Latest / Selling on Giants: The eCommerce Marketplace Podcast / Advanced Google Ad Tech for Amazon and Walmart Sellers with Tyler Gregg

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Advanced Google Ad Tech for Amazon and Walmart Sellers with Tyler Gregg · Selling on Giants: The eCommerce Marketplace Podcast

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to another episode of Selling on Giants.
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_00: I'm your host, Mr.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_00: Will, and today we had an insightful conversation with Tyler Gregg, the VP of Strategic Initiatives at AMT.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: Tyler is an expert at leveraging Google ads to grow brands.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_00: In this episode, you'll learn where Google shoppers fall in their journey, the types of businesses that should consider using external traffic to their Amazon or Walmart pages, and how to set it up.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_00: We also explore different strategies to consider and why this approach is a game changer for brands operating on marketplaces.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_00: It was a great conversation, and I'm excited to share these valuable insights with you.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: Let's do it.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_00: All right, Tyler, welcome to the show.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for being a guest and coming on selling on Giants.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_00: As we get started, my first question for you can you tell me a bit about your background and how you got started in e-commerce specifically in Google AdTech?
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and well, thanks so much for having me on today.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_01: My background, I've been in e-commerce for about a decade now.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_01: Um, our company called Amped actually started as a company called Metric Story.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_01: And in about 2015, 2016, we started working with some of the largest e-commerce brands, helping them analyze their Google Analytics data.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_01: And we built a data science engine that was able to mine through the data and spit out insights and recommendations on actions to take.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_01: And what we found was the most actionable insights were, of course, tied closest to revenue.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_01: And that was usually from Google ad revenue.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_01: And so all of a sudden, we started kind of pivoting our technology to look at Google Analytics data, but also incorporate Google Ads data.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_01: And we had pretty successful business on that side of it.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_01: And then COVID hit and we kind of reevaluated stuff.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_01: We were still doing pretty well, but it wasn't on the growth trajectory that let's face it, our VCs wanted.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_01: And so we pivoted a little bit and we focused solely on the Google ads side of it.
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_01: And that got us into partnership with Google, got us into partnership with Amazon, and we created the first technology that actually connected Google Ads to Amazon's marketplace and brought full attribution into our platform.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_01: What's unique about it and what's uh super important, and the reason a product like ours exists is Amazon, they love their customer data, but they do not share that customer data with anyone, which means that you cannot put that customer data into Google Ads.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_01: If you could put the customer data from Amazon conversion data into Google Ads, you wouldn't need a product like AMPT.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_01: You would just do Google Ads to Amazon and Max for conversion, put T ROAS on or auto auto bidding on, and you'd be good to go.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_01: But because Amazon's so tight with that customer data, it creates this middleman that's needed to allow brands who want to advertise and engage customers on Google to have to use this middleman technology to get Google data and Amazon data stitched together so that they can run their campaigns.
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's so beautiful too.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: Like, talk about what a gap in the market.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_00: I can't tell you how many e-commerce brands that we work with that will leverage some type of off-platform strategy.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_00: And the biggest complaint prior to solutions like AMP was like, what's the ROI?
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: How do I know I'm getting a return on this investment?
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_00: And before, there was a lot of like uh indirect ways for us to kind of uh measure that, but having that connection definitely uh informs the the shopper, the end user, which is great.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_00: So, I mean, on that on that note, too, with regards to your your Google Ad tech and kind of the topic for today, it's driving external traffic to platforms like Amazon and Walmart, which is uh which is huge.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_00: It's a big differentiator, and it's how brands can you know uh do something apart from a typical Amazon endemic brand.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_00: So that being said, I I'm a big fan of Mythbusters.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_00: So I'd love to just kind of ask you what are you been in this role for a while, you've been doing the the data attribution.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_00: What are some common misconceptions uh sellers have when it comes to using Google and more importantly, the attribution around it?
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, the biggest myth um is the impact that it has on rank.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_01: And it does have an impact on rank.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_01: But I talk to sellers and brands all the time where they'll say, Hey, I was in my seller community and I heard I can just turn on Google Ads and it's going to automatically uh rank me up higher.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_01: And while that can happen, that's not exactly how it happens.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um, it's an important component of the ROI is you know, spinning that retail flywheel.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_01: But the best way to improve your rank is to have a strategic and thoughtful strategy to Google Ads where you're running the best quality Google ads.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_01: The higher quality Google ad campaigns you're running, the more sales you're gonna get on Amazon.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_01: The more sales you get on Amazon, the higher your rank is gonna be, right?
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_01: So we always talk to our brands when we onboard them is yes, the impact on rank is part of the ROI of running Google Ads, but it's not just throw some Google campaigns on and hope to see your rank spike the next day, right?
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_01: You need to be thoughtful, you need to be strategic about it and um and bring in the right customers.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_01: So the better quality Google ads you have, the more add to cards and conversions you're gonna get and in engagement with your products on Amazon.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_01: And that's what the ranking algorithm likes.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_01: They like that engagement, they like those add to cards, they definitely like those conversions.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_01: So it's super, super important.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_01: Like, yes, look at rank, but it's not as simple as just turn on Google and next day you're gonna be ranked on page one.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_00: Man, I wish it was that easy.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_00: And you're absolutely right.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_00: There are so many indicators, you know, uh, how your fulfillment is, what your price point is.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_00: So uh it's no wonder uh I could see how people would think if I dump more money in it, it would lead to more sales and how that could be um kind of confusing.
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_00: Uh on that note, how important is it for a brand to drive external traffic to platforms like Amazon and Walmart?
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I I obviously think it's very important.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_01: I'm biased, of course, but I think it's important for the right stage of growth for a customer or for a brand on Amazon.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_01: If you're just getting started on Amazon, your whole focus should be on Amazon, right?
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_01: Like you need to get your conversion rates running, you need to get Amazon sponsored ads running, you need to fill the bottom of the funnel first.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_01: Google ads sits in the middle of the funnel, right?
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_01: So if you think about you know filling up your pool, right?
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_01: You need to fill up the bottom first.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_01: Once you fill that up and you're starting to max that out, now you can start supplementing and injecting more quality traffic from the middle of the funnel.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_01: So it's super, super important to where I think a lot of brands should be doing Google to Amazon.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_01: I also think a lot of brands are not quite ready to do Google to Amazon.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_01: So it's important to think where are you at in the stage of your brand's growth to kind of start to think about bringing it in.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_01: The other side of it, too, is the product.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_01: Um brands that have the most success with us are um uh consumables and like CPG type brands to where there's that repeat purchase rate.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_01: Now, the repeat purchase rate is super, super important for brands who then go out to Google.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_01: The way I kind of describe it is on Amazon, you you're fishing in the same pond over and over again.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_01: So with sponsored ads, your ROAS is always gonna be great, right?
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_01: Because most likely you you get a customer, they buy, they're gonna search Amazon again, find your product, buy it again, and you're gonna catch the same fish over and over again.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_01: If you have a product with that kind of repeat purchase rate, you have to get new to brand customers.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_01: That's when you can go to the next pond over, which is Google, fish in that pond, bring them into Amazon.
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, with Google, we see on average a 72% new to brand rate.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_01: It's different for different products and categories, but that's such a key metric.
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_01: And I think what's interesting is you do not get new to brand as a metric on Amazon sponsored ads.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, why do we adds?
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_01: There's probably a reason Amazon doesn't show you that uh because it's probably pretty low, right?
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_01: So Google presents a great opportunity to find new customers, bring them in, and if they buy over and over again, all of a sudden, maybe you're not profitable on that first purchase, but if you know they're going to buy second and a third time, that's when our brands are able to really drive profitable uh Google campaigns.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: That's beautiful.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_00: I, you know, I love hearing the full funnel, and that's a like a common conversation we have on the agency end.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_00: It's when we've saturated the PPC market, and it's like, well, what can we do next?
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_00: And a lot of that conversation is like, we need to go to other ponds to use your analogy because we need to start getting those new to brand acquisitions over.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_00: So that's really smart.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_00: And you mentioned like it's it's not right for every type of brand.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_00: Uh if you don't mind, what are some indicators that a brand should consider where it's like, okay, I I think we may be ready to start tapping into uh Google traffic?
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, there's two important ones that I always point to.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_01: First off, is does your product have a like a certain aesthetic or a personal decision in it?
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_01: So think about like a like a piece of art, right?
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_01: Like maybe you sell a poster.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_01: Uh people are searching Google for posters, right?
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_01: But if you get a text out on Google, you don't see what the product looks like.
• 9:44
  SPEAKER_01: So you're gonna click on the ad, you're gonna search Google for poster for my house, you're gonna click on the ad, and then you're gonna land and go, oh, that doesn't fit my aesthetic.
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's hit or miss.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe it does, but probably doesn't, right?
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_01: Because you you have that aesthetic, that personal buying factor into it.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_01: So those types of products are really difficult.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_01: They can work very well on Amazon because you search poster on Amazon, you see all the pictures, right?
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_01: And you're getting qualified before you click on the ad.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_01: So Google, those kind of products are a lot more difficult.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and then the other side is price of the product or lifetime value of the product to the CPC.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_01: So if your CPCs on Google are going to be a dollar and you sell a product for$20, that delta is big enough to where a decent conversion rate can bring in really profitable customers.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_01: If on the other hand, you sell a$5 product and your CPCs are two or three dollars per click on Google, unless these customers are buying that product 20 times in a year, you're just not gonna have a delta between the cost per click and uh the price of the product or the lifetime value of the product.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_01: So those are the two main things that we always look at when we kind of educate and talk to brands on whether or not Google is the right channel for them.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_00: Beautiful.
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_00: That uh that makes a ton of sense.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_00: To your point, very we noticed this on Amazon, like products that are very subjective.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_00: You get a lot of window shoppers.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_00: And of course, to your point, does it match my decor?
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_00: Like there's a lot of uh variable factors that lead into that type of purchasing decision.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_00: And of course, I mean, that's a why uh the pricing and the lifetime value.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_00: That's why Amazon has programs like the small and light program, because they're aware for you know small items that might be one-time purchase that are relatively inexpensive.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_00: It's tough to market and advertise those types of products.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_00: So that that really resonates.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_00: So on that note, we we kind of understand how it works.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, I didn't uh I just want to take a second.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: Can you explain the concept of attribution for some of our listeners who just might not be familiar with that concept and how it applies to uh marketplaces?
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_01: So Amazon Attribution is a program that Amazon rolled out, geez, like five years ago now.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_01: It's been a while.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, it's still in beta.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, so Amazon moves pretty slowly.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but it's very, very helpful.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_01: And what it allows brands to do is they can go into their Amazon ads um UI, right?
• 12:19
  SPEAKER_01: They're and they can go into the campaign manager and they can go to attribution.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_01: And what this allows you to do is it allows you to create a tag in Amazon and then you can go apply it to your external traffic.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_01: So whether it's Meta, whether it's uh TikTok, whether it's emails, if you want to do emails and send your email list to your Amazon listing, you can put that tag onto that campaign and then you can look in Amazon and see how many add-to-carts, how many conversions, how much revenue did that tag generate for you.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_01: Now it's pretty straightforward with something like Facebook or email to where it's kind of a campaign and that's it.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_01: But for Google, it's much more complex because it's not just a campaign that you have to tag.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_01: You have to tag every single keyword so you know what keywords are actually converting on Google.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_01: That's why you really need an automated solution to automatically apply Amazon attribution.
• 13:16
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's where our company comes in is AMP.
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_01: We don't actually create attribution, we piggyback off of Amazon's attribution program, automate the tagging at campaign and keyword level, and then stitch it all together.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, so Amazon attribution is a great, great tool.
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_01: There are ways to where brands can do attribution without AMPT or solution like AMP, but it's super, super manual and the data is gonna be siloed between platforms.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_01: So it makes it easy when I talk about this stuff, right?
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_01: It's hey, like go ahead, try it.
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_01: You know, like there's ways to do this manually.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_01: You're not gonna want to, right?
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_01: You're probably gonna want an automated solution for it.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and then of course, on top of that, you're you're gonna need bid strategies and and whatnot to run the right campaigns, which if you if you know what you're doing in Google and you know what you're doing on Amazon, you can do that as well.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_00: Beautiful.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, from somebody who's been a professional advertiser for over a decade and started with Google before went to Amazon, that is super tedious.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_00: That like I couldn't imagine having you know a 50 skew catalog and having to have all those keywords indexed, get all the data for reporting, and then take the actionable insights and apply it.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_00: It's just a lot of data moving around.
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_00: So I could definitely see the value at AMP and having an interface and having that really all organized for a seller so that they could be more efficient with their advertising budgets.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, you did mention a lot, and I'd love for just dive in a little deeper.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_00: What are some key metrics that sellers should consider and monitor when using uh off Amazon like Google to drive traffic to their pages?
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, the biggest metric I always talk to my clients about is add-de-cart rate because you're injecting traffic into the middle of the funnel, and Google, by nature, you're engaging a customer in their research phase of their journey.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_01: Whereas on Amazon ads or even Walmart ads, you're engaging customers at the bottom of their journey, right?
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_01: There's crazy stats of if someone searches something on Amazon, I think it's like 75% chance they're going to buy that day or something like that.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_01: And with Google, they're not buying that day, right?
• 15:23
  SPEAKER_01: Like think when was the last time you Googled something, right?
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_01: You Googled it to kind of start your research process.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_01: You kind of poked around on some different blogs, you kind of read different price points, right?
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_01: So when brands engage on Google, oftentimes the conversion doesn't happen right away, but it can still happen down the road.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, so I always talk to my brands about add-to-carts because that's an engagement metric that indicates the quality of traffic that you're bringing in.
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_01: If you have a high add-to-cart rate, you know, seven, eight, nine, 10%, 15%, meaning like what?
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_01: That'd be like one in every 10 clicks is saying, oh, I like that product.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_01: That's definitely helping that retail flywheel.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_01: That's showing Amazon those engagement rates that they care about for their ranking algorithm.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_01: But then also you can just kind of apply that.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_01: If someone adds it to cart, like people don't just add to cart on Amazon for the fun of it.
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_01: It there's a chance they're going to come back and buy it.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_01: I do it all the time.
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_01: I'll be on my phone, I'll add something to cart, and then a week or two later, I'll come in and go, actually, I did need that, right?
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_01: And I'll complete it on my laptop or whatnot.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_01: So I talk to brands a lot about add to carts and that add-to-cart rate to understand the quality.
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_01: Of course, conversions and revenue does matter, right?
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but it's going to be different than on Amazon because with Google, the other metric is new to brand, right?
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_01: So you don't get new to brand metric on Amazon sponsored ads, you do on Google.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_01: So if you have a lifetime value, you know, a cost and return ad spend isn't the right metric.
• 16:52
  SPEAKER_01: You want to be thinking cost per acquisition.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_01: So looking at those add-cards, looking at those conversion rates, looking at the repeat purchase rate that you get from these new to brand customers.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_00: Beautiful.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_00: Well said.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_00: And what I really like there is like identifying that when somebody, you're absolutely right, when somebody searches on Google, they're in the research phase.
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm totally guilty of shopping around for months, just researching something, especially like the higher price point an item, the more research that goes into it.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_00: So, with that, you know, understanding shopper intent and where Google falls, like where is your ads any different?
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_00: Is the messaging any different?
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_00: Do you drive right to Amazon or is there like an educational page that links up?
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I guess could you explain a little bit of how you use that to inform your campaigns and your strategy?
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_01: For sure.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_01: So to answer that first part, there is sending it straight to Amazon is what you want to do.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, we get it asked all the time.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_01: Like, what about sending it to a squeeze page?
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, maybe I can collect their email and all that stuff.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_01: We tested that thoroughly.
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_01: Um, it does work to an extent, but it dilutes the power of sending it straight to Amazon, right?
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_01: When you send it straight to Amazon, there's that flywheel effect, there's the impact on ranking that can happen when you get that customer engagement.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_01: If you send it to a squeeze page, you're the the bounce rate's very high.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_01: Someone searches Google for baby crib and they get a weird landing page that maybe looks okay, but they're unused to it, right?
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_01: Uh they're gonna bounce, right?
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_01: And so we always send it straight to Amazon.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, what we do always recommend though is Amazon storefronts.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_01: Storefronts with Amazon are a perfect spot to send the traffic to because uh for three reasons.
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_01: First off, it allows you to highlight your brand in ways that your PDP page does not.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, the second reason is there's no competition, so it improves your conversion rates by about two to three X is what we see when we run our campaigns and we've done A-B testing on it.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_01: And then, furthermore, you're able to really educate that customer.
• 18:53
  SPEAKER_01: So think about a PDP page, right?
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_01: You have the product up top, you have the add to cart button right there, and then what's right below it, you have competition and you've got the carousel of competition.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_01: And then below that, you have all your A plus content.
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_01: So consumers don't really see that A plus content as much as you'd like them to.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_01: They look at your product, they scroll down, they probably are getting distracted by another customer, another product.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_01: With your storefront, you can replicate that page.
• 19:20
  SPEAKER_01: It's called a product section.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_01: So you can put a product section at the top, which pulls in everything from your PDP page.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_01: It pulls in all your bullet points, all your headlines, all your images, and the add to cart button.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_01: And so you put that right at the top above the fold, and then right below it, you just put your A plus content.
• 19:38
  SPEAKER_01: So all your selling points, all your features and benefits, all that good stuff.
• 19:41
  SPEAKER_01: And it basically replicates the PDP page.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_01: Same buying experience for a customer, except it removes all the competition that can be distracting.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_01: So storefronts are a phenomenal place to send external traffic to.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_00: That's beautiful.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_00: That's what I was I was thinking as you were talking.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_00: Like, do you drive it to a PDP with all that uh competition and all those ads or write to a storefront?
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_00: So when you're building these storefront pages, do you typically segment by category, by keywords, by product type?
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_00: Like how should a seller think about organizing their storefront in a way that's more, you know, still good for the user experience, but is more tailored towards advertising campaigns?
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_01: And the simple answer is if you have a brand.com site, you can basically replicate your brand.com site within Amazon.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_01: So typically it's categories, and then within categories, you've got individual product pages.
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, a very clean example is like pretty much, well, maybe not everyone, but Nike.com, right?
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_01: You're gonna have all the categories running shoes, tennis shoes, basketball shoes, et cetera, at the top.
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_01: And then when you hover over it, it gives you the drop down to go, I don't know, white shoes, brown shoes, yellow shoes, right?
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_01: And then you can get even further sub pages where you're able to get into, you know, different court styles or all that stuff.
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_01: So that's what we recommend is breaking out category and then sub pages.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_01: And really each product should have their own subpage if you're really building out your site.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and what Amazon's done with their storefronts is really phenomenal because you're basically be able to replicate a Shopify site, but within Amazon and get Amazon's conversion rates.
• 21:25
  SPEAKER_01: So um, there's lots of great examples.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_01: We've got a bunch on our website that we we recommend.
• 21:29
  SPEAKER_01: We don't actually build storefronts uh because we're we're a tech platform, but we always kind of point brands to like, hey, here's a design, just replicate this.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, copy this.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_00: And now no, AMP.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_00: So we drive to the storefront, and I know the storefront has its own data, like it has its own performance and metrics.
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_00: Does AMP take both the uh you does your platform take that storefront data on top of the Google data and is able to kind of combine it all into something useful that a brand could use to make informative.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: Strategic decisions?
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_01: We don't.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_01: We toyed around with it, but the API access just isn't super clean for us to get that data.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_01: But I do know some of my brands will look at that to where they can look at clicks and pages and they can see how customers are interacting with the site.
• 22:18
  SPEAKER_01: There's lots of great metrics, and you can even put storefront tagging onto your AMP campaign.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_01: So you can kind of feed in uh different campaign structures and naming conventions into that analytics on storefronts, but it's not an area that we do automatically or do too often.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_01: But there is some cool stuff that you can do with the storefront analytics.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_00: Beautiful.
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_00: At least they're on the back end.
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_00: So just because they're not there doesn't mean you can't check on them and just see what's there.
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I'd love to get uh just a really successful story from me.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_00: I love stories.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_00: So I'd love to hear so if you can describe to me maybe typical or a specific brand, feel free to mention them with a category.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_00: Like they came to you with this problem, you guys were able to do X, Y, and Z, and this brand saw these great results.
• 23:05
  SPEAKER_00: Do you have anything you could share?
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, for sure, for sure.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_01: Um, one of my comp companies is a supplement company, and what they've done really effectively is first off, they know what their lifetime value is, they know what their repeat purchase rate is for their customer.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_01: And so what they're actually optimizing with on Google is understanding the new to brand number that we're able to provide and understanding that their customers on average purchase three times in a year.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and then that's what Amazon gives you.
• 23:35
  SPEAKER_01: They give repeat purchase rate for a year.
• 23:37
  SPEAKER_01: You can extrapolate that out to what that means for year two and year three, right?
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_01: But just one year, they know on average it's three times per year.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_01: So what that allows them to do is it allows them to be more aggressive on Google with their bid strategy so that they can um they're not profitable on their first conversion.
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_01: Their ACOS and their return ad spend is is not profitable on the first conversion, but they know on that second and third one it is.
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_01: Uh the other thing that they do very effectively is their on Amazon strategy is rock solid.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_01: And what I mean by that is they're doing sponsored ads, they're doing um DSP retargeting, they're doing display retargeting, and they know when they get a customer engaging that they're going to stay top of mind.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_01: They're going to bring that customer back and nurture them through.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_01: And eventually they're they know the conversion rates or what they're going to convert that customer on.
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_01: So even if a customer, a potential customer lands on the page today and it adds it to cart but doesn't convert, they see that ad to cart and they are able to put a model on it of going, we know that we're going to convert 85% of everyone that adds to cart, right?
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_01: And when they know that kind of data and they know what they're on Amazon retargeting does for them, all of a sudden now they're even more aggressive on Google and they're more aggressive on their Amazon strategy to engage customers, bring them into the funnel, knowing that everything at the bottom of the funnel is gonna convert them.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_00: That's beautiful.
• 25:03
  SPEAKER_00: Sounds like a really intelligent brand you're working with.
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_00: The fact that they have all that information on hand, and those are always the best uh type of situations when you know, hey, for every dollar I put in, I'm seeing three out.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_00: It makes it really easy to get more investment and uh be able to leverage technologies like AMP and off Amazon or Google, Google search to Amazon.
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_00: Uh on that note, I'd love to dive in a little bit more about AMP and talk about uh the platform.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_00: So can you give me just a quick overview of the uh of AMPT and your mission?
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, uh we're all about shortening the path to conversion uh for consumers.
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_01: And what that means is when people go to Google to start their research phase, we want to get them to the point of purchase as quickly as possible.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_01: So instead of a customer going to Google, searching for products like yours, bouncing around a brand.com, bouncing around through Amazon, and then eventually converting several weeks later, we want to, when they ask for something on Google, we want to send them directly to the point of purchase, which is usually Amazon.com or Walmart.com, right?
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_01: Or in-store on Walmart, of course.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_01: We want to get them right to that point of purchase.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_01: And we've built this technology platform to enable brands to engage their customers that way.
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, so with this platform, it connects Google ads and Amazon, stitches it all together, and then applies auto bidding to maximize for conversions within our platform.
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_01: So it's uh it's the attribution uh data pipelining, but then intelligent bidding on top of it to really optimize for performance over time.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_01: Additionally, we're launching a closed uh beta for Walmart as well, in partnership with Walmart, actually, to where we're gonna be able to replicate our Google ads to Amazon strategy and allow brands selling at Walmart to do the same thing with attribution and with the intelligent bidding strategy that we've built into our platform.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_00: That's absolutely amazing.
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_00: And I love to hear that you guys are on Walmart as well.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, we also do Walmart as a service, and there is a lot of attention coming around Walmart.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_00: They're picking up market share in terms of e-commerce.
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm pumped to see some technology companies getting involved because there is still a lot to be desired on the Walmart platform.
• 27:19
  SPEAKER_00: Um, what are some of the key features that you're most proud of that that you want to talk about when it comes to using AMP?
• 27:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think it's our intelligent bidding.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, we call it AMP predictive bid manager.
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_01: And what it does is because you can't put Amazon conversion data into Google Ads or Walmart conversion data into Google Ads for that matter, uh, we had to create our own bid strategy.
• 27:45
  SPEAKER_01: Every no brand wants to do manual bidding.
• 27:47
  SPEAKER_01: No one wants to sit there and kind of adjust bids every single day and analyze the impact and then readjust the next day, right?
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so what we did is we essentially looked at Google and they have bid strategies like T ROAS and maximize for conversions.
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_01: And we said, okay, we can't leverage those when sending Google to marketplaces because Google needs conversion data for that.
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_01: But we have all the Google data, we have all the conversion data.
• 28:12
  SPEAKER_01: Why don't we replicate that?
• 28:14
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so we create this predictive bid management system that's constantly analyzing uh historical performance, modeling out future performance, and then adjusting bids to hit those targets.
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_01: So our brands, when they launch their campaigns and they go through their learning period, they can then set goals.
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_01: So they can say, hey, my customer acquisitions X.
• 28:34
  SPEAKER_01: So that means I need a Y ACOS or Y retraw and ad spend.
• 28:39
  SPEAKER_01: And they they literally input that into AMP, and then AMP is going to constantly be adjusting for that.
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_01: But then even further, AMP also models out at that ACOS, what projected revenue will we be able to get?
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_01: How much are we going to be able to spend?
• 28:54
  SPEAKER_01: And so brand can say, okay, based on AMP's models, and there's visuals for it, I can get a 10% A cost and that will produce$3,000 in revenue this month.
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_01: Or I could loosen that threshold and I'll shoot for a 40% A cost, and that means I can get$12,000 in net new revenue.
• 29:13
  SPEAKER_01: So it allows brands to be very strategic in setting their goals and understanding what that's going to produce.
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_01: Obviously, if you have stricter ACOS goals, you're going to get less new customers, less revenue, less growth.
• 29:25
  SPEAKER_01: If you have looser ACOS goals, you're going to really be able to drive growth.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_01: So our modeling is able to give brands insight into what the bids are going to actually end up producing for their growth strategy.
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_00: That sounds amazing.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_00: I love the modeling.
• 29:40
  SPEAKER_00: The predictive analytics is really uh nice to hear.
• 29:43
  SPEAKER_00: And I could tell you somebody who does a lot of ad budgets, understanding what that point of diminishing returns is.
• 29:49
  SPEAKER_00: And I think we could safely say with AI and all the technology that the days of manually managing and bidding campaigns are kind of going the way of the dodo.
• 29:59
  SPEAKER_00: And uh there's a lot more software and innovation happening in the space, which is really exciting to see.
• 30:05
  SPEAKER_00: Um, on that note, I like to kind of end these shows talking about the future of e-commerce.
• 30:09
  SPEAKER_00: So uh I have two general questions I'd love to get your insights on, Tyler.
• 30:13
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, first, what trends do you see shaping the future of e-com, particularly in relation to traffic and attribution?
• 30:21
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I I'm so curious to see where Walmart goes.
• 30:26
  SPEAKER_01: Um I think it's gonna be so good for the marketplace or for consumers and also for brand selling to have a second marketplace that's very viable for consumers to purchase from, right?
• 30:39
  SPEAKER_01: Like right now, I mean, Amazon dominates it, right?
• 30:43
  SPEAKER_01: And that allows Amazon to do is you know, raise their seller fees, really have a lot of control.
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_01: And we can get uh if Walmart can get up to speed here and have a you know two-day shipping, really reliable products and all that good stuff nationwide.
• 30:59
  SPEAKER_01: All of a sudden, if you have two marketplaces competing, I think that's gonna be great for brands selling on those marketplaces and also great for consumers buying from them to have two viable options that can deliver products and goods that they need and that they need in two days, right?
• 31:15
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so I'm super, super keen to see what Walmart does in the coming years.
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_01: Um, it they've got a long way to go for sure.
• 31:23
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but they also have a lot of great resources to cover that ground.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, the the obvious fact that they have the distribution centers already with their physical stores is super, super intriguing to what that's gonna mean for how they grow and how they can deliver to consumers.
• 31:43
  SPEAKER_00: Very insightful.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I agree, a little competition I think is gonna be great for everyone, especially in the last, geez, I'll say six months.
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_00: We're recording this at uh in May, give or take.
• 31:53
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and just the fees that they're tacking on with uh with these sellers and uh a lot of and rightfully so, they're outraged.
• 32:00
  SPEAKER_00: So uh so it's no surprise that Walmart gaining some ground will uh will shake things up a bit.
• 32:07
  SPEAKER_00: Uh my last question for you, and I know you do Google, you're a Google guy.
• 32:11
  SPEAKER_00: How do you envision the future of Google changing with AI, search, and even advertising?
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, uh it's gonna be interesting.
• 32:20
  SPEAKER_01: You know, it's something that we think about a lot internally.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_01: Um obviously like chat GPT coming out, and there could be a play there and a competitor there as well.
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's super interesting.
• 32:30
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, consumers are always going to be searching and doing their research um beyond the marketplace, right?
• 32:37
  SPEAKER_01: No matter where Walmart shakes out and their plan to go digital um and where Amazon goes in the coming years, uh, consumers are always going to be searching elsewhere to get informed.
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_01: So we're we're we're curious.
• 32:51
  SPEAKER_01: We're we're not 100% sure obviously where it's going, but uh we're definitely excited to see how it develops, what Chat GBT means, what even Google Bard means for our search results going forward.
• 33:03
  SPEAKER_01: So it's certainly going to be uh interesting to watch in these coming years.
• 33:07
  SPEAKER_00: Uh on the cutting edge, it's always a fun place to be.
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_00: Uh Tyler, I can't thank you enough for being a guest.
• 33:12
  SPEAKER_00: There are tons of value bombs in here from understanding when and who is right uh for using Google to drive external traffic, but also the context of how to do it, some strategies around it.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_00: So I can't thank you enough for taking the time.
• 33:25
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, if you can, please tell the listeners where to find you.
• 33:29
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks so much for having me on today.
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_01: Well, it's been a blast.
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_01: Always fun chatting.
• 33:34
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, if anyone's interested in getting in touch with us, uh you can head over to amped.io.
• 33:38
  SPEAKER_01: That is ampd.io.
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_01: Uh or shoot me an email.
• 33:43
  SPEAKER_01: Uh Tyler atamped.io.
• 33:45
  SPEAKER_01: Uh works great.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_01: Just put in the subject line that you heard me through uh the Bellavics podcast here.
• 33:51
  SPEAKER_01: And I will hopefully see that email and get back to you uh shortly.
• 33:55
  SPEAKER_00: Awesome.
• 33:56
  SPEAKER_00: Well, you guys knew where to find.
• 33:57
  SPEAKER_00: Check out Tyler at amp.io.
• 34:00
  SPEAKER_00: Tyler, once again, thank you for being part of this show.
• 34:04
  SPEAKER_01: Awesome.
• 34:04
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks, Well.
• 34:05
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for tuning in to this episode of Selling on Giants.
• 34:09
  SPEAKER_00: I hope you found our conversation with Tyler Gregg as enlightening as I did.
• 34:13
  SPEAKER_00: My biggest takeaways was understanding where Google shoppers fall in their journey and recognizing the right time for businesses to leverage external traffic to their Amazon or Walmart pages.
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_00: Tyler was a great guest.
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_00: He provided practical advice on how to set these campaigns up, different strategies to consider depending on your maturity and why this approach is a game changer for brands operating on marketplaces.
• 34:37
  SPEAKER_00: If you're looking to grow your brand and optimize your external traffic strategies, this episode's for you.
• 34:43
  SPEAKER_00: If you enjoyed this episode, please leave a review wherever you listen to your podcast.
• 34:48
  SPEAKER_00: Or if you're tuning in online, please leave us a comment.
• 34:51
  SPEAKER_00: Your feedback helps us bring more valuable content to you.
• 34:54
  SPEAKER_00: And remember to subscribe to our podcast for more expert interviews and actionable tips to help you succeed in the e commerce world.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you again for listening, and we'll see you next time on Selling on Giants.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_00: Stay classy, people.