Advertising has become an essential promotion method for sellers on eBay, Etsy, and Amazon

Today, it’s not enough to simply list an item on eBay, Etsy or Amazon and hope it gets seen by shoppers. Not only does your listing compete with many competitor listings, but it also competes with promoted listings (paid ads). Do sellers now need to pay for ads to get their listings listed on top of the fees they’re already charged for listing on the marketplace?

A report from Kenshoo found that e-commerce ad spending grew 54% year-over-year in the third quarter of 2019. Kenshoo's Quarterly Trends Report, which details the performance of social, paid search, and e-commerce advertising, found that targeted promotions saw an increase in July, with ad spending by the same advertisers being almost identical to November of the previous year.

As e-commerce advertising becomes increasingly competitive, we spoke with Margo Kahnrose, SVP of Marketing at Kenshoo, to learn more and find out what marketplace sellers should know about Marketplace Promoted Products Ads.

Sponsored and promoted listings have made search results pages on major marketplaces more competitive than in the past, Kahnrose said. “Any advantage that once went to a well-known brand or traditional relationship is now essentially out there in the bidding.”

To break through the noise, sellers must become well-versed in advertising in e-commerce channels and adopt more sophisticated marketing strategies that not only lead to the point of purchase but also intervene and engage customers on the spot, she said.

“The marketplace provides tremendous benefits to sellers who are able to hack better engagement strategies with platforms like Amazon.”

However, Carnroth warns that marketers must measure the results of their campaigns. "As with any new channel or publisher, they should be careful to track their learnings as they go; incrementality testing is a great way to test and measure the effectiveness of new investments or strategies."

But this may be easier said than done. We’ve heard from sellers who say they can’t effectively measure the effectiveness of Promoted Product ads on their online marketplaces.

Etsy has further muddied the waters by combining Promoted Listings ads on its marketplace with Google Ads under a program it calls Etsy Ads.

We asked Kahnrose how frustrating it is for sellers to not have control over the volume per bucket (Etsy ads or Google Ads)?

“More and more major e-commerce marketplaces are taking note of Amazon’s success in advertising and are thinking about how to learn from it to better serve the brands they sell while increasing their profit opportunities.

“We’re definitely starting to see this approach in the market, and it makes sense to leverage existing ad tech and inventory from companies like Google to support nascent products.

“However, we are also seeing a trend among marketers who want greater control over their ad spend and greater transparency into how it is managed.

Success depends on sites being able to provide advertisers with unbiased, accurate measurement and reporting, and advertisers being able to translate data into actionable insights. This is the only way for merchants to truly understand new channels like marketplace PLAs within the context of the broader marketing mix, which is critical to confident and sustained adoption of new ad products.”

Sellers often turn to social channels to increase visibility, and even there, merchants are increasingly turning to advertising. Kenshoo’s Q3 2019 Quarterly Trends Report found that social spending increased 32% year-over-year and 4% quarter-over-quarter.

Pinterest has been popular with small online sellers from the start because it’s a convenient and free way to reach shoppers. But Kenshoo found that monthly ad spending on Pinterest has increased by nearly 30% over the past six months.

Kenshoo is studying these trends because it’s at the forefront – its marketing solutions provide data-driven insights and optimization technology to help clients on Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Pinterest, Snapchat, Instagram, Amazon, Apple Search Ads, Verizon Media, Yandex, Yahoo Japan, and Baidu.

Margo Kahnrose, who currently leads demand generation, brand and communications for Kenshoo globally and has more than 15 years of experience in marketing, brand, communications and creative, said the company enables advertisers to proactively manage a variety of ad types, including Google Shopping ads, and helps advertisers manage shopping ads on other top publishers, including Facebook.

Its clients, mind you, are high-volume advertisers. “Brands and agencies that manage large digital ad spend across search, social and e-commerce media are a great fit for Kenshoo,” she explains.

But sellers of all sizes can find its research useful – Kenshoo publishes its trend reports every quarter – and you can find them on the Kenshoo website.

Another guide that may be useful to sellers is titled “To Win at Amazon Advertising, You Must Think Like Amazon” and is available for download from this page on the Kenshoo website.