It increasingly seems that Amazon’s major use for its generative AI development has been put towards convincing folks to buy things from its main website. We’ve seen generative images, a shopping assistant, another shopping assistant, a function that buys things for you, and a digital salesman. Up next? Generative AI product ads.
Amazon Ads has made its Video Generator technology broadly available to American sellers, following a beta that lasted nine months. It does little for buyers, except perhaps dazzle them for long enough to prod that Buy Now button.
Something new in the Amazon
For sellers on the platform, it’s a different ball game. The company reckons that its Video Generator will “allow advertisers to create realistic high motion shots of their products in use, transform still images to movement with a single click, and offer more creative options for brands of all sizes.”
That’s great if you don’t have (or want to pay) a graphic designer, but those ‘unique’ generative presentations must deal with a mixture of creativity and restriction. The function offers six different video types, which will doubtless lead to some repetitive-looking content on Amazon’s main website. That’s especially true of those resellers who all get their gear from the same place (i.e, Shenzhen).
But there are a couple of cool things on offer. It’ll turn product images (hopefully not already created by a generative AI) into brief clips with a single click, can put products into motion and context (placing a watch onto a wrist, for instance), or extract context from inferior, non-AI ads and turn them into something that a human being has never sullied with their touch. Ahem…
At present, the Amazon Ads feature is confined to the US, and “limited product categories” are supported, but if past behaviour is any indication, the online retail giant will upgrade (or simply re-release) the feature as time goes on.
