Amazon Ads has made its Video Generator, which is powered by AI, available in India, enabling brands to make professional video ads in just a few minutes and without any production knowledge or extra cost.

The tool, which is being introduced at the same time in India, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Mexico, Spain, and the UK, is a huge leap in the video advertising creation and scaling process, according to Kabir Bedi, the Head of Product for Generative AI at Amazon Ads, who describes the tool as "a step-level change".

How it works

The whole thing is very simple to understand and do. The advertisers indicate what product they wish to sell, give the ASIN (Amazon Standard Identification Number), and the only thing left is to click on generate. There are no prompts needed, no other information required.

"We take the liberty to automatically get the product and brand information from the product page, and then in three to four minutes, we can create up to six videos for them," said Bedi.

The whole process is done by the system doing everything automatically; it decides the scenes, the background music, the headlines, and the transitions, however, the advertisers are still able to make changes to their videos if they want to, for example, swap scenes, add logos or even images. When the videos are ready, they can be taken to create Sponsored Brands campaigns right from the Amazon Creative Studio.

Above the white backgrounds

The new technology has overcome a seriously pervading problem in product advertising. "Advertisers have been showing their products against a white background for the easiest-to-produce assets," Bedi said. "But customers want to see the products in the right context, through lifestyle scenarios."

In 2023, Amazon introduced an Image Generator that was capable of making backgrounds around product images. However, there were some limitations, such as a watch being set upright on a table instead of being on a person's wrist.

"I shall look at the making of a glass, or a camera person's way of working," said Bedi. "It is the main difference because now the advertisement will show the product in action rather than just at its best."

The latest models bring forth the ability to produce incredibly realistic visualizations of the products' usage – as in the cases of a glass of milk being poured into a bowl from a jar, a watch is on a model's wrist – with gestures that seem to be extremely natural.

Mighty nice results from the beginning

The product was introduced after a splendid trial period in the USA wherein Amazon had almost 400% increase in the number of campaigns created through the Video Generator.

What is more revealing, more than 60% of the items that were promoted through the video ad tool had never used video marketing before. "We are quite satisfied with the outcome since it is a good indicator that this tool is democratizing video advertising," said Bedi. "We are letting in a new bunch of advertisers who have never created video ads before."

The Indian scenario

Indicating the significance for Indian enterprises, Kapil Sharma, Director of Amazon Ads India, said, "In India, many advertisers -particularly small and medium enterprises-have described to us their woes in making attractive video content. The Video Generator solves this problem by allowing advertisers to change one product picture into elegant video animations."

This situation is likely to be that of the lifting of restrictions, which could really make the competition equal. The branding of companies with big budgets for marketing might be the only ones allowed to use professional video production. But now, a small business dealing in kitchenware can make as many as the time taken to brew one cup of tea, high-quality video ads.

What makes it possible

Bedi acknowledged that Amazon employs both proprietary and external technologies when questioned about the underlying models. “Some of the models, like Amazon Nova, are on Amazon Bedrock, but we also use other industry models,” he clarified. “There is no one model that can be applied universally for every use case. We are keen to make sure that we are always providing the highest quality output.”

The Video Generator transforms product detail pages and audience insights into multi-scene videos with smooth transitions, background music, and text made to appear automatically. It further includes an intelligent summarization feature, which selects and edits the key clips from existing videos to create ad formats that are optimally placed.

Safeguards and compliance

Bedi underlined that Amazon had taken several measures to guarantee responsible use. “We have input and output filters, moderation systems, and other safeguards in place to limit the possibility of IP misuse,” he remarked.

Advertisers will be responsible for checking their videos and ensuring they are in line with copyright laws as well as Amazon’s terms and conditions. “We will always follow the law in the respective countries and will continue to adjust our models as the AI governance frameworks change,” Bedi said.

Wide adoption across categories

The technology has been accepted in numerous product categories. “We are noticing the uptake in health and personal care, beauty, home, kitchen, and electronics,” Bedi stated. “These are the domains where demonstrating the product's use is of great value. However, we have also seen a uniform rise in acceptance because the advertisers who previously could not afford video production have now became able to do so instantly.”