Amazon PPC offers two main targeting approaches: automatic and manual. Understanding how each works — and how to use them together — is key to building an efficient advertising strategy.
Automatic Campaigns
In an automatic campaign, Amazon decides which customer searches to show your ad for. It analyses your listing content (title, bullet points, description, backend keywords) and matches your product to relevant searches. You set a bid and a budget, and Amazon does the rest.
The advantage is simplicity and discovery. Automatic campaigns require minimal setup and often surface keyword opportunities you would never have thought of. They are excellent for new products where you do not yet know which keywords drive sales.
The downside is less control. You cannot choose specific keywords or set different bids for different search terms. You are relying on Amazon's algorithm to make good matching decisions — and it does not always get it right.
Manual Campaigns
Manual campaigns give you full control. You choose specific keywords to target, set individual bids for each keyword, and select match types (exact, phrase, or broad). This precision lets you concentrate your budget on the keywords that generate the best returns.
The three match types work as follows. Exact match shows your ad only when the shopper's search matches your keyword exactly. Phrase match shows your ad when the search contains your keyword phrase in order. Broad match shows your ad for searches related to your keyword, including synonyms and variations.
The Recommended Strategy
Most successful sellers use both. Start with an automatic campaign to discover which search terms generate clicks and sales. After two to four weeks, review the Search Term Report and identify your best-performing keywords.
Create a manual campaign with those winning keywords, using exact and phrase match for maximum control. Set bids based on the actual performance data you gathered from the automatic campaign. Then add those keywords as negative exact matches in your automatic campaign to avoid paying for them twice.
This creates a clean structure: the automatic campaign continues discovering new keywords, and the manual campaign captures maximum value from proven winners.
Budget Allocation
As you build out your manual campaigns, gradually shift more budget towards them and reduce the automatic campaign budget. Manual campaigns should eventually handle the majority of your ad spend since they target proven keywords. The automatic campaign keeps running at a lower budget as a keyword discovery tool.
Ongoing Optimisation
Review both campaigns weekly. From your automatic campaign, harvest new converting keywords into your manual campaign. In your manual campaign, adjust bids based on ACoS — increase bids on profitable keywords to win more impressions, decrease bids on expensive keywords that convert poorly.
This continuous refinement is what separates sellers with profitable advertising from those who throw money at PPC and hope for the best.