Amazon

The Amazon Prime Day Seller Plan of Action

By Tinuiti Team

Jul 11 2016

Amazon Prime Day 2016: The Seller’s Plan of Action

Amazon Prime Day is likely to be one of the biggest selling days for Amazon Sellers. This year, Amazon is being much more selective with the products they’ll promote on Prime Day so that they can work on providing a better customer experience this time around.

However, Prime Day is a little like Christmas in July in that there are going to be more shoppers on the platform which can boost sales for everyone.

In contrast to last year, when many sellers did not know how to prepare for the rise in traffic – sellers are now better equipped and Amazon is making a series of adjustments to offer customers better deals on their favorite items.

“The focus for Sellers is now shifting from preparation (setting up promotions, building advertisements, establishing budgets, etc.) to management and maximizing success the day of,” Joe Selzer, Marketplace Channel Analyst at CPC Strategy.

It will be imperative for Sellers to keep a watchful eye on their account(s) on July 12th, identifying and responding to any issues or opportunities as quickly as possible.”

“With so many shoppers flooding the Marketplace looking to “buy now,” anything hindering a Seller’s ability to make their products both discoverable and buyable can spell big trouble in terms of lost sales.”

“Some examples of issues Sellers should be wary of include out-of-budget advertising campaigns, account payment failures, and order fulfillment bottlenecks if they are not leveraging FBA.”

Amazon Prime Day Advertising Checklist

We spoke with Amazon experts to craft The Amazon Prime Day 2016 Seller Plan of Action, a list of best practices every sellers should implement on Amazon’s self-made shopping holiday.

Increase Budget

- On Amazon Prime Day Sellers should increase their advertising budgets by 50%, specifically for Sponsored Products & Amazon Marketing Services.

- In our experience as an agency managing a variety of product verticals for many sellers, we’ve seen consistent success from using Amazon’s dynamic advertising platformâ€•Sponsored Products.

- On Prime Day, it’s better for advertisers to bid aggressively – rather than miss out on sales completely.

Monitor Budget

- Sellers should closely monitor their budgets throughout the day to make sure no advertising campaigns run out of money.

- Advertisers can check their Sponsored Products account level budget caps located within the Advertising tab> Campaign Manager > Settings.

Campaign Builds

- Sellers with access to AMS, should consider building Product Display ads with coupon promotions attached to them.

- We also recommend increasing bids on core keywords and ad groups.

High Speed Sales

- Advertisers should identify fast-moving products and address issues the day of.

- Sellers should be prepared for high spend and (potentially) delayed sales reporting.

- For Amazon sellers without Prime Day deals, they should also consider the possibility of dropping price, offering free shipping, etc. This is also something FBM sellers should consider implementing on Prime Day.

Amazon Prime Day Aftermath

- Sellers can also expect fluctuation in CPC and spend in days following Prime Day.
- Many Sellers will be increasing budgets and bids for July 12th, but the rate at which they reverse those changes back to normal will vary widely.

- Sellers should also prepare for any operational aftermath including more returns to process, increase in customer questions, and more opportunity for FBA refunds.