Amazon Ad Teams, 3P Pricing, Prime Day

By Cleveland Admin

Brands Increasingly Using External Resources to Manage Amazon Advertising
Feedback from our recent Teams Benchmark indicates that brands are increasingly using external resources to manage their marketing on Amazon, with 54% of respondents indicating that a third party manages Amazon advertising, while 34% manage this function internally. While there is no one right answer for leveraging external expertise on Amazon, many brands choose to work with agencies that are focused solely on Amazon advertising (26%), agencies that have a broad knowledge of digital advertising including Amazon (18%), and firms that offer full-service agency offerings including advertising (10%). 

Amazon Shutting Off Buy Box for 3P Sellers with Lower Prices on Other Marketplaces
Bloomberg reported this week that Amazon has increasingly been sending pricing alerts to 3P sellers who have lower prices on other platforms (frequently Walmart), and suppressing those sellers until prices on Amazon match the lowest price on other marketplaces. While Amazon would likely argue that this is designed to incent sellers to lower prices on Amazon, the article notes that this often has the effect of driving sellers to raise prices on other platforms. This could attract the attention of regulators, as Amazon has been the subject of multiple antitrust investigations over the past several months. 

Amazon Prime Day event continued to expand this year, broadening from 36 hours in 2018 to two full days this year
Feedback from vendors on our recent LiveCast indicated that a net 20% of attendees (net=better less worse) saw Prime Day sales better than expectations, perhaps not surprising considering Amazon indicated unit orders grew from 100mm in 2018 to 175mm in 2019. In reviewing category data from analytics provider Stackline, home improvement, household supplies, and beauty were some of the top performing categories during the event.