Dive Brief: 

• Amazon has revealed a new tool meant to deliver a self-serve ad-buying experience on its own sites and a network of third-party sites. 
• The idea is to remove the need for a salesperson in the ad-buying process in order to reduce friction from, say, a salesperson pushing for a bigger budget or the advertiser resenting the loss of control over its campaign. 
• Publicis Groupe's VivaKi has been working with Amazon to build the tool and is the first agency signed on to use it. 

Dive Insight: 

Self-serve options are almost becoming the standard among major ad networks like Amazon. Advertisers want to feel in control of their campaigns and a salesperson can sometimes stand in the way of that. Self-serve tools could be especially helpful for smaller advertisers that need strict control over their budget.