Amazon bolsters ad capabilities with generative AI images

Amazon is releasing several new features designed to improve the performance of ads on its platform, including AI-based image generation.

Amazon Ads has launched image generation in beta. The generative AI solution is designed to enable brands to produce lifestyle imagery that can help improve their ad performance.  (For example, an advertiser's standalone image of a toaster may be placed in a lifestyle context such as on a kitchen counter as opposed to just showing it against a white background.)

The image generation capability requires no technical expertise. In the Amazon Ad Console, advertisers select their product and click “generate,” with the imaging tool leveraging generative AI to deliver a set of lifestyle and brand-themed images, based on product details, in a matter of seconds.  Advertisers can then refine images by entering short text prompts, as well as create multiple versions for testing to optimize performance.

“With the launch of our image generation capability, any advertiser can now use a simple tool to create unique, lifestyle creative assets that make their campaigns more compelling, and at no additional cost,” Colleen Aubrey, senior VP of Amazon Ads Products and Technology, said in a corporate blog post.

Amazon Ads has started rolling out image generation to select advertisers and will expand availability over time. The company says it will continue to improve the experience based on customer feedback.

The image generation tool was announced at the 2023 Amazon Unboxed advertising conference in Seattle. Other new advertising capabilities are listed below.

Ad tech capabilities

Amazon is rolling out new advertising technology capabilities, including:

• Strategic campaign planning. Advertisers can forecast relevant reach by channel or determine where to de-duplicate reach based on campaign performance over the past 12 months, and then allocate campaign budgets to drive the desired business outcomes.
• Campaign activation and optimization. Amazon Marketing Stream, a push-based API solution that delivers hourly campaign metrics, is now available worldwide and includes Amazon demand-side platform (DSP) metrics alongside already-available Sponsored Products, Sponsored Brands, and Sponsored Display reporting feeds.
• Events Manager. With Amazon DSP Events Manager, advertisers can create predictive audiences, measure performance, and automate optimizations using their first-party conversions and other types of event signals. Events Manager will soon feed into Amazon Marketing Cloud, the flexible Amazon Ads clean room analytics service.

Amazon Publisher Cloud

Amazon Publisher Cloud a clean room solution that enables a publisher to analyze its first-party signals with Amazon Ads insights to create deals optimized for reach. Publisher deals are made available for activation on the Amazon DSP platform through a single, streamlined workflow. 

Amazon Publisher Cloud–based programmatic deals are available with beta launch partners NBCUniversal, DirecTV, Dotdash Meredith, TelevisaUnivision, Fandom, and other premium publishers.

Sponsored TV

Amazon Ads is also launching Sponsored TV, a self-service ad solution for brands that sell on Amazon in the U.S. to reach audiences on streaming TV services. Sponsored TV enables brands to run streaming TV campaigns with no minimum spend to reach audiences watching content on Amazon Freevee, livestreamed entertainment on Twitch, and third-party streaming TV services through Fire TV apps.