Customer Knowledge Base
Customer Knowledge Base
Breadcrumbs

Amazon Marketing Cloud (AMC) — Data Scope and Update Frequency

Migration note (Phase 1b): Built during the Root 8 (DSP & AMC) migration. The Custom Attribution material was folded in from the legacy page "Custom Attribution available in Amazon Marketing Cloud" and condensed. Content reproduced and tidied — not yet optimised or fact-checked.

What AMC Provides

Amazon Marketing Cloud (AMC) is Amazon's privacy-safe data clean room. It lets advertisers analyse cross-channel audience and conversion data at the user level — without exposing personally identifiable information — across Sponsored Ads (SPA) and Amazon DSP. In emax digital, AMC powers the dashboards in the Marketing Cloud (AMC) section (Exposure Group Analysis, Frequency Optimisation, Time to Conversion, Path to Conversion, Intraday Optimisation, Ad Type Touchpoints).

Prerequisite: AMC-based dashboards require an active Amazon DSP + AMC connection. The customer must have an active AMC instance. Contact your emax digital account manager to configure AMC.

Data Scope and Update Frequency

  • Update frequency: AMC data updates daily.

  • 14-day lag: Data for any reporting period is fetched 14 days after the period ends, so Amazon's standard 14-day attribution window can close. Complete results for a given week or month are available on day 15 after that period closes. AMC dashboards are therefore not suitable for real-time decisions.

  • Standard attribution window: AMC conversion metrics use a 14-day click + 14-day view model, which can differ from the attribution settings in your Sponsored Ads or DSP console.

  • Privacy thresholds: AMC enforces minimum audience sizes to prevent re-identification. Segments, exposure groups, or paths with very small user counts may be suppressed (shown as zero, empty, or "redacted by Amazon"). This is an AMC requirement, not a data error.

  • Marketplace scope: AMC analyses are run per marketplace; figures are not aggregated across marketplaces.

Custom Attribution in AMC

Ad attribution determines how conversions are assigned to the ad touchpoints (impressions or clicks) that preceded them. AMC makes it possible to go beyond Amazon's standard attribution and apply a custom attribution model.

Please note: emax digital does not query Custom Attribution by default — only as a scoped custom project. Speak to your account manager if you want a custom attribution analysis.

Standard attribution (for reference)

Ad type

Standard model

Window

Merchant-based (Sponsored Products for Sellers)

Last-click

7 days by default; emax digital lets Sellers switch between the 7-day and 14-day window (API also supports 1 / 7 / 14 / 30 days)

Brand-based (DSP, Sponsored Display, Sponsored Brands, Sponsored Products for Vendors)

Last-click prioritised over last-view, across competing ads

14 days before conversion

Pixel conversions (Amazon DSP, where a valid pixel is attached)

Last-click, clicks prioritised over views

14 days before conversion

Custom attribution models

Custom attribution in AMC lets you choose a lookback window (up to 28 days) and select the model that determines how credit is split across touchpoints. Amazon provides standard query templates; emax digital can help you choose the model that fits your goals and query the data.

Models are compared below against this example path: Streaming TV → Display → Sponsored Products → Purchase (the customer saw a Streaming TV ad, then a display ad the same day, then a week later searched the brand, clicked a Sponsored Products ad, and purchased).

Model

How credit is assigned

Best for

Limitation

First Touch

100% to the first touchpoint. In the example, Streaming TV gets all the credit.

Understanding how shoppers discover your brand; awareness/reach goals.

Ignores every touchpoint after the first.

Last Touch

100% to the last touchpoint. In the example, Sponsored Products gets all the credit.

Understanding what closes conversions; short buying cycles.

Ignores every touchpoint before the last.

Linear

Credit split evenly across all touchpoints. In the example, each of the 3 touchpoints gets 33.3%.

A balanced view of a multi-touch / multi-channel strategy.

Assumes all touchpoints are equally important; can over- or under-value channels.

Position-based

Customisable split between the first and last touchpoints (e.g. 30% first / 70% last). In the example, Streaming TV 30%, Sponsored Products 70%.

Capturing both top- and bottom-of-funnel impact.

Ignores all the touchpoints in between the first and last.

Limitations & common misconceptions

  • Custom attribution data sources in AMC cannot reproduce the same conversion data as the standard-attribution data sources — the two are not directly comparable.

  • A common misconception is that custom attribution shows the path to conversion. It does not. Although ad-exposure sequences are used inside the query, the output (for Linear and Position-based models) is a weighted sum of attributed conversions by campaign — one row per campaign, not a journey. To view the actual path to conversion, use the Path to Conversion by Campaign Type dashboard.

  • Custom attribution is a scoped custom project, not a default deliverable.