This year, we saw performance impacted by a few variables never before experienced.
a PLTFRM Company
VENDO’s Low-Bid Strategy Drives 139% Lift on Hero Keyword
November 15, 2025
27.5%
Top-of-Search (TOS) impression share
+139%
orders on hero keyword
-50%
cost-per-click
10%
improvement in advertising-cost-of-sales
$2>$3.50
Prime Day
ROAs Improvement YoY
17%
Increase
in Shipped Revenue YoY
#3
Organic Ranking on
‘Protein Powder’
6
Products Moved
to Page 1
Context
Firstly, we saw the COVID e-commerce spike trend down a bit, which was indicated by consumers falling back to in-store shopping on Black Friday at a higher rate. As a result, Sunday and Cyber Monday performed the best of the 5-day main event, which runs from Thanksgiving Thursday to Cyber Monday. Black Friday still saw a lift but not as profound as the last couple of years.
Secondly, Amazon ran 2 Prime Day events in the same year for the 1st time ever, with the 2nd event, “Prime Early Access Sale” (dubbed Fall Prime Day), occurring in October only about 5-6 weeks before Black Friday/Cyber Monday promotions began. Because of this, consumers got a head start on their holiday shopping earlier than ever.
Third, there was a mass Amazon Advertising Console technical glitch, resulting in underspending on Black Friday.
Nevertheless, VENDO was able to deliver on wins for its brand partners as detailed below.
Context
A brand in the highly competitive bamboo toilet paper category sought to improve visibility and efficiency on its primary keyword: bamboo toilet paper. Initially, the brand achieved only 7% Top-of-Search Impression Share (TOS IS) with an unsustainably high $11.80 cost-per-click (CPC). These high CPCs quickly exhausted the campaign budget, resulting in minimal sales. VENDO was brought in to improve performance while increasing visibility for this critical search term.
Tactics
To boost keyword momentum while increasing efficiency, VENDO implemented a dual-campaign approach. The original campaign continued with aggressive bidding to secure top-of-search placements, while a new low-bid campaign for the same hero keyword was launched with approximately 50% lower bids.
The goal of the low-bid campaign was to generate sales from lower-cost placements such as rest-of-search and product pages. This would help build sales velocity on the keyword without the high cost associated with top-of-search.
As consistent weekly sales accrued through the low-bid campaign, Amazon’s algorithm began to reward the brand with lower CPCs and improved placements. This increased efficiency allowed for a greater budget allocation toward the hero keyword, further strengthening its top-of-search performance.
Results
Within two weeks of launching the low-bid campaign, weekly orders on bamboo toilet paper increased 256%. After one month, the brand was consistently driving +178% orders per week on the keyword, and the Top-of-Search Impression Share had increased significantly to 27.5%. Despite this dramatic improvement in visibility, the CPC fell by 50%, from $11.80 to $6.20, proving that Amazon does indeed reward sales velocity on key terms.
Looking at the performance month-over-month, total orders increased 139%, while the ACOS on the hero keyword improved from 87.5% to 77%. The brand not only gained visibility but did so more efficiently, validating the power of the low-bid strategy in driving long-term performance gains on high-cost keywords.