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Newsletter #9: External Traffic edition

Welcome to this week's newsletter 👊

The weekly newsletter that is more valuable than a 5 star review.... but will you give us a gold star? .... read on and give us a , a 😘 or possibly a🖕

The focus this week is proofing that Amazon loves external traffic and the results of the PPC vs TikTok Ads poll.

In this edition:

  • Proof Amazon LOVES external traffic.... Straight from the source

  • New Amazon Attribution updates.....it's like Amazon finally woke up ⏰☕

  • PPC vs TikTok Ads....... we asked 1,500 sellers to compare their PPC costs to TikTok costs 📊

  • The TikTok Info you need to know..... through the power of memes

Proof Amazon LOVES external traffic

Straight from the source

This week I spoke to Tyler from ampd.io ('cos us external traffic guys stick together.... we even share friendship bracelets 🥰)

We were discussing external traffic on Amazon.... I specialise in TikTok (including Facebook and Messenger in the past) and they specialises in Google ads.

In my case studies, I have proven that TikTok boosts Amazon sales by around 30-40%... Tyler has seen similar results from Google traffic.

So we know External Traffic is king..... but we want Amazon to confirm it.

So we need to look at Amazon's case studies (thanks Tyler for sharing this 👊).

Here are 2 case studies published by Amazon:

Skip the reading and take note of these highlights (BRB = Brand Referral Bonus):

Amazon discussed these case studies on an Amazon hosted webinar...

Tyler upfront asked them: "So External traffic can only help a listing, right? We don't see any downsides to it"

Amazon replied "We are not allowed to say that.... but follow the case studies **wink, wink**

That's the same as my wife saying "No, you don't have to do the dishes" **wink, wink**

The one time I didn't do the dishes and I received the equivalent to an Amazon Suspension... AKA no love until the dishes got some love.

How you can take advantage of this (referencing Amazon.... not your marriage, Don Juan):

  • Always use Brand Attribution for every link you send to Amazon

  • Amazon loves traffic from the big platforms (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, Google, etc). Focus on sending traffic from these platforms directly to the Amazon listing storefront (it can't do any harm).

In my opinion, External Traffic is as important as PPC.

The A9 algo wants you to send it traffic.... give it what it wants 👊

New Amazon Attribution updates.....

It's like Amazon finally woke up ⏰☕

So this is 100% down to ampd for making Amazon aware.

Their blog post covers it in detail.

Basically, when you send external traffic to Amazon, you will see you competitors advertising on your page (damn leeches 🤬).

So basically, Amazon was encouraging us to send external traffic to our listings.... but then sharing the traffic with any competitor that advertised on our page (you gotta love Amazon...I like to think of Amazon as a deluded teenager with herpes... the gift that keeps on giving 🤬).

The ampd team reported this to Amazon.

Amazon is taking action and giving brands full exclusivity when using Brand Attribution links.

This is still in beta.... so if the update is not working for you... wait a bit.

Buy Tyler a drink... he just helped EVERY Amazon seller **🍻 cheers Tyler**

PPC vs TikTok Ads

We asked 1,500 sellers to compare their PPC costs to TikTok costs 📊

In a newsletter a few weeks ago, we asked the all the subscribers (1,500 Amazon sellers) if there PPC costs are cheaper than our TikTok Ad costs (see screenshot below):

Quick reminder... this was based off 20 different Amazon products and I use it as an benchmark to budget for launches and campaigns. It was covered in this newsletter.

Drumroll please.....

🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 ⏫ My PPC is HIGHER than the TikTok metrics

⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ ⏬ My PPC is LOWER than the TikTok metrics

88.89% reported their PPC costs are higher 🤬

That sucks... it just shows how we are all cannibalising PPC.

When it comes to PPC, there are 2 expenses:

  • Money: PPC is never getting cheaper.... today is the cheapest it will be going forward.

  • Time: Great, you save a ton of money this month by optimising your PPC campaigns, but as it took you over 40 hours..... did you really save?

This poll wasn't meant to be an attempt to downplay PPC.... it is a necessary evil 👿

But wanted to demonstrate that PPC will soon be too expensive to even be competitive.

We currently use TikTok Ad campaigns to manipulate Brand Analytics and improve PPC campaigns (external traffic and PPC complement one another).

The TikTok info you need to know.... meme-ified

That's it for this week 👊

But I want to know what you thought...

What did you think of today's content?

Last week our goal was to get more than 8 subscribers to vote... we had 4 votes 🤬 Are we as useful as a JohnSon & Johnson vaccine?

Login or Subscribe to participate in polls.

Thanks for reading.

- Paul

PS... Whether you want to start TikTok Shop or a Standard TikTok campaign... we are closing to new clients as of this weekend... Can you afford to miss out?

PPS.... Here are the previous editions if you want to catch up and here are our case studies.

PPPS..... If you REALLY enjoyed this.... share the love.... the aim of this newsletter is to give you an ego boost 👊... 'cos you now know more than 99% of other Amazon sellers...share this newsletter purely to say "I found it first!" If you get the most shares then you and I will have a 1:1 strategy call 👊

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