How to reach High-Intent audiences on Amazon using DSP
How to reach High-Intent audiences on Amazon using DSP
Most programmatic platforms make assumptions about who might want to buy your product. Amazon doesn’t assume. It knows.
That’s the fundamental shift Amazon DSP brings to advertising: instead of targeting based on what users might be interested in, you reach people based on what they’ve actually searched, viewed, added to cart, and bought. In a world where third-party data is increasingly unreliable and privacy regulations keep tightening, that distinction matters more than ever.
This post breaks down how Amazon DSP identifies high-intent audiences — and how to build a strategy around them.
What makes an audience “High-Intent” on Amazon?
Intent isn’t binary. Someone who googled “best running shoes” is interested. Someone who searched for running shoes on Amazon, clicked on three listings, added one to cart, and abandoned it is about to buy.
Amazon DSP lets you target the second person — not the first.
Unlike Sponsored Ads, which only reach users when they actively search, Amazon DSP targets audiences based on actual behavior: what they browse, what they buy, and how consistently they engage with a category over time. That means you can reach users before they search, while they’re comparing options, and after they leave without converting — with data that reflects real purchase intent, not browsing guesswork.
The High-Intent audience types that matter most
Not all DSP audiences deliver equally. The closer you get to a verified purchase signal, the stronger the intent — and the better your downstream results.
1. In-Market Audiences
Users actively searching and comparing products in your category right now. Think of it as the programmatic equivalent of catching someone at the shelf with a product already in their hand.
2. Purchase-Based Audiences
Targeting based on verified buying history. You’re not inferring intent — you’re confirming it with real transaction data from Amazon’s ecosystem.
3. Remarketing Audiences
Re-engaging product page viewers, cart abandoners, and past buyers. These audiences consistently deliver the strongest conversion rates in DSP because the user already knows your product.
4. Lookalike Audiences
Amazon’s machine learning builds similar audiences from your best customers’ actual buying patterns — not just demographic similarities, but behavioral ones rooted in real purchase data.
5. First-Party Audiences
Your own CRM data or pixel audiences activated within DSP, keeping your brand in front of high-value users both on and off Amazon.
Layering audiences for precision
Individual segments are powerful. Layering them is where the real advantage comes from.
Instead of targeting just “in-market for yoga mats,” combine it with “Prime members” and “previously purchased fitness products.” The result is an audience with measurably stronger purchase intent and lower customer acquisition cost than any single segment delivers alone.
Amazon DSP now lets advertisers create up to ten include groups with distinct targeting logic — making it significantly easier to build these combinations without multiplying line items or complicating campaign structure.
Reaching High-Intent users beyond Amazon
One of the most underused aspects of DSP is what happens after someone leaves Amazon without buying. DSP follows that user across Amazon-owned properties — Fire TV, IMDb, Twitch, Prime Video — and thousands of third-party sites, with the same first-party purchase signal intact.
In 2025, that inventory expanded significantly with Netflix, Spotify, and SiriusXM now available through DSP. The targeting data behind every impression remains Amazon’s first-party data — not a probabilistic third-party guess. That’s a meaningful difference when you’re paying on a CPM basis and targeting quality directly drives efficiency.
What this means for your strategy
A few principles that consistently work in practice:
1. Start with the highest intent, then scale out.
Validate your messaging with remarketing and in-market audiences before expanding to lookalike or lifestyle segments. Let performance guide the expansion.
2. Separate intent signals into different line items.
A cart abandoner from three days ago is not the same as someone who browsed your category once two months ago. Bid and message them differently — because they are different buyers at different moments.
3. Measure New-to-Brand (NTB) as your primary growth indicator.
High-intent doesn’t always mean existing customer. NTB tells you whether you’re genuinely acquiring new buyers or simply recycling the ones you already have — a critical distinction for long-term growth.
What goes next
Amazon DSP’s edge isn’t just reach — it’s the quality of the signal behind the reach. And that’s what makes getting the audience strategy right the most important lever in the entire platform.
If you want to review how your current DSP setup is targeting intent, or evaluate whether DSP is the right move for your brand right now —
