This Amazon Fire upgrade goes to 11!
An Amazon launch is a thrilling event. Everything is kept under wraps, even from members of your own team. Designers upload blank assets to Amazon’s CMS with obfuscated file and folder names that reveal nothing of their content. As much QA as possible is done with these blanks, but the real excitement comes when we upload the real assets and quickly make sure everything is working as expected. In that flurry of excitement, something you’ve worked on for weeks or even months is introduced to the world.
I was given over a terabyte of wonderful photoshoot data and asked to come up with a look for the launch of the updated Amazon Fire HD8 and HD8 Kids Edition tablets. The boy in the kid’s shoot was such a hit internally that I had to make him the star of that series.
Traditionally, assets that feature a device tend to perform better than lifestyle images. Fortunately, Amazon is always up for a good multivariate test. We tested a few copy approaches, highlighting price, specs, BOGO promo, and newness. For the BOGO promo I was asked to show two devices in the photo, but instead, I convinced marketing to go with an image of the boy enjoying his Fire tablet while his sister spies on him jealously. Jump at that deal and get her one too!
Testing for the regular tablet followed a similar pattern. In this case, rather than featuring a person I chose to show the tablet in action assisting the user with their meal prep. Or, in the case of the animated gif version for email, using the new hands-free Alexa mode to switch to Amazon’s hot new entertainment property Jack Ryan.
These designs were adapted for Amazon and third-party site placements, as well as email, social media, and blog entries.
Ultimately the “All-new” versions drove the most traffic to the landing page, with the device on the diagonal color blocks winning for the regular Amazon Fire HD8, and the jumping boy winning for the Kids Edition, proving that sometimes a new tactic will win over a tried and true method of promotion.