If you’re selling on Amazon, it’s well worth your time to learn some Amazon marketing basics. In 2019, over 150 million mobile shoppers alone used Amazon, and the amount of vendors is growing alongside the consumers—with around 2.5 million active sellers to date. So how can you differentiate your product? Especially as a relatively new seller?
There are both on-Amazon marketing basics and off-Amazon tools that can help you reach more buyers than ever.
What you’ll learn in this article:
Amazon Marketing Basics
Before we look at any other tips, you should consider these Amazon marketing basics that use its built-in tools. And there are a lot of them.
To fully make use of Amazon marketing services, you should have a Professional account and be in good standing. This means you should have a seller reputation of 3.5 stars or more to be eligible.
Create Product Pages That Pull You In
Before we even get to advertising, your Amazon marketing basics start with a solid product page.
For a complete product page, you need to look at your title, your images, and your product description.
There’s an old adage in copywriting that 80% of your time should be spent writing the headline of your article, and this holds true for your product listing title. Besides having a killer product image, your title is the most important part of your listing. Not only should it contain keywords to make it easily searchable, but it should also be easy to read.
While you shouldn’t just stuff your title full of keywords, Amazon does give you some leeway with 150-250 characters. Make sure to include your brand name, the name of the product, and its unique features. For example, what color is it, does it come as part of a set, and so on.
The next thing to consider is your product images. They are just as important as your title. Amazon requires that your images be a minimum of 1,000 pixels x 1,000 pixels if you want to use their zoom feature, which is especially popular with buyers, and your product should be against a plain white background. Amazon allows 5-9 images so you can better showcase your product.
Secondary images can be more diverse. It’s recommended that you include images of the product label, examples of how your product is used, images that compare your product to its competitors, and informational images that include more product technical information.
After you’ve got your title and images down, you can focus on the product description. Your description should be readable and include keywords that you want to rank for. Amazon gives you bullet points to highlight the main points of your product.
Optimize your bullet points by answering common questions or objections right off the bat. This gives customers a reason to keep reading. Feel free to turn each bullet into a short paragraph in order to get your point across, but refine them until you are able to use as few words as possible to accurately communicate it.
The second part of your product description is buried at the bottom of the page but allows you to expand on your item’s benefits. Not only can you include more information about your product, but you can use HTML markup to make certain text bold or in italics.
Finally, you can use enhanced brand content (EBC) to add more visuals to your product page. EBC allows you to use one of five templates to create an extra module that describes your brand and product. These templates include additional text boxes and images. While EBCs aren’t mandatory, they can offer your listing a premium feel at no extra cost. You can find your EBC options under the “Advertising” tab on your Seller Central dashboard.
Promotions and Coupons
Another Amazon marketing basic is setting up promotions and coupons. If you go to your seller’s dashboard, you’ll see an “Advertising” tab at the top. These give you the option to set up promotions or coupons. Both coupons and promotion codes are similar—with one key difference. Coupon codes show up in your listing and product page, while promotion codes only turn up during checkout or if your product makes it to the buy box.
Both of these options only take a few steps to setup. You’ll need to decide who you plan to target with these codes, as well as whether you plan to offer a flat-fee discount or a percentage off. You’ll also need to decide how long you’ll want the promotion to last and your overall budget.
Once you’ve completed the process of creating a coupon or promotional code, you can easily share them with your past buyers by just copying and pasting the code into an email.
Depending on your seller status, you may also be able to take advantage of Lightning Deals.
Amazon Ads
Amazon ads are another way to increase brand awareness and sales, with a conversion rate of almost 10%, they are extremely effective. Your ads show up in the Amazon listing as a sponsored product. To get a place in the search engines as an ad, you need to bid on certain keywords that relate to your product.
If you’ve already got a stellar product page, you’re set to start thinking about Ads. You first need to establish your goals. Do you simply boost brand recognition or focus on sales? How long will your advertising campaign last? What’s your budget?
Lauren Gomez, Director of Marketing and Ecommerce at Positec Tool Group and author of Amazon Marketing Services Made Easy, says the most important thing to consider is your ad structure, especially if you have a lot of products. “Amazon ads can get complicated, quickly, especially if you want to test your creative. You should be very cognizant of your financial goals because you can easily overspend.”
You’ll also need to decide which products you want to advertise and what keywords best represent each product. You can also use negative keywords to sort out irrelevant searches. For example, if you are promoting an accessory item for the Nintendo Switch and only the Nintendo Switch, you can filter out Playstation searches.
Once you answer these key questions, it’s time to begin looking at what kind of ad you’ll be running. There are three types:
1) Sponsored Product (SP) Ads
These ads are the ones you’ll find in the search results and product listing pages. SP ads are excellent at achieving higher brand visibility and offer vast keyword targeting options. There are two subset targeting options: uto-campaigns and product attribute targeting. These allow you to fine-tune where your ad will appear.
2) Product Display Ads
Want to pounce on your competitor’s customers? Product Display Ads show up just below the buy box and on your competitor’s product page. This option is fantastic if you want to cross-sell in the same industry or with related products.
3) Sponsored Brand Campaign
Formally called headline search ads, Sponsored Brand Campaign ads appear above, below, and besides regular search engine results. These ads are more prominent than regular SP ads, and can further boost your visibility.
It goes without saying that regardless of which campaign you choose, you’ll want to pay particular attention to your campaign copy, keywords, and campaign structure. When it comes to writing ad copy, it’s critical to be as accurate and specific as possible, while incorporating some elements that trigger shoppers to want to buy it now. This can include letting them know the offer is short-term or including a strong benefit in the copy.
That said, ads are a great way to evaluate your product catalog and fine-tune your items and product pages. Gomez says, “What are people clicking on? If you have a keyword, for example, ‘blue kite,’ with a lot of clicks but no one is buying, you can piece together more insights on the disconnect. Is it really purple and people are confused? Is the description lacking?”
As long as you have a firm grasp on your budget and ad ROI, you can gain sales while improving your store from these campaign insights.
Off-Amazon Marketing Basics
When it comes down to it, you aren’t limited to just advertising your store on Amazon. You can easily incorporate coupon codes and promotions into other aspects of your Amazon marketing plan to ensure you get the most traffic.
Customized Email Follow-Ups
The first step of off-Amazon marketing is to tap into your email list. Email campaigns can help you sell products quickly and their reviews can help you boost your seller reputation. But you can also easily automate the email writing process through customizable templates and schedulers to ensure you don’t spend hours laboring over the perfect email sequence.
While Amazon does send automatic follow-ups, your Amazon seller email campaigns can also notify your list about certain promotions that may appeal to them and send them relevant coupons.
An email list can be especially useful if you are launching a new product or want to test your product page before sending it out.
However, whenever you send an email, it’s important that it’s personalized and customized so it doesn’t get lost in the shuffle.
Design Stellar Landing Pages
You already have a product page, so why create a separate landing page? Not only will a separate landing page give you more views from Google searches, but an independent landing page gives you complete creative control on how you display and advertise your product.
You can add more videos (to add videos on Amazon you’d have to sell select items and join the A+ program or get access to an ECB template), highlight your promotional codes, and give extended details about how to use your product and what benefits shoppers can expect.
Separate landing pages are completely Amazon legal, so long as you link to the Amazon product page.
Use Facebook Ads To Boost Sales
Facebook Ads can help you can use them to boost sales or even test your copy. Like Amazon ads, there are a number of dynamic ad types including static images or videos. You can also target similar keywords and demographics.
You can also take advantage of Facebook’s Pixel feature. Facebook Pixel gives you a code to add to your landing page or website that tracks your visitors. This information is then sent to Facebook, where you can retarget your ads to people who have already seen the landing page and might be on the fence about buying.
However, expect Facebook ads to be a bit more expensive and conversion rates may be lower than on Amazon itself. This is because people on Facebook are not looking to buy products, while that’s the whole point of Amazon.
You can also use the product landing page to grow your email list by offering a coupon or promotional code in exchange for their email address. Then, in the future, you can send this new buyer more relevant promotions and turn them into a loyal shopper.
Go with Google PPC
According to Google, businesses make $2 for every $1 they spend using Google Pay-Per-Click (PPC) ads. These visitors are also more likely to make a purchase than those you find organically, making this form of marketing indispensable.
Similar to Facebook ads, it’s better to link Google PPC to your landing page. To get started, simply sign in to Google Adwords to begin setting up your campaigns. You’ll find the ad structure similar to Facebook ads, and you’ll want to create a campaign with several ad groups containing relevant keywords. For each ad, you’ll also need a headline and description of your page.
Also similar to Facebook, it’s possible to remarket using Google PPC. You can retarget visitors who have been to your website in the past, or even upload a custom contacts list.
Direct Traffic To Your Product Page With Chatbots
Have a chatbot? Whether you are using Facebook chatbots or an on-site variant, these nifty AI helpers can help you deliver your sales message to customers no matter where they are.
It turns out 40% of consumers don’t care whether a real person or not helps them, as long as they receive their service in a timely manner. And these bots are already helping to drive sales. 27% of shoppers have used chatbots to buy an item and another 22% have used chats to get ideas for purchases.
Grow your Amazon business
For both individual and professional sellers, Amazon offers an array of tools to help you get started. Amazon marketing gives you the opportunity to really scale your business while working within your budget. While it may seem overwhelming at first, once you have your strategy in place and employ these Amazon marketing basics, you can begin to automate the system, make tweaks, and watch your business grow.
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