We get this question from time to time, you’re searching through your search term reports for an autocampaign, and there, mixed among all of the shopper queries, sticking out like a sore thumb, is an ASIN.
Why is there an ASIN in my Search Term Report?
When you create an auto campaign, Amazon actually does something a bit more complicated in the background. It creates a campaign with four different methods for automatically placing your ads.
Close Match – Search terms that are very related to your product
Loose Match – Search Terms that are kinda related to your product.
Substitute ASINs – Products that are direct competitors for your products
Complement ASINs – Products that customers might buy along with your product.
So, when you see an ASIN in your Search Term Reports, its because Amazon showed your ad for either Substitute or Complementary ASINs.
Great, so what’s the problem?
The problem is that it’s very rare that all four of these match types work well for any given product, and it’s extremely common to have an ASIN show up for either Substitute or Complement matching and simply destroy your autocampaign’s budget.
Imagine you were spending $40/day on a campaign, and this one ASIN was absorbing $35 in daily PPC spend, with no sales, only leaving $5 for the other match types that might be more profitable. So naturally you wanna get rid of it!
Okay, so can I just Negative Exact Match it?
If it was a Search Term, that would totally work. However, ASINs don’t work like that. Adding the ASIN as a negative exact match would only make sure your product didnt show up when people typed in that ASIN. So, uh, not helpful.
What CAN I do then?
While it’s technically impossible to completely prevent ASINS from appearing in your autocampaigns, you can, however, drastically reduce the number that appear.
There are two approaches to addressing this. One of them involves negative exact matching keywords in the competitor’s listing, which is sort of meh. That’s a scientific term. I mean you’re welcome to do it but it’s meh, because it’s too easy to actually also get rid of a keyword you want to bid on.
Honestly the easiest thing to do is just turn off the Product match types in that campaign, and create a second campaign with JUST the Product match types.
You’ll still see the occasional ASIN pop up in your “Search Term” auto campaign, but the overwhelming number of ASINs only appear in “Product” match types.
How do I turn off the PRODUCT match types in my auto campaign?
Simple.
First go to the PPC Prophet Campaign Browser on the left side of the screen.
Choose the AUTO campaign you’d like to adjust and then click on the TARGETING TYPES menu option at the top of the screen, you’ll see a screen with toggles for the four targeting types.
All you have to do is click the off button for the match types you no longer want to advertise for, and you’re good to go.
That’s it!
You’ll stop seeing ASINs in your Search Term Reports the very next day.
If you’d like help with your automatic campaigns, or maybe automating ALL of your PPC to make more money using Amazon Sponsored Ads, please sign up today for a free trial of PPC Prophet.
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