are uncertain whether or not you should take your brand to the next level, consider DataHawk’s Amazon Advisory Services. Communicating with a specialist that guides you through your options helps out. Reach out today if you need help.