Welcome to the eCommerce Podcast with me, your host, Matt Edmundson. This is a show all about helping you deliver ecommerce. Wow. And to help me do just that today, we're chatting with Will Hare from Bellevix about how we do advertising on marketplace platforms like Amazon. Yes, we are. And we were just chatting, actually. That's why he called me mid laughing when we started the recording. Uh, it turns out he's from Raleigh, North Carolina, which I think Colby Flood is from, uh, there.
So I've just introduced those two. If you're from Raleigh, North Carolina, give him a shout out. Uh, Colby was on the podcast a while ago, actually, uh, Facebook ads a long time ago, but, um, yeah, go listen to that episode. It was great as well. Now, before we get into it, let me do the usual newsletter. If you haven't done so already, go to ecommercepodcast.net. Come join our newsletter community. As we always give more in the newsletter and extra insights and all that sort of stuff.
And you'll love it. You're going to get a lot out of it. It's going to really help you grow your e com business. So come join us there. We'd love to see you in that. Just go to ecommercepodcast.net. Follow that. Subscribe link and you will see just a place where you put email, no name, nothing. We've made it so easy. Just go ahead. Uh, we'll see you over there. eCommerce Podcast. net right now.
Let's talk about Will, the ecommerce wizard and co founder of Belovix who's been helping brands crush it on Amazon and Walmart marketplace for over. A decade. The digital marketing virtuoso has turned Belovix into a powerhouse agency by mastering the art of marketplace strategy and showing brands how to turn their online presence into pure gold. Yes, he has. Well, welcome to the show, man. Great to have you. How are you doing today? Doing great, man. Living the dream.
And that is quite the intro.
Matter of fact, I think we can just end the interview here. Uh, I'll be signing off. That was wonderful. Matt Edmundson: Living the dream. Yeah, I, we, um, my brother and I. I'm sure we're not the only people on the planet to do this. We have abbreviated it to LTD. So when I call my brother, I'm like, how you doing, bro? He's like LTD. Cause we just can't be bothered to say live in the dream. Live in the dream. Yeah. Very military phrase. Yeah.
A little bit. And then also in the UK, LTD, um, means limited company. So it's uh, it's it's also a sort of a legal entity, but I I just boring. I don't know why you've mentioned it We should change that yeah
Yeah,
absolutely, absolutely, so how come you live in the dream man
I'm honestly truly blessed. I, uh, I run a boutique agency. We help brands, um, scale on marketplaces and I get to work with a lot of entrepreneurs like, uh, like myself, where we're kind of all over the place, but we're passionate about one thing. In my case, it's helping these brands, but these brands. Solve problems and supplement. They solve problems in beauty, electronic space, pet space, and they're fun. They're inventive.
Sometimes they're eccentric, but like interesting people tend to be eccentric. So with that being said, my days are never the same. I get to have great conversations with people like you met and share kind of what we've learned on the journey. We don't have everything down that it was a great introduction, but we're always learning. And as you, as you know, being in the ecommerce space, dude, things change. Like crazy.
Amazon did not operate the same way it did last year and with AI coming in like it's just changing so fast. So for somebody like me who loves to chase the shiny object, I haven't stopped running.
Yeah, it is so true and I think The thing that I've noticed is the people that stop learning, who feel like they've got it, they're not the ones that are around after a while. Um, because it just, it does change so much, um, the space in, in many ways. Uh, there's always new things to think about, nuances. And I think competition's an interesting one, isn't it? You know, you, you, you, especially with places like Amazon.
Um, and Walmart, which I know you, you specialize in, um, it feels like, and, and we'll correct me if I'm wrong here, but it, it kind of feels like Amazon is a lot more competitive than it has ever been. Yeah. If you want to get on there and start selling stuff, it's no longer a case of I can put it on. I'll sell a million of these because there's a hundred thousand other people importing the same products or doing something and trying to get that space.
So, which is why it's great to have you on the show. Cause I want to talk about this. I want to talk about how we as entrepreneurs of ecommerce businesses, probably doing some stuff on Amazon. Um, how do we compete? How do we, where do we start, um, in 2025?
Yeah, it's, uh, it's very competitive and to your point, like gone are the days where you could just list the product in a niche category and nobody's there. Like the, it's just, it does. It happens rarely. So rarely, like we don't really see it as much as an agency, but how do we compete? It's omnichannel presence in all transparency.
Amazon is only a piece of the puzzle, but we know behavior On social media behavior on your website, how you engage influencers and affiliates, they all spill over at the end of the day, Amazon has done a really good job of building a platform that has consumer trust. People go on there. They're going to read the reviews. If they can't find your product, it's kind of a red flag. Like, Oh, is it, is it even safe to buy?
And even worse are the brands that, uh, just let their, their affiliates run, run the show. It's like, uh, you know, uh, the, I don't know, the criminals running the asylum. That's the wrong analogy, but. Uh, that's what it is. So, uh, it's competitive and how do you get ahead? It's, it's marketing and brand building is a big part of it. And I wish it all happened on Amazon, but it doesn't, but Amazon is a piece. There is some building that goes on, but it's a pay to play platform.
So a lot of what we'll do and what we'll probably talk about is, um, how advertising plays and how retail media has changed over the last few years.
And that's the big thing now, isn't it? With Amazon, you've, you've got to pay to play. And I think. The thing that I've noticed, uh, I mean, just to come back to something that you said, actually, and, and I run an e com company, run several e com companies, as I've mentioned, one of which, uh, we do, we do okay on Amazon. I mean, we're not breaking any records. Um, but the thing that I've noticed with Amazon is, um, that famous phrase, a rising tide floats all boats, right?
Yeah. So the more I sell on the website, the more I seem to sell on Amazon, the more I sell on Amazon, the more I seem to sell on the website. The more I do stuff over here, do you mean it, it, it, my fear was with Amazon, if I start on that platform, I'm sending people who would have come to my website. So I would have known who the customer was. And then my margin, obviously on my own website is significantly higher than Amazon. Um, but that doesn't seem to have.
I mean, obviously if someone buys from Amazon, they're obviously not buying from my website, but the people that buy from Amazon, I don't know who they are, but I'm kind of guessing they don't, don't, they wouldn't have known about us anyway, you know? And so you, you kind of create that sense of brand awareness. I don't know if that's what you find, you know, this sort of this rising tide floats all boats idea.
Absolutely. It kind of hits into what I was talking before and what, what my hypothesis, and I read this in, um, man, modern retail published an article recently on it, um, and essentially like, uh, consumers value, convenience, uh, not only is it trusting, but it is convenient two day shipping, perhaps some of the same day shipping, which is insane, like the logistical network and Amazon build and the trust, like. It's part of people are willing to pay extra to get something in a day or two.
But yeah, the margins with all the fee hikes the last year, I mean, it's, it's borderline criminal, uh, but you know, it's the cost of operating and there's never, you know, cannibalization of, of sales. Sure. It can happen to some degree. Like it's really hard to get somebody to do a behavior, like taking them from Facebook and moving them to Amazon. You're just going to naturally. Lose people as there's more steps in the process.
Um, but they, to your point, they will find their way there, whether they're just checking it or seeing the better shipping times or all these other, um, considerations when they're, when they're on that purchasing journey.
Yeah, it's, it is definitely a different place to, to what it was when it sort of first started out with this sort of, you know, where you could sell stuff on Amazon, but I'm intrigued. You know, like you say, the fees have increased, the costs of selling on Amazon are really quite high. So we had a beauty business for the longest time, and one of our best selling products on that website had a 16 percent gross margin. Right.
Okay. So there was no way you would've been able to sell that on Amazon? Not on, no way. Not on, so the, the products you sell on Amazon have to have really high gross margins to be able to afford their fees and how that works. So what I've tended to notice is there then has been a a, a slight move. On the products on Amazon, and I don't know if I'm sure Amazon are aware of this. I'm sure they have plans for it, and I'm sure, um, it's maybe me just going slightly nuts.
So the products that you find on Amazon more and more tend to be products that have higher margins built into them. So you get a lot of the, uh, the Chinese products on, you know, sort of people buying stuff from China import and trying to sell it at a reasonable price. I'm not having an issue with that. This is just what I've noticed, for example. Um, is that me just going, Crazy or is that, do you see that actually happening?
No, you're absolutely right. Actually, we recently lost a supplement brand for that same reason. Uh, the woman manufactured herself, you know, we were doing good. She was a seven figure brand on Amazon, but her margins were tight on all their products. She, uh, was really conscious of her customer, didn't want to raise prices. And then Amazon has the fair pricing policy. So she couldn't have higher prices on Amazon. And not our website.
And so what we ended up doing is taking her products and doing fulfilled by merchant, which helped cause it cut her, her, uh, her fees in half, give or take. Um, but at the end of the day, she ended up leaving us because the margins couldn't support it. So even on the, the service side, like we're conscious of it. If you don't have, you know, at least 50 percent margin, gross margin on your products, like with agency fees, with Amazon's fees, like it's probably not going to be a good fit.
And that's just kind of right now. That's just the way it is. I'm hoping that, um, there'll be some pushback, but I also think to some degree, they're phasing out some of the smaller businesses. Um, and they're making it difficult for some of these brands to come on. So I think slowly Amazon's transitioning to more for established brands. Um, and that's just kind of the, the lay of the land at the moment.
Yeah, it's interesting, isn't it? And I, I'm intrigued how that works, you know, like, um, it, it means that, like, for example, you take a TV.
Um,
I know full well what the, I know what margins are on TVs when they're sold in store and they're not great, right? These guys aren't, they're not making massive amounts of money. So they can't then go and sell those on Amazon, but the manufacturer can, right? And so Amazon then goes and makes a deal with Samsung. So right, put your TVs on, on here. Um, and And they sort of start selling those TVs, which, which I find, I find quite fascinating.
So that I think this is, this will be another shift, won't it? Amazon will go more and more to the brand. So if, if you are an ecommerce business selling other people's products, I think. More and more, you might find Amazon difficult if you are selling your own manufactured product with a high gross margin, then Amazon, I think, is still quite an interesting place. So we, like the lady that left, we have a supplement brand, for example. So I understand the margins and supplements.
Um, and I understand the niche that we operate in and actually Amazon is good for that, you know, and, and, and at the moment it still works, but I'm not holding my breath that it will be like that forever. Um, so in the meantime, um, I mean, all that caveat said, um. I am on Amazon. How do I kill it? How do I kill it on Amazon? Well, what do I do?
Yeah, so there's a lot and just to kind of, uh, put a bow on what you just commented on, like we primarily work with brands, uh, a reseller, um, you know, uh, business model, like it does exist. I, I'm friends with a Canadian company that like all they do. Is buy and resell products. I think it will still exist to some degree, um, like commodity type products where like people don't really care about the brand. They just want to get nails super cheap or something like that.
Yeah.
Um, so it's still exist. Um, it's just getting more difficult. And I do think there's other platforms that, you know, Timu and Sheen outside of the political stuff that's going on, uh, is great platform for cost, uh, low. Quality, low price products, uh, and there's a market for it. People are always going to want cheap to some degree. Um, so there is shifting consumer behavior and as a result, there'll be shifts in how sellers, uh, reach their audiences.
Um, kind of jump into what you were saying. So how do we scale on, on Amazon? It's definitely marketing and advertising. And I'll talk like, um, at Bellavix, we use like a bottom up approach. So, um, everybody knows the, the user intent funnel. So, you know, when we start advertising with the brand, you know, we do want to make sure we occupy, we defend listings and that we have a brand presence for advertising and it'll vary. Some companies don't want to invest them much.
So they might be like, Hey, 10%, don't spend more than 10%. Or I only want to invest when it's a 10 ROAS on branded. I don't want to pay for customers that are already customers and fine. That makes sense. And then a lot of what we'll focus on until a brand's about a hundred thousand dollars a month. Is getting people in consideration. So remarketing using display advertising, uh, conquesting going after competitors, uh, having a presence for relevant search terms and kind of building that up.
And that's kind of the bottom of pro up. And then when we get to a point where you got about a hundred K a month in sales, turning on something like programmatic advertising, uh, tends to be effective and gives us the ability on Amazon to build audiences. A lot of your, uh, listeners may be rolling their eyes. I've tried it. It didn't work depends how you use it.
Um, so a lot of times when we get started, we'll build remarketing funnels and we'll go pretty heavy, um, after competitors and just see what that row as is. We also do some streaming TV, but that is a top of the funnel and kind of a longer play before you actually see any type of brand lift and Amazon will pull some brand lift reports. I know some of our software like tech metrics, we'll be able to kind of get. That information too.
Um, so it really depends the size of the brand and kind of what your goals are. And what we found, and we don't do this, we work with agencies that assist, um, but you may get a better return as opposed to turning on DSP, doing meta ads, uh, working with influencers tends to work really well. We do a little bit of affiliate marketing with Levante and stacked influence, and those tend to be pretty good if we drive them to Amazon.
Yeah.
Indirectly, we get sales velocity. We'll get more reviews when people buy them. They tend to be in a better mood than Vine program buyers because they generally get free products. Um, and they'll share user generated content. And user generated content in advertising happens to work really well. We actually have a case study that's being published on the site now that shows that user generated content has better conversion rates than something that's like traditionally.
Uh, built using a studio and I'm personally convinced it's cause we're all on Instagram and tech talk. And we just become accustomed to like discovering products this way. So it's very natural and. Native, uh, to use advertising terms.
Uh, well, jeez, there's a lot there, but
Yeah.
Let's, um, let, for those that might not know, let's define a few terms if we can. What is programmatic advertising?
Yeah, programmatic is, uh, on Amazon demand side platform, but pretty much just display advertising. It's our ability to target customers on and off the platform based on intent, contextual behavior, or how they engage products, uh, and the Amazon platform.
Okay, and you wouldn't do programmatic advertising for someone that turns over less than 100k a month?
Yeah, I mean, uh, it varies based on category, but between 70 to 100k is generally where we turn it on. Uh, we should be able to use pay per click and some of these off Amazon methodologies will get you there. In terms of brand building, DSP is not a ROAS driving machine, which is why what you mean by DSP, uh, demand, uh, programmatic advertising. So it's referred to as Amazon DSP. Um, so forgive me using all these acronyms. I'm brainwashed by the Amazon machine.
Matt Edmundson: That's fair play. I just, I'm aware that we ecommerce probably more than any other industry I've come across uses three letter acronyms. And so I feel like. It's my quest in life just to get people to qualify what they mean because what I, what I understand by various things and what other people understand by various things can be very different. Um, so if I, let's, let's deal with the smaller brands first and let's talk about strategies for them then.
So I'm turning over, I don't know, 10, 20, 30, 40 grand a month on, on Amazon. I'm a sort of a smaller chap for better expression. What sort of strategies then should I be focusing on? So I, I need to maybe look at. You talked about using meta, for example, and user generated content to drive traffic to Amazon. And this, again, you used a phrase sales velocity, which I know is a very important thing on Amazon.
But talk about that and how that might work a little bit in more detail, if you don't mind. Yeah. So typically when we see brands driving off Amazon traffic, we would use something like Amazon attribution. I think they changed the name, but I'm going to go with attribution because that's how I refer to it, but it's our ability to use these URLs so we could track behavior. And we would want every unique campaign to have a unique URL so we can measure the impact.
Like the toughest thing about Amazon is that it's, it's a black box. So therefore. You know, if I'm driving traffic into this black box, I may not know which campaigns perform. It also doesn't communicate back to Meta, to Google, to really any of these platforms. So first things first is you're going to want an infrastructure in place where you can get some measurements. That can, you can feed to your, your advertising team, whoever that is. So they know these campaigns are working.
These attributes are working. And then on Amazon, I don't like using skag single keyword ad groups. Um, and I'm talking more Google than meta right now. Uh, but in the instance where we're driving traffic to, uh, Amazon, I am a big proponent of this cause I do believe that it gives us better insights into what's working and what's not. I've. Heard of brands using like Zon Guru, I think, and other software, um, that somehow patches it together.
I'm, um, uh, a little hesitant to believe how accurate that is. Um, so for the most part, I'd rather use Amazon attribution and measure it. And generally the conversion rate is not going to be, um, as great as it is advertising directly on the platform.
So the. I guess the key question that someone's going to have is, why would I, if I have my Google ads budget, um, a thousand pounds or thousand bucks this month, whatever it is, why would I use that to send traffic to Amazon versus sending traffic to my website?
So Amazon has something called the halo effect, and this is a really good question. I get this all the time when I talk to brands. Um, so when I mentioned, uh, earlier, their sales velocity is like the number one KPI. So if you could demonstrate to Amazon that this product sells and that's done through sales per month or a given period of time, then you'll technically rank better organically. And we have some older case studies where we prove this out using Google ads and stuff.
And the lift will vary, um, depending on the category and the brand. Um, and that is the main reason why it's like, if I know. For this specific root keyword. That's very relevant to my product. Um, that the opportunity is like 10 million a month, and I am doing a thousand dollars on that product. Then I know that there's room for me. So we may not want to do it all the time.
There is a point of diminishing returns, but to get the gears going to kind of show Amazon that there is opportunity there, that's the reason to do it. And all transparency, I don't recommend driving the entire budget. Uh, I like to do like 10 to 20 percent of your budget to just go over. And I like to start with keyword queries that have Amazon in it. So in your case, you sold the supplement.
So if it's a whey protein, people will go to Google and be like, whey protein, Amazon, because we're lazy and why not? And so like those are low hanging fruit that the intent is already to buy it on Amazon. So putting some ad dollars behind that makes sense. I wouldn't do any branded. I think at the end of the day, the value is acquiring new customers. So if I was building keywords or audiences that wasn't remarketing, uh, I would direct those, um, those shoppers towards my Amazon store.
And I like driving to the storefront versus the product detail page because the storefront doesn't have ads from your competitors. You could showcase your unique selling proposition and get a look and feel for the brand and build that trust. As opposed when you drive to a product detail page, uh, like myself, it's like, Oh, this is great. Ooh, this is better. Click, click, click, click. Before you know, you paid to drive traffic to somebody else's
store. That's part of the problem, I suppose, with Amazon, isn't it? So sorry, just a bit, just to clarify, if I'm running ads, I liked your whey protein Amazon. That makes a lot of sense. Um, and I, I, I, so I, I'm a whey protein company. They've not put in strawberry, they've not put in the size. It's just sort of a general thing. You're going to send them to the storefront, my whey protein storefront in effect, um, rather than a specific whey protein product.
Yep. Um, if they put in the search a, a specific product, do you still send them to the storefront page or do you send them to that specific product?
I would continue driving to the storefront just because I'm very conscious of other people, uh, conquesting on us. Cause like it's a common advertising tactic and brands love when you steal audience from bigger brands. So generally, cause your storefront page should showcase all the products. If it's done right, they should be able to add it to cart. So they'll see the product that they're actually looking for. And there's not really an act. I mean, technically, yes, there's an extra step.
Click to add to cart, but, um, they're going to do the same thing if you drive them to that Amazon listing. So I would recommend just driving to the storefront.
And so along, so alongside this, are you doing ads on Amazon or are you just using metal Google to drive traffic?
Yeah. I mean, when we start with the brand, we primarily start with pay per click. Um, and we'll do the bottom, you know, automatic campaigns like everyone else for keyword harvesting, and then kind of. Once we get some data, we'll launch some manual campaigns. We also do keyword research. So we'll, you know, if it's a new to market product, we'll, we'll start with smaller ad groups to kind of train the algorithm.
If it's a product that's been around, then we're just going to optimize, launch some additional campaigns. But PPC is definitely where to start. And if we want to talk about like low costs, cause you mentioned like if this brand's under 20 to 30, 000, let's just assume that they don't have great reviews. You know, they may have great rating, but the quantity. Yeah, those reviews may not be competitive.
Like whey protein is, uh, is competitive, you know, there's, there's listings with thousands of, cause whey proteins been around for a while. Um, so we're big fans of like brand tailored promotions, which is our ability to offer discounts to audiences, uh, with specific intent models. So like, uh, somebody who's. Uh, purchased from you in the last year or somebody who's high risk of leaving. Cause they haven't, they purchased in the past, but haven't purchased lately.
Um, we could conquest abandoned cart, which is like low hanging fruit. These are all audiences and you could pepper them with as little, I believe as little as a 5 percent discount, um, but these are people that have shown intent. Uh, another great program that's cost effective is Amazon's creator connections. It's a relatively new program and. It should be well, if it hasn't already, it is being rolled out according to our Amazon resources to the entire Amazon ecosystem,
right?
It's your ability to it's your ability to work with Amazon associates. And these are, uh, affiliates influencers, if you will, who will buy your product for some type of commission, you don't even have to offer a sample and they'll promote it on their LinkedIn or their, excuse me, on their social media, wherever that is. But we've gotten brands into, uh, articles, uh, which help with SEO. Um, you know, top 10 supplements of 2025, uh, as well as some micro influencers that have done really well.
And they'll end up putting that on their storefront. So then you start getting presence in other places for customers to discover. Um, that tends to be pretty effective. So those are two low hanging fruit that, you know, come to mind off the bat that can drive sales and their performance based.
So the, sorry, the, the name of the new feature on Amazon, uh, again, was.
Uh, creator connections, Matt Edmundson: creator connections. Yeah. So, um, for the longest time, uh, there's been Amazon associates, right? Um, is that all right? Or you just dropped your coat? Okay. I just dropped my cup. I'm sorry. I didn't hear what you said. I apologize.
No, no problem. So for the longest time on Amazon, we've had like, um, We've had the affiliate thing, haven't we, Amazon Associates? I have an Amazon Associate link, which I set up, I don't know, 1973. I don't think I've ever used it, but I think there's something there. Um, with this new creator connections, are they sort of revamping? Amazon associates a little bit of they kind of gone. This is a little bit outdated. We need to update it here.
Yeah. So the way it works, it's a dashboard inside of Amazon that created connections. You'll jump into it and essentially create an influencer brief. Like, Hey, you know, this is the product. This is about it. We're offering a 30, 20, 30 percent discount on all sales.
Um, they'll opt in, um, you'll get, it's a low volume game, but you'll get these associates, they will purchase the product through Amazon and they will create that content, you'll have access to the content, you can use it for your marketing purposes. So it's very streamlined and I find that it works better than, you know, like a Levanta, an Archer, Phil, like some of these. Platforms that already exist.
The caveat is, is like, you really don't have control over who, who applies and how they get the product. And also the volume is, is low. Um, the ROAS is great. You know, a ROAS is like 10 all the time, but like, you know, in a given month for a brand that has some popularity, you know, maybe 60 to 70, uh, of these affiliates will actually participate. Which is low. And then, you know, some of them will buy the product, but never post.
And all the issues that come when you're working with some of these influencers. Uh, but it's all contained on Amazon. You just set it up and it runs itself. And what we love about it, as long as the brands don't have any restrictions with who they work with. Um, what's nice is that it it's performance based. So these people don't get paid unless they're moving products. Yeah. Um, so that's kind of the benefit.
It's interesting that they're revamping then the associates side of things, isn't it? And, and actually affiliate marketing becomes a bit more interesting rather than just taking whatever it was, like one, 2 percent of the sales price. Yeah. Um, you can actually now go 10, 20, 30%, whatever the brand believes on that product. Yeah. Um, which again, makes it a bit more interesting. And I, I, I quite like that. I wonder how many.
YouTubers out there that have done content on, you know, I don't know, I, I'm just looking around my desk here, uh, the Logitech, uh, MX master three mouse, um, and they go sign up to this program and then just put that link in on their YouTube or if you, is it a case of you have actually got to buy the product for it to work?
Uh, they got the influencer has to buy the product for it to work. So, you know, you can give them samples and yeah, like if you do samples, you get more volume. Do the brands that we work with because the quality of the influencer is all over the place. Generally, we don't give away samples. We'd rather be more aggressive on their commission, and that's worked pretty well. We start at 20%, but we've had brands go up to 50%, and the higher that commission, the more volume we can get.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, but, you know,
it's just a
crapshoot.
That's really interesting. That's really interesting. So that's then helpful for some of the smaller brands. What are some of the tactics you've found for the guys doing over 100 grand a month?
Love, I love programmatic. So, uh, that's the, uh, the DSP, the display advertising, the type of audience to be skin build. So like cut out anything that might be like, um, medical related. So like we've worked with brands that help people with diabetes and stuff like that, like a pregnancy. We have HIPAA laws here. So like targeting becomes very difficult.
And so we would recommend using like a connected TV, um, mountains, a really good one, or another third party platform to help those brands scale. But for your typical brand that sells supplement or beauty products, uh, it's great because we're able to build audiences. So like.
What we have found is that a lot of people on Amazon will just focus on like the bottom of the funnel, those, you know, conquesting product searches and their brand and what happens over time is like, to your point, competition, more people come in, you know, everybody has an anti aging product if they're selling beauty. Um, so it's like, how do you differentiate yourself?
And how you do that effectively is by leveraging, uh, programmatic and building these audiences that are a little higher up in the funnel that are related to you by lifestyle. They're related to you by their demographic, their shopping behavior, their hobbies and interests and a great way to get started, which a lot of people neglect is like. You know, I don't know a website that doesn't have Google analytics tied to it.
And Google analytics, if you go on the backend, they share this information about the website audience, you can essentially take that and use that to get started if you work with an agency in the, um, advertising. Uh, partner network, um, like Bellavix is, uh, we get access to Amazon resources and they can pull information and help us build, uh, some of these initial audiences. And 1 of my favorite audiences that they're able to build, it's called an overlap report.
And so they'll, they'll take the ASIN in question that you're researching, and then they get a bunch of information based on the current audience that goes there and they build this report and the overlap of that report are like the common interest that these. Uh, shoppers have, and we turn those in the audiences and surprisingly, we get pretty good engagement and we look for a lift in sales over time. So like, if you're going to start DSP.
You know, you want to run it at least for six months and you want to focus like, you don't have to spend like, so a brand that's conservative and starting with programmatic advertising, 10 percent of your budget is enough for us to at least do the remarketing. Uh, typically what we recommend is 80, 20, 20 percent of your budget going to this and allowing us to. Test some of these different audiences, but the KPIs are different.
We're looking for impressions, product, detail, views, uh, add to cart. So it's like, it's, it's softer metrics, but we know that over time and, you know, Amazon has the Kantar report, uh, Ogilvy for any advertisers who, uh, follow that, like we know exposure is how you get. People to buy your product. And so this exposure allows us to kind of build those audiences. And over time you will see a sales lift.
That's how we've taken brands from that a hundred thousand dollars a month to three, 400, 000 a month. Um, so it does work effectively and some categories do really well and others don't. So it's, um, you know, it's something that needs to be measured and reacted on. It's not something you just turn on and forget about. There are some categories that it just. It might not make sense.
Um, we've worked with some beauty brands that we've tried to do this and we just, we never really saw the lift we were looking for after about a year of doing this.
And so we, we stopped, they, they ended up using meta and Google and, and it worked out well, and we still saw sales increase, and then we just focused on what we can do on the AMS side with PPC advertising, and there are some brands that, you know, we're working with a supplement brand now in the, the green fruits and green space that. Uh, we shouldn't see this, but we see a 7 ROAS on programmatic and we're mid, mid to bottom of the funnel. And it's like, what's different about those products?
I mean, yeah, there's nuances that are different, but like 7, I, I can't explain it.
But you enjoy it while it lasts. Yeah, exactly. And nothing
gold can stay. Yeah, exactly.
Absolutely. I'm curious, why don't you do programmatic advertising for companies that are saying doing 10, 000 a month? Is it a budgetary issue or is it an access issue? It's always
budgetary. Yeah. So like we've worked with some private equity brands that have the budget and they also understand full funnel marketing and advertising and they'll sign off on it. They get it. They're like, yeah, let's do commercials. We want to get, we want to build our audiences. But most of the time, the brands that come to me that are doing 10 to 20, 000, they're, they're smaller. A lot of times I'm working directly with the owner.
Um, and they're just, they're, they're closer to the money. So therefore they're a lot more conscious of how it's spent and they want to see that row as, and, and I get it, you know, early on, it makes sense, you want every dollar to count and therefore, when I talk about. Mid and upper funnel. And I share all these KPIs. They're like, well, I spent a thousand dollars of my 3, 000 budget and I didn't see a sales lift in the first month. So like in those situations, it's just. It's not worth it.
Yeah. Slightly untenable. No. Fair play. Fair play. What's, um, what's one thing about Amazon we should all know heading into 2025 that maybe we don't know right now?
Yeah. Maybe most Matt Edmundson: people don't know. Yeah. AI is definitely taking over. So as of now, Amazon updated the title restrictions and they're cracking down on longer titles. So, uh, as of January 21st, uh, they have taken everybody's titles and they cut them on their own using AI. What we have found with AI is that, oh man, it's painful. Uh, when they rolled this out last year, they, uh, they changed some of our titles and we didn't turn it off.
And they ended up getting some of our listings suspended with. The titles that their AI recommended. So what I'm saying is like a brace AI, it's not changing anything. Be conscious of your listing quality for sure. Um, but understand that, um, it's, it's not going anywhere. It's, you know, I feel bad for companies like get Tita, the reimbursement software where like Amazon is baking a lot of those features in, and I know they have a partnership with the. With companies like that.
So it's interesting to see what AI is going to be taken over. Uh, and where the human part of this is like, it's always going to be in the brand and it's always going to be in the creative to some degree, but you know, where is it heading in terms of advertising? You know, are we going to get a version of G max on Amazon where it's minimum human interaction? You just set the ROAS and let it, let it do its machine learning. Um, so it's.
We're on the brink of something, uh, monumental and it'll change how, you know, we as agencies, but also as sellers. Engage with with marketplaces and how we operate on them.
That's really interesting. So watch this space. Uh, watch this space. Well, listen, I am my question for you. Well, no, actually it's that time where I remember your question for me. What's your question for me, which I'm going to answer on social media. What is it?
I want to know what's your most memorable experience from living in Salisbury, North Carolina. You shared a little bit about yourself and, uh, North Carolina is now home. So I would love to know what, what you remember most and what you like most about North Carolina, because this is where I call home and I really enjoy it here.
Well, I will, I love North Carolina. It's like my second home. And, um, yeah, for those of you don't know, I used to live in North Carolina for a little while, hence I have a slight. When I say Carolina, I can't say Carolina like a British person. It's Carolina. And I don't know why it's very odd. It's very, very odd. Uh, so I will of course answer that question over on social media.
Come follow me on LinkedIn at Matt Edmundson and you will find me answering that question at some point, what I love most. About North Carolina and I think everybody should go to North Carolina at least once in their life And whilst i'm not answering the question, you should also try cheer wine while you're there. Just want to put that
out
Brilliant well listen had it's been great talking to you man. Thanks for coming on and sharing the um the insights I I see that the sun is is coming out where you are because it's shining into the lens a little bit You've got this angelic glow going on um So if people want to reach out to you, if they want to connect with you, the angel of Amazon, uh, how do they, how do they do that?
Yeah. Check me out on LinkedIn. Will like, uh, Will Haire like on your head with an E. Uh, I put out stuff every day to try to help sellers. We're really in tune to the news and what goes on. So follow me there and then check out our website if you're interested, if you need support or need help, you know, we're passionate, we're not a huge agency, but we like, um, we like working with brands that have interesting challenges and are, uh, our mission based.
So you can check us out at bellavix.com and Matt, this was a lot of fun. It was a really great conversation and great getting to know you. So thank you for having me on your show.
No, it's been great, man. Great. If you, here's another three letter acronym. Well, uh, what's your ICP, your ideal client profile? Who do you work best with?
Go on. We work with, uh, brands, uh, brands that own their trademark, uh, and generally are doing at least a million dollars in revenue because generally we can, they have a little bit of an audience and they may be struggling on Amazon, so we could help you guys get to that three, four, 5 million range in a couple of years.
Fantastic. We will of course link to Will's information in the show notes, which just, if you're on an app, podcast app, you don't even need to tell you to scroll down, they'll be there or come on by the website, ecommercepodcast.net. And of course, if you signed up to the newsletter. It'll be in your inbox. Just the way it works. So, uh, that's, um, that's great. Well, listen, man, thanks for coming on. Absolutely loved it. Let me do this. Huge round of applause for Will. Yes, there we go.
So there we go. That's enough applause. Don't want your head to get too big. Uh, what a great conversation. Uh, now be sure to follow the eCommerce Podcast, wherever you get your podcasts from, because we've got some more great conversations lined up. And I genuinely don't want you to miss any of them. Uh, and in case no one has told you yet today, let me be the first. You are awesome. Yes, you are created. Awesome. It's just a burden. You have to bear. Will has to bear it. I've got to bear it.
You've got to bear it as well. Now that eCommerce Podcast is produced by the wonderful Podjunction. com. Uh, you can find our entire archive of episodes on your favorite podcast app. I think music was written by the magnificent. Josh Edmundson. And as I mentioned, if you'd like to read the transcript or show notes, simply head over to the website, ecommercepodcast.net. But that's it from me. That's it from Will. Thank you so much for joining us.
Have a fantastic week wherever you are in the world. I'll see you next time. Bye for now.