5 Amazon PPC Optimizations

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At Emplicit, we've helped over 500+ eCommerce brands earn $550 million in sales through Amazon.

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Are your Amazon PPC campaigns not getting enough impressions (and sales)?

At Emplicit, we've helped over 500+ brands earn $550 million in sales through Amazon.

So we’ve seen & solved countless PPC issues.

Here are the top reasons we've seen for underperforming campaigns:

(if you’d prefer to watch video rather than read text, click here).

1️⃣ Product ineligibility

This is often the first thing to check. Your product might be ineligible for advertising due to various reasons:

• Inventory issues: If your product is out of stock, Amazon won't show your ads.

• Pricing problems: If your price is too high compared to similar products, Amazon may restrict advertising.

• Buy box issues: If you're not winning the buy box, your ads won't run.

Here's how to check:

In this example, you can see the product is listed as "ineligible." Sometimes Amazon provides details, but often you'll need to investigate further or contact Amazon support.

Quick fix: Ensure your inventory is in stock, your pricing is competitive, and you're winning the buy box for your listings.

2️⃣ Paused variations

It's easy to accidentally pause a variation and forget about it. This can lead to your entire campaign stopping if:

• Your main variation goes out of stock

• You paused a backup variation to save inventory

• You're trying to direct traffic to a specific variation

Here's an example of what this looks like in Seller Central:

In this case, both product variations are paused, resulting in zero impressions for the campaign.

Quick fix: Regularly audit your campaigns to ensure you have at least one active variation that can run ads.

3️⃣ Negative keyword mishaps

Negative keywords are powerful tools, but they can backfire if not used carefully. Here's how:

• Negative phrase match keywords can unintentionally block relevant searches

• Ad group level negatives can override campaign settings

For example:

If you sell eco-friendly Tyvek envelopes and add "Tyvek envelope" as a negative phrase match keyword, you'll also block "eco-friendly Tyvek envelope" searches.

Quick fix: Use negative exact match keywords instead of phrase match when possible. Always double-check both campaign and ad group level negative keywords.

4️⃣ Rising CPCs

Amazon's Cost-Per-Click (CPC) tends to increase over time. If your bids don't keep pace, you might lose impression share. Here's an example:

In this graph, you can see the CPC for "bubble mailer envelopes" rising from $0.50 to $0.60. When it hit $0.75, the campaign stopped getting impressions because the bid was no longer competitive.

Quick fix: Regularly review your top-performing keywords and adjust bids to stay competitive. Consider using automated bidding strategies to keep up with CPC changes.

5️⃣ Keyword restrictions

Amazon sometimes prevents bidding on certain keywords they deem irrelevant to your product. For example:

• If you sell shipping envelopes, Amazon might not let you bid on "MacBook Pro envelope bag"

• Designer brand names like "Kate Spade" might be restricted for non-brand owners

While this usually helps prevent irrelevant ads, it can sometimes limit legitimate cross-promotion efforts.

Quick fix: If you believe a keyword is wrongly restricted, contact Amazon support for clarification or to request an exception.

The key is to regularly audit your campaigns for these issues.

By addressing these common pitfalls, you can revive your campaigns and start seeing impressions (and sales) again.

Want a full video breakdown? Watch this:

Here are some other guides you may find useful:

• Amazon PPC 101

• Pillow Talk: How to make your listing stand out on Amazon

• How we boosted Amazon sales by 17% in just 2 weeks

Whenever you are ready, here’s how we can help you:

Grow Your Brand on Amazon & TikTok with 100% hands-off marketplace management

We've helped over 500 clients earn more than $550 million on Amazon. If you need help making the most of the Amazon opportunity, click here to book a call & claim a Free audit of your store/brand.