All you need to know about Amazon Sponsored Display

Overview
In Amazon PPC, there are three basic methods of advertising: Sponsored Brands, Sponsored Products, and Sponsored Display. Sponsored display is the newest Amazon PPC ad type, which was steadily released in 2019 and is now a must-have for all Amazon sellers, brand owners, and ad managers. This article delves into the Amazon Sponsored Display ad (SPA) format.
Sponsored Display appears mostly on Amazon product pages and other Amazon-affiliated pages. Under the bullet points, these Amazon display ads appear as a small rectangle or square banner with the product’s primary image. Unlike Sponsored Brands, the banner only promotes one product variation
Aside from the placement on the product detail page, it’s also in less visible places like the customer review and the offer listing page.

Make sure to be Brand Registered
Sponsored Display advertising is only available to Amazon merchants that are registered brand owners with the Amazon brand registration, just like Sponsored Brands.
You’ll need an IP for your brand and it must be registered with trademark authorities in the following countries to join the Amazon brand registry:
United States, Brazil, Canada, Mexico, Australia, India, Japan, France, Germany, Italy, Turkey, Singapore, Spain, Netherlands, Saudi Arabia, the United Kingdom, the European Union, and the United Arab Emirates.
On Amazon, you may learn more about how to register your brand here.

Sponsored Display Types

Product Targeting
When you establish a new Sponsored Display campaign, after you’ve chosen your campaign settings and the product to advertise, you’ll have the option of choosing between two targeting types, Product Targeting and Audiences.
Product targeting, also known as Product Attribution Targeting (PAT), allows your adverts to appear on a specific product detail page. Within Product Targeting, you will further be given options: 1) Categories and 2) Individual Products.

1. Categories
You can target ASINs in specific categories with your adverts.   Obviously, you will choose the categories that are relevant to your offering, and you may choose more than one category. This “products target” type is more flexible than the Individual Products option, as it allows Amazon Advertising to bid on ads based on merely bid and category perimeters.
It is advised to use this option carefully as it has the potential to really spike your ad spend.

2. Individual Product
This selection allows the seller to bid on specific Amazon product pages, the individual products option allows you to laser focus your advertising on a particular ASIN.
Individual product targets can be added by:
A. Suggested ➡ Amazon will give you a list of related target based on the selected product to advertise
B. Search ➡ Search for list of targets via keyword search</span
C. Enter list ➡enter a list of ASINs separated by either a space or a comma
D. Upload ➡ if you have a large list of ASINs on a spreadsheet you can upload it using csv

Audience Targeting
Audience targeting type, let you target audiences on and off Amazon based on specific actions and events. Audience in Sponsored Display is an attractive targeting type. These distinct actions and events can be combined to create a unique segment for your Sponsored Display advertising campaign.

Audience comes in two flavors, 1) Views Remarketing and 2) Amazon Audience

1. Views Remarketing
The Amazon Sponsored Display audience targeting type includes views remarketing as a subset. It enables you to re-target Amazon buyers who have interacted with your product listing in the last 30 days but have not purchased it. You have the option of focusing on one or more of the engagement behaviors listed below:
A. Shoppers who have viewed your advertised products on Amazon in the past 30 days.
B. Shoppers who have viewed products similar to your advertised products on Amazon in the past 30 days that have not purchased your product

You should absolutely bid on the engagement type “Advertised products” and make a high bid on it because it could be a low-hanging fruit for you. These are the group of people who are thinking about buying your product (bottom of the funnel). In many circumstances, that extra push is necessary to complete the transaction. It will be money well spent to re-engage these audiences.

2. Amazon Audiences
Amazon Audiences is a new audience targeting sub-type. It can show your adverts both on and off Amazon. Hundreds of pre-built audience segments are available in the Amazon audience, allowing Amazon sellers to reach new potential customers through awareness and brand growth. Under the Amazon audience umbrella, there are now four main audiences.

In-market ➡ audience whose recent activity suggests they are likely to purchase a product in a certain defined product category
Lifestyle ➡audience whose shopping and content consumption indicate interest in a lifestyle, for example, shipping on Amazon, browsing on IMDb or streaming on Prime Video.
Interests ➡ audience whose recent activity suggests they have durable interest in certain categories. A key difference between interest and In-market will be the durability of the interest.
Life Events ➡ audiences with recent activity around life moments such as moving or getting married

How to Use SDA Strategically
Target Competitors
Make a list of 5-10 competition asins to target. The majority of the ASINs on this list should have been picked up during past automated campaigns that resulted in a sale, so you know they’re relevant to your product. You can further refine this list to ensure that your offer is superior to the competition in terms of price, features, listing copy, or a number of reviews.
Another option is to use the Amazon search box to find a comprehensive list of asins. In your search, use your main keyword and take the first 5-10 ASINs that come up.

Complimentary Products
You can also target products that are complementary to yours, for example, yoga trousers and yoga mats if you are selling yoga pants. This type of promotion involves a thorough understanding of your product and the intended demographic. Examining the commonly purchased together section of your list is a nice approach to identify complementary products.

Retargeting Shoppers
As mentioned before, you can use the views remarketing target options to re-engage shoppers that have:
A. Shoppers who have viewed your advertised products on Amazon in the past 30 days.
B. Shoppers who have viewed products similar to your advertised products on Amazon in the past 30 days that have not purchased your product

Interest and Event Targeting
You can now target these categories if your product falls under the In-market, Interest, or Lifestyle events in the new Amazon audiences targeting. It’s best if you only have one in your ad groups so you can track how well these portions are performing.

Kindle Books
A creative way to use Sponsored Display Ads is to target the books category on Amazon. If a book interest and topic aligns with your product that you want to sell, you can use Sponsored Display to target the book ASIN or ISBN number. For example if you are selling yoga equipment then you want to target yoga books, or if you are selling travel-related accessories, then you will target travel books. Use your imagination in terms of where you want to place your ads on the Amazon place.
The ad placement for these book listings are from KDP advertising and are on average not as competitive as products listings on Amazon. By placing ads on books you can potentially have very low CPC and high ROI.

Step by Step Sponsored Display Creation

On the Amazon Advertising console, click on “Create Campaign”

Under Sponsored Display tile, click “Continue”

Enter all required campaign information in the settings section

Under the Targeting section, targeting type, either Product Targeting or Audience

If you have selected Product Target, add your asins into the “Products to target” section

On the other hand if you have chosen the Audience targeting. Select and add your audience type. Then finally, click “Launch” on the bottom right

Conclusion
You can target Amazon shoppers with Sponsored Display in a way that Sponsored Brands and Sponsored Products can’t. This  allows Amazon advertisers to create truly one-of-a-kind campaign objectives that will help you to scale while maintaining a low ACoS. As always in Amazon PPC, do not be afraid to test.