Stop 10 · E-commerce & Performance MarketingTopics · 3/8

Marketplace Marketing (Amazon Ads Overview)

In short

On a marketplace like Amazon, shoppers already have their wallets out. Ads there help your product show up at the exact moment someone is about to buy.

Advertising within a marketplace (like Amazon) rather than driving traffic to your own site — different dynamics since you're competing directly against other sellers on the same platform, often for the same search terms.

The blob waves from a small stall at the front of a busy fair lane strung with lights.

Think of it like this

The best spot at the mela

At a giant mela, thousands of shoppers walk the same lanes. Stalls near the entrance and at the food court corner sell the most, and the organisers charge extra for them. Marketplace ads are paying for those prime spots inside someone else's busy mela.

Watch it happen

The main Amazon Ads types

Amazon Ads

What you need to know

ACoS

Advertising cost of sales = ad spend / ad sales. It's ROAS flipped: 25% ACoS equals 4x ROAS.

Listing quality first

Good images, clear titles and reviews make ads work. Ads to a weak listing waste money.

Search terms report

Like Google, check which shopper searches triggered your ads and add negatives.

Ads can lift organic rank

Many sellers find that more sales from ads also help their organic visibility over time. Results vary.

See it in code

Walk through the code

excel

1B1  Ad spend           ₹12,0002B2  Ad sales           ₹48,0003B3  Total sales        ₹1,20,0004B4  ACoS      =B1/B2   → 25%5B5  ROAS      =B2/B1   → 4.0x6B6  TACoS     =B1/B3   → 10%

1/2ACoS and ROAS are two views of the same thing.

ACoS judges the ads alone. TACoS compares ad spend to all sales, showing how much the business depends on ads.

Save yourself the pain

Common mistakes

Oops

Running ads on a listing with two blurry photos and no reviews.

Do this instead

Fix the listing first. Ads bring people to the page; the page has to close the sale.

Oops

Aiming for the lowest possible ACoS on every product.

Do this instead

Set targets from your margin. A new product may need a higher ACoS to get its first sales and reviews.

Your mission

Spot the ads on a marketplace

~20 min

Quick check

A seller's ACoS is 20%. What's the ROAS?

Go deeper

1Explore Amazon's Sponsored Products ad format conceptually (even without an active account).
2Learn how marketplace advertising differs from advertising toward your own website.
3Understand the trade-off: marketplace reach and trust, versus less control over the customer relationship.