Monthly Amazon Update – September 2019

According to internal sources, „The Information“ reports that the number of planned cashier-less Amazon Go stores of 56 this year can not be realized. Instead, Amazon opens merely 20 stores. The 156 stores in 2020 were supposed to generate a revenue of $500 million USD. For the coming years, a number of 3000 stores was expected, which is now questionable. Link

According to the Wall Street Journal, Amazon changed its search algorithm to favor and highlight products that are more profitable to Amazon than others, as well as their own products. Amazon denied the allegations. Link

New products on Amazon will be now presented with a “New” label. Right now, it is being tested sporadically alongside another new label for “Top Brand”. Fashion labels seem to profit from it. Link

A new advertising format called “Sponsored Display” has been rolled out by Amazon for sellers and vendors in a beta state. The special potential lies in the ability of advertising not only on Amazons page, but also on other websites like news sites. Sellers choose the products to be advertised, daily budgets and bid-limits, while Amazon chooses the targeting using their data about customer search and purchase behavior. Until now, this data was only accessible via Amazon DSP, which started at a minimum budget of 10.000 Euro per month. The generated ads will look the same as from Amazon DSP, called Dynamic-E-Commerce-Ads (DEA). Link