Google and Amazon are both set to make significant moves in digital advertising. But their underlying approach broadly differs.
Last week, two industry giants kicked off their respective marketing conferences: Google Marketing Live and the Amazon Publisher Services (APS) Summit.
These conferences were a strategic opportunity for both companies to launch their future offerings in the advertising landscape. While Google addressed its in-house advertisers, Amazon catered to publishers and discussed supply-side AdTech.
At the nucleus of both their AdTech offerings is an upgraded customer experience.
Google is crucially focused on an information-search process driven by intelligence.
When users input a query on the search engine, it’s through the shown ads that they’ll be able to take the next step. This means the copious amount of ads we come across will rise significantly. Even the auto-generated responses will entail ads on desktops and mobile phones.
However, it’ll be a strategic means for businesses to reach consumers faster. And AI will be present at the heart of it all – from AI-based channels to AI overviews and ads within Gemini’s AI mode.
For businesses to leverage Google’s AI-driven inventory, buying Google’s entire suite of enterprise ad products is a prerequisite for advertisers. Those who wish to appear on the tech giant’s AIO or AI mode ads will have to use Shopping and Search campaigns with broad match and Performance Max.
Meanwhile, Amazon has chosen to move differently.
Its focus is mainly on the supply side rather than providing tools only for publishers. While the e-commerce giant hopes to place more video ads across its properties, the company plans to continue offloading all manual campaign work onto AI systems.
Moreover, with improved AdTech strategies, Amazon is targeting shoppers who have shown buying intent.
Through Amazon’s DSP, all video ads can leverage its first-party retail purchase data. This provides a crucial advantage to businesses because this data provides in-depth insight into shoppers’ buying behavior. Now, advertisers can target buyers based on actual intent instead of only browsing history.
With this, Amazon’s focus is on driving commerce-centric advertising for brands wanting direct sales. Whereas Google’s ad vision prioritizes a broad audience reach, helping elevate brand awareness.
