The economics are pretty compelling here. However, brand perspectives on this update vary pretty widely based on the relative maturity and scale of DTC.com efforts. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

1. Use Email: <\/strong>Scott Bishop from Oriental Trading Company suggested that even for a die-hard customer marketing firm like his, this update may warrant an email test.  \u201cI\u2019d be curious to run a campaign against our inactive buyer list just to see how many we can reactivate by landing them on Amazon instead of our direct site.\u201d Scott\u2019s theory is two-fold, first, this may be a reasonable way to win back customers that have defected to Amazon with compelling economics, and second, Amazon\u2019s superiority in conversion (one-click check out with prime shipping) may remove some friction that has held back other efforts to reactivate dormant shoppers.  Kaitlyn Kobida of Chomps provided some encouragement for this approach, \u201cWe\u2019ve done some tests where we add in both Amazon and DTC.com product links to some of our email marketing campaigns. We\u2019ve found that by identifying the preferred shopping destinations of our customers and marketing to them accordingly, we can generate more sales.\u201d   <\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n
   1. Promote Amazon-Exclusive SKUs: <\/strong>Ian Lewis of BIGNAMECOMMERCE mentioned, \u201cWhile it may be challenging for us to use Non-Amazon Marketing to promote SKUs that we sell on our direct site, I could see this being a valuable tool to subsidize marketing efforts for SKUs that are exclusive to Amazon.\u201d He elaborated that while it may not make sense for his business, \u201cIt could make sense for a lot of brands to compare the relative contribution rates (to sales and margins) of various products across DTC.com and Amazon channels and then to prioritize landing pages for non-amazon marketing efforts accordingly.\u201d <\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n
      1. Revisit inefficient Paid Search or Paid Social Ad Targets<\/strong>: Kaitlyn Kobida commented,\u201c This program may help us scale our Google marketing dollars. We had already been experimenting in this area by taking some category search terms that were less profitable when directing to our direct site and re-directing them to Amazon product pages in effort to drive higher conversion rates. Now with this additional economic incentive, we are looking to get more aggressive with this strategy.”    But experienced marketers also caution realism here, David Kennedy, Momentum Commerce\u2019s Vice-President of Client Services reminded everyone, \u201cThe reason that Facebook is so good at finding and scaling efficient audiences is that their targeting and bidding algorithms are generally trained by a direct conversion feedback loop. When marketers send traffic to Amazon, Facebook is not able to model and find look-alike audiences with the same precision. The same principle holds true for paid search on Google.\u201d<\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n
         1.  Activate the Amazon Flywheel with Influencers: <\/strong>Molly Doe, Momentum Commerce\u2019s Vice President of Client Development commented, \u201cInfluencers have become one of the most effective methods for launching new products.  Given the increasing costs of onsite advertising on Amazon and the \u201cHalo benefits\u201d of effective product launches on the platform, I\u2019m excited to see if Brands will respond to this program by encouraging their influencers to link to Amazon storefronts more frequently.\u201d <\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n

            Five quick thoughts from Momentum Commerce on the Amazon Brand Referral Bonus<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

            1. For the right brands this is a BIG DEAL. But it isn\u2019t for everyone.  <\/li>
            2. Initial testing should isolate specific products and specific channels in order to inform more accurate measures of value. <\/li>
            3. Brands should  tread lightly here and not cannibalize direct sales relationships with customers. Let\u2019s not bet the farm just yet.  What happens if Amazon moves the bonus payment down to 2% in six months?  <\/li>
            4. There is likely some element of \u201cfirst-mover advantage here\u201d particularly in the application of non-Amazon Marketing dollars to support new product launches on Amazon.  3P brands tracking through Amazon Attribution should be able to yield unfair economic advantages while the bonus rates are this high. <\/li>
            5. An increase in Non-Amazon Marketing driving Amazon sales will likely increase the importance of having an optimized Amazon Storefront as the storefront will often be a better destination for mid and upper funnel campaign traffic than straight Product Detail pages.   <\/li><\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

               Last week I sat down with seven terrific marketers to discuss Amazon\u2019s recent announcement of the Amazon Brand Referral Bonus.\u00a0 This program is designed to encourage brands to direct their Non-Amazon marketing efforts to their Amazon storefront and product pages. The Amazon Brand Referral Bonus specifically offers a 10% rebate on any sales attributable to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":541,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-540","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-retail-media"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n