Insights
Marketplaces Manager
Marketplaces
There are many reasons you might want to be on Amazon: over half of product searches reportedly start there; it is an excellent way of reaching international markets, particularly when you don’t have a brand presence; and you can easily compete with well-established sellers.
Unfortunately, succeeding on Amazon isn’t as simple as just creating an account and uploading your products. Like Google, Amazon has an algorithm to ensure users are shown high-quality products that are relevant to their search.
Using Amazon Advertising is a great way of getting in front of potential customers (and we talk more about this here), but gaining organic visibility should be part of any vendor’s strategy. By optimizing your product listing through providing complete and relevant information about the product, you ensure that your listing is compliant with Amazon’s A9 algorithm – improving your ranking.
In addition to increasing rankings and therefore traffic, conversions, and revenue, a well optimized listing provides a better user experience and ensures that the product they get is what they expected. This will lead to better, and more, customer reviews, which boosts rankings further.
There are six factors that need to be considered as part of the optimization process:
Amazon enforces a character limit on product titles, but the limit varies depending on the product category. We recommend sticking between 60 – 80 characters regardless of the upper limit, as this ensures the title is readable on any mobile device.
The title should include the most relevant information about the product; brand, color, size, quantity, material, etc, as well as any USPs or key benefits. The title needs to be readable; while an algorithm looks at keywords, you need to also optimize for potential customers to entice them to click through. Using dashes (-) and pipes (|) can help to break up keywords and make the title easier to read.
Each listing can contain up to nine images; we recommend including a minimum of six highlighting different angles, different uses, and a mix of stock and lifestyle imagery. Images are crucial in ecommerce purchasing as the customer can’t try the product before buying it. Images help customers to assess the quality of a product and gauge whether a product is right for their needs.
The bullet points, or key product features, at the top of the listing should be used to really sell your product; why should someone buy this over an alternative?
Not all bullet points are created equal. It’s likely that many users will skim read your listing, so it’s important that each sentence is concise, with the key features and benefits listed at the beginning of each bullet point. Outline exactly what the customer gets, including any warranties and quality guarantees.
It is better to use all the space available and list every single feature and benefit, than not use the space, as competitors can place ads in the space if it’s not all being used.
The product description should elaborate on the features outlined in the bullet points, using the space to expand on the benefits of the features: the product has X, which means YZ. This space can be used to also sell the brand; USPs, character, specialisms – what makes your brand better than your competitors?
It is useful to use the product description to target keywords and search terms that did not fit or make sense in the product title or bullet points – this is particularly useful in targeting long-tail searches. Look to use at least 1,000 characters but remember to keep sentences short and snappy.
Positive product reviews directly influence your product rating. The higher your product rating, the higher the product position in the results, the higher the click through rate, and the higher the conversion rate – above four stars is ideal.
If you are struggling to get good ratings, you need to assess why. Is there a problem with the product or packaging? Perhaps there is a discrepancy between what the customer thinks they’re getting and what they are actually getting – do you need to evaluate the product listing if so?
Offering ongoing and timely customer support can help to prevent negative reviews, while customised follow up emails can help to encourage reviews for customers who may not have otherwise gotten around to it.
Amazon gives sellers the opportunity to include keywords in the backend of their product listings; these keywords are hidden from users but ensure that you can be seen for relevant searches.
You may use up to 250 bytes of search terms and keywords – if you go above this limit, none of the keywords will be taken into consideration, so it is crucial you do not go above. Remove any keywords already included in the product listing, and make sure to include highly converting keywords from your Amazon Advertising and PPC campaigns.
Other ways to find keywords include:
Marketplaces like Amazon can be used for cross-border ecommerce. If you choose to sell your products internationally, it is important that the product listing is localized by native linguists, rather than simply translated, as poorly translated listings lack the trust signals required by both consumers and Amazon’s algorithms.
In addition, translating keywords instead of conducting local keyword research can see brands miss opportunities out on traffic, as the features and USPs a user searches for can vary between markets.
Optimizing your Amazon product listing can help to improve visibility, increase click through rate and conversions, ultimately leading to more online revenue. We can help to improve the performance of your Amazon listings, and other marketplace listings; why not get in touch to find out how?
Insights
Insights
Insights