How to Control Your Rising Amazon PPC Costs

It’s no secret that Amazon PPC costs are continuing to rise. They have been climbing steadily for the past few years and show no signs of slowing down anytime soon. It is becoming challenging to keep up with these rising PPC costs without significantly impacting your bottom line! But it doesn’t have to be this way. With a little bit of savvy marketing strategy, you can take control of your PPC budget – even when the competition becomes fierce!

In this blog, we’ll cover the top 5 reasons why your ACoS is too high and practical suggestions for what to do about it.

Before Paying for Clicks, Fix Your Foundation

Before getting into the top 5 reasons PPC is costing you too much, I want to give you some golden rules to set you up for success before paying for clicks. If your ACoS (advertising cost of sales) is super high, chances are your foundation is cracked. To put it simply, you’re getting clicks, but no one is buying what you’re selling. 

So the first rule of reducing your rising PPC costs is to optimize your listing in the following ways:

– Target the right keywords in your listing copy – To get your ad in a great spot on Amazon, you need to make sure your listing is relevant for those “page 1” medium tail keywords. If the customer can’t find your blue water bottle for cycling because you’re calling it a collapsible plastic bottle in your listing, you will make fewer sales. If the customer can’t find you, they can’t buy from you. Know your product and, more importantly, know how the customer searches for your product and ensure you’re targeting the right keywords in your copy.

– Ensure your listing will convert – Keywords are expensive! You need an offer that converts and a strategy to get in front of the RIGHT customer with the RIGHT photos and story to convert them. If your ad is at the top of page one and you aren’t converting, there’s a problem in your listing, photos, price, or reviews that needs fixing.

The Top 5 Reasons Your ACoS is Too High

Now that you know the golden rules to fix your foundation let’s talk about the main reasons your PPC costs are so high and what to do about it.

REASON 1: YOU HAVE NO ADVERTISING STRATEGY

Let’s get the mojo back in your PPC dojo! Do you remember those campaigns you started at launch? It’s possible they are no longer achieving the results you want. Always start with the end in mind. Campaigns, targeting, ad placement, and bidding strategy should differ depending on your goals.

Start with a goal and develop a strategy to reach it. Maybe you want to relaunch a product that just came back in stock and has lost its ranking. Do you start up your old campaigns again? Or are there specific keywords you want to rank for that should be in a single campaign with a top of search placement strategy?

One technique to develop advertising goals is to bring up the search page on Amazon where you’d like your ad to appear. Look at the other products on the page. Where would your product fit the most to attract and convert customers? 

For example:

• A headline search ad with a custom image might look great on a page for a close match keyword phrase.

• A video ad can draw attention to a long tail keyword super relevant to the product. Targeting a longer tail keyword may increase the chances of your video ad appearing more often on the page. Is there already a video ad running on the page? Opportunity knocks!

• A top-of-the-search ad could rank your product if it converts well. On the other hand, if your product is already highly ranked organically on that page, you might want to bid lower or use a product targeting strategy for other products on the page to gain more traction overall.

REASON 2: YOUR CAMPAIGNS AREN’T OPTIMIZED

The following reason your ACoS is too high is that one of your keywords is running away with all the budget. Meanwhile, the rest of your highly relevant keywords in the campaign aren’t even getting impressions! What I’m trying to say is, you’re not optimizing your campaigns.

Here are some campaign optimization basics to follow:

• Sort by spend. What keywords are running away with your budget? Lower them a little at a time. Next, arrange by ACoS. What keywords need MORE money on them? Where do you need to reduce?

• Consider placement and relevancy when adjusting your bids. When a keyword is performing well, or you want it to perform better, be sure to optimize your listings for relevancy. This will earn you better ad placement for a lesser bid.

REASON 3: YOUR TARGETING TECHNIQUES ARE OFF

Often, a keyword or product targets are too narrow, too broad, or include too many keywords in a single campaign that cause your high advertising costs. 

Here are some examples of common mistakes:

• Only targeting exact matches – If you only target the exact match of a keyword, your ads will not show for many of the customers’ searches, and your competitors will take the sale.

• Not using product targeting – Unlike keyword targeting, where relevancy plays a significant role, product targeting allows your product to show up on ANY page, especially for competitive or substitute products.

• Not using registered brand ads – in many cases, sponsored brands ads give you better placement for less money. Why not try it?

• Too many keywords in a single campaign – The budget doesn’t make it across the board when you add 500 keywords to a single campaign. You could have lots of very relevant keywords getting no love or sales.

REASON 4: YOUR CAMPAIGNS AREN’T ORGANIZED

“Yes, mom, I’ll clean my room later!” If your Amazon campaign manager looks a little bit like your teenager’s bedroom floor, you might want to get organized. 

Here are some tips:

• Utilize portfolios to keep your campaigns organized.

• Rename campaigns by goal and type, so it’s easy to remember what’s inside

• Keep track of changes you make between optimization sessions so that you can stay on task and keep your metrics measures

REASON 5: NO EXTERNAL TRAFFIC STRATEGY

The last reason your ACoS is too high is that only half of Amazon’s traffic is direct. It means half of your potential customers come from OFF OF AMAZON. If you’re not advertising there, your competitors are getting the sale. 

Off Amazon traffic is a generally cheaper cost per click, PLUS it helps you rank because Amazon’s algorithm loves external traffic (and the chance to gain more potential Prime members).

Here are some popular forms of external traffic to try:

• Google Search Ads – 60% of external traffic comes from search, and guess which search engine owns most of that traffic? Yup, GOOGLE.

• Social media posts – Organic posts on popular social media channels such as Pinterest, Facebook, and Instagram can make a big impact. Start advertising when you start to gain traction on organic posts.

• Referral sites – Tons of websites send high converting traffic to Amazon. Are you running a coupon or sales promo? Advertise on Deal and Coupon sites such as Deal News and get deal seekers buying up your offers.

• Media opportunities and content marketing backlinks – Run a press release about your product’s unique benefit to customers or get featured on top 10 blogs. There are lots of great PR agencies such as Seller Rocket to help you get noticed. You can even hire someone on Upwork to write and distribute a press release for a super low price.

I hope these tips will help you get organized and save on your PPC costs. If you’d like my expert opinion on how to fix your foundation, submit your listing for a free review here.

About the author

Amy Wees is the CEO of Amazing at Home E-Commerce Consulting, a world-renowned company that has helped thousands of brands launch private label products on Amazon and beyond! Amy’s knowledge in product development, sourcing, marketing, and sales has enabled her to help countless entrepreneurs develop their successful businesses. Visit amazingathome.com to learn more.