Amazon Search Term Report: How to Read It, Use It, and Turn Wasted Spend Into Profit in 2026

Last month, I sat down with a seller who was convinced his ads were broken. His ACoS had crept from 22% to 41% over a quarter. Same products. Same campaigns. Same bids. Something had clearly changed, but nothing in his Campaign Manager showed it.

Five minutes into pulling his Amazon search term report, the answer was sitting right there in column F. A single broad-match keyword was matching to 200+ junk queries ("free [product]", "[product] for kids", "[product] near me") and burning through 38% of his budget for zero orders.

That report is the most valuable file in Amazon advertising. It is also the one most sellers either ignore, skim once a month, or pull only to find out why something is broken. Treat it like the operating system of your PPC account instead, and you stop the bleeding before it hits your P&L.

This is a full breakdown of the Amazon search term report: what it actually shows, how to pull it, how to read every column, and the exact workflow we use to turn its data into lower ACoS, faster every week.

What Is the Amazon Search Term Report?

The Amazon search term report is a campaign-level data file that shows you the actual search queries shoppers typed before clicking your sponsored ads. Not the keywords you bid on, but the literal words that triggered your ad to show.

Two terms get mixed up constantly:

• Keywords are what you bid on inside your campaign.
• Search terms are what the shopper actually typed.

When you bid on the broad-match keyword "running shoes", Amazon may match your ad to "running shoes for women", "trail running shoes", "running shoes size 10", and dozens of other queries. The search term report is the only place where you see that one-to-many relationship between your keyword and the real customer search behind every click.

Without this report, you are flying blind on what your ad spend is actually paying for. With it, you can decide, in concrete dollar terms, which queries to bid up, which to bid down, which to add as exact match, and which to negate forever.

Why the Search Term Report Is the Most Important PPC Report You'll Run

Most Amazon sellers waste 30-40% of their ad budget on search terms that will never convert. That's not a marketing stat we made up. That's what we see in nearly every account we audit at Daniks.AI, including our own before we built the automation.

Here's why the search term report sits at the center of everything:

• It tells you what you're actually paying for. Your campaign says "broad match". Your search term report tells you that "broad match" is matching to 600 queries and 71 of them have spent money with zero orders.
• It's where new keywords come from. Every profitable exact-match keyword in your account started as a discovered search term in this report. You harvest converters; you starve losers.
• It exposes match-type leaks. Broad and phrase match are aggressive. The search term report shows you exactly how aggressive, and where to plug the leaks with negatives.
• It validates your listing. When the report shows you matching to queries that have nothing to do with your product, that's not just a PPC problem, it's a backend keyword problem in your listing.

If you only have time to look at one PPC data source per week, this is it. The Campaign Manager dashboard tells you that something is wrong. The search term report tells you exactly what. For a deeper look at the metric this report ultimately moves, see our complete Amazon ACoS guide.

How to Pull the Amazon Search Term Report (Step by Step)

There are two ways to pull the report depending on what you need.

Option 1: From Within a Campaign (Quick Check)

This is the fast path when you want to look at a single campaign:

1. Log in to Amazon Seller Central or Amazon Ads.
2. Go to Advertising → Campaign Manager.
3. Open the campaign you want to analyze.
4. Click the Search Terms tab at the top of the campaign view.
5. Set the date range (we recommend the last 60 days for most decisions).
6. Click Download in the top right to export as a spreadsheet.

This view is great for a 5-minute spot check on one campaign. It is not great for portfolio-wide decisions.

Option 2: From Reports (Full Account View)

For portfolio-wide work, which is where the real money is, go to the bulk report:

1. In the Amazon Ads console, click Measurement & Reporting → Sponsored Ads Reports.
2. Click Create report.
3. Set the report category to your campaign type: Sponsored Products, Sponsored Brands, or Sponsored Display.
4. Set the report type to Search term.
5. Set the time range. For weekly optimization we use the trailing 60 days; for quarterly cleanups we use the last 90 days.
6. Set the time unit to Summary (not Daily, which inflates the file and makes pivots harder).
7. Name the report, click Run report, and download as CSV.

For new sellers still getting their first reports working, our Amazon PPC for beginners guide walks through the full advertising console setup before this point.

Reading the Search Term Report: What Every Column Means

Open the CSV in Excel, Google Sheets, or your tool of choice. You'll see somewhere between 15 and 30 columns depending on the report type. These are the ones that matter:

• Campaign Name: which campaign the data is from.
• Ad Group Name: which ad group inside that campaign.
• Targeting: the keyword (or product ASIN, for product targeting) that you bid on. This is your bid.
• Match Type: broad, phrase, exact, auto-loose-match, auto-close-match, auto-substitutes, auto-complements, or product targeting.
• Customer Search Term: the actual query the shopper typed. This is the column you live in.
• Impressions: how many times your ad showed for this query.
• Clicks: how many times shoppers clicked.
• CTR: click-through rate (clicks / impressions).
• Cost-Per-Click (CPC): average cost per click.
• Spend: total money spent on this search term in the time range.
• 7-Day Total Sales: revenue from purchases within 7 days of the click.
• 7-Day Total Orders: number of orders.
• 7-Day Conversion Rate: orders / clicks.
• ACoS: advertising cost of sale (spend / sales) for this specific search term.
• ROAS: return on ad spend (sales / spend).

The magic happens when you combine Targeting + Match Type + Customer Search Term. That trio tells you the full story: what you bid on, how loose the match was, and what query actually triggered.

The Two Columns That Drive 90% of Your Decisions

If you only look at two columns, look at these:

1. Spend (with zero or near-zero orders): these are the queries draining your budget. Negate them.
2. 7-Day Conversion Rate (above your account average, with at least a few orders): these are queries you should promote to their own exact-match keywords and bid up.

Everything else is noise around those two signals.

The Exact Workflow: Turning the Report Into Action in 5 Steps

Here is the weekly process we ran on our own accounts before automating it, and that we still use as the ground truth that Daniks.AI is built on. Each step has a specific filter you can copy and apply directly.

Step 1: Find the Spend Leaks (Negative Keyword Candidates)

This step alone usually recovers 15-25% of wasted spend in the first month.

Filter: Clicks ≥ 10, Orders = 0

Why 10 clicks? With less than 10 clicks, you don't have statistical confidence the term is a true loser. With 10+ clicks and zero orders at typical Amazon CVR rates (~10%), you're already burning money.

For each row that matches:

• Is the customer search term obviously irrelevant ("free [product]", "[competitor brand] [product]", "[product] for kids" when you sell adult)? → Add as a negative exact at the campaign level.
• Is the search term mostly relevant but tied to a specific intent your product doesn't serve ("[product] for beginners" when yours is professional-grade)? → Add as negative phrase.
• Is the search term relevant but just unprofitable so far? → Don't negate yet. Lower the bid on the parent keyword instead.

Don't be aggressive with negatives at the ad-group level if you might want that traffic in a different campaign. Use campaign-level negatives when you want to block the term across the whole campaign, and account-wide negatives sparingly. They affect every campaign you'll ever run.

For the full breakdown of when to use negative phrase vs negative exact, see our negative keywords guide.

Step 2: Find the Hidden Winners (Keyword Harvest Candidates)

This is where the search term report makes you money instead of just stopping the bleeding.

Filter: Orders ≥ 2 (or ≥ 1 if you're a new account with low overall volume), ACoS below your target ACoS, search term is not already targeted as an exact match in any campaign.

For each row that matches, add the search term as a new exact-match keyword in your dedicated exact-match campaign (or a research-to-exact campaign if you've built that structure). Set the starting bid 10-15% above the avg CPC shown in the report. You want to actually win that traffic at scale, not just sample it.

For the full waterfall framework, see our Amazon PPC keyword research guide and our match types guide.

Step 3: Spot the Close-Variant Leaks

Even on exact match, Amazon matches close variants (singular/plural, accented characters, common misspellings). Most of the time this is fine. Sometimes it costs you money.

Filter: Match Type = exact, Targeting ≠ Customer Search Term (i.e., the keyword and the actual query don't match exactly)

Sort by spend. Look at the queries Amazon counted as "exact" matches. If you see a variant that consistently underperforms your true exact keyword (different intent, different ACoS), negate that specific variant. This is a small-but-mighty optimization most sellers skip entirely.

Step 4: Audit Your Auto Campaigns Specifically

Auto campaigns are where the largest spend leaks tend to live, because Amazon has full freedom to match anything in your listing's backend keywords and product page content.

In auto campaigns, the Match Type column shows you which auto-targeting bucket triggered each search term:

• Close match: search terms very similar to your product.
• Loose match: loosely related search terms.
• Substitutes: search terms for products similar to yours.
• Complements: search terms for products that go with yours.

When you see one bucket consistently producing junk queries with zero orders, you don't just negate the queries. You lower the bid on that whole targeting bucket inside the campaign. Loose match and complements are the usual suspects.

For a full breakdown of auto vs manual workflow, see our auto vs manual campaigns guide.

Step 5: Repeat, But on a Schedule

The single biggest mistake we see sellers make with the search term report is treating it as a one-off cleanup project. It's not. New search terms appear every week as Amazon's matching algorithm explores new query patterns and as shopper behavior shifts.

A realistic cadence for a manually managed account:

• Weekly (30-60 minutes): pull the trailing-14-day report. Negate obvious losers. Harvest 3-5 new converters.
• Monthly (2-3 hours): pull the trailing-60-day report. Run the full 5-step workflow. Review close-variant matches.
• Quarterly (4-6 hours): pull the trailing-90-day report. Audit negative keyword lists for over-negation (terms that have started converting again). Recalibrate match-type structure.

If you do nothing else, do step 1 every week. The compounding effect of stopping wasted spend week after week is enormous.

A Real Example: $1,847 Saved in 14 Days

To make this concrete, here's a real workflow from one of the accounts we audited in February 2026. The seller (call him Marcus) was selling a $34 yoga accessory in the US marketplace.

Before the cleanup:

• Trailing 30-day spend: $4,210
• Trailing 30-day ACoS: 38%
• Number of campaigns: 11
• Negative keywords: 23 total (mostly old, almost none recent)

Marcus pulled the trailing-60-day search term report. Here's what we found together in step 1:

• A single broad-match keyword "yoga mat" was matching to 84 distinct search terms.
• 31 of those terms had 10+ clicks and zero orders.
• 7 of those 31 were variations of "yoga mat for kids" (Marcus's mat is adult-sized).
• The 31 terms had collectively spent $923 in the prior 60 days with $0 in sales.

We added 31 negative-exact and 4 negative-phrase keywords. We also lowered the bid on the parent "yoga mat" broad keyword by 18%.

In step 2 we found 9 search terms with 3+ orders and ACoS under 25% (his target was 30%). All 9 were variations of "[material] yoga mat with strap". We promoted each to exact match in a new ad group with a bid 12% above their report-shown CPC.

Result over the following 14 days:

• Spend: $1,964 (down ~7% on similar daily pace)
• ACoS: 26%
• Wasted spend on the negated terms: $0
• New exact-match keywords driving 22% of total ad sales by week two

The point is not "we're geniuses". The point is that the data was sitting in his account the whole time. He just hadn't pulled the report in 11 weeks.

Search Term Reports by Ad Type: What's Different

The standard report we've discussed is the Sponsored Products version. The other two ad types have their own quirks.

Sponsored Brands Search Term Report

Sponsored Brands has a search term report with the same structure, but two things differ:

• It includes the search term data for keyword-targeted campaigns only. Product-targeted SB campaigns don't surface "search terms". They surface ASINs.
• The conversion attribution window is the same 14-day click-through window Sponsored Brands uses by default, vs. 7 days for Sponsored Products. Compare ACoS across ad types carefully.

For full Sponsored Brands strategy, see our Sponsored Brands guide.

Sponsored Display Search Term Report

Sponsored Display is the odd one out. Because Sponsored Display targets audiences and ASINs (not keywords for shoppers), there is no "customer search term" column in the same sense. You get a Targeting report instead, which shows the ASINs or audience segments your ads ran against and converted on.

The workflow still applies. Find the targets spending money with no orders, exclude them; find the targets converting well, expand them. But the column you filter is Targeting (the ASIN), not Customer Search Term.

For Sponsored Display optimization specifically, see our Sponsored Display guide.

Common Mistakes That Destroy the Value of This Report

We've audited hundreds of seller accounts. These are the search term report mistakes we see almost every week:

• Negating too aggressively too early. A search term with 4 clicks and zero orders is not a confirmed loser. Wait for 10+ clicks before negating, otherwise you'll kill terms that would have converted on click 12.
• Negating without checking match type structure. If you add "yoga mat for kids" as a negative exact at the account level, but your kids-yoga-mat product is in a separate campaign, you just killed your own conversion. Always negate at the campaign level by default, escalate to account only with clear reasoning.
• Harvesting converting terms but never raising the bid on them. Adding a new exact-match keyword at the default $0.75 bid won't actually win the traffic at scale. Bid above the avg CPC the report shows you.
• Ignoring the broad-match queries that converted. Most sellers focus on the losers and miss the discovery upside. Every week your broad and auto campaigns are doing free keyword research for you. Read it.
• Pulling the wrong date range. A 7-day report doesn't have enough data for confident decisions. A 365-day report mixes in stale data from before your last bid changes. Use 60-90 days for most decisions.
• Looking at the report but not actually doing anything with it. The report itself isn't worth anything. The negatives, harvested keywords, and bid changes you make from it are what move ACoS.

Why Most Sellers Eventually Automate This Workflow

Here's the honest truth about doing search term report management manually. It works. We did it ourselves for years. But it scales like this:

• 1-2 campaigns, 1 SKU: 30 minutes per week. Manageable.
• 10-20 campaigns, 5-10 SKUs: 2-3 hours per week. Still doable.
• 50+ campaigns, 25+ SKUs: 6-10 hours per week. This is where things break down.
• 200+ campaigns, full catalog: a full-time job. This is where most agencies start charging $3K+/month.

At a certain account size, manual search term report management stops being a high-leverage activity. You start skipping weeks. Skipping months. Negatives don't get added. Converters don't get harvested. ACoS slowly drifts up, week after week, in ways no single report tells you about.

This is the gap Daniks.AI is built to close. Set your ACoS target. Connect your Amazon Ads account. Our system pulls every search term across every campaign every day, applies the exact workflow above (more aggressively than any human would because it has perfect memory), and adjusts bids in real time on the converters.

For sellers already running the manual process, the typical result in the first 30 days is a 15-25% reduction in wasted spend and a 3-8 point drop in ACoS. Start your free 14-day trial and let it run on one campaign in parallel with your manual workflow. You'll see the gap quickly.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the difference between a keyword and a search term on Amazon?

A keyword is what you bid on inside your campaign. A search term is the actual query the shopper typed before clicking your ad. With broad and phrase match, one keyword can trigger your ad for hundreds of different search terms, and the Amazon search term report is the only place you see that mapping.

How often should I check the Amazon search term report?

For active campaigns, pull it at least weekly. The minimum viable cadence is a weekly trailing-14-day pull to spot new losers and harvest new converters, plus a monthly trailing-60-day pull for the full optimization workflow. Quarterly, do a deeper audit including negative-list cleanup.

How long does it take for new search terms to appear in the report?

Search term data populates roughly 48-72 hours after the click happens, and conversions back-fill into earlier dates as Amazon's 7-day attribution window plays out. For decisions sensitive to fresh data, use a report that ends 3 days ago rather than today.

Can I get a search term report for organic Amazon traffic?

Not directly. The search term report only covers sponsored ad traffic. For organic search term insight, you need Amazon Brand Analytics (which requires Brand Registry), specifically the Search Catalog Performance report and Search Query Performance report. Those are a separate workflow but pair powerfully with the PPC search term report.

Why are some of my search terms blanked out as "*"?

Amazon hides individual search terms when query volume is too low for privacy reasons (typically fewer than 10 monthly shoppers per query). These show up as asterisks. You can still see spend and orders for the row, but you can't add the specific term as a negative or exact match. Best practice: ignore the masked rows when filtering, and focus optimization on the queries Amazon will show you.

Should I add converting search terms as broad or exact match?

Always exact match. The reason a search term converted is because that specific query matched your product well. Adding it as broad just opens the door to all the loose variants you don't want. Add as exact, set a strong bid, and let the broad/auto campaigns continue their discovery job for new terms.

What's the best filter to find wasted spend in the report?

The single most effective filter is: clicks ≥ 10 AND orders = 0. Sort that subset by spend descending. The top 20 rows are usually 60-80% of your wasted budget for the period. Negate those first.

Does Daniks.AI do all of this automatically?

Yes. Daniks.AI continuously pulls every search term from every campaign in your connected accounts, applies the negation, harvesting, and bid-adjustment logic from this guide (with much tighter statistical thresholds than a manual workflow would use), and runs it 24/7. Start a free 14-day trial to see it on your account.

The Bottom Line on the Amazon Search Term Report

The Amazon search term report is the highest-leverage data file in your advertising account. Every dollar of wasted ad spend is sitting in it, waiting to be negated. Every undiscovered profitable keyword is sitting in it, waiting to be harvested. The accounts that compound profitable growth on Amazon are the ones that actually act on this data, every week, without skipping.

If you do nothing else after reading this guide, pull the trailing 60-day report tonight, filter for clicks ≥ 10 and orders = 0, and add the top 20 spenders as negative exact keywords. That single action will pay for the next month of whatever PPC tool you use, including ours.

For a deeper look at the strategies that build on top of this foundation, see our Sponsored Products optimization guide and our advanced Amazon PPC strategies guide.