Ad Relevance uses artificial intelligence to analyze billions of browsing, shopping, and streaming signals across Amazon’s properties.
Cookie deprecation is still a work in progress. Still, Amazon is pushing ahead with its advances in creating an ad-targeting solution that does not rely on the types of third-party identifiers that have served as a bedrock for much of digital marketing. The e-commerce giant detailed plans for Ad Relevance at Cannes Lions, a major industry gathering that celebrates advertising creativity. Over the years, it has shifted more focus toward large tech platforms. Amazon also used the festival to trumpet progress with its generative AI-powered image generator for campaign assets, one piece of its strategy to bring the emerging tech to more advertisers.
Ad Relevance is supported by Amazon’s access to a high volume of first-party shoppers, browsing, and streaming viewership data. It leverages the latest AI bells and whistles to ingest that information and quickly identify consumers at different stages of the path to purchase. It can serve ads across various devices, channels, and content types and has already been piloted on existing Amazon Ads products, including the machine learning-powered Performance+ ads launched in March.
Early results showed that Ad Relevance could “extend addressability” to up to 65% of previously anonymous impressions using different targeting tactics. CPMs, or the price a brand pays for every 1,000 impressions an ad receives, were lowered, while costs-per-click improved by 8.8%. Amazon said these metrics were achieved with 100% budget delivery.
Amazon’s touting ID-free targeting capabilities comes as the cookie deprecation timeline remains a moving target. Google originally planned to wind down cookies in Chrome in the second half of this year but delayed its plans to 2025 earlier in the spring after facing regulatory hurdles and industry pushback against Privacy Sandbox, its proposed alternative.
Also Read: Hyper-targeting: The Secret Weapon for Laser-Focused Marketing
Still, marketers are on the hunt for viable cookie replacements, and Amazon clearly sees an opportunity to shore up its booming ad business further. Amazon’s revenue derived from advertising jumped 24% year over year to $11.82 billion in Q1, driven by demand for sponsored product ads. The company has recently introduced commercials to Prime Video, which it expects will contribute to further momentum in the months ahead.
