What will Prime Day 2020 be like?

• Jeff Bezos sets a new wealth record of $200 billion.
• Today’s launch of the Sponsored Brand Video format promises new possibilities.
• More news and tips on DSP campaigns can be found in our summary below.

General Updates

How brands tackle Prime Day 2020

Prime Day in previous years was held in July and allowed brands to replenish their 4th quarter inventories and use the event to test strategies for the Thanksgiving period. This year everything is different – not only does Prime Day take place during a global pandemic, it also falls in the last quarter. Forbes shows the approaches of various companies how they deal with the situation.

Jeff Bezos richer than ever before

The wealth of Amazon boss Jeff Bezos recently reached a new level – with a fortune of more than 200 billion US dollars, he is not only currently the richest person in the world, but also richer than anyone ever before.

Amazon orders 1,800 Mercedes.-Benz electric delivery vans for European deliveries

To get a little closer to its goal of becoming a climate-neutral and sustainable company, Amazon has now ordered a large number of Mercedes-Benz electric delivery vans for deliveries in Europe. An even larger electric van order was placed with Rivian Automotive LLC, a start-up in which Amazon invested.

Due to pandemic boom Amazon delivers nearly two thirds of its own packages

Online trade, driven by the Corona pandemic, does not seem to slow down in the second half of the year, so that Amazon has to take over an ever-increasing share of its own deliveries.

Pressure on sellers who do not meet prime delivery times is increased by Amazon

Amazon sellers who offer Prime service are now to be more strictly controlled. In the past – even before Corona – it became apparent that a large part of the promised delivery times were not kept. According to Amazon, sellers should also ship at weekends if necessary.

Amazon expands its grocery store business

Amazon is planning another chain of grocery stores called “Fresh” in addition to Whole Foods. Their first store recently opened in Los Angeles and is intended to appeal to a different customer group than Whole Foods. In the Amazon manner, the store offers a range of new technologies that could make shopping easier.

Fitness tracker “Halo” is announced by Amazon

Apple Watch and Fitbit are getting serious competition with Halo. Amazon’s fitness wristband offers not only the usual tracking options, but also new functions such as technologies for measuring body fat percentage, sleeping temperature and the emotional state of a person.

Amazon looks for Influencers and starts Celebrity Store

As part of the Amazon Influencer Program, Amazon is currently looking on Instagram for people with high reach who recommend products within the affiliate program. Now there is even an Influencer Shop in the USA: a selection of celebrities appear who run their own store or represent a brand. There are almost 50 celebrities like Bear Grylls, Serena Williams, Lady Gaga and Justin Bieber.

What caught our attention

The launch of Sponsored Brand Video Ads for desktop and mobile views for Germany and UK will take place on September 2nd. With the new feature, Sponsored Brand videos can be placed on search result pages. The corresponding ads are billed on a cost-per-click basis (CPC).

In addition to Sponsored Brand video ads, Sponsored Display ads for sellers, and the upgrade of Sponsored Display ads with view targeting for sellers and vendors will now be launched in the USA.

On some Amazon product detail pages, we were able to observe a product gallery among the “frequently bought together” products in the past days. This is currently only displayed for selected products in the desktop version. Should this be implemented permanently, optimized product images will become more important than ever.

Amazon filters reviews by product features: On some product detail pages, reviews are now categorized by product properties and visibly placed at the top.

Comment: New advertising formats

The previous days and weeks have been packed with exciting Amazon news and updates, especially surrounding the topic of advertising. A clear sign that Amazon sees a lot of growth in this area in the future – especially for FBA sellers. A short assessment:

1 – Sponsored Video Ads are now also available in Germany and UK after a long BETA phase. Many brand manufacturers have been long awaiting this feature and first insights from the USA sound promising. Important to note: the rules for video ads are very specific and asset creation needs to be well prepared. It will certainly take a few more weeks until best practices are established. Especially for bestsellers/hero items this could already be an exciting option today.

2 – Sponsored Display Ads are now also available for all FBA sellers, which is a good update in itself. In addition, a new targeting option is also available in the USA starting this week: views. This new targeting option is best described with a DSP Light version. Banners are now also played on other websites off Amazon. In contrast to DSP, the billing is not on CPM but on CPC level. Important to note: targeting of lookalike and in-market/ lifestyle audiences is not possible. It is a pure re-targeting tool – but without many of the complexities of DSP. A minimum ad spend is also not necessary. This could be a very exciting development!

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All the best and stay healthy,

Your Team at Remazing

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