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Prime Day 2022: The Ultimate Seller’s Guide

May 31, 2022 In Amazon Strategy

Prime Day 2022: The Ultimate Seller’s Guide

Prime Day is right around the corner this year, returning to July after a two-year hiatus. The only intel we have so far is that Prime Day will be sometime in the back half of July, most likely on a Tuesday.

For the last few years, Prime Day came with “unprecedented” preceding it. As the country reels from the continued supply-chain crisis and rising fuel prices, Prime Day 2022 will be no different. Covid is hopefully on its way out, Amazon is trying to construct its own supply chain and logistic network after the Russian war in Ukraine destabilized an already fragile system, and US eCommerce has almost hit $1 trillion, despite Amazon’s underwhelming performance in Q1.

One caveat to years of uncertainty – despite the volatility of the market, our brand partners have continued to see success during Prime Day YoY with the support of our team. In this post, we’re sharing some of our extensive Prime Day knowledge so you can reach new heights this Prime Day.

In this post, we’ll be covering: 

  • 2021 Recap
  • Prime Day 2022 Prep
    • Leveraging Resources
    • Inventory Planning
    • Advertising Strategies
    • Paid Search Timeline
    • Content Strategy

Last Year’s Recap

2021 was a crazy year. Delta, Omicron, and Prime Day in June (following 2020’s October Prime Day) continued to screw around with the successful formula we’d been using to bring our Brand Partners to success during the shopping event. 

From 2020 to 2021, just one of Macarta’s Brand Partners saw a 130% YoY increase in ordered revenue, 121% YoY increase in ordered units, and a whopping 132% YoY increase in conversion rates.

As René Crandall, Paid Search Manager, outlined last year:

“Overall, performance [in 2021] from a search and advertising perspective were pretty typical of the usual Prime Day bump. Bids were more expensive (as they are year after year), so ramping up KW bids and budgets before Prime Day is more critical than ever. It’s also worth noting that brand partners who ran discounts performed much better than brands who didn’t run discounts, which shows that success is largely based on offering price discounts.”

As more brands enter the Amazon eCommerce space, aggressive keyword bidding, listing optimizations, and DSP have never been more important.

Prepping for the Big Day

The deadline to sign up for Prime Day 2022 has passed, and those who have submitted applications, are probably wondering: what’s the next step? Well, let’s walk you through what you should be doing until that special Tuesday in July. 

Leverage Resources ASAP

Right now, especially if you are a smaller business, you need to be leveraging all of your available resources to start driving awareness.

Consider using these options to drive consumer awareness in the coming months:

  • AMAZON LIVE — Run an Amazon Live on products you are highlighting for Prime Day leading up to and on the day of the event to increase detail page traffic.
  • AMAZON POSTS — Posts are a simple, easy way to repurpose your social content on Amazon. Amazon Posts appear not only on your product’s PDPs, but on comparable competitor products as well.
  • SOCIAL MEDIA — Now more than ever is the time to lean into your social media following. If your advertising budget is tight, optimize your content and link to your Brand Store and specific PDPs on your social media channels. Also — check out how TikTok can actively drive major sales traffic.

Start Planning Inventory

With war in Ukraine and a global supply chain crisis, figuring out inventory isn’t as easy as it used to be. However, here are seven factors that will impact expectations and outcomes when it comes to inventory planning:

  • Consider changes to shopping habits from year to year
  • Think tactically and specifically when forecasting
  • Time your supplier orders properly
  • Order sooner rather than later
  • Take into account non-Amazon inventory and order accordingly
  • Choose an advertising strategy in advance
  • Leverage email marketing to direct customers to your own site

Advertising Strategies

There are a number of ways you can advertise during Prime Day, each of which serves a different purpose. Get familiar with the different advertising types and choose the strategy — or combination of strategies — that is right for your brand.

  • Sponsored Brand: Drives to a specific brand store subpage or custom landing page
  • Sponsored Product: Always-on approach helps your post-Prime Day relevance and efficiency 
  • Sponsored Brands Video: An eye-catching ad type utilizing video. This helps cut through the clutter of search results

If you have a limited budget:

  • You’ll want to shift strategy to focus on higher-converting, more refined keywords that can help minimize cost

If you have a high budget:

  • Sponsored Product: High-converting ad type
  • Sponsored Brand: Utilize all 3 available options with standard images, lifestyle images, and video
  • Sponsored Brands Video: Test multiple videos for multiple products to more ad placements
  • Demand-Side Platform (DSP): In order to capitalize on Prime Day’s increased traffic and sales, you’ll want an intentional fully funnel strategy before, during, and after the event.
  1. Before: In the weeks leading up to Prime Day there is a consumer behavior shift, where shoppers start window shopping and learning about brands/products, meaning you’ll want to shift focus into upper funnel audiences/placements with an emphasis on consideration. Once you’ve engaged and generated interest with target shoppers, keep on them with lower-funnel DSP or remarketing segments.
  1. During: To stay competitive, you will want to invest heavily in both upper and lower funnel — but remember that these high traffic events generate higher conversions, but staying the most engaged costs a higher sum.
  1. After: Once Prime Day has passed, we suggest continuing to invest in lower-funnel remarketing tactics. You’ll likely have higher audience numbers during this period, allowing you to speak to consumers who have not converted (yet!) to encourage future purchases.

If you’re prioritizing long-term goals:

  • Upper Funnel DSP: Great for exposure and retargeting

Prime Day 2022 Paid Search Timeline

Below are a few important action items to help inform your paid search Prime Day strategy. Consider this timeline in the weeks leading up to the event in order to capitalize on the countless amount of shoppers hunting for deals:

  • 2 weeks before Prime Day: Let any new Sponsored Product, Sponsored Brand or Sponsored Brands Video campaigns that you’re launching for Prime Day run at least two weeks before the event so that relevancy can build, making your ads more competitive within the ad auctions.
  • 1 week before Prime Day: Increase your branded keyword bids. Competitors will begin ramping up their bids as well, so it’s important that you become diligent in defending your branded ad placements on Amazon. Some branded keywords will increase $1 to $2 higher than the usual CPC, so keep an eye out on those terms! 
  • A few days before: Begin increasing your campaign budgets at least a few days before Prime Day. The sheer volume of shoppers on Amazon is HUGE during the event, so be tenacious about capitalizing on all that traffic. 
  • Before, during, and after: Run a branded-keyword Sponsored Brand ad before, during, and after Prime Day — this is an incredible top of search placement that you’ll want to utilize to protect your branded ad placements on Amazon, especially when competitors are ramping up their ad spend.

Content Strategy

You know your Amazon presence better than anyone — but are you using that space as effectively as you could? Here are just a few of the most vital facets of your Amazon store that should be given the most attention in the coming weeks!

  1. Brand Store — Explore our Complete Brand Store Guide for all the tips and tricks you’ll need to make an eye-catching (and memorable) brand store.
  1. Product Display Page — Few things drive prospective customers away like a poorly designed PDP. If it looks like you don’t care, why should the consumer? Here are the top three aspects you need to focus on:
  • Copy — In the post-Covid world, those old Keywords you’ve been using may no longer be indexing like they used to. Redefine your keyword strategy (without keyword stuffing) and make the title descriptive, informative, and optimized for Amazon SEO. Likewise, for the bullets, pure tech specs aren’t going to win over a wary customer. For helpful tips on efficient copy uploading, check out our step-by-step guide to updating content.
  • Images & Video — Did you know that you can have 7 images (or 6 images, 1 video) on your PDP? That’s 7 pieces of free advertising to show off the best your products have to offer, and that space shouldn’t be neglected. Wowing imagery is the way of the future, and if you need proof, here’s how we used it to double one of our brand partner’s sales.
  1. Posts & Follows — Increasing brand awareness is a never-ending task, yet large events are the perfect opportunity to generate buzz. Capitalize on the days and weeks leading up to Prime Day and then reinforce your brand’s unique vision with Amazon Posts and Amazon Follow

  • Posts are the perfect opportunity to tease a new Prime Day exclusive product release or simply remind shoppers that you sell awesome products that align with their values and needs. As you post frequently and increase your digital presence, make sure to continue that momentum after Prime Day has ended. Now that you’re top of mind, give your followers a reason to continue following.

While Prime Day prep can be overwhelming, there is a team of Amazon experts on standby who have been driving huge earnings for our Partners for years. Reach out to us here, and let’s get your business on the road to success!

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