Dentsu Aegis Network has launched its new Amazon Solutions service, an integrated approach to all of Amazon’s business for clients, from both an ecommerce and a media perspective.

“Amazon is a complex organization, because it’s both a retailer and it’s a media organization. It has the core Amazon.ca, Twitch, Amazon Web Services, many parts of the business. It’s complex,” says Damien Lemaitre, head of Amazon Solutions at Dentsu Aegis Network. The new offering from the network will allow brands to leverage all of these components to establish a strong market presence through multiple touchpoints.

Along with Lemaitre, 25 employees from multiple disciplines across the Dentsu network will be a part of the Amazon Solutions team. Focuses will include merchandising (digital shelf optimization, leveraging algorithms and product discoverability) and accelerated advertising programs.

“You have to be on the retail platform to deliver your value proposition and your messaging, so creating the content is very important,” Lemaitre tells MiC. “From there, we can get into the media solutions like search and advertising.”

He says there are some ecommerce agencies that specialize in Amazon as well, but Dentsu Aegis Network’s scale, number of agencies and cloud capabilities allow it to differentiate. “We know how to build a brand outside of Amazon,” he says. “Amazon is just one channel; we have a bigger type of offering.”

He says there are two types of brands that typically use Amazon for media. There are “the ones who have looked at doing some media, search and display, but they’ve plateaued and they couldn’t scale without the right tools.” Then there are brands that are still exploring Amazon as a media platform, but don’t know how to approach it and work with Dentsu as its consultant.

The team will be busy, he says, as “there are so many products that come out from Amazon, about every two months.”

Dentsu is also keeping its eyes open on other platforms, because the ecommerce/media hybrid is becoming more prevalent – Walmart has launched a media solution in the U.S., while Loblaw is now diving into digital media.

“The next step is for us to really approach all properties with the same solution mindset,” he says. “We’re looking at Walmart and doing some tests, and we know Loblaw very well, and we believe that marketplaces and retailers as a [media] platform will be a big 2020 trend. We will be ready to approach that.”