Influencers Bring Shoppable Video Ads to Amazon Prime Day

Amazon added influencer videos to this year’s Prime Day sales event covering a wide range of product categories. We tuned in to Prime Day Live segments Tuesday on LED light bulbs and headphones, and both experienced technical glitches, with videos cutting out midstream. The shoppable segments were informal and casual: Influencer BMAC went off screen in search of a pair of earbuds and then found them in another location. Viewers could react to the content in running text commentary to the right of the video and click a tab to follow the influencers; a running count showed the percentage of items sold in a promotion. EMarketer analyst Jeremy Goldman blogged Monday that Amazon booked event spaces in the weeks leading up to the two-day sale and “loaded them with goods that would be on sale on Prime Day.” Amazon invited participants in its Amazon Influencer Program to visit “creator houses” in Los Angeles, New York and Austin to produce content, Goldman said, and for creators who also sell on Amazon, the company conducted two webinars on best practices to "optimize Prime Day revenue." Goldman cited Numerator figures saying the average Prime Day order value dropped 8.5% last year from two years prior, saying, “The novelty is wearing off -- which could be one reason Amazon is turning to influencers to reinvigorate the event.” Influencers are growing in importance to the typical consumer, he said, saying in Q4, the number of minutes of influencer-created content on Facebook and YouTube was up 7% vs. the prior year. That’s important, he said, because 68% of those who watch YouTube influencer videos recall the brands mentioned, and 86% have purchased, or would consider purchasing, a product endorsed by an influencer.