Amazon Automation: Guardrails, Not Autopilot

“Automation” sounds great until your ad platform spins up 20 campaigns you didn’t ask for and burns through budget before lunch.

The truth? Automation on Amazon can save you time or cost you control.

Pricing rules: Keep the Buy Box without tanking margin.
Bid automation: Let the ad tech platform optimize bids, but only within the guardrails you set.
Repetitive tasks: Bulk case submissions, pulling reports, tagging keywords (things you shouldn’t waste brain cells on).

Campaign chaos: Autopilot tools follow rules you set, not your strategy. They’ll adjust bids or spin up campaigns exactly as instructed—without stopping to ask if it’s the right move. That’s how you end up wasting spend and losing control.
Context blind spots: Software doesn’t know why your hero ASIN tanked. It just “optimizes.”

Think of automation as power steering, not self-driving. You still steer. You still decide when to brake.

Automation isn’t a strategy. It’s leverage. If you don’t know why you’re automating, you’re not streamlining, you’re surrendering.

Want the full breakdown? Catch the replay of the From East to West AMA where Brett Bohannon and Michael Maher dig into new Amazon features here.