A note from our CEO

Hi everyone,

Amazon confirmed Prime Day will be June 23-26 this year. We’re officially ~2 weeks out. It’s time to do the usual Prime Day prep - ramp up your ad spend, think about your content, and run some coupons to help boost your sales rank going into the week. But there are also some unique factors to consider this year due to the timing of the event. 

First off, we should expect a slower sales week before Prime Day. Two reasons for this: 

1. People are going to hold off on purchases until Prime Day 

2. Juneteenth falls on a Friday this year, making a new summer 3-day weekend right before Prime Day starts. These are always slow shopping periods, but it might be even more drastic than usual because of the first point.

We also have the US’ 250th bday on July 4th, and the World Cup will be in full swing for the duration of Prime Day. Neither of these are likely to change up your strategy, but expect to see July 4th and soccer-related items take up a lot of deal estate; we’ve already seen huge jumps in search volume for patriotic and World Cup-adjacent products (see the Search Trends section below).  

I was on a webinar about prepping for Prime Day recently (here’s the recording: https://www.youtube.com/gRfB624UUQg). There was one thing I spoke about that seemed to resonate with the group: affinity circles, and how they broaden on Prime Day (and you can find new customers!). 

Affinity circles are how closely aligned a customer is with your brand. Like a solar system where your brand is in the middle, your diehard fans are in the closest orbit, and so on.

On Prime Day, your lower affinity circle expands. People are ready to try things out and make impulse purchases; there’s less friction than usual in the funnel. But they’re also less likely to become repeat customers than non-sales event shoppers, especially without proper post-purchase nurturing.

What does this mean practically? 

1. Make your content more general / approachable so it’s a good intro to your brand

2. Adjust how you do post-event remarketing.  For example, lower affinity shoppers may be more likely to buy something other than your best seller. A different product (seasonal SKU, trial/variety pack, etc.) could be a better entry point.

If you tailor your approach to the lower affinity folks, they can potentially stay in your orbit after Prime Day. If not they could fly off into space, never to be seen again.

We have more Prime Day tips from the Cartograph team below, but hit me up by responding to this email if you want to chat about your own Prime Day strategy. Always happy to talk shop.

Til next time,

Chris

P.S: If you want EVEN MORE Prime Day content, check out our Navigating Tentpole Events whitepaper here: https://bit.ly/tentpole-events.

In this newsletter:

• Sales and Ad Spend Numbers

• Prime Day AI prompts

• Search Term Trends

Last Month’s Sales and Ad Spend Numbers

Prime Day Prompts - Using AI to Lighten the Load

Prime Day brings a lot of opportunity. It also brings a lot of work. Here are some Prime Day-specific prompts from our team that you can drop in your favorite AI tool to help bring the workload down a bit. While it might be a bit late for some of the pre-event prompts, all of these can be adapted for any big Amazon sales event so save them for next time!

PRE-EVENT

• "Here is my last 12 months of sales data by ASIN. Which SKUs are most likely to benefit from a Prime Day promotion based on velocity and margin? Which should I exclude?"

• "Draft a 5-day pre-Prime Day email sequence for my DTC list designed to drive Amazon cross-shopping and retargeting pool fill."

• "Given my current FBA inventory levels and a projected 3x sales lift, what's my stockout risk by ASIN? Flag anything under 14 days of coverage."

• "I'm planning a Lightning Deal on [ASIN]. Help me write the deal submission copy and suggest an ideal discount depth based on category norms."

• "Review these three ad headlines for Prime Day and score them on urgency, clarity, and CTR potential."

• "What keywords should I prioritize for bid increases in the 2 weeks before Prime Day? Here's my current search term report."

MID-EVENT

• "Here's my hourly sales data from the past 6 hours of Prime Day. Is my pacing on track? Where should I shift budget?"

• "My CPC on [keyword] just spiked 40%. Based on its current performance data, should I adjust my bids for this term?"

• "A competitor just dropped their price below mine mid-event. Here are my options: [list]. Help me think through the trade-offs of each."

• "Write a push notification / SMS alert for our DTC subscribers letting them know our Prime Day deals are live. Please keep it under 160 characters."

POST-EVENT

• "Here's my YoY Prime Day performance by ASIN. Write a plain-English summary I can share with stakeholders."

• "I acquired [X] new-to-brand customers during Prime Day. Draft a 3-email post-event retention sequence aimed at driving a second purchase within 30 days."

• "Based on my sell-through rate during Prime Day, which SKUs should I reorder immediately, and which are overstocked going into Q3?"

• "My TACoS spiked during Prime Day, but my organic rank improved significantly. Help me write the narrative explaining why that trade-off was worth it."

• "What learnings from this Prime Day should I document for BFCM planning? Here's my performance summary."