Amazon is exploring technology that would help other apps and websites sell ads within AI chatbots, according to The Information sources who spoke to the company about its plans.
Sources said that in recent months, Amazon Publisher Services, which is the division of its ad business that helps websites run ad auctions, has held discussions with some websites and outside firms about how it could work with them to power chatbot ads, similar to how it currently serves as a middleman between retailers and publishers via its demand-side platform. Amazon employees pitching the idea have pointed to Pinterest as a potential user of such a technology.
Recently publishers, websites, and apps like Yahoo, Time, Yelp, Forbes, and ESPN have introduced their own chatbots on their sites, creating new real estate where Amazon Ads could potentially live. And given how expensive it would be to create such an offering in-house, and the expertise required to do so, I can see the appeal of employing Amazon to do the heavy lifting.
Of course, most of the chatbots mentioned above are powered by major LLM providers, including Google and OpenAI, which could very well offer their own revenue-sharing ad integration in the future. Amazon will likely have some competition in the space, but they're smart to get an early start.
It's interesting that the industry is essentially looking at AI chatbots as just another channel to insert advertising, and the spoils may inevitably go to the victor who owns the advertiser relationships.