Overview
Prime Day is one of the most important ecommerce events of the year and a critical opportunity to grow market share, drive sales, and capture new-to-brand customers. But winning Prime Day takes more than just increasing spend. The most successful brands plan ahead, stay agile during the event, and use data to extend impact after it ends. This guide walks through a proven three-phase strategy to help your team maximize performance before, during, and after Prime Day.
Lead-in: Build awareness before conversion spikes
Once Prime Day is announced, shopper behavior starts to shift. Conversion rates decline as customers begin browsing and building carts ahead of the event. This period is all about earning visibility and creating demand.
What to do: Ramp up Sponsored Brands and DSP to drive awareness and consideration. Reduce Sponsored Products budget, as conversion will be lower than usual. Push traffic to curated brand store pages and key product landing pages. Use Budget Optimizer to shift more spend into upper funnel channels.
Best practice: Launch new campaigns at least 7 days before Prime Day to give them time to ramp. Campaigns created too close to the event often struggle to deliver efficiently.
During the event: Stay aggressive and responsive
Based on previous multi-day events, we're expecting Prime Day to have a strong Day 1, a slower middle period, and a final spike at the end of the sale. With Prime Day ending on a Friday this year, expect the final-day surge to come in the afternoon instead of the evening.
What to do: Increase daily budgets 2 to 5x vs. baseline, especially on Day 1. Use Hourly Bidder to front-load spend on the first day and backload spend on the final day. Monitor campaign performance closely and reallocate budget in real time. Align bids to your ROAS thresholds, not just traffic potential.
Best practice: Avoid launching new campaigns on Prime Day. Stick to existing campaigns with strong auction history to ensure delivery and efficiency. Set a performance threshold (ROAS, TACOS, etc.) and don't over invest where performance is bad.
Lead-out: Capture demand after the event ends
Some shoppers miss the sale but still return to buy. Amazon’s algorithm continues to recommend top-performing items in the days that follow. This is your window to retarget and close.
What to do: Focus on Sponsored Display and DSP retargeting to re-engage shoppers. Reduce awareness spend and prioritize high-intent, bottom funnel tactics. Reinvest remaining budget into SKUs that performed well during the event.
Best practice: Use CommerceIQ reporting to identify breakout SKUs and campaigns, and apply those learnings to future promotions and seasonal pushes.
Common pitfalls to avoid
Pitfall | Why it's bad | What to do instead |
Launching campaigns too late and missing out on auction momentum | Bids are more expensive closer to Prime Day, and late campaigns don’t accumulate relevance or visibility early. You miss out on building momentum with pre-traffic and lose to competitors who've been live longer. | Start 7–10 days early. Launch warm-up campaigns before Prime Day to gain auction history, optimize CTRs, and build relevancy. Use pre-event campaigns to gather learnings for optimization. |
Overspending on low-ROAS campaigns due to hype, not data | Brands chase traffic blindly, especially on vague or generic keywords. This leads to inflated CPCs and diluted budgets on non-converting terms. | Double down on proven terms. Prioritize high-intent, historically efficient keywords and ASINs. Use dayparting, placement modifiers, and real-time ROAS dashboards to reinvest only in what’s converting. |
Ignoring post-event demand and failing to retarget high-interest shoppers | Prime Day drives tons of window-shopping and abandoned carts. If you stop campaigns cold on Day 4, you lose the chance to close warm leads. | Run retargeting campaigns for 7–14 days after Prime Day. Use Sponsored Display or DSP to re-engage high-interest shoppers. Promote replenishable items or bundles as follow-up offers. |
Final takeaways
Prime Day success comes down to three things:
Early planning
Agile execution
Disciplined optimization
When brands align spend to each stage of the buyer journey and adapt based on real-time data, they maximize returns and set themselves up for long-term growth. CommerceIQ’s retail media solutions help you manage every stage of the event with confidence. From Budget Optimizer to Hourly Bidder to real-time reporting, we give you the tools you need to win before, during, and after Prime Day.