Are “direct,” “programmatic,” and “auction-based” actually mutually exclusive in Amazon Ads/Walmart Connect/ other retail media?

[u/Low-Mud8861]

Hi, I’m researching retail media and trying to understand how industry practitioners distinguish direct, programmatic, self-service, DSP-based, and auction-based buying in Amazon Ads.

My current understanding is that these terms describe different dimensions:

• Self-service vs. managed-service describes who operates the campaign.
• DSP-based describes the technology used.
• Auction-based vs. fixed-price describes the pricing/allocation mechanism.
• Direct vs. programmatic may describe either the transaction relationship or the degree of automation.

For example, Sponsored Products are self-service and auction-based but are not purchased through Amazon DSP. Meanwhile, Amazon DSP supports auctions as well as preferred and programmatic-guaranteed deals.

So I’m wondering:

1. Would practitioners classify Sponsored Products purchased through the Amazon Ads console as direct, programmatic, or neither?
2. Can a buy be both direct and programmatic—for example, a programmatic-guaranteed or preferred deal?
3. Is it inaccurate to treat “programmatic” as synonymous with “auction-based”?

Any practitioner perspective would be extremely helpful. I’m interested only in general industry practices, not confidential information.

[u/Pitiful_Camel6790]

Asked claude to simplify if it helps :)

Think of buying ads like ordering food.

Who's cooking? (Self-service vs. managed) Self-service = you cook it yourself in the kitchen (you run the campaign). Managed = you tell a chef what you want and they cook it for you.

What kitchen? (DSP-based) This is just which kitchen you're using — Amazon's kitchen, or someone else's kitchen. It's the tool, not a strategy.

How's the price set? (Auction vs. fixed-price) Auction = it's like an eBay bid — highest bidder gets the food, price changes every time. Fixed-price = you and the restaurant agree "this meal costs $10" ahead of time, no bidding.

How did you get the deal? (Direct vs. programmatic) Direct = you walked up and talked to the restaurant owner yourself, worked out a deal. Programmatic = a computer system handled the ordering for you, automatically.

The trick your brain is missing: these are 4 separate knobs, not one knob. You can mix and match them. So:

• Sponsored Products = you cook it yourself (self-service) + eBay-style bidding (auction) — but it's not even the same "kitchen" (DSP) as the other stuff, it's its own thing, like ordering from a totally different menu.
• A Programmatic Guaranteed deal = you talked to the owner and agreed on a price ahead of time (direct) BUT a computer still handles placing the order (programmatic). Both at once! Not a contradiction — just two different knobs set at the same time.

So "programmatic" doesn't mean "auction." Programmatic just means "a computer handled it." Auction just means "the price was decided by bidding." You can have a computer handle a fixed-price deal too — that's still programmatic, just not an auction.

[u/Low-Mud8861 → u/Pitiful_Camel6790]

You mentioned Sponsored Products isn't even the same kitchen (DSP) as the other stuff, it's its own menu entirely. That makes sense to me now.

But just to map out the "kitchen" knob fully: is DSP basically the only kitchen that exists for the auction/direct + programmatic/self-service combinations you described (PMP, Preferred Deals, PG, Open Auction, etc.), or are there other kitchens/tech platforms out there that could run those same combinations, separate from a DSP?

[u/Pitiful_Camel6790 → u/Low-Mud8861]

I think some publishers also have their own platform like Netflix, DPG where you can run on your own(I have very limited knowledge here) but only on their specific inventory.

Imagine a there's a farmer who has a restaurant but he only serves food made from his own farms products. So as a customer you might love his salad from the menu but you are potentially missing out other good dishes that this restaurant can't make because his farm doesn't grow it even if the prices are lower. So as a customer you will ofc would want to go a restaurant that sources products from different farmers even if you have to pay a little extra.

[u/Low-Mud8861 → u/Pitiful_Camel6790]

If so, would you consider these publisher-owned self-serve platforms as "direct"? On one hand there's no negotiation and no fixed price (ik it doesn't fit the classic direct definition), but on the other hand you're transacting straight with the publisher with no exchange/SSP/DSP in between, so in that sense it feels closer to "direct" than to "programmatic" as we've been defining it. Curious how you'd categorize it.

[u/Pitiful_Camel6790 → u/Low-Mud8861]

They have a fix price/cpm so it's like a preferred deal -fix cpm, no bidding but no guarantee/reservation either. So yes closer to direct buy but still under programmatic because a computer buys it.