Migrating Smart Campaigns to the optimizer

Access from: Advertising → Ad Agents · Migrate campaigns button

If you created Smart Campaigns before the Campaign optimizer, each one is made up of four Amazon campaigns working together: one automatic, one for categories, one for validation and one for performance.

The optimizer works differently: a single campaign per goal, with all the budget and all the targets concentrated in it. Migrating is the step that turns the former into the latter.

Your deadline is 22 October 2026

That is how long you have to migrate them yourself. Whatever is still pending after that date, we will migrate for you. You don't have to do anything for that to happen, but getting ahead of it pays off:

• You pick the workflow that will run each campaign. In the automatic migration we pick it for you.
• You can simulate the migration and review the outcome before applying it.
• You pick the moment, instead of the change reaching you on some random day.

In the meantime you'll see a notice above the table with how many you have left. It goes away on its own once none are left.

Creating Smart Campaigns is no longer possible

The Ad Agents screen no longer lets you create new Smart Campaigns: its only action is migrating the ones you have. If you want a new campaign managed by the optimizer, create it as a Sponsored Products campaign and link it to the workflow from the wizard itself.

What the migration does

For each Smart Campaign you choose:

1. Keeps one campaign: the one you choose in the dialog or, if you leave it on Automatic, the best-performing one between validation and performance. To pick it, it compares whether they have active targets, whether they have data from the last 14 days and, among those that qualify, keeps the one with the best ACOS.
2. Pauses the others, or archives them if you choose so in the dialog. By default they are paused, not archived: you can reactivate them whenever you want. The automatic campaign only stays active if you choose to keep it.
3. Moves the targets from the paused campaigns into the surviving one and publishes them to Amazon. Duplicates are dropped. If you untick this option in the dialog, the surviving campaign keeps only its own.
4. Applies the budget to the remaining campaign (see below).
5. Links the campaign to the workflow you chose, which will optimise it from that night on.

The original Smart Campaign is marked Migrated to v2.0 in the table and can no longer be edited there: from that point on it is managed through the campaign and its workflow.

Before you start

You need a Campaign optimizer workflow already created. Choosing one is mandatory when migrating, because it is what does the work every night; without it the campaign would be left with nobody optimising it.

If you don't have one, the dialog itself tells you and takes you there: in Processes → Workflows, click Add and pick the Campaign optimizer template. The details are in How it works.

You can use the same workflow for all your migrated campaigns, or create several and split them up — by brand, by target ACOS, or by whatever criterion suits you. Each campaign links to exactly one, and you can change that link later from AI Settings whenever you want.

How to migrate

1. Go to Advertising → Ad Agents.
2. Tick the checkboxes of the Smart Campaigns you want to migrate. The button shows how many you have selected: Migrate campaigns (3). Already-migrated ones cannot be ticked.
3. Click Migrate campaigns.
4. In the dialog, choose the Workflow that will optimise it.
5. If you want, adjust what happens to each one: Options for all sets the values for the whole batch, and the table lets you change them row by row (see What you can choose in the dialog, below).
6. Confirm.

The migration runs in the background and takes a few minutes per campaign, because it has to publish the targets to Amazon. You can keep working meanwhile; when it finishes, the row switches to Migrated to v2.0.

Right after confirming, a notice appears above the table with how many went in and, if any was left out, why.

What you can choose in the dialog

If you leave everything as it is, the migration decides on its own as described above. Four options change that behaviour:

• Campaign to keep: chosen in the table, one per Smart Campaign, between its validation campaign and its performance campaign. By default it is set to Automatic: the best-performing one. Paused campaigns can be chosen, because the migration enables them; archived ones are listed but cannot be chosen, because Amazon does not allow reactivating them.
• What to do with the campaigns that are not kept: Pause them, the default, or Archive them. Archiving also archives the ones that were already paused. Archiving cannot be undone: Amazon does not allow reactivating an archived campaign, and the dialog warns you when you choose it.
• Also keep the automatic campaign: it is not paused, it is enabled if it was paused and the same workflow optimises it, adjusting its bids and negating the searches that do not convert. Searches that do convert stay in the automatic campaign: they are not moved to the other one. If a Smart Campaign has no automatic campaign, or it is archived, its checkbox is disabled and tells you why.
• Move the targets to the kept campaign: ticked by default. If you untick it, no new target is published and the kept campaign keeps only its own.

The last three are set for the whole batch in Options for all and can then be changed row by row in the table. If you change an option for all, it is applied to every row again.

Where the budget comes from

The surviving campaign absorbs the traffic of all four, so it needs a matching budget. It is looked up in this order:

1. The Smart Campaign's own budget, if it has one.
2. If not, the sum of the budgets of the campaigns that were active. Paused ones don't count: they would give a budget the group never actually spent.
3. If there is still none, the value you type in Daily budget if there is none: in Options for all for the whole batch, or in the table column for a specific Smart Campaign.

That field is optional and never replaces an existing budget: it is only used when there is nothing to derive it from, which is common in Smart Campaigns that have been switched off for a while. If you leave it empty and one needed it, the migration still completes but that campaign keeps whatever budget it already had in Amazon, and the notice tells you so.

If you also keep the automatic campaign, it keeps spending its own Amazon budget. So that total spend does not go up, that budget is deducted from the Smart Campaign's (never below the minimum Amazon accepts) and it does not count in the sum of active campaigns.

Simulating before migrating

If your account has simulation enabled, the dialog includes the Simulate the migration option, ticked by default.

With it ticked, Epinium runs through every step and records what it would do, but changes nothing: not your campaigns, not their targets, not Amazon. It is there to confirm the migration can complete without errors before applying it for real.

To migrate for real you have to untick it deliberately. The dialog's button always tells you what it is about to do: Simulate or Migrate.

What can be undone and what cannot

The paused campaigns	Reversible — reactivate them whenever you want
The archived campaigns, if you choose to archive them	Not reversible — Amazon does not allow reactivating an archived campaign
The applied budget	Reversible — edit it on the campaign
The workflow link	Reversible — change it from AI Settings
The moved targets	They stay in the surviving campaign
The conflicting negatives	Not reversible — they are archived so the moved targets can serve, and Amazon does not allow reactivating an archived negative

That last one only happens when there are negatives that would block a migrated target. In most migrations there are none.

What happens if a Smart Campaign cannot be migrated

The notice afterwards tells you how many were left out and why:

• Was already migrated — it isn't migrated again, that would be a no-op.
• Cannot be migrated: it has no validation or performance campaigns — there is no candidate to keep. This usually happens with Smart Campaigns created half-way or edited by hand.

The rest of the batch migrates normally; one skipped campaign doesn't stop the others.

After migrating

The surviving campaign now behaves like any campaign managed by the optimizer:

• You'll find it in Advertising → Campaigns. To see only the ones on your workflow, use the table's Workflows filter.
• Its goal, its bid limits and the autonomy mode are edited from AI Settings, on the campaign itself.
• If you kept the automatic campaign, it is in Campaigns too, linked to the same workflow and with its own AI Settings.
• The optimizer starts working on its next run. The first 14 days are a warming period: it moves more cautiously while it gathers data.

What it decides each night and how to review it is covered in Autonomy modes and variables and What the workflow did.