Amazon has recently launched a video builder tool to help brands make new and engaging content. The tool is free through the advertising console and allows you to make 15-second videos that can be used in multiple ways on and off Amazon. You can access the tool through the Creatives tab in the menu on the right side of your advertising console view.
Once you’re in, simply select the product you want to make the video for, and then you will have 22 templates you can pick from for the format of the video. Most of these templates only require three images and three headlines. We anticipate Amazon adding more options as this tool is adopted by advertisers.
Once you have selected your template, you have options to change the color theme and the text font. The Amazon video builder tool also provides background music options for the ad. An important aspect to remember when building videos is that sound won’t automatically play on the ad. The video has to be unmuted by the potential customer when they see it. So your video ad should be able to get the point across and be engaging without audio.
Most of the templates split the video into three parts, including an intro, a middle, and an outro.
The video ad runs a 15-second slideshow with transitions built in. With each of the three parts, you can choose to feature an image and a short headline. The character limit you have for the headline depends on the template and font you pick. So if there’s a headline you feel is essential to the ad, you might need to play around with the template and font to find a combination that will allow your headline to fit.
The first facet that stood out to me while I was playing around with the Amazon video builder tool is that once you figure out a template, color theme, and text font that fits your brand, it could take you only 10-15 minutes to make one of these videos. The ease of use and the ability to make multiple videos in an efficient manner is impressive, making it a great tool for a brand that doesn’t have much video content or is looking for ways to quickly produce new video content. The templates are clearly designed, so the videos can easily be incorporated into video ads.
This tool comes at a good time because Amazon also recently rolled out video as a new feature for Sponsored Display ads. Before, you could only use videos on Sponsored Brands ads. Sponsored Display ads can be shown on Amazon, like Sponsored Products and Sponsored Brands ads, but they differ from the other two ad types. Display ads can also be shown off of Amazon, which makes them good for remarketing and/or audience targeting. On Amazon, Sponsored Display ads can show on product pages below the Sponsored Product carousel of ads. This is another example of videos having the advantage over traditional ads in terms of making engaging content as well as pure size.
We hope to see similar results with Sponsored Display video as we’ve seen with Sponsored Brands video campaigns that tend to perform well on Amazon. Sponsored Brands videos are prominently featured on the search page and are much more engaging and eye-catching than the other search page ads. They also take up an entire row on the page, as you can see in the example below.
The Cost-Per-Click (CPC) of these ad placements is a little higher, but the placement on the page is hard to beat. Even with the higher CPC, these campaigns are often still efficient.
Once you have built a video that fits your product and brand, the Amazon video builder lets you download the video so you can use it in multiple ways outside of ads on Amazon as well. You can add videos to your product pages as another way to have more engaging content that can keep potential customers on your page instead of clicking away to a competitor. The videos you build can also be used on your brand store.
You can also take the downloaded videos and use them off of Amazon, on Instagram, YouTube, your website, and anywhere else you would like.
The Amazon video builder is a great new tool that works hand in hand with the other features Amazon ads has recently rolled out. With every new feature, it becomes more clear that Amazon ads is prioritizing innovative ways for brands to create new and engaging content on Amazon. As I talked about above, videos go a long way on and off of Amazon, and this video builder can go a long way for a brand, too, especially for brands that don’t have much video content at their disposal.
