Marketers scramble to tailor strategies for Amazon

Online retailer is encouraging companies to buy more ads through its own media group

Amazon’s rapidly expanding influence on a wide portion of the American public has become impossible to ignore — and it is giving rise to a whole new side of the advertising industry.

As more people live large portions of their lives in Amazon’s ecosystem, ad agencies are increasingly offering specialised services to help brands take full advantage of the company’s universe.That means adding flourishes like recipes and magazine-style images to product pages, coming up with creative ways to get customers to post reviews on Amazon and plotting how companies can best connect with people who are using devices like the voice-activated Echo.

And Amazon itself, aware of its growing power, is encouraging companies to buy more ads through its own media group. Its argument: When an ad is on Amazon, a direct connection can be made between people seeing it and then making a purchase.

“How your product is perceived on Amazon and in the Amazon community in ratings and reviews has such a powerful impact on the future of you as a brand,” said John Denny, vice president for digital and e-commerce at Bai Brands, the beverage company. “Increasingly, if you win on Amazon, you win, period. And this is the world marketers have to wrap their brains around.”

Several advertising executives anticipate that more agencies will begin offering Amazon-focused services, comparing the company’s rise to previous paradigm shifts like when search engines and social media became a daily part of people’s lives.

It’s already affecting what shoppers see. Take, for example, the Amazon product page for a whey protein powder from Optimum Nutrition. It was put together with help from the Tombras Group, based in Knoxville, Tenn., which recently started an Amazon-focused division.

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