Common Amazon Advertising Mistakes to Avoid

There’s a lot to look out for if you’re new to Amazon advertising– or even if you’ve been advertising on the eCommerce platform for years. 

You may be an Amazon ads expert. Or a new seller on Amazon who’s setting up ads for the first time. 

Amazon advertising offers a wide range of cost-effective opportunities to boost sales and product awareness but can quickly become costly with often avoidable ads mistakes. And with Amazon’s algorithm constantly updating, it never hurts to refresh your knowledge. 

Before we dive into some common advertising errors, let’s check out some astonishing statistics:

  • 43% of consumers click on Amazon ads online.
  • 88% of brands selling on Amazon use Amazon Ads.
  • More than half of Amazon sellers spend more than $60,000 a month on Amazon ads.

Common Amazon Ads Mistakes

So let’s get into it. The facts above show the significance of why Amazon ads should be included in your marketing strategy. And like everything else, we’re here to help you avoid some common errors we’ve seen brands make. 

Mistake #1: Treating Amazon Ads like Google Ads

While the terminology and general principles for Amazon’s ads program are similar to Google’s, some sellers make the error of not adapting their advertising strategy to fit the two different platforms. 

Do not be mistaken, Google Ads and Amazon Ads offer a variety of opportunities that can help promote your products, each offering its own set of unique advantages to aid whatever your advertising goal may be. We suggest diving deeper into the guides linked above to further understand the basics and best practices for both platforms. 

Mistake #2: The ‘set it and forget it’ method. 

Ignoring your campaign once its live is wasteful at best and potentially dangerous at worst. By monitoring campaigns regularly, sellers can recognize trends and optimize ads accordingly.

Now thankfully, Amazon advertising doesn’t need to be monitored too closely. There’s no need to agonize over your campaign every few minutes or even hours, but we do recommend checking in daily to every other day depending on our campaign’s maturity. 

Those sellers who view Amazon Ads with a “set it and forget it” mentality miss the point and waste a good chunk of their time and money trying to hit the lottery in a market full of competitors who are optimizing their campaigns. 

Mistake #3: Keywords + lack of negative keywords

It can be pretty challenging to find the right keywords that maximize your chance for conversions on Amazon. Sellers often spend an overwhelming amount of time researching keywords and neglect utilizing negative keywords, when appropriate.

Negative keywords may even help avoid wasteful spending. Or aid in your campaign competing against another one of your campaigns. We recommend checking out this webinar, produced by Amazon, that dives into keywords, negative keyword uses, and how to launch manual keyword targeted campaigns. 

Mistake #4: Not paying attention to conversions on your listings

Listing optimization and conversion history are two key factors that affect how your ads are served on Amazon. A poorly optimized listing due to lack of appropriate keywords, negative keywords, product description, etc., can directly influence the number of impressions your ad gets.

We suggest being proactive and checking the ASINs to be incorporated into your ads campaign to make sure the listing is, in fact, converting. In your seller account, go to Reports > Business Reports > Detail Sales and Traffic By Child Item report and check each ASIN you plan to advertise. Note: This is also an excellent opportunity to optimize your listing if needed. 

Mistake #5: Not taking advantage of Amazon resources

Even though it may seem impossible to stay on top of Amazon’s always-changing algorithm, there are a lot of resources from Amazon directly for sellers to keep up-to-date. 

Amazon’s Advertising Learning Console offers new and experienced advertising resources to empower knowledge growth and tools for your online business. Don’t forget, you’re eligible to get Amazon’s Ads Certified.

A final thought.

Amazon Ads offers endless opportunities for brands of all sizes and budgets and in any industry to reach customers further. The “common mistakes’ pointed out in today’s blog can be easy fixes and quick wins for your ads strategy and even save your team some time and money. 


If you need help growing your business on Amazon, Contact Us Now to speak with one of Aisle3’s advertising experts. 

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