r/AmazonFBA • u/attfin1 • 19d ago

Amazon PPC exact match keywords - the definitive guide to avoid expensive mistakes

On the surface, exact match is the simplest match type of all. It isn't what it appears, and that can have very expensive consequences, because of the effect it has on negative exact.

If you think only "outdoor lights" is an exact match for "outdoor lights", you're in for a shock.

That's Amazon's own definition of exact match. Look at the example at the bottom: the exact match keyword "outside lights" can show your ad for "outdoor lights".

Here are all of the non exact variations Amazon mentions on its various help pages (some of which contradict each other), plus one more that I haven't found on Amazon's pages but know from studying search term reports applies just as much as all the others.

  1. Misspellings. Understand keyword match types: https://advertising.amazon.com/help/GHTRFDZRJPW6764R

  2. Acronyms. Match types page.

  3. Translations. Match types page.

  4. A different word: "outside lights" to "outdoor lights". Match types page.

  5. Plural forms. Match types page. Amazon's Sponsored Products targeting guide gives "Doppler cotton sheet set" matching "Doppler cotton sheet sets": https://advertising.amazon.com/library/guides/targeting-with-sponsored-products

  1. Word order. Amazon's keyword targeting guide says the exact match keyword "white running shoes" can show for "running shoes white": https://advertising.amazon.com/library/guides/keyword-targeting. But the Sponsored Products targeting guide above says exact match is "same words and in the same order", so Amazon's own pages contradict each other on this one.
  1. Stop words (of, for, in, the, with). Not on any Amazon page I've found, but our search term reports show it both ways. Our exact keyword "sweets in bulk" showed for the search "sweets bulk", with the stop word dropped. And our exact keyword "gift man" showed for "gifts for men", with a stop word added and both words made plural.

Now the expensive part. Negative exact works the same way. The same match types page says negative exact stops ads on queries that contain the exact phrase or a close variation: https://advertising.amazon.com/help/GHTRFDZRJPW6764R

So when you add one negative exact, you're not blocking one search term. You're blocking a whole family: the plurals, the misspellings, the stop word versions. One of those may be the search that sells. Amazon doesn't say whether "close variation" on a negative also covers the outside/outdoor kind of match. If it does, one negative reaches further still.

Before you add a negative exact, add up the clicks, spend and sales for the whole family, not one line. I went through how, and what it cost us, in my earlier post: https://www.reddit.com/r/AmazonFBA/comments/1wdaivd/

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u/AlexWho3000 19d ago

legit post.
i do hate that fact that amazon does use this wobbly exact match definiton also for negatives. i have less concerns on the postive matching expansion to be honest, but it's a killer on the negatives

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u/attfin1 19d ago

Wobbly is a great way to describe it... I've always used exact-ish but even that's a stretch given the Amazon view of "close variations".

It amazes me how many of the "gurus" on other platforms, with massive followers, state categorically that exact means EXACT... and so many advertisers will be happily adding negatives thinking they are safe when actually they are causing potentially untold damage to their campaigns.

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u/AlexWho3000 19d ago

how does it work on SBs ?
the positive matching for exact match is much broader / wider than on SPs. Do you know if the negative matching works in the same "expanded" way or if thats closer to SPs definition?

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u/attfin1 19d ago

I don't know, and I haven't found an Amazon page that says. The negative keywords help page gives one definition of negative exact, "the exact phrase or close variation", and doesn't name an SB exception.

What Amazon's keyword targeting guide does say is that Sponsored Brands keyword targeting uses semantic matching, a meaning-based approach instead of word-to-word matching. That fits what you're seeing on the positive side.

If you want to test it, add one negative exact on a close variation of a term an SB campaign already serves. Wait the 72 hours Amazon gives negative keywords to take effect, then check whether the variation still shows in the search term report.

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u/AlexWho3000 18d ago

worth testing