A01 chaf6542 06 se fm indd

 Data‑  driven  automation

Round (2004) said that ‘data is king at Amazon’. He 

gave many examples of  data-  driven automation includ-

ing customer channel preferences, managing the way 

content is displayed to different user types such as new 

644

Part 3  Implementation

M12_CHAF6542_06_SE_C12.indd   644

7/22/14   1:41 AM

---

releases and  top-  sellers, merchandising and recom-

mendation (showing related products and promotions) 

and also advertising through paid search (automatic ad 

generation and bidding).

The automated search advertising and bidding sys-

tem for paid search has had a big impact at Amazon. 

Sponsored links were initially done by humans, but 

this was unsustainable due to the range of products at 

Amazon. The automated programme generates key-

words, writes ad creative, determines best landing page, 

manages bids, and measures conversion rates, profit per 

converted visitor and updates bids. Again the problem 

of volume is there: Matt Round described how the book 

How to Make Love Like a Porn Star by Jenna Jameson 

received tens of thousands of clicks from  pornography- 

 related searches, but few actually purchased the book. 

So the update cycle must be quick to avoid large losses.

There is also an automated email measurement and 

optimisation system. The campaign calendar used to be 

manually managed with relatively weak measurement 

and it was costly to schedule and use. A new system:

● 

automatically optimises content to improve cus-

tomer experience;

● 

avoids sending an email campaign that has low 

clickthrough or high unsubscribe rate;

● 

includes inbox management (avoid sending multiple 

emails/per week);

● 

has a growing library of automated email programmes 

covering new releases and recommendations;

● 

but there are challenges if promotions are too suc-

cessful and inventory isn’t available.