Sponsored Brands ads help increase brand awareness because traffic is directed directly from the ad to your Amazon storefront or custom Amazon landing page. Once a customer clicks, it's all about your brand – no competitor's listings are visible.

Let's take a deeper look at what exactly Sponsored Brands ads are, how they work, and how to set them up.

What are Amazon Sponsored Brands ads?

Amazon Sponsored Brands, formerly known as Amazon Headline Search Ads, are banner ads that typically display your brand logo, custom tagline, and multiple products at the top of Amazon search results. In early 2020, Amazon released a new feature that allows brands to create video ads that will appear in search results.

Sponsored Brands ads have grown in popularity over the years—today , 38% of third-party Amazon sellers use them, and 66% of them make $1 million in lifetime sales . In 2018, only about 10% of Amazon’s ad revenue came from Sponsored Brands ads. Since then, that number has doubled.

When clicked, a Sponsored Brands ad will direct customers to your storefront or landing page where they will view your products and yours only . Alternatively, you can pool this traffic into one of your product listings. For example, if you use video ads, traffic will be sent directly to the relevant product listing, not your storefront or landing page.

For customers, there are a lot of distractions on Amazon—innumerable product options in search results, and competitor ads scattered across your own product listings, to name a few.

Amazon Sponsored Brands gives you the opportunity to create a custom branded shopping experience for your customers—cutting out all the noise on your search results pages.

Similar to Sponsored Products Ads, Sponsored Brands ads are PPC (pay-per-click) ads for keyword searches . Customers enter target keywords into the search bar, and your ad appears in search results, ready to be clicked. When someone clicks on your ad, you pay Amazon. Just like Sponsored Products, you can control your keyword bids and daily spend to ensure you stay within your overall marketing budget.

If you shop on Amazon, you will definitely come across Sponsored Brands ads when searching for products. They typically feature two or three of the brand's products and appear at the top of search results, above sponsored product ads — although Amazon may also place your ad next to or in search results.

Amazon continues to improve its advertising features and metrics to help sellers and brands run profitable and effective campaigns. Sponsored Brands Ads offers a unique reporting tool called New Brand Metrics that can tell you whether sales are coming from new or existing customers.

These metrics enable brands to make more informed decisions about their advertising efforts.

How do Sponsored Brands ads work?

Just like Sponsored Products and Sponsored Display Ads, Sponsored Brand Ads are a form of PPC advertising , so you will bid on various keywords with other sellers to get an impression on potential customers. As a seller, you control your bids for each keyword and your daily budget for each campaign.

With Sponsored Brands, you can choose from three types of ad formats: Collection, Store Spotlight, or Video.

Product Series

The Product Collection ad type allows you to target up to three products from your brand from a landing page of your choice. This way, Amazon means you can send traffic directly to your own custom-branded Amazon storefront or a dedicated landing page that only includes the products in the ad.

Collections are a great option if you want to promote products in your brand that have low organic or sponsored ad visibility. You can add products that perform well in your mix to help increase the chances of someone clicking on your ad.

Below is an example of a product line ad in action.

If you click on the Toshiba logo, "Storage Made Simple" or the blue "Shop Toshiba" text below, it will take you to a landing page showing only the three products advertised.

Notice there are no other distractions on this page? This is a huge win and very valuable for your brand because there are no competitors' ads to click on. Plus, customers can browse your range of products in one place to find exactly what they're looking for.

store focus

The next ad type is only available if you've created your own Amazon storefront, which is only available to brand-registered sellers. With Store Spotlight, you can drive traffic to what is basically your own e-commerce site, but on Amazon. There will also be no advertising on your storefront – customers will only see your brand.

Store Spotlight is great for brands that sell multiple products in various categories or subcategories. Instead of promoting three specific products, you can advertise three complete product categories and their store pages —all with just one ad.

This Sponsored Brand ad for OXO showcases the categories: "Holiday Essentials," "Cooking Essentials," and "Entertainment Essentials." If you click on any of them, you will be taken to the corresponding category page where you can view multiple products.

For this example, we'll explore "entertainment must-haves."

As you can see, it leads me to the "Entertainment" page of the OXO Amazon store, where I can explore many different products. OXO adds content that showcases products in use, providing a more engaging and professional brand experience .

video

Sponsored Brands video ads are unique and can provide an advantage over competitors because video content can help your product stand out in search results.

In this example, I searched for "blender" on Amazon. As I scrolled through the results on the first page, I came across a large video ad – it did catch my attention, even though it was muted (video ad autoplays, no sound).

The videos should be short— Amazon recommends 15-30 seconds in length—but informative. A well-done video ad tells potential customers everything they need to know about a product in the first few seconds.

Before creating a video, be sure to check out Amazon's video creation guide . Unless you're a skilled videographer, you should hire a professional to shoot your product videos—especially someone familiar with Amazon.

Best Practices for Product Videos

Educate your customers with demo videos about your products

The video should be completely product-centric without any unnecessary filler content

Keep your video short and to the point (15-30 seconds)

Your video will autoplay without sound, so add informative text or subtitles

Video loops automatically; consider making the loop seamless to keep customers hooked

Show off your product as soon as the video starts.Don't use fade-in effects or start with complex intros

How to Set Up a Sponsored Brands Ad

Starting and running your Sponsored Brands ad is easy. As with other advertising solutions on Amazon, you don't need a large budget to start promoting your brand. All you have to do is become a registered brand seller, and with just a few clicks, your ad can be up and running.

In Seller Central, go to the "Ads" tab, then click "Campaign Manager," then "Create Campaign."

Next, click "Sponsored Brands" under "Choose your campaign type."

Under "Settings," enter your campaign name, the date range you'd like your ad to run on, your daily budget, and the brand you'd like to promote.

Next, you'll choose your ad format.

As we mentioned before, you can choose from Product Collections, Store Spotlights or Video Ads. For this example, I'll choose the product collection.

To run a Product Line Ad, you need to select at least three products in your brand to display.

After selecting the three products you want in your Sponsored Brands ad, the next step is to add your creative content. You have a lot of options here – you can create custom titles, choose product order, add logos, and custom images.

The final step is to choose a target, enter target keywords, and set a bid for each keyword.

Once you've selected the keywords you want to target, click Submit for Review. Amazon will review your ad within 72 hours. That's it! Your ad should start and run as soon as Amazon approves it.

So, are Sponsored Brands ads worth it?

Sponsored Brands ads allow sellers to curate brand experiences for customers while diverting them from competitors’ listings. They stand out and are engaging – they make it easy for customers to click through to see your unique brand.

Having another advertising strategy in your arsenal is a great way to stay ahead of the competition, especially if you're able to create video ads. Data shows that online shoppers respond to visual cues for products: 79% of consumers who shop on Amazon say they are influenced by product ratings or reviews that include photos or videos.

return on ad spend

Another benefit of using Sponsored Brands ads is that they offer the highest return on ad spend (RoAS) of any type of Amazon PPC.

So you'll earn more for every dollar you spend on Sponsored Brands ads than if you pay for Sponsored Products or Sponsored Display ads.

That said, if you're signed up for Amazon Brand Registry, test Sponsored Brands ads to see how they work for your Amazon business! Try each format, test different products and creative content, and see what resonates with customers.

Have you run these types of ads before or have other questions about Sponsored Brands? Let us know in the comments!

More cross-border information public account: cross-border video cici