Why Full-Funnel Advertising on Amazon Is Critical for Brands

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TL;DR: What’s changed with Amazon

• Amazon is no longer just a bottom-funnel conversion channel—it’s a discovery and consideration engine.
• Search is increasingly the point of conversion, not the point of influence.
• Amazon’s demand-side platform (DSP) and audience targeting are now essential for generating demand.
• Amazon Marketing Cloud (AMC) unlocks visibility into how upper-funnel tactics drive downstream conversions.
• Brands that remain search-only will hit a growth ceiling.

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Amazon is a full-funnel media engine

For years, Amazon was treated as a place where high-intent shoppers converted and success was measured by ROAS alone.

And while it’s still one of the most efficient bottom-of-funnel (BOFU) channels in digital marketing, it has evolved to be much more than that.

Today, Amazon is a full-funnel media engine, where discovery, consideration, and conversion all happen within the same ecosystem—and brands who are still treating it like a BOFU play are quickly falling behind.

Our Amazon and Ecommerce Marketplace team recently teamed up with Xnurta on a webinar about this shift, and how brands should adapt. Here are the top takeaways.

From conversion engine to discovery platform

One of the clearest signals of this transformation is how shoppers behave today.

“I think that Amazon has really transitioned from being primarily a conversion platform to more of a discovery and research tool.” —Taylor Bittle, Marketplace Ads Manager, Amazon and Ecommerce Marketplace Practice, Right Side Up

This aligns with broader market trends. According to NielsenIQ, over 63% of U.S. consumers now start product searches on Amazon, more than on any other channel—search engines sit second at 48%. 

In other words, nowadays, demand is both captured and created on Amazon, whereas for years it was just the former. That shift has massive implications for how marketing strategies should be structured.

Search isn't going away, but its role has changed

Make no mistake about it: search is one of the highest-intent touchpoints on Amazon, and it’s as vital as ever. But its role is changing.

“Search is still going to be there: it’s the closest connection you have from a consumer’s brain to their pocketbook.”—Tom Kluis, GM, Amazon and Ecommerce Marketplace Practice, Right Side Up

The difference is what happens before that search.

Shoppers are no longer entering Amazon with fully formed intent. They’re browsing, comparing, researching, and even discovering brands for the first time.

Search remains critical, but it’s increasingly the place where existing demand converts.

Put simply, when a strategy is limited to search, it often competes for demand generated elsewhere.

The evolution of full-funnel advertising on Amazon

As shopper behavior shifts, Amazon’s ad ecosystem has evolved to match it. Here’s what we we see today:

• Sponsored Products and Sponsored Brands still dominate lower-funnel capture.
• Amazon’s demand-side platform (DSP) enables upper-funnel awareness and mid-funnel consideration.
• Amazon Marketing Cloud (AMC) connects the journey across touchpoints.

“It’s no longer just how to harvest demand… it’s more so about how to generate that demand.” —Ashlee Earl, Manager, Client Success, Xnurta 

Historically, Amazon strategies focused on:

• Keyword harvesting
• Bid optimization
• Conversion efficiency

Today, it’s much more complex than that—and virtually a whole new operating model. High-performing brands are now adding:

• Audience targeting and segmentation
• Cross-channel sequencing (DSP → Search)
• Behavioral retargeting
• Incrementality measurement

Symptoms and outcome of search-only strategies

Many brands are already feeling the pressure, with rising CPCs, slowing new-to-brand growth, and increasing reliance on branded search—all symptoms of a saturated lower funnel.

Without upstream demand generation, brands end up:

• Competing harder for the same customers
• Paying more for diminishing returns
• Cannibalizing their own branded traffic

“Search is great, but there is going to be a ceiling in terms of growth… that’s the perfect time to introduce DSP.” —Taylor Bittle, Marketplace Ads Manager, Amazon and Ecommerce Marketplace Practice, Right Side Up

This is why any brand looking to generate incremental growth needs to build a full-funnel strategy.

Amazon DSP: From nice-to-have to strategic necessity

Amazon DSP has historically been misunderstood, with a reputation of being expensive or purely top-of-funnel.

But that perception is outdated—and wrong.

Modern DSP strategies now span the entire funnel:

• Retargeting high-intent shoppers who didn’t convert
• Consideration campaigns targeting in-market audiences
• Awareness campaigns driving discovery at scale

More importantly, DSP can directly impact search performance and demand. In one example shared in the webinar, optimizing DSP led to increased branded search volume, higher organic sales, and improved overall efficiency (lower blended ACoS).

AMC: The missing link between upper and lower funnel

As with other channels, one of the biggest reasons brands historically avoided upper-funnel investment on Amazon was measurement, or a lack thereof.

If DSP didn’t show strong ROAS, it was often cut.

Amazon Marketing Cloud changes that.

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Related article

Read our complete guide to Amazon Marketing Cloud, including how to build an effective three-step strategy today.

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By enabling multi-touch attribution and path-to-conversion analysis, AMC reveals how different tactics contribute to outcomes, not just who gets last-click credit.

“AMC is really key in bridging your search and DSP efforts: it just unlocks that customer journey.” —Taylor Bittle, Marketplace Ads Manager, Amazon and Ecommerce Marketplace Practice, Right Side Up

This allows marketers to:

• Understand how many touchpoints drive conversion
• Identify which channels create vs. capture demand
• Optimize for metrics like new-to-brand and lifetime value

In practice, this often surfaces a surprising insight: Some of the “least efficient” campaigns as measured by ROAS are actually the most valuable for long-term growth.

The modern Amazon playbook

So what does this shift actually require from marketers?

At a high level, it means rethinking Amazon as a system, not just a channel.

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Related case study

Learn how we helped a premium grocery brand achieve its highest revenue month ever on Amazon by improving operational stability.

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A modern Amazon strategy should incorporate these four steps:

1. Generate demand through DSP and audience targeting.
2. Capture demand through optimized search campaigns tailored for brands’ best shoppers.
3. Measure impact holistically using AMC.
4. Optimize toward incrementality, not just ROAS.

By adopting this model, brands can scale beyond keyword limitations and build sustainable growth instead of getting stuck in an increasingly expensive and crowded lower funnel.

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Build a full-funnel strategy that scales

Amazon is now a full-funnel media engine, and growth requires more than just better keywords; it requires a coordinated, data-driven strategy across search, DSP, and measurement.

If your brand is hitting a ceiling—or you’re unsure how to move beyond search—now is the time to rethink your approach. Reach out to Right Side Up today to start building a full-funnel Amazon strategy that actually scales.

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