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How to Get Started with Amazon Sponsored Brands PPC Ads – 2025 Guide

Want to really stand out on Amazon’s marketplace? Here’s how to use Sponsored Brand ads to carve out valuable eCommerce real estate.

  • September 5, 2025
  • /
  • CANOPY Management
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Table of Contents

  1. Building Brand Recognition in a Crowded Marketplace
  2. The Expanding Amazon Marketplace in 2025
  3. Amazon Brand Registry: Your Essential First Step
  4. Getting Started With Amazon Sponsored Brand Ads
  5. Who Can Use Sponsored Brands?
  6. What Products Are NOT Eligible for Sponsored Brands
  7. New-to-Brand Metrics and Targeting
  8. Sponsored Brands Advertising Formats
  9. Advanced Campaign Goals and Cost Controls
  10. AI-Powered Features for 2025
  11. How to Launch Your First Sponsored Brands Campaign
  12. Creative Optimization and Video Best Practices
  13. How Canopy Management Can Help
  14. Frequently Asked Questions

It’s no longer a question of “do Amazon ads work?” 

Yes, they absolutely do work. 

That’s why a primary focus of Canopy Management’s Amazon and Walmart marketing agency is helping sellers navigate the world of Amazon advertising.

Amazon pay per click advertising has quickly become one of the largest “levers” available to ecommerce sellers. For businesses looking to sell niche products on Amazon, it can be a challenging task to stand out in a sea of competition.

There’s a big learning curve.

This post – the second of a three-part series including Amazon Sponsored Products, and Sponsored Display – is designed to allow Amazon sellers to digest this crucial facet of ecommerce marketing in smaller, bite-sized chunks.

Building Brand Recognition in a Crowded Marketplace

In today’s hyper-competitive Amazon ecosystem, brand recognition is your competitive moat. While individual product ads can drive immediate sales, Sponsored Brands ads are your primary tool for building the brand equity that creates long-term customer relationships and sustainable business growth.

Brand Recognition: With millions of sellers on Amazon, customers are overwhelmed with choices. Without strong brand recognition, your products become commoditized, leading to price wars and eroding profit margins. Sponsored Brands ads solve this by putting your brand front and center, not just your individual products.

Customer Lifetime Value: Sponsored Brands ads don’t just drive one-time purchases—they create brand-loyal customers who return to buy from you repeatedly. Research shows that branded shoppers have significantly higher lifetime values and lower acquisition costs over time.

Premium Positioning: Unlike product ads that compete primarily on price and features, Sponsored Brands allow you to communicate your unique value proposition, brand story, and quality differentiators. This positions your products as premium choices rather than commodity alternatives.

Cross-Product Discovery: When customers connect with your brand through Sponsored Brands ads, they’re more likely to explore your entire product catalog. This cross-selling effect can dramatically increase average order values and overall revenue per customer.

Ready to Start Growing Your Amazon Brand?

Canopy’s Partners Achieve an Average 84% Profit Increase!

Find out more

The Expanding Amazon Marketplace in 2025

Amazon’s Growth Trajectory

The platform continues expanding rapidly: Amazon hosts 9.7 million sellers worldwide (though only 1.9 million are actively selling), with estimates suggesting hundreds of new sellers join daily. This creates both opportunity and competition.

At the same time, Amazon is doing everything in its power to make sure that brands (of all sizes) carefully align their brand with Amazon’s well-cultivated marketplace.

Amazon has a substantial share of the market, but they’re not satisfied with that. They’re constantly looking for ways to increase their footprint.

Key 2025 Statistics:

New Market Expansion: As of May 2025, Amazon Ireland (Amazon.ie) now supports Sponsored Products, Sponsored Brands, and Brand Stores, opening new opportunities in Western Europe.

That’s why it’s become increasingly important to find a way to set yourself apart.

Amazon Brand Registry: Your Essential First Step

Establishing ways that brands can creatively establish their brand voice and unique value proposition is front-and-center for Amazon right now.

Amazon Brand Registry is a crucial starting point for sellers looking to level up their ecommerce business. Once you’ve done that, it’s time to take the next step and look at how a specific Amazon Sponsored Ad type can help you to carve out valuable real estate on Amazon’s marketplace. 

For many Amazon sellers, their online business really starts to take off when they begin to implement Sponsored Brand Ads.

Brand Registry Benefits in 2025:

downtown city scene with a lot of very bright advertising lights

Getting Started With Amazon Sponsored Brand Ads

We recently wrote about getting started with Amazon Sponsored Products ads. If you’re just beginning your Amazon advertising journey, that previous post is a perfect place to start. This post will take you through the next Amazon advertising campaign type: Amazon Sponsored Brand.

Much like a Sponsored Product Ad, a Sponsored Brand Ad is cost-per-click, and may target keywords, categories, and/or products. An Amazon Sponsored Brand Ad can feature your brand logo, a custom headline, and multiple products.

What’s New in 2025:

Sponsored Brand ads appear in prominent places within relevant shopping results and on product detail pages. The Amazon ad may appear on both desktop and mobile, and help drive discovery of your brand among customers shopping for similar products.

The assets that Sponsored Brands allow you to create are customizable, may feature product and lifestyle images, as well as video. You can direct shoppers to your Amazon Store, a new landing page, or a custom URL.

Who Can Use Sponsored Brands?

Sponsored Brands are available for:

Important Note: Brand Registry enrollment is mandatory for most Sponsored Brands features, as it verifies your brand ownership and unlocks advanced advertising capabilities.

What Products Are NOT Eligible for Sponsored Brands

At this time, the following products cannot be advertised with Sponsored Brands:

For a full list of permitted and prohibited categories, review the creative acceptance policies for Sponsored Brands and Sponsored Products.

2025 Update: Amazon has improved its image compliance reporting system, providing more detailed guidance on why creatives might be rejected, helping sellers avoid listing suppression.

Ready to Start Growing Your Amazon Brand?

Canopy’s Partners Achieve an Average 84% Profit Increase!

Find out more

New-to-Brand Metrics and Targeting

Revolutionary 2025 Feature: Amazon introduced New-to-Brand (NTB) audience targeting for Sponsored Brands campaigns in May 2025, allowing you to boost bids specifically for shoppers who haven’t bought from your brand in the past 12 months.

Why New-to-Brand Matters

Sponsored Brand ads drive brand discovery with shoppers and help you reach new customers. Because driving first-time purchases can often cost more than driving repeat purchases, you’ll want to know what percentage of sales are coming from these efforts. ACoS or RoAS alone do not clearly measure the impact of Sponsored Brands in growing your brand audience.

How It Works

With new-to-brand metrics, Amazon sellers can:

Pro Tip: Advertisers who increased their bids by 100%+ for NTB audiences saw 2x more new customer orders than those who didn’t adjust their bidding strategy.

Using new-to-brand metrics to supplement advertising cost of sales (ACOS), or return on ad spend (ROAS) will tell you whether or not your “discovery” campaigns are working.

There are three different Amazon Sponsored Brands ad creative formats; Product Collection, Stores Spotlight, and Sponsored Brands Video.

Image courtesy of Amazon

1. Product Collection

Amazon’s product collection format allows you to promote multiple products from a landing page or lifestyle images of your choice. This is where you can show (and tell) browsing Amazon customers your story with ads that feature rich custom images.

You can use custom images that represent your brand or lifestyle imagery to help prospective customers better understand your product. After selecting your product collection, next you’ll select a landing page and a minimum of one product to feature in your creative.

2025 Enhancement: Amazon now automatically displays promotional CTAs (call-to-action) with deals and messaging when you’re running promotions.

Canopy Pro Tip: 

For you KDP Authors out there, Sponsored Brands helps you put your personal brand front and center. Your ads’ landing page takes shoppers into a virtual bookstore and enables a browsing and decision-making experience with features like highlighted books, reviews, summary, and other metadata about the ASIN.

Image courtesy of Amazon

2. Store Spotlight

For an Amazon seller with brand registry, Amazon Stores allow merchants to set up an online storefront for their brands for free. By using custom layouts and pre-made templates, sellers can quickly create a website-within-a-website to spotlight your brand (and creativity).

Now that you’ve put the time into developing your brand Store, take it to the next level with Store Spotlight. Sponsored Brands now allow you to feature your Store to make it much easier for a satisfied customer to make buying from your brand a habit.

Requirements and Features:

New in 2025: Amazon has added AI-powered headline suggestions to Store Spotlight campaigns. These suggestions are generated based on your advertised products and follow Amazon’s ad policy guidelines, helping you build customized creatives more quickly while improving creative approval rates.

Image courtesy of Amazon

3. Amazon Sponsored Brand Video

If you’re like most people, video is a scroll stopper. You can’t help it. Amazon has rolled out Sponsored Brands video, a new ad format that displays auto-playing video in shopping results.

Video Ad Specifications:

Major 2025 Updates:

Important: Sponsored Brands video has its own ad placement and auction. This means running a Sponsored Brands video won’t compete against your other sponsored ads.

Canopy Pro Tip: 

Canopy Management’s Creative Services team just won (again) two gold AVA video awards for its work on our partners’ Amazon advertising campaigns. As a full-service Amazon Management Agency, Canopy has an extensive Amazon Creative Services department that includes full listing optimization, Amazon research and copy optimization, Amazon posts, as well as cutting edge photography and video.  If you’re looking for a head start, reach out to the Creative Services team to find out more!

Ready to Start Growing Your Amazon Brand?

Canopy’s Partners Achieve an Average 84% Profit Increase!

Find out more

Advanced Campaign Goals and Cost Controls

Revolutionary 2025 Feature: Amazon introduced sophisticated campaign goals and AI-powered cost controls that automatically adjust bids to help you meet specific objectives within your desired budget.

Three Strategic Campaign Goals

1. Grow Brand Impression Share

2. Acquire New Customers

3. Drive Page Visits

Cost Control Features

Smart Bidding: Define your success metric for each goal in terms of a target cost. The system automatically adjusts bids to help you meet objectives at or below your target cost.

Budget Management: Set maximum costs over a 7-day rolling average, eliminating the need to calculate individual bids for each target.

AI-Powered Features for 2025

Amazon has integrated artificial intelligence throughout the Sponsored Brands experience:

Automated Optimization

Creative Intelligence

Audience Intelligence

Cross-Device Optimization: Campaigns automatically adjust for desktop, mobile, and tablet performance

How to Launch Your First Sponsored Brands Campaign

Getting started is streamlined in 2025. Here’s the step-by-step process:

Step 1: Campaign Setup

  1. Navigate to Amazon Advertising Console
  2. Select “Create Campaign” > “Sponsored Brands”
  3. Choose your campaign goal (Brand Impression Share, Acquire New Customers, or Drive Page Visits)
  4. Set campaign duration and daily budget

Step 2: Creative Development

  1. Select your ad format (Product Collection, Store Spotlight, or Video)
  2. Upload your brand logo and create headline
  3. Choose products to feature (minimum of one, maximum varies by format)
  4. Select landing page (Brand Store, product page, or custom URL)

Step 3: Targeting Strategy

  1. Choose targeting method:
    • Keyword targeting: Target specific search terms
    • Product targeting: Show ads on competitor or complementary product pages
    • Category targeting: Reach shoppers browsing specific categories
  2. Apply bid adjustments for New-to-Brand audiences (if using customer acquisition goal)
  3. Set keyword bids or use Amazon’s suggested bids

Step 4: Launch and Optimization

  1. Review all settings and creative assets
  2. Submit for review (typically approved within 72 hours)
  3. Monitor performance and adjust bids, budgets, and targeting as needed

New in 2025: Enhanced creative editing allows you to update video creatives in live campaigns without losing historical performance data.

Creative Optimization and Video Best Practices

Static Creative Best Practices

Video Creative Excellence

Technical Specifications:

Content Strategy:

2025 Video Features:

How Canopy Management Can Help

Amazon has been at the forefront of the eCommerce world for over two decades, providing a platform for millions of businesses to sell their products. With the rise of eCommerce, Amazon has become the go-to destination for shoppers across the world, making it a valuable advertising platform for businesses looking to reach new customers.

Back in the early days of Amazon, Amazon PPC was just one way of launching a product. Now it’s almost impossible to find success without it. Yes, there are some that do, but they’re the exception, not the rule.

The 2025 Reality: With AI integration, enhanced targeting options, and increasingly sophisticated campaign goals, Amazon advertising has become more complex but also more powerful. Professional management is more valuable than ever.

That’s why experienced Amazon sellers reach out to the team at Canopy Management. Our expert Amazon Creative Services, PPC and DSP pros are a big part of why Canopy partners show an 84% average profit increase.

Want to be part of the Canopy Tribe? Find out more right here.

Canopy Management is a full-service marketing agency for Amazon, Walmart, and TikTok sellers. Our team consists of multi-million dollar, omni-channel entrepreneurs, industry leaders, and award-winning experts. 

When you consider the many ways that Canopy Management can help you grow your business, you’ll see why selling on Amazon is much easier “under the Canopy”:

Our Comprehensive Services:

Frequently Asked Questions

What’s the difference between Sponsored Brands and Sponsored Products?

Sponsored Products focus on individual product listings and are best for driving immediate sales. They don’t require Brand Registry and appear more subtly in search results.

Sponsored Brands promote your brand as a whole, featuring your logo, headline, and multiple products. They require Brand Registry, appear more prominently, and are better for building brand awareness and customer acquisition.

Do I need Amazon Brand Registry to run Sponsored Brands?

Yes, Amazon Brand Registry is required for most Sponsored Brands features. Brand Registry verifies your brand ownership and unlocks advanced advertising capabilities, including Store creation and enhanced analytics.

How much should I budget for Sponsored Brands campaigns?

Start with 20-30% of your total advertising budget allocated to Sponsored Brands, with the remainder going to Sponsored Products. New brands should focus more heavily on Sponsored Brands for customer acquisition, while established brands can balance between acquisition and conversion campaigns.

What’s the difference between the three campaign goals?

Choose based on your primary objective: awareness, acquisition, or engagement.

How do New-to-Brand bid adjustments work?

New-to-Brand targeting allows you to increase bids specifically for shoppers who haven’t purchased from your brand in the past 12 months. You can apply percentage-based bid increases (e.g., +50%, +100%) for this audience segment. Advertisers using higher bid adjustments for NTB audiences typically see improved new customer acquisition rates.

Should I use automatic or manual targeting for Sponsored Brands?

For new brands: Start with automatic targeting to discover high-performing keywords, then gradually move to manual campaigns for better control.

For established brands: Use a mix of both, with automatic campaigns for discovery and manual campaigns for precise control over your most important keywords.

How long should my Sponsored Brands videos be?

Optimal length: 15-30 seconds for maximum engagement Amazon allows: 6-45 seconds Best practice: Keep videos concise while effectively demonstrating your product’s key benefits and brand story.

Can I edit my ads after they’re live?

2025 Update: Yes! You can now edit video creatives in live campaigns without losing historical performance data. For static ads, you can modify headlines, images, and product selections, though changes require re-approval.

What’s the typical performance timeline for Sponsored Brands?

Allow at least 30-45 days for comprehensive campaign optimization.

How do I measure Sponsored Brands success beyond ACoS?

Key metrics to track:

Can Sponsored Brands help with organic rankings?

Yes! Sponsored Brands campaigns contribute to organic performance by:

The combination of paid brand advertising and improved organic performance creates a powerful growth flywheel for your Amazon business.

What’s the biggest mistake brands make with Sponsored Brands?

Common mistakes include:

  1. No clear campaign goal: Running campaigns without specific objectives
  2. Poor creative quality: Using low-resolution images or weak headlines
  3. Ignoring New-to-Brand metrics: Focusing only on ACOS instead of customer acquisition
  4. Inadequate budgets: Setting budgets too low to gather meaningful data
  5. No video content: Missing the engagement benefits of video advertising

Pro tip: Invest in high-quality creatives and give campaigns sufficient budget and time to perform before making major optimizations.

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