How to get your first sales on Amazon

We recommend two strategies to use at launch to get initial sales: promoting your product through a deal site, and using Amazon PPC. The main strategy we recommend for getting initial sales is by using Amazon pay-per-click, or PPC, advertising. PPC is a big topic, and something we recommend you always have running (and not just at product launch). We’ll explain how PPC works here. For step-by-step tips for different campaigns and strategies, download the full, check out the Selling on Amazon guide.

PPC

“Pay Per Click” or PPC is a method of internet marketing in which you pay for consumers to click to your product listing. This advertising is a way of driving traffic to your product (in addition to the organic clicks, which you don’t pay for and are based on algorithms that help a consumer find the most relevant product for their search).

PPC is a more effective method of paid advertising on Amazon than other advertising like Google or Facebook because you’re targeting shoppers who are already on Amazon for the purpose of buying.

There are three different types of PPC ads on Amazon:

1. Sponsored Products

These appear at the top and bottom of Amazon’s search results page, as well as in the product carousel on a competitor’s product listing. They appear on desktop, mobile, and the app. A consumer can click on your ad and be taken to your product’s listing. As with all types of PPC, you are charged every time someone clicks on your ad (not when your ad is displayed or if someone buys your product).

In the search results

On a product listing

1. Sponsored Brands

You have to be brand registered to use Sponsored Brand PPC ads. These ads appear on the top and bottom of Amazon’s search results, and will show for both Amazon’s desktop and mobile site. Sponsored Brand ads display your logo, a headline, and up to three of your products. When a customer clicks on your logo, they are taken to your Amazon Store or a dedicated landing page that only shows your brand’s products. When they click on a product, they are taken to the product listing.

1. Sponsored Display

You also have to be brand registered to use Sponsored Display PPC ads. Sponsored Display ads help expose consumers to your product outside of Amazon.com and help bring more people to the site. Amazon displays an ad for your product on external websites and targets customers who have looked at either your listing (to bring them back) or a similar product within the last 30 days.

How to create a PPC ad

a. Be prepared with keywords. Reminder! PPC ads are based on either the keywords that Amazon thinks are relevant, or keywords lists that you have come up with, so before you run these campaigns, make sure you have done proper keyword research.

b. Choose the campaign type — automatic or manual. An automatic campaign means you allow Amazon to decide which keywords to display your ad for (based on your listing’s title, bullet points, description, back-end keywords, etc.). With a manual campaign, you choose the keywords you want your ad to appear for.

c. Name your campaign — we recommend keeping it simple, like “[Your product] – Manual targeting”)

d. Set a daily budget — if you can afford it, we recommend $50 to $100 per day