Keywords

Your keywords (word combinations and phrases) are used to match your ads with search terms that shoppers are using to find products.

You can also use negative keywords to prevent your ads from displaying when a customer's search terms match your negative keywords.

For Sponsored Products, Amazon matches your keywords to a customer's search terms to display ads for the products you advertise.

Add new keywords

You can add new keywords to an existing campaign at any time.

To add new keywords:

1. Navigate to Campaign Manager.
2. Click the campaign name.
3. Click Targeting.
4. Click Add keywords. You can choose from our list of recommended keywords, enter your own keywords, or use a combination of both.
5. Add a keyword and select the match type.
   Note: Keywords aren't case-sensitive, so they'll match uppercase or lowercase letters in search terms. There is a maximum limit of 10 words per keyword and 80 characters.

Keyword and product targeting

You determine what scenarios your ad is eligible to serve impressions in by targeting by keywords or using product targeting.

Keyword targeting

Keyword targeting allows you to choose keywords to show your products in customer searches and detail pages. Use this strategy when you know the search terms that shoppers use to search products similar to yours.

For example, if your product is a phone case, you may choose the keyword “phone case.” When a shopper searches for a product with the search term “phone case,” your ad is eligible to show in search results and detail pages.

For KDP authors, we recommend to initially choose a range of keywords from broad to specific in your campaigns. Choose broad terms describing your book and your overall category (example: eBook Best Sellers, Great Authors), relevant genres (example: Women Authors, Classics), similar authors or publishers (example: Charlotte Brontë, Penguin Classics), and terms, themes, or ASINs that are relevant to your books (example: Heathcliff, ASIN 0141439556).

PDF: View our guide on keyword recommendations for Books

Product targeting

Product targeting allows you to choose specific products, categories, or other product features that are similar to the product in your ad. Use this strategy to help shoppers find your product when browsing detail pages and categories, or when searching products on Amazon. You can target categories and products individually or target a combination of categories and brands in the same campaign.

To help you get started, we provide targeting recommendations under the “Suggested” tab in the Product targeting section. To prevent unwanted impressions, you can specify a negative list of ASINs that the ad will not be matched to.

Categories tab

In the categories tab, you can target suggested categories that are based on relevance to your product. You can also search by category, or you can browse categories listed below the search field. Additional refining categories are available for Sponsored Products and Sponsored Brands:

• With Sponsored Products, you can refine categories by brand, price range, review star ratings, and Prime shipping eligibility.

Products tab

In the products tab, you can target suggested individual products that are similar to the product in your ad. You can also search for specific products in the search field.

Match types

Match types allow you to fine-tune which search terms your ads are eligible to show against.

When choosing a match type, it's recommended that you start with broad match to capture the most information on where your ads perform the best. Then review targeting report (Sponsored Products) to evaluate the performance of your keywords and match types. Once you've observed which keywords and search terms are performing best, you can change your bids or create a more concise group of keywords to optimize your campaigns and reach your goals. and

Manual targeting match types

• Broad match: This match type offers your ad broad traffic exposure. A search term will match if it contains all the keyword terms in any order. Broad match also includes the plural form of the keyword, related searches, and other variations that are close to the keyword.
• Phrase match: The search term must contain the exact phrase or sequence of words. It is more restrictive than broad match and will generally result in more relevant placements for your ad.
• Exact match: The search term must exactly match the keyword or sequence of words in order for the ad to show, and will also match close variations of the exact term. Exact match is the most restrictive match type, but can be more relevant to a search.

Automatic targeting match types

• Close match: Amazon shows your ad to shoppers who use search terms closely related to your products. Example: An Ad for Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie may be shown predominantly in search results for “Peter Pan book,” Peter Pan children’s book,” and “Illustrated version Peter Pan."
• Loose match: Amazon shows your ad to shoppers who use search terms loosely related to your products. Example: An ad for Peter Pan by J. M. Barrie may be shown predominantly in search results for "Peter Pan coloring book," "fairy tale books," and "literary classics."
• Substitutes: Amazon shows your ad to shoppers who view the detail pages of products similar to yours. Example: An ad for Peter Pan by J. M. Barrie may be shown predominantly on detail pages for Peter Pan Leather Bound Illustrated Collectible, Peter Pan Pop-Up Book, and the Annotated Peter Pan book.
• Complements: Amazon shows your ad to shoppers who view the detail pages of products that complement your product. Example: An ad for Peter Pan by J. M. Barrie may be shown predominantly on detail pages for Peter Pan Halloween costumes, the Peter Pan DVD, Peter Pan coloring books.

Negative keyword match types

• Negative phrase: Ads don't show on search queries that contain the complete phrase or close variations. There is a maximum limit of four words per negative keyword and 80 characters.
• Negative exact: Ads don't show on search queries that contain the exact phrase or close variation. There is a maximum limit of ten words per negative keyword and 80 characters.

Automatic and manual targeting

Targeting uses keywords and products to show your ads on search and detail pages to relevant shoppers. For Sponsored Products campaigns, you can create two types of targeting: automatic and manual.

Automatic targeting

With automatic targeting, we match your ad with keywords and products that are similar to the product in your ad. We choose keyword and product matches for you based on shopper searches related to your product information. Automatic targeting allows you to easily and quickly create a campaign. After your campaign has been running, you can view your campaign’s performance in campaign manager to monitor impressions and clicks to your ad and modify the targeting to meet your business goals.

When you choose automatic targeting, we use multiple default strategies on your behalf to match your ad to a shopper looking for your product. For example, your ad will be eligible to be shown in the search results if your product closely or loosely matches searches results from shoppers. Similarly, we'll show your ad to shoppers who view the detail pages of products that are substitutes or complements of your ad products. After you create your campaign, you can view these different targeting strategies (i.e., close match, loose match, substitutes and complements) in campaign manager and make changes to meet your campaign objectives. For example, you can increase your bid for one tactic versus another to meet your objectives.

Manual targeting

For more advanced advertisers who have targeting experience, manual targeting helps you to specifically target keywords and products. You can choose different match types for keywords, and choose categories, products, brands or features related to your product.

Negative keywords

Negative keywords prevent your ads from displaying when a shopper's search terms match your negative keywords.

You can create a negative keyword for a campaign in Campaign manager, or when uploading a bulk file. or

You cannot block ASINs using negative keywords, but ASIN targeting is available for Sponsored Products using product attribute targeting.

You can use negative keywords to exclude poorly performing searches, reducing your advertising cost and increasing your return on ad spend (ROAS).

Add negative keywords

You can add negative keywords when you're creating a campaign, or add them later in the campaign manager.

To add negative keywords to a campaign:

1. Go to Advertising > Campaign Manager.
2. Select a campaign, and then go to Negative keywords.
3. Click Add campaign negative keywords.