Maximising Sponsored Product Performance with Amazon Marketing Cloud

The integration of Amazon Marketing Cloud (AMC) with Sponsored Products marks a pivotal shift in Amazon’s advertising ecosystem. Amazon offers two primary advertising solutions: Amazon DSP (Demand-Side Platform) and Sponsored Ads. Amazon Marketing Cloud (AMC) is a powerful analytics platform designed for e-commerce businesses to derive actionable insights from Amazon Ads data. AMC integrates various data sources, including event-level signals from Amazon Ads and third-party vendors.

AMC provides e-commerce businesses with powerful capabilities to measure the true impact of their advertising spend. One of AMC’s most valuable features is its ability to create customised audiences based on highly granular data. AMC places a strong emphasis on privacy and data security. AMC empowers e-commerce businesses to refine their audience strategies through advanced segmentation. AMC gives e-commerce businesses the ability to assess the impact of their advertising across various Amazon Ads channels and beyond.

AMC supports the creation of precise audience segments such as top-funnel users or bottom-funnel groups. AMC enables advertisers to identify high-value customers who spend £250+ annually. AMC simplifies the process of generating and acting on insights through its no-code user interface. AMC also offers developers the flexibility to integrate with the platform via APIs. AMC has recently expanded its accessibility, allowing multiple users and partner organisations to work within a single AMC instance simultaneously.

Amazon Marketing Cloud (AMC) significantly enhances Sponsored Ads performance by providing advanced data analytics, audience targeting, and measurement capabilities. By combining Amazon Ads signals and first-party data, AMC allows advertisers to track the customer journey, optimise campaigns, and measure return on investment.

Advertisers can create custom audiences by analysing user engagement signals, such as product page views, clicks, or cart abandonments. AMC also offers New-to-Brand (NTB) insights, helping businesses identify products that attract new customers and allocate ad budgets more effectively. Multi-touch attribution tracks the influence of Sponsored Products, Sponsored Brands, and Sponsored Display ads on conversions.

AMC’s path-to-conversion analysis reveals ad synergy across formats, enabling advertisers to optimise cross-campaign strategies. Hourly performance data helps businesses focus budgets on high-performing time slots. Additionally, the platform enhances bid management, prevents overexposure through frequency analysis, and improves targeting precision with advanced audience segmentation tools.

AMC integrates seamlessly with Amazon DSP and APIs, offering scalability and automation for large campaigns. With privacy-compliant data handling, AMC enables businesses to maximise ad performance while maintaining customer trust.

At Amazon unBoxed 2024, it was announced that advertisers using AMC can now create audiences for their sponsored ads campaigns. Advertisers can build rule-based or lookalike audiences for Sponsored Display targeting and adjust bidding for Sponsored Products and Sponsored Brands. The integration of Amazon Marketing Cloud (AMC) with Sponsored Products marks a pivotal shift in Amazon’s advertising ecosystem, extending its robust analytics and audience segmentation capabilities beyond Amazon DSP (Demand-Side Platform).

AMC revolutionises Sponsored Ads by offering advanced analytics, precise audience targeting, and performance optimisation tools. It allows advertisers to measure campaign impact, create custom audiences, and track the customer journey across Sponsored Products, Sponsored Brands, and Sponsored Display.

AMC combines event-level signals and first-party data to deliver actionable insights. Advertisers can implement targeted strategies using engagement signals like clicks, product views, and cart abandonments. The platform’s New-to-Brand (NTB) metrics identify products driving new customer acquisition, while multi-touch attribution provides a holistic view of ad performance across channels.

Path-to-conversion analysis highlights the synergy between different ad formats, showing how Sponsored Ads influence purchase decisions at various stages of the funnel. Advertisers can refine their strategies by focusing on high-performing time slots, optimising bids, and preventing ad fatigue through frequency analysis.

AMC simplifies audience segmentation, helping businesses target high-value prospects and improve campaign efficiency. Seamless integrations with Amazon DSP and APIs ensure scalability and automation, while its no-code interface supports quick insights for non-technical users. By prioritising privacy and data security, AMC enables businesses to improve ROI and drive long-term customer acquisition strategies effectively.

Quick Overview of Amazon’s DSP and Sponsored Ads

Amazon offers two primary advertising solutions: Amazon DSP (Demand-Side Platform) and Sponsored Ads. Both are effective in driving visibility and sales, but they differ in their scope, strategies, and use cases.

What is Amazon DSP (Demand-Side Platform)?

Amazon DSP is an advanced programmatic advertising solution that allows advertisers to purchase display, video, and audio ads across Amazon’s websites, apps, and third-party sites (including mobile apps). By leveraging Amazon’s data on customer behaviours and interests, DSP enables advertisers to reach highly targeted audiences, including those on platforms such as Amazon Music and IMDb.

Key benefits include:

• Audience Targeting: DSP enables advertisers to target specific audiences based on their purchase history, browsing Behaviour, and product interests, as well as creating custom and lookalike audiences.
• Multiple Ad Formats: DSP allows for display, video, and audio ads, making it a versatile tool for full-funnel marketing (from awareness to conversions).
• Prospecting and Retargeting: DSP supports both prospecting (reaching new potential customers) and retargeting (re-engaging with previous site visitors or customers).

What is Amazon Sponsored Ads?

Amazon Sponsored Ads offers a more straightforward advertising approach, primarily designed to promote products within Amazon’s ecosystem. The Sponsored Ads suite includes Sponsored Products, Sponsored Brands, and Sponsored Display ads, with a focus on driving immediate conversions and increasing product visibility.

Sponsored Ad types:

• Sponsored Products: These ads appear in search results and on product pages, targeting specific keywords or products, making them ideal for driving conversions.
• Sponsored Brands: These ads feature multiple products and appear at the top of Amazon search results, helping to increase brand visibility and drive awareness.
• Sponsored Display: These ads target users who have already interacted with your products or related products, providing remarketing opportunities across Amazon and external websites.
• Sponsored TV: Sponsored TV Ads represent Amazon’s entry into the connected TV (CTV) advertising space, allowing advertisers to engage audiences through streaming content on platforms like Amazon Fire TV, Freevee, and Prime Video. Sponsored TV campaigns provide a way to promote products, services, or brands to viewers while they stream entertainment, expanding reach beyond traditional e-commerce touchpoints.

What are the Key Differences Between DSP and Sponsored Ads?

• Targeting Capabilities: DSP excels in audience targeting, leveraging Amazon’s vast customer data to reach specific segments based on Behaviours, interests, and demographics. Sponsored Ads primarily focus on keyword-based targeting within the Amazon platform.
• Ad Formats: DSP offers a variety of ad formats (display, video, audio) while Sponsored Ads are limited to product-based ads (Sponsored Products, Brands, and Display).
• Campaign Focus: DSP is ideal for brand-building and upper-funnel activities, while Sponsored Ads are designed to drive conversions in the lower funnel.

By using both DSP and Sponsored Ads, advertisers can create a holistic advertising strategy that combines the strengths of both tools, reaching new customers, driving conversions, and optimizing campaigns across various stages of the customer journey.

Understanding Amazon Marketing Cloud (AMC) for E-commerce

Amazon Marketing Cloud (AMC) is a powerful analytics platform designed for e-commerce businesses to derive actionable insights from Amazon Ads data. AMC is a clean room solution that allows advertisers to securely collaborate with their media partners, combining first-party data with Amazon Ads signals to create custom reports, optimise campaigns, and drive performance.

Key Features and Benefits for E-commerce Advertisers

1. Comprehensive Data Integration: AMC integrates various data sources, including event-level signals from Amazon Ads and third-party vendors like Experian and Foursquare. E-commerce businesses can upload their own first-party data, such as CRM records, direct-to-consumer (D2C) sales, and customer data platform (CDP) records, to create detailed, personalized reports and audience segments.
2. Event-Level Data Analysis: AMC allows advertisers to query up to 12.5 months of event-level signals, including impressions, clicks, and conversions, across all Amazon Ads media types, Sponsored Products, Sponsored Brands, Sponsored Display, and Sponsored TV. This data helps businesses Analyse the performance of their campaigns across multiple touchpoints, leading to more accurate attribution and insights.
3. Custom Reporting and Audience Building: With AMC, e-commerce businesses can write custom SQL queries to build reports tailored to their objectives. This flexibility empowers advertisers to explore deeper insights, such as understanding the incremental value of combining Amazon DSP with sponsored ads or identifying the most efficient paths to conversion. Pre-built templates are also available for common use cases, allowing advertisers to quickly access relevant data.
4. Privacy-Safe Collaboration: AMC operates within a privacy-safe clean room, ensuring that sensitive customer data is protected while still enabling valuable insights. This privacy-centric approach meets the evolving regulatory landscape, making it easier for e-commerce businesses to navigate the future of digital advertising without relying on third-party cookies.
5. Enhanced Campaign Optimisation: AMC supports the creation of rule-based and lookalike audiences for direct activation to Amazon DSP, making insights actionable. By combining AMC’s deep data analysis with Amazon DSP’s advanced targeting capabilities, e-commerce businesses can improve their media Optimisation strategies, maximizing ROI and reaching the right customers at the right time.

How AMC Integrates with the Amazon Ad Tech Suite

As part of the broader Amazon Ads ecosystem, AMC plays a critical role in helping e-commerce brands navigate the complexities of retail media. By providing advanced analytics and insights, AMC enables advertisers to evaluate the performance of their media campaigns across various channels, whether on Amazon’s retail platform, streaming services, or other digital media. This integration allows businesses to optimise their advertising strategies across the entire customer journey, from media exposure to conversion.

Benefits of Amazon Marketing Cloud (AMC) for E-commerce Advertisers

How AMC Differs from Other Amazon Ads Tools?

AMC stands out from other Amazon Ads reporting tools by allowing advertisers to query event-level data across both Amazon DSP and Sponsored Ads campaigns. Unlike standard Amazon Ads tools, which provide aggregated reports, AMC enables detailed analysis by joining first-party records with Amazon Ads signals. This flexibility allows for deeper insights into campaign performance, optimizing strategies, and addressing complex business questions.

AMC’s Key Benefits for E-commerce Businesses

1. Campaign Measurement

Amazon Marketing Cloud (AMC) equips e-commerce businesses with powerful capabilities to measure the true impact of their advertising spend. By utilizing data from multiple Amazon Ads channels, such as Sponsored Products, Sponsored Brands, and Amazon DSP, businesses can assess how various media types and devices contribute to the customer journey and conversion rates.

This holistic measurement enables advertisers to understand the full impact of their campaigns across all touchpoints, making it easier to identify synergies and gaps in the customer path. For instance, businesses can determine whether a Sponsored Products ad helped drive a purchase that was influenced later by a Sponsored Brands video ad. This allows for smarter decisions about budget allocation, ensuring optimal media spend across all touchpoints.

2. Building Custom Audiences

One of AMC’s most valuable features is its ability to create customised audiences based on highly granular data. Using SQL-based logic, advertisers can build bespoke audiences that align closely with their marketing objectives. For example, e-commerce brands can target users who interacted with Sponsored Ads but didn’t complete a purchase, allowing for retargeting efforts that drive conversions.

These audiences can be further refined to target customers who have viewed specific products, added items to their wishlist, or abandoned carts. Once the custom audience is built, it can be activated directly through Amazon DSP, ensuring that your advertising reaches the right individuals with precision.

3. Privacy and Security

AMC places a strong emphasis on privacy and data security. All customer data within AMC is pseudonymized, ensuring that sensitive information is anonymized and handled in strict accordance with Amazon’s privacy policies. The system only accepts aggregated and anonymized information, offering privacy-safe analytics. This means businesses can gain valuable insights and perform detailed analysis without compromising customer privacy or violating regulatory standards.

By maintaining this level of privacy, AMC enables businesses to use advanced data analytics and customer insights while ensuring compliance with global data protection regulations, making it an ideal platform for advertisers concerned with data security.

4. Advanced Audience Segmentation

AMC empowers e-commerce businesses to refine their audience strategies through advanced segmentation. Advertisers can create custom audiences based on a variety of factors, such as Behavioural triggers, purchase history, engagement patterns, and demographics. This allows for more precise targeting and ensures that campaigns are reaching the most relevant individuals.

For instance, an advertiser may segment their audience based on users who have interacted with their brand’s Sponsored Ads in the past 30 days but haven’t made a purchase. These individuals can then be retargeted with personalized messaging, driving them back into the sales funnel.

5. Holistic Measurement Across Channels

AMC gives e-commerce businesses the ability to assess the impact of their advertising across various Amazon Ads channels and beyond. By consolidating data from Sponsored Products, Sponsored Brands, DSP, and even first-party sources, businesses can create a 360-degree view of the customer journey. This approach ensures that advertisers understand not just the individual touchpoints but also how these touchpoints work together to drive conversions.

For example, an advertiser could Analyse how their DSP campaigns on Streaming TV contributed to engagement with Sponsored Products and vice versa. This understanding helps businesses allocate resources more effectively, ensuring that each channel is optimised for maximum performance.

6. Insight Expansion Through Paid Features

For businesses looking to take their insights to the next level, AMC offers a variety of paid features that enhance the depth and scope of analytics. By subscribing to these features, businesses can access enriched data powered by Amazon Ads as well as third-party providers like Experian and Foursquare.

For example, Experian’s vehicle purchase insights can help automotive brands measure the impact of their Amazon Ads on vehicle sales, while Foursquare’s store visit insights can be used by retail brands to track the influence of online ads on in-store visits. These third-party integrations provide a more comprehensive view of advertising performance, making it easier to track cross-channel and cross-platform impact.

7. No-Code Experience for Quick Insights

AMC simplifies the process of generating and acting on insights with its no-code user interface. This feature is especially beneficial for non-technical users, such as media planners and traders, who may not have SQL experience. With point-and-click functionality, these users can quickly generate, visualize, and act on insights without the need to write complex queries.

For example, a media planner can leverage the auto-generated metric visualization tools to understand the performance of their campaigns and identify areas for Optimisation, all with minimal effort.

8. Easy Integration with Paid Features (Beta)

AMC’s integration with paid features (currently in beta) further enriches its capabilities. Through these features, advertisers can expand their audience reach, enhance targeting precision, and assess the impact of their campaigns on offline sales, web traffic, and other external factors. For example, retailers can use paid features to evaluate how Amazon media influences in-store visits or how various touchpoints contribute to offline sales.

These features also allow businesses to measure the long-term effects of upper-funnel activities, tracking the sales generated by initial ad interactions months later.

9. API Integration for Scalability

AMC also offers developers the flexibility to integrate with the platform via APIs. This allows businesses to automate processes, scale operations, and streamline workflows. For example, advertisers can use APIs to automate the process of creating custom audiences at scale or schedule queries to run at specific intervals.

This integration with other Amazon Ads products, along with third-party tools, further enhances AMC’s value as a powerful marketing solution for e-commerce businesses.

10. Multiple Users and Partners

AMC has recently expanded its accessibility, allowing multiple users and partner Organisations to work within a single AMC instance simultaneously. This feature is particularly beneficial for agencies or brands with multiple sub-brands or campaigns. By enabling multiple stakeholders to access and collaborate within AMC, businesses can streamline operations and enhance collaboration.

AMC’s Role within Amazon’s Ad Tech Ecosystem

1. Integration with Amazon Ad Tech Products

Amazon Marketing Cloud (AMC) serves as a central hub within Amazon’s advertising technology ecosystem, enabling advanced measurement, analysis, and audience management.

Amazon DSP and Sponsored Ads:

• Event-level data (e.g., impressions, clicks, conversions) generated from Sponsored Products, Sponsored Brands, Sponsored Display, and Amazon DSP campaigns is centralized in AMC.
• AMC allows you to Analyse this granular data for advanced reporting and custom audience creation.
• Conversion events are also captured, whether they occur within the Amazon store or through external measurement methods, such as the Conversions API or Amazon Ad tag.

AWS Integration:

• For advertisers using APIs, AMC integrates seamlessly with Amazon Web Services (AWS).
• Aggregated reports from AMC can be exported to Amazon S3 buckets or other object storage services.
• AWS also enables advertisers to leverage their first-party data (e.g., CRM data) and integrate it with AMC for deeper insights.

External Tools:

• AMC can connect with third-party solutions like automated dashboards, CRM tools, and custom-built tools for analytics and reporting.
• This integration enhances the usability of AMC data beyond the Amazon ecosystem.

2. Insights for Optimisation

Insights derived from AMC reports allow advertisers to:

• Fine-tune Sponsored Products campaigns (e.g., optimizing keywords).
• Create high-value custom audiences for activation on Amazon DSP.

Comparison of AMC Reporting with Other Measurement Tools

AMC offers features that differentiate it from other reporting tools, such as Sponsored Ads Reports, Amazon DSP Reports, Amazon Ads APIs, and Amazon Marketing Stream. Here’s a breakdown:

1. Amazon Marketing Cloud (AMC)

• Custom SQL Queries: Use SQL to query granular, event-level records across channels (Amazon DSP and sponsored ads).
• Flexible Attribution: Advertisers can implement their own attribution logic, such as multi-touch attribution with lookback windows of up to 28 days.
• Custom Insights: Mix Amazon event-level signals with first-party or third-party inputs for richer measurement and custom audience creation.
• Use AMC When: You need highly customizable reports, flexible attribution modeling, and advanced measurement across multiple inputs.

2. Sponsored Ads Reports

• Provides pre-aggregated performance data for Sponsored Products, Sponsored Brands, Sponsored Display, and Sponsored TV campaigns.
• The reports are generated directly via the Advertising Console and require no programming skills.
• Reports are channel-specific, meaning data cannot be aggregated across multiple channels.
• Use Sponsored Ads Reports When: You need quick, ad-hoc insights or pre-scheduled reports to optimise campaigns. Example: Generate a Search Term Report to identify top-performing keywords.

3. Amazon DSP Reports

• Similar to Sponsored Ads Reports, DSP reports deliver pre-aggregated campaign performance data.
• Customisation options allow advertisers to select from a predefined list of dimensions and metrics.
• Use DSP Reports When: You want to optimise Amazon DSP campaigns. Example: Generate an Inventory Report to identify sites or deal IDs driving the best performance.

4. Amazon Ads Reporting APIs

• Reporting APIs enable programmatic access to Amazon DSP data, offering similar insights as the Advertising Console.
• Reports can be stored locally, integrated into dashboards, and used for custom analytics.
• Use Reporting APIs When: You have developer resources to integrate Amazon DSP reports into your brand’s analytics infrastructure. Example: Automate daily Inventory Reports for a real-time dashboard.

5. Amazon Marketing Stream

• A push-based system that delivers near-real-time campaign metrics and changes on an hourly basis.
• Ideal for building real-time applications or managing intraday campaign performance.
• Use Marketing Stream When: You need real-time reporting for Amazon DSP and sponsored ads. Example: Build an app to monitor campaigns and act when a campaign hits its budget maximum.

The below table provides a high-level comparison of the reporting solutions and the functionality available with each.

Audience Tools: AMC vs. Amazon DSP

Both AMC and Amazon DSP support audience creation, but AMC provides advanced capabilities for more sophisticated use cases. Here’s how they compare:

1. Amazon DSP Audiences
Amazon DSP supports three primary audience types:

• Amazon Audiences: Pre-built audiences based on Amazon’s shopping and streaming signals (e.g., in-market, lifestyle, demographic).
• Advertiser Audiences: Custom audiences created from:
  • Engagement on Amazon platforms (products, Brand Stores, content).
  • Advertiser’s first-party hashed data.
  • Data delivered via connected DMPs or Amazon Ad tag events.
  • Lookalike audiences based on advertiser seed audiences.
• Third-Party Audiences: Audiences sourced from providers like LiveRamp.

2. Key Limitation: Amazon DSP Audience Builder does not support advanced event metadata or logic.

3. AMC Audiences
AMC offers deeper control and flexibility for audience creation:

• Event Metadata: Combine different signals like timing, location, creative exposure, and sales data.
• Advanced Logic: Create audiences using criteria like purchase value, repeat purchases, and browsing Behaviour.

4. Examples of AMC Audience Use Cases:

• Identify high-value customers who spent $250+ annually on your products.
• Segment those customers who browsed specific ASINs in the last 7 days but haven’t made a purchase.
• Build audiences of repeat purchasers or those yet to try newly launched products.

5. Lookalike Audiences
AMC enables advertisers to create lookalike audiences by using high-value segments as seeds. For instance:

• A brand can use the $250+ spenders group as a seed audience to identify new customers with similar shopping Behaviour.

Summary of AMC’s Differentiators

• Advanced Analytics: Custom SQL queries and multi-touch attribution.
• Granular Audience Creation: Segment audiences based on purchase Behaviour, metadata, and advanced logic.
• Integration: Connects with AWS, third-party tools, and the broader Amazon ad tech ecosystem.
• Flexibility: Combines first-party, third-party, and Amazon data signals for rich insights and measurement.

In essence, AMC provides a privacy-safe, centralized platform for advanced measurement, flexible reporting, and precise audience creation, complementing and extending the capabilities of Amazon DSP and Sponsored Ads tools.

Amazon Ads event tables

In Amazon Marketing Cloud (AMC), event-level records contain individual events with associated metadata, including a pseudonymous user_id field. This user_id allows for linking different events, such as impressions and conversions, across multiple touchpoints. By using this field, advertisers can combine data from various tables (e.g., campaigns, devices, and conversions) to create custom reports, gaining deeper insights into the customer journey and the effectiveness of their ads. This provides more flexibility compared to pre-aggregated reports.

AMC offers various event tables to address complex business questions. These include traffic event tables (impressions, clicks, views for DSP and sponsored ads), segments tables (audience segment data for campaigns), attributed events tables (conversion events linked to DSP or sponsored ads), and custom attribution tables (for custom attribution models). These tables can be combined or queried individually to provide detailed insights on campaign performance, audience composition, and conversion tracking, with options to upload first-party data for further analysis.

The Amazon Marketing Cloud (AMC) offers a wide range of fields for in-depth analysis of advertising campaigns.

1. Campaign Attributes: Includes campaign and line item details, start/end dates, budget, and creative components.
2. Impression Attributes: Tracks impression timestamp, costs, geographical data (country, state, DMA), device type (phone, desktop, TV), browser, and viewability status. Also tracks interactions like clicks and video views.
3. Supply Attributes: Provides data on the supply source, site/deal name, and associated bid price and costs.
4. Audience Attributes: Details on audience settings, Amazon segment membership, and first-party segment membership.
5. Conversion Attributes: Includes store type (e.g., Amazon.com, Whole Foods), conversion types (purchase, add to cart), ASIN value, and new-to-brand status.

These attributes can be combined to craft tailored reports that give a clearer picture of ad performance across different variables.

Pre-Aggregated Reports

Tools like the Amazon DSP reports page grant the user access to pre-aggregated reports, which means that data is already compiled, or aggregated, along certain dimensions. Advertisers can pick and choose from the dimensions and metrics present in the pre-aggregated records.

Event Level Records

With AMC, users generate reports from event-level records. Each row is an individual event such as a single impression, click, or conversion. Because the table includes a pseudonymous user_id field, impressions can be linked to other event types (such as conversion events, represented in the second table) based on a common user_id value and other logic. The granularity of the data facilitates the ability to mix and match fields across a variety of tables, in order to create an aggregated report that meets your specifications.

Leveraging AMC for Cross-Functional Collaboration and Campaign Optimisation

AMC enables cross-functional collaboration to enhance media strategy, audience planning, campaign Optimisation, and measurement. It provides insights for budget allocation, audience targeting, and performance analysis. Teams like media planners, IT, and developers work together to create reports, build audiences, and automate processes. The workflow includes identifying business questions, ensuring necessary inputs, writing and testing SQL queries, building reports, drawing insights for Optimisation, and measuring impacts. Collaboration across roles ensures efficient use of AMC in driving campaign success.

How do I get Started with AMC?

This section outlines the steps to get started with Amazon Marketing Cloud (AMC), from requesting an AMC instance to leveraging the Instructional Query Library (IQL) for SQL queries and finding AMC reference materials.

Requesting an AMC Instance

Before using AMC, you need to understand its structure. AMC operates with two primary Organisational objects:

• Account: Typically corresponds to a corporation or agency, and it contains one or more AMC instances.
• Instance: A single instance contains Amazon Ads event data for one advertiser. An instance is mapped to specific Amazon DSP accounts or Sponsored Ads entities, and queries can only be run within a single instance, not across multiple instances.

To get started with AMC, contact an Amazon Ads representative to request the setup of your account and instance. An advertiser might have multiple advertiser IDs (Amazon DSP) or entity IDs (Sponsored Ads), but all the IDs must belong to the same company for them to be consolidated within one AMC instance.

What is Instructional Query Library (IQL)?

The Instructional Query Library (IQL) is a resource that helps you get started with AMC. It consists of pre-built SQL templates designed for common measurement and audience use cases, along with reference materials like key expressions, functions, and guides for filtering and calculations. While AMC allows fully customized queries, the IQL templates offer an easy entry point for beginners.

Each query template in the IQL comes with:

• An overview of the query
• Requirements for execution
• Directions on how to perform the query
• Sample reports with instructions for interpreting the results
• A pre-built SQL template for the query

Conversions by Audience Segment with Impressions: Optimizing DSP Campaigns

This section focuses on how to leverage AMC for Amazon DSP campaign Optimisation, particularly analyzing segment-level performance and generating actionable insights for audience strategy. Using the “conversions by audience segment with impressions” instructional query (IQ), you can assess the effectiveness of audience segments, identify performance patterns, and optimise campaigns based on insights.

What is Audience Measurement?

Audience measurement within AMC helps you understand the attributes of your target audience (such as demographics, interests, and Behaviours), assess performance at the segment level, and determine which audience segments are most likely to drive success based on your goals. The conversions by audience segment with impressions IQ combines Amazon DSP impression events, audience segment metadata, and ad-attributed conversions to evaluate campaign performance by audience segment, whether the segments were applied or reached incidentally.

Business Questions for Audience Measurement

The flexibility of the “conversions by audience segment with impressions” IQ allows you to tailor your analysis to specific business questions, such as:

• How effective is the current audience strategy for Amazon DSP campaigns?
• Which audience segments are driving the highest purchase rates on Amazon?
• Which audience segments, not yet used in campaigns, should be considered for future targeting?

Explore AMC Audience Scenarios

In this section, we’ll delve into the use of AMC rule-based audiences and lookalike audiences and how they can enhance audience strategies in Amazon DSP campaigns.

AMC Audiences Overview

AMC audiences are designed for advertisers who sell both on Amazon and other platforms (e.g., retail locations or websites). They are created using SQL and based on signals from Amazon DSP, sponsored ads traffic, ad-attributed conversions, and first-party data. This allows advertisers to target high-value customers based on key performance indicators (KPIs).

Audience Strategies by Funnel Stage:

1. Awareness Stage:

• Engage customers exposed to prior creative messages (e.g., video ads) and remarket with the next part of your creative sequence.
• Create lookalike audiences based on high-value customers.

2. Consideration Stage:

• Engage shoppers who have repeatedly visited your product pages.
• Re-engage users who interacted with your lower-funnel Sponsored Products ads or browsed your website.

3. Conversion Stage:

• Target customers who added items to their cart or wishlist but have not yet made a purchase.

4. Loyalty Stage:

• Promote special deals to new-to-brand customers or those who bought at a discounted price.
• Cross-sell to customers who’ve purchased one product and might be interested in others.
• Reactivate customers who purchased in the past but haven’t bought in the last 6-12 months.

Key Considerations for Audience Planning:

• Campaign Stage: Define whether your campaign focuses on awareness, consideration, conversion, or loyalty.
• Audience Attributes: Select the relevant characteristics (e.g., demographics or product browsing Behaviour) that align with your campaign goals.
• Previous Campaign Insights: Use historical performance data to inform new campaign strategies, leveraging AMC reports or the Audience Report in Amazon DSP.
• AMC vs. Amazon DSP Audience Builder: AMC allows for more sophisticated audience creation with a variety of event types and look-back windows that Amazon DSP’s Audience Builder doesn’t support. However, DSP’s interface is simpler, making it ideal for basic campaigns.

AMC vs. Amazon DSP Audience Builder

Both tools have their strengths. Amazon DSP offers a simpler interface for basic tasks like ASIN-based remarketing, while AMC is better suited for more complex, multi-channel, and customized audience creation. AMC supports creating highly specific audiences by tracking a wider variety of events and metrics (such as add-to-cart or purchase actions), making it more suitable for bespoke use cases.

This knowledge of audience scenarios can help advertisers tailor their strategies effectively, balancing the simplicity of DSP with the Customisation and precision offered by AMC.

Creating Lookalike Audiences to Expand Your Reach

In this section, we will explore the process of creating lookalike audiences in AMC to expand your reach and find new high-value customers. These audiences allow you to target prospects who share similar Behaviours and characteristics with your existing customer base.

What Are Lookalike Audiences?

A lookalike audience is created by defining a seed audience, usually a group of high-value customers who have demonstrated desirable Behaviours (e.g., making purchases). AMC uses machine learning to find more customers who share similar traits with this seed audience. This process helps advertisers extend their reach and target individuals who are likely to perform well, without needing to rely solely on known customers.

Once you define the seed audience, AMC identifies lookalike segments based on their similarities to the original group. These segments can then be used in Amazon DSP campaigns.

Customizing Lookalike Audiences

When creating a lookalike audience, you can customize the degree of similarity between the seed audience and the lookalike group. You can select one of the following options:

• Most Similar: The lookalike audience is closely aligned with the seed audience, but it’s smaller in size.
• Similar: This audience includes individuals closely aligned with the seed, but expands slightly.
• Balanced: The lookalike audience balances between similarity and reach, including both Similar and Most Similar populations.
• Broad: This audience is larger, with less similarity to the seed, including the Balanced and Similar groups.
• Most Broad: The largest lookalike audience, including all the previous groups, suitable for campaigns focused on reach and awareness.

Best Practices for Creating Lookalike Audiences

To create high-performing lookalike audiences, follow these principles:

• Choose the Right Seed Audience: The seed should reflect the Behaviour you’re optimizing for. For example, if you’re focusing on conversions, past purchasers make a better seed than cart abandoners.
• Ensure Sufficient Seed Size: Seed audiences should have a minimum of 500 user IDs and a maximum of 500,000 user IDs to ensure the machine learning model can find relevant similarities.
• Match the Campaign Goals: If you’re running an upper funnel campaign, prioritize reach and awareness by selecting a broader audience, whereas for lower funnel activity, a more similar audience might be preferable.

Activating and Optimizing Your Lookalike Audience

Once your lookalike audience is created, it needs to be activated within your Amazon DSP campaign. Some best practices include:

• Plan for Measurement: Assign each audience to a separate line item in your campaign for better tracking and performance analysis.
• Accrue Signals: Run the campaign for at least 8-12 weeks to give the algorithm time to optimise and gather enough data for actionable insights.
• Allow for Learning: Avoid making drastic changes during the first two weeks of the campaign. Give Amazon DSP time to learn and adjust before tweaking bids or audience settings.

By following these steps, you can effectively use lookalike audiences to expand your reach and target high-value prospects, improving both the effectiveness and efficiency of your campaigns.

Unlocking New Insights with AMC Features

This section covers additional AMC features that enhance the core experience and provide more advanced tools to optimise advertising campaigns. These features help you scale your work, integrate AMC with other systems, and gain deeper insights into cross-channel marketing efforts.

Accelerate Your Work with AMC Solutions

AMC solutions are point-and-click tools designed to simplify and speed up the analysis and reporting process. These solutions provide pre-configured charts, graphs, and recommended actions that don’t require SQL knowledge, allowing media planners and traders to quickly derive insights and optimise campaigns. The SQL-free interface enables users to interact with AMC in a more intuitive way.

The solutions are built on event-grain signals and are designed to address common advertising challenges. For example, High-value audiences help users identify and activate segments of customers most likely to drive business outcomes, such as those with strong brand loyalty or high engagement.

Key Benefits of AMC Solutions:

• Simplified Decision-Making: Focuses on the most popular and effective use cases.
• Flexibility: Customisation options for date range, campaign specifics, and audience characteristics.
• Actionable Insights: Pre-configured solutions provide actionable recommendations based on real-time data.

Enhance Insights with Paid Features

AMC offers paid features that provide additional, subscription-based tables and insights, expanding the capabilities of the platform. These features allow users to Analyse cross-channel impacts and better understand the effects of Amazon Ads. They can be particularly useful for advanced reporting and measuring how ads influence other conversion events, such as vehicle purchases or in-store visits.

The paid features include insights from both Amazon and third-party providers. These insights allow you to create more robust and flexible remarketing strategies and improve overall campaign targeting.

Examples of Paid Features:

• Amazon Insights: Includes Flexible Shopping Insights and Audience Segment Insights. These help you understand how advertising influences consumer Behaviour and assess the impact of Amazon Ads on various actions.
• Experian Vehicle Purchase Insights: Useful for the automotive industry, this feature helps measure the effect of advertising on vehicle purchase activities.
• Foursquare Store Visit Insights: Ideal for retail, hospitality, and other brick-and-mortar businesses, this feature helps track ad-attributed visits and customer journeys across channels.

Trialing Paid Features

AMC also allows users to test these paid features in a sandbox environment, providing synthetic versions of these tools for trial purposes. Additionally, instructional queries (IQs) are available to guide users through using these features effectively.

By integrating AMC’s solutions and paid features, advertisers can scale their efforts, deepen insights into customer Behaviour, and improve campaign performance through data-driven decision-making.

Integrate AMC with Other Tools

This section explores how AMC can be integrated with various tools and services to streamline processes, automate tasks, and scale operations effectively. By leveraging AMC’s APIs and integrations with Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Customer Data Platforms (CDPs), users can maximize their analytics and optimise campaigns across multiple platforms.

Automate and Scale with AMC APIs

AMC offers two main access points: the AMC user interface (UI) and the AMC APIs. While the UI allows for ad-hoc SQL queries and manual report downloads, the APIs provide more flexibility for automation and scaling. APIs enable seamless communication between AMC and other applications, allowing for:

• Automating queries: Automate regular data collection tasks and streamline workflows, such as sending performance data to a centralized data lake.
• Managing analytics at scale: Efficiently handle large volumes of analytics and audience creation, especially for brands with multiple child brands or agencies managing numerous clients.
• Uploading first-party data: APIs also enable the upload of first-party records into AMC, supporting advanced analytics and audience segmentation.

Integrating with AMC APIs requires initial development and ongoing maintenance to manage updates and new features. Developers can access these APIs via the Amazon Ads API gateway alongside other tools like Amazon DSP and Sponsored Ads APIs.

Key AWS Integrations with AMC

AMC is built on AWS infrastructure, providing powerful integration options for scaling and automating processes:

• Amazon S3: Automatically store AMC reports in an S3 bucket, which can then be used in other workflows, such as building dashboards or visualizing key metrics.
• Amazon QuickSight: Integrate AMC data with Amazon QuickSight to create interactive dashboards and perform business intelligence analytics. This allows stakeholders to visualize trends and gain actionable insights.
• Amazon Marketing Cloud Uploader from AWS: A tool that automates the upload process of first-party signals into AMC, reducing the need for manual intervention and speeding up data transformation tasks.
• AMC Insights on AWS: This solution allows Organisations to deploy AWS services for querying, analyzing, and visualizing AMC reports, making it easier to access and manipulate AMC data for deeper insights.

These integrations enhance AMC’s functionality, helping businesses create data-driven campaigns with greater speed and accuracy.

Customer Data Platforms (CDPs) and AMC

CDPs consolidate customer data from multiple sources, creating unified customer profiles that can be activated across various marketing channels. In the context of AMC, CDPs can be used to:

• Store and organize first-party signals: CDPs allow you to unify customer data and use these records in AMC for advanced analytics and audience creation.
• Activate audiences across channels: CDPs make it easy to push unified customer data to AMC, where it can be leveraged for cross-channel marketing efforts.
• Flexibility and agility: CDPs allow users to select audience traits from structured datasets, stream data seamlessly, and perform closed-loop marketing strategies (e.g., visualization and segment Optimisation).

Consult with your CDP provider to ensure compatibility with AMC for smooth data transfer and usage.

Leveraging External Solutions

To further extend the capabilities of AMC, businesses can integrate with external solution providers listed on the Amazon Ads partner directory. These partners offer expertise in:

• AMC use case strategy
• End-to-end media and measurement services
• Custom solutions for advanced queries, visualizations, and campaign Optimisation

Working with external providers can help businesses tailor AMC to their unique needs and optimise their use of Amazon Ads products.

By integrating AMC with APIs, AWS services, and CDPs, businesses can automate tasks, scale operations, and extract more value from their marketing data, ultimately driving better campaign outcomes.

How does Amazon Marketing Cloud (AMC) Enhance Sponsored Ads Performance?

With the integration of Amazon Marketing Cloud (AMC) into Sponsored Products (SP) and Sponsored Brands (SB) campaigns, Amazon has provided advertisers with powerful new tools to optimise their ad strategies. AMC, which was traditionally used with Amazon’s Demand Side Platform (DSP), is now accessible for Sponsored Ads, offering advanced analytics and insights that allow advertisers to refine targeting, increase efficiency, and boost performance.

The platform enables advertisers to create customised audiences using engagement signals such as clicks without purchases or product detail page views, facilitating targeted retargeting strategies. Path-to-conversion analysis highlights the interplay between Sponsored Products and Sponsored Brands, providing actionable insights to refine the customer journey. Hourly performance data allows advertisers to allocate budgets more effectively, focusing on high-conversion periods to maximize ROI.

AMC also simplifies bid Optimisation by uncovering keyword-level opportunities and high-performing time slots, helping advertisers adjust their strategies for better performance. Additionally, the platform offers comprehensive reporting on metrics like New-to-Brand (NTB) sales at the ASIN level, enabling advertisers to evaluate how effectively their campaigns attract new customers. All this is achieved within a privacy-compliant framework that ensures secure handling of pseudonymized data.

For PPC-only clients, AMC bridges the gap between basic advertising tools and advanced data capabilities, providing an invaluable resource for enhancing targeting precision and improving campaign outcomes. This seamless integration of insights and Optimisation ensures that PPC advertisers can achieve superior performance and efficiency.

1. Unlocking New-to-Brand (NTB) Insights

A major enhancement of AMC for Sponsored Ads is the availability of New-to-Brand (NTB) data. This was previously difficult to track in Amazon’s advertising console for Sponsored Products. Advertisers can now access NTB metrics at both the campaign and ASIN level. This means brands can better understand which products are driving new customer acquisition, even for non-brand searches. For example, advertisers can use AMC to identify high NTB products and increase spend on these to drive more traffic from new customers.

2. Understanding Customer Acquisition Costs (CAC)

AMC now enables advertisers to more effectively manage Customer Acquisition Costs (CAC). By tracking the full journey of the customer across the entire purchase funnel, advertisers can assess how much they are spending to acquire a new customer. Beyond just last-click attribution, AMC’s multi-touch attribution system tracks the influence of each ad interaction leading up to a purchase, providing a more holistic view of ad spend effectiveness. This data can then be paired with Customer Lifetime Value (LTV) to determine the long-term profitability of customers and optimise future advertising budgets accordingly.

3. Path to Conversion and Ad Synergy

AMC’s path to conversion analysis is another significant benefit. This feature shows how different ad types influence a customer’s purchase decision. For example, analyzing the interaction between Sponsored Products, Sponsored Brands, and Sponsored Display ads reveals that customers exposed to all three ad formats are more likely to convert. Understanding this synergy allows advertisers to adjust their strategies to include cross-campaign exposures, ensuring that they are effectively engaging customers at every stage of the funnel.

Additionally, AMC provides insights into the time of day when conversions are highest. This data enables advertisers to adjust bids and budgets to target high-conversion times, improving ad performance by focusing resources on the most effective hours.

4. Targeting High-Value Customers

AMC’s expanded audience targeting capabilities offer another key advantage. With its data-driven insights, advertisers can now target customers based on their recent ad interactions, such as those who have watched a streaming ad and visited a brand’s website. By using bid modifiers and PPC data, brands can adjust their bids to focus on high-value customers who have shown purchase intent but have yet to convert. This allows for better use of ad spend by targeting the most relevant customers.

5. Optimizing Frequency and Attribution

The optimal frequency analysis feature in AMC helps advertisers fine-tune the number of times an ad is shown to a particular customer. This ensures that customers are not oversaturated with ads, which can lead to diminishing returns. By adjusting the frequency cap based on data-driven insights, brands can improve ad effectiveness and maintain engagement without causing ad fatigue.

AMC also brings multi-touch attribution to Sponsored Ads, enabling advertisers to better understand the impact of various ad types on the path to purchase. For example, with ads running across streaming TV, display, and Sponsored Products, AMC can show the relative contribution of each ad to the eventual conversion, offering a more comprehensive view of ad performance.

6. Refining Strategies with Advanced Reporting

AMC simplifies the process of deriving actionable insights from complex data. Advertisers can now access reports that visualize customer Behaviour, helping to refine campaign strategies. For example, keyword targeting can be optimised by increasing bids on specific categories, such as “coffee maker,” to capture high-intent shoppers. With audience segmentation capabilities, brands can now target users who have interacted with certain keywords, enhancing the relevance of their campaigns and boosting conversion rates.

By utilizing first-party data alongside Amazon Ads signals, AMC enables highly tailored campaigns that ensure each ad dollar is spent effectively.

Leveraging AMC with tools like Intentwise

Integrating AMC for Sponsored Ads Performance Amazon Marketing Cloud (AMC) is a powerful analytics tool that enables advertisers to leverage event-level data for in-depth audience insights and performance measurement. When paired with Intentwise, a tool that simplifies AMC’s functionalities, advertisers can streamline operations, automate data processes, and extract actionable insights. Together, these platforms offer robust solutions for Sponsored Products (SP) and Sponsored Brands (SB) campaigns.

Streamlined Workflow Overview

1. Setting Up AMC Instances:

• Each AMC instance is tied to your account’s data, with configurations allowing access to historical records back to 1 July 2023.
• Integration requires identifiers like SPA Entity ID (for Sponsored Ads) and DSP CFID (for DSP campaigns).
• Setup times vary: 2-3 days for accounts with existing instances, up to a week for new users.

2. Configuring Intentwise:

• Add AMC as a data source within Intentwise by navigating to “My Connections.”
• Enable specific report types, such as Sponsored Products or Sponsored Brands insights, to start syncing data.
• Data begins syncing within 24 hours post-activation.

3. Audience Creation and Campaign Integration:

• AMC enables creation of precise audience segments such as top-funnel users (missed clicks) or bottom-funnel groups (cart abandoners).
• Using Intentwise, audiences can be dynamically refreshed, segmented by ASINs or other dimensions, and activated directly in DSP campaigns.
• Sponsored Products and Sponsored Brands audiences can also benefit from AMC integration, allowing advertisers to tailor their campaigns and bids based on detailed audience Behaviour.

Advanced Analytics and Custom Reporting

Pre-Built Templates:

• Access insights like Path-to-Conversion, Time-to-Conversion, or New-to-Brand metrics without needing SQL expertise.
• Intentwise’s templates are designed for common AMC applications, offering quick insights and reducing setup time.

Query Automation and Scalability:

• Schedule queries to run weekly or monthly, ensuring timely access to performance data.
• Execute multiple queries across several AMC instances, eliminating the need for manual toggling between accounts.

Data Pipelining:

• Automate AMC data export to platforms like Snowflake, Redshift, Tableau, or Power BI for comprehensive reporting and visualization.
• This eliminates the need to manually download and stitch together .CSV files, saving time and reducing errors.

Customized Dashboards:

• Personalize dashboards to reflect unique KPIs.
• Quickly export tailored visuals for stakeholder reporting.

Key Benefits for PPC Advertisers

1. Enhanced Audience Targeting:

• Build and activate audiences for specific funnel stages using AMC’s advanced segmentation.
• Target high-intent users like cart abandoners with Sponsored Display ads or re-engage missed clicks for Sponsored Products campaigns.

2. Optimised Bid Management:

• Use bid modifiers to prioritize visibility for critical audiences.
• Increase bids strategically for high-value groups based on performance insights.

3. Improved Attribution Models:

• Utilize AMC’s multi-touch attribution to evaluate each ad’s role in the customer journey.
• Customize attribution to better align with your campaign objectives.

4. Efficient Reporting:

• Analyse search term performance, CTR, and conversion rates using AMC insights.
• Intentwise simplifies access to key reports, reducing the time needed for manual analysis.

5. Expanded Use Cases:

• Cross-Selling Opportunities: Retarget customers with complementary products.
• Seasonal Retargeting: Identify and re-engage high-intent audiences exposed to seasonal campaigns, such as Prime Day.

Challenges and Recommendations

Technical Challenges:

• Audience creation or data integration errors can be addressed by revisiting parameters or consulting Intentwise support.

Reporting Gaps:

• While AMC’s reporting for Sponsored Ads audiences is still developing, Intentwise compensates with actionable reports and dashboards.

Empowering Advertisers

By integrating AMC’s data-driven analytics with Intentwise’s operational ease, advertisers can optimise their Sponsored Ads campaigns across the sales funnel. This partnership simplifies audience targeting, streamlines reporting, and enables deeper insights into customer Behaviour, ultimately enhancing ROI and campaign efficiency in Amazon’s competitive ecosystem.