This Issue's TLDR...

• 3 ways your PPC agency might be manipulating your metrics to tell a better story
• 20+ listing issues that sellers should audit weekly (and, how to fix them)
• Did a major agency in the Amazon space get acquired?

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Today marks the final installment (for now) of The Insider Series.

If you missed the previous ones, you can find them here.

For this final installment of The Insider Series, I'm sitting down with Neha Bhuchar, Founder of atom11, an award winning Amazon PPC automation and optimization software.

Neha has been ALL OVER the speaking circuit lately (ASGTG, Prosper) and if you heard her speak, you know she's a BIG BRAIN when it comes to Amazon PPC.

The last few installments of The Insider Series have been in Q&A format. But, when Neha shared what she wanted to talk about, I decided it was best to just hand her the mic and let her flow.

So, without further ado, here's Neha on the different ways that ACOS be gamed (perhaps by your agency).

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ACOS Can Be Gamed, 5 Metrics To Measure Instead

ACOS has been the darling metric of Amazon Ads for as long as I remember. And, why not? It makes perfect sense for lower funnel Sponsored Product Ads, which are low priced, high performance, highly profitable native Amazon ads. ACOS not only tells you how efficient your ads are, but also if they are profitable or not.

But if you are only measuring ACOS, then your metrics can be gamed.

Here are 3 ways in which I can game your advertising ACOS followed by right guardrails to focus on instead:

By increasing % spend on branded keywords: It's not a secret that branded keywords will give you the best ACOS. Since these are keywords that are leading high intent customers to your products. But increasing % spend on branded keywords increases PPC cannibalization and reduces New-to-Brand customer acquisition.

• Right guardrails: If you are a start-up brand (less than $1 Million ARR), then branded spend should be in the range of 5-10% of total spend. If you are an emerging brand, then branded spend should be in the range of 10-18% of total spend. And if you are a large brand, then branded spend should be in the range of 20-25% (as you need to defend brand against competitors)
• How to avoid this: Two Simple steps to avoid or control increased spend on branded keywords:
  • Measure % branded spend and new to brand acquisition on a monthly basis and ensure that guardrails are being met. If you are using an automation software, make sure that you are setting up these guardrails there.
  • Make sure branded keywords are set up in separate campaigns, so that their spend can be controlled at your will.

By decreasing bid for ALL non performing keywords, irrespective of conversion: If I only bid on high performing keywords, I can achieve your dream ACOS in a minute. But that will constraint your digital footprint (product discovery) and eventually customer acquisition.

• Right guardrails: The guardrails here are more qualitative than the above, but tight auditing mechanisms can help you prevent this pothole. Keyword bidding strategy depends on your risk appetite, so I will try to give you break it down with that:
  • Sales driven: Diversify your focus KPIs to (a) total sales (b) TACOS and (c) Conversion. Your bidding strategy should focus on conversion rather than ACOS. Negate less, optimize bids more.
  • Brand building driven: Diversify your focus KPIs to (a) increase in branded search volume, (b) new to brand. Your bidding strategy should focus on conversion
  • Profitability driven: You are closest to this risk. Diversify your focus KPI to (a) CAC (customer acquisition cost, calculated by Total sales/ units sold) and (b) LTV (Lifetime value per customer, use this sheet to calculate). Avoid this risk by ensuring that you have a healthy mix of spend on high ACOS but high conversion keywords and low ACOS keywords.
• How to avoid this: Simple steps to avoid this:
  • Measure % spend on high performing keywords (lower ACOS than target ACOS), low performing keywords (higher ACOS than target ACOS) and no performing keywords (0 sales). If you are driven by profitability, you will maximise high performing keywords and ACOS makes sense. But if you are driven by sales, you can add atleast 15-20% spend on low performing keywords (and it can go higher depending on your risk apetite)
  • Diversify the KPIs you track as per your objective.

By advertising only 2 or 3 top selling products: Advertising top selling products gives you the best ACOS and increases sales like no other. A good advertising strategy maximises spend on top sellers, while continuing to experiment on medium and bottom sellers and trying to increase their sales. Manipulating this strategy to achieve low ACOS kills experimentation and concentrates risk on the limited 2 or 3 ASINs.

• Right guardrails:
  • Top selling ASINs: At least 60% spend should be earmarked on top sellers (unless launching new products every month)
  • Medium selling ASINs: 30% spend should be earmarked on medium selling ASINs
  • Bottom selling ASINs: 10% spend should be earmarked on bottom selling ASINs Measuring granular details is hard and time consuming. A dashboard (as shown below) can help you not only save time, but audit quicker, and take faster actions.

Summary

ACOS can be gamed.

Create the right guardrails for your team so that you can actually gain from your advertising spend. Ensure that you dig deep into Product level, search term level and keyword level details so that you can access the real drivers of your ACOS.

Measure the following metrics along with ACOS:

• TACOS
• CAC and LTV
• % branded spend
• % spend on different product bands
• NTB and Branded Search Volume

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BEST from LinkedIn

Incredible resource here from my good friend Danan Coleman.

Thanks Danan!

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BEST from X

Spoiler Alert: The Beer Game is not actually about beer.

It's actually a commentary on repeated and predictable SUPPLY CHAIN mistakes that all companies make.

That is...The Beer Game exposes the "bullwhip effect," where small demand changes cause massive upstream supply swings.

Really cool read if you want to get nerdy this weekend.

Luis Malheiro @iamluismalheiro Jay Forrester, an MIT Professor, created a game that messes with the minds of even the brightest people: The Beer Game. It revealed a shocking truth: 95% of players make the same predictable mistakes. Here's how this simple simulation exposes fatal flaws in how we think: 🧵 8:59 AM • Apr 23, 2025 379 Retweets 2149 Likes Read 47 replies

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This recent business sale caught my eye because it involves a business in the Amazon space.

I don't have any details beyond this, and I've been squinting to try to identify the company through the blur here.

What do you all see behind the blurred name below?

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