GHD UK succeeds with Tambo’s holistic Amazon Advertising strategy

Short for “good hair day,” GHD’s vision is “to transform the lives of women with a good hair day.” With a focus on continuing research and work with a network of professional stylists, GHD offers stylers, curlers, hair dryers, hot brushes, and other hairstyling products.

On Amazon since 2014 and using Amazon Advertising since 2018, the UK division of GHD (GHD UK) initially partnered with Tambo, a brand growth agency focused on Amazon, during Q3 2019 for an audit of its brand presence on Amazon. The relationship evolved as GHD looked to further optimize its content and advertising strategy for October-December 2019, traditionally its peak sales season.

From its initial brand audit, Tambo identified opportunities for acquisition campaigns with Amazon Advertising to engage new-to-brand customers. Previous GHD Amazon Advertising campaigns had focused on brand loyalty. Tambo set out to optimize GHD’s presence on Amazon to reflect a premium hairstyling brand.

Tambo focused on best-selling GHD products to help lead acquisition campaigns using Sponsored Brands, giving ad space priority to products based on retail readiness and promotion status. Sponsored Products campaigns primarily focused on category keywords, centered on generic and branded keywords with a goal to reach new-to-brand customers. A modest budget was dedicated to Sponsored Display for brand loyalty goals, to help keep GHD’s display ads showing above the fold on its product detail pages.

Consistent measurement provided Tambo with the insights needed to dynamically adapt campaigns. Biweekly reviews of keywords, targeting, bids, and products ensured that the strategy remained optimized. Tambo leveraged the Amazon Advertising API for daily campaign reporting to review trends. Tambo CEO Paul Adams also credits Bulksheets as a great way to discover new keywords, which were used on a monthly basis.

In tandem with its advertising strategy, Tambo created a content and branding audit of GHD on Amazon. Focusing on A+ Content for product detail pages and Store content, Tambo and GHD optimized for awareness and experience of potential customers. For both content and campaigns, a strategy of “premiumization” focused on spotlighting and growing GHD’s high-end products.

Between October 1st and December 31st, 2019, GHD exceeded their target sales on Amazon by 42%. New-to-brand customers represented 85% of GHD sales on Amazon during this same period.

The “premiumization” strategy helped in the sales growth of GHD’s high-end products on Amazon. Of particular note, GHD’s Platinum+ series of hair stylers experienced significant growth during Q4 2019, with a 189% increase in projected cost of sales year over year. Average order value for GHD’s products on Amazon increased by 23% in the same time frame.

GHD’s results can be attributed to a holistic strategy from Tambo, incorporating content, campaigns across Amazon Advertising products, and consistent reporting and adjustment of campaigns. Engaging new-to-brand customers while focusing on premium products and ensuring brand loyalty on product detail pages, Tambo delivered many wins for GHD.

GHD UK e-commerce Key Account Manager Ollie Charlton also credits the success of the Tambo collaboration to a product/brand audit and strategy development well in advance of GHD’s busy Q4 season. “I would emphasize how important it is to get your campaigns collaboratively set up/tested and monitored ahead of the period where you are looking to drive results, i.e., ahead of peak,” says Ollie Charlton. “Have all campaigns live and running circa two months prior to [the season start] date in order to make any optimization ahead of time if required.”

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