Every Sponsored Products campaign starts with one choice: let Amazon pick where your ad shows (automatic targeting) or pick the keywords and products yourself (manual targeting). Sellers often treat it as either-or. It works much better as a system, where the auto campaign finds new search terms and the manual campaigns spend money on the ones that have already proven they sell. This guide explains the difference and how to run the two together.

Key Takeaways

  • Automatic campaigns let Amazon match your ad to searches and product pages based on your listing. Manual campaigns run only on the keywords and products you choose.
  • Auto campaigns have four targeting groups (close match, loose match, substitutes, complements) and you can bid on each one separately.
  • The targeting type is fixed once a campaign is live. To switch, you create a new campaign.
  • Use auto to discover, manual to scale, and negative targeting to stop the two from competing for the same search.
  • Give any change at least one to two weeks of data before judging it.

The Basic Difference

In an automatic campaign you upload no keywords. Amazon reads your product listing and past shopping behaviour and decides which searches and product pages your ad is relevant to. It is quick to launch, and it often finds search terms you would never have thought of.

In a manual campaign you supply the targets: keywords with a match type, or specific products and categories. Nothing runs that you didn't add. That gives you control over bids at the level of each keyword or ASIN, which is where profit is won or lost.

Automatic

Fast to set up, wide reach, good for discovery. Less control over where spend goes, so it needs regular search term checks.

Manual keyword

You choose keywords in broad, phrase or exact match and set a bid for each. Best for scaling terms that already convert.

Manual product

You target competitor ASINs, your own ASINs or whole categories. Useful for defending your listings and conquesting rivals.

One rule catches many sellers out: Amazon does not let you change a live campaign from auto to manual or back. If you want a different targeting type, you build a new campaign. For a refresher on where Sponsored Products sits among Amazon's ad types, see Amazon PPC explained.

The Four Auto Targeting Groups

An automatic campaign is really four campaigns under one roof. Amazon splits its matching into four groups, and you can set a separate bid on each.

GroupWhere your ad can showTypical use
Close matchSearches closely related to your productUsually the most relevant traffic; often the best converter
Loose matchSearches only loosely related to your productWider discovery; watch spend closely
SubstitutesDetail pages of products similar to yoursShowing up as an alternative to competitors
ComplementsDetail pages of products that go with yoursCross-sell placements, often lower intent

Most auto campaigns are launched with one default bid across all four groups, which hides very different results. After a couple of weeks, look at each group's ACOS and conversion rate. It is common for one group to carry the campaign while another mostly spends. Lower the bid on the weak group or pause it, and raise the bid on the group that converts.

How Manual Campaigns Work

Manual keyword targeting uses three match types, from widest to narrowest:

  • Broad: the search can include your words in any order, plus plurals, synonyms and related terms. Good for finding variations.
  • Phrase: the search must contain your words in the same order, with other words before or after.
  • Exact: the search must match your keyword word for word (plurals included). The most restrictive, and Amazon notes it tends to convert best.

Amazon's own guidance is to test all three for a keyword, with the highest bid on exact, a lower bid on phrase and the lowest on broad. Product targeting works the same way but with ASINs and categories instead of words, and lets you refine by brand, price, rating or Prime eligibility.

Running Auto and Manual Together

The strongest setups use both. Here is a simple routine you can follow.

01

Launch auto first

Start one auto campaign per product or close product group. Amazon suggests letting it run about two weeks before building manual campaigns, so you have real search term data.

02

Mine the search term report

Download the search term report for the auto campaign. Look for terms and ASINs that produced orders at an acceptable ACOS, and terms that spent without selling.

03

Promote winners to manual

Add proven search terms to a manual exact campaign and proven ASINs to a manual product campaign, with bids set from what they actually earned.

04

Negate them in auto

Add each promoted term as a negative exact keyword in the auto campaign, so the manual campaign gets that traffic at the bid you chose.

05

Cut the waste

Terms that spent with no sales get added as negatives too. Our Amazon negative keywords guide covers how to do this safely.

06

Repeat every week or two

The auto campaign keeps finding new terms while the manual campaigns grow. Review on a schedule rather than whenever you remember.

Why negate promoted terms?

If the same search term is live in both your auto and your manual campaign, Amazon decides which one serves it, and it may not be the one with the bid you intended. Negating the term in auto keeps each search in one place and makes your reports easier to read.

Setting Bids and Budgets

Bids in an auto campaign are a guess at first, because you don't yet know which searches you'll get. Start moderate, then adjust each targeting group once data comes in. Manual campaigns deserve more precise bids, because each keyword has its own history.

  • Pick a bidding strategy per campaign. Amazon suggests "dynamic bids, up and down" when you want to push sales and "dynamic bids, down only" when protecting return on ad spend. We compare the options in Amazon PPC bidding strategies explained.
  • Keep discovery budgets smaller than scaling budgets. Auto campaigns are there to find terms, not to carry most of your spend.
  • Remember daily budgets aren't evenly paced through the day, so a low budget can run out early on busy days.
  • Judge results against a target you've set in advance. If you are not sure what a healthy number looks like, read ACOS vs TACOS: what is a good ACOS on Amazon.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

  • Running only auto. It works for a launch, but without manual campaigns you can't put more money behind the terms that sell.
  • Running only manual. You stop discovering new searches, and the account slowly loses reach as shopper language changes.
  • One bid for all four auto groups. It treats close match and complements as if they were worth the same, which they rarely are.
  • Judging too early. A few days of clicks is noise. Amazon recommends at least one to two weeks of testing before pausing keywords.
  • Mixing products with different prices in one ad group. Bids apply to every product in the ad group, so group items with similar prices and margins.

References

  1. Amazon Ads, A simple guide to effective targeting with Sponsored Products
  2. Amazon Ads, Sponsored Products overview

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