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The eCommerce industry is reaching new heights every year. If you want to boost your sales as a business, you must leverage this market and show up at popular eCommerce platforms where you frequently meet potential buyers. Statistics by Forbes emphasise that 24% of retail sales will occur online by 2026.
Amazon is one such popular online shopping destination with a customer base of over 100 million in India. The eCommerce giant is the third-largest brand by revenue and the fourth-largest tech company, reaching a USD1 trillion market cap.
When a specific product pops up in customers’ minds, they most often immediately think of looking for it on Amazon. This US-based eCommerce marketplace champions online sales and excels at the art of catering to maximum customer needs. Hence, leveraging Amazon’s online universe for your business’s growth is the best marketing hack.
There may be a point where your sales on Amazon stagnate, or you may not yet be able to properly utilise this huge marketplace to make higher profits. Interestingly, Amazon holds the highest market share, accounting for 37.8% of eCommerce sales. Therefore, it’s a must for businesses listing their products on the platform to learn a few techniques. Doing so will help them nudge their sales. Let’s look into cracking strategies to increase your ROI (Return on Investment) on Amazon.
A fantastic way to attract new customers and get more sales is to offer a lightning deal or discount on products of your choice. It features your product on Amazon’s deal page for a short period of up to 6-8 hours. Go for one such deal a day for the best results. Moreover, participating in promotions such as Lightning Deals, Prime Day, or holiday sales events can boost your visibility. Keep your inventory and logistics in check with the increased demand due to promotional activities.
Every Amazon seller is eligible to provide lightning deals to their customers. However, if you want to create a deal, your products need a substantial sales history and a minimum 3-star rating on Amazon if there are over five reviews for the product. Moreover, Amazon provides a minimum percentage of product variations for these deals. You must follow the specifications and keep product variations, such as colour, size, etc. Furthermore, the product must be in new condition, and sellers must abstain from putting up an offensive or inappropriate product. Lastly, you must comply with the customer review policies set by Amazon and use Seller Fulfilled Prime or Fulfillment by Amazon.
If you think that only producing and maintaining inventory in your warehouse does the trick to have better sales and profits on Amazon, that’s barely the case! You cannot compete on this large platform without putting in any marketing efforts. You need ultra-focused keywords for your niche to capture your target audience. So, to improve your game, Amazon offers two types of advertisement formats that you can count on.
1. Amazon brings sponsored ads for products to sellers that promote specific products. Firstly, you should jot down the products you want to advertise on Amazon. Secondly, allocate keywords or product attributes to target niche customers. Lastly, set the cost-per-click amount for your ad.
2. The second type of promotion is sponsored ads for brands, which create awareness of your brand and products among the targeted customers. The seller makes an ad creative with a logo, headline, and product images. You can also choose if the customer clicking the ad will land on your Amazon Brand page or another link that leads to your Amazon product. A clever way to display your entire product range is to invite the buyer to your Amazon brand page. The customer can find various options in one place and ends up buying more.
Additionally, Amazon has cost-per-click advertising for sellers. You may track your spending for clicks on your ads, find the keywords buyers use, evaluate your ad’s performance, and adjust your budget accordingly.
Seasonal or occasional coupons or discounts on select products are among the most popular marketing gimmicks that excite buyers and enhance your sales. It’s always a delight for a customer to see a coupon sitting in their cart while checking out. The customer can discover these discounts through coupons home pages, offer listings pages, in their shopping carts, or product detail pages.
As a seller, you can use coupon targeting by setting a pre-defined budget for the coupons. For instance, get 20% off on products above Rs. 2000, or get free shipping on a purchase worth Rs.599. Such offerings encourage your buyers to purchase more. However, these coupons may not be the best way to fetch customer reviews. Amazon does not consider product reviews based on coupon purchases for the ‘Amazon Verified purchase’ badge.
Influencers and bloggers are the new-age social media stars who can drastically impact your sales graph. Most brands today leverage the power of these attention-grabbing entertainers or educators to promote their products and services. As a matter of fact, YouTube vloggers and other influencers on digital platforms influence 60% of Amazon’s purchase decisions, as Amazon India quoted in an interview with Outlook Business.
Sellers can get more reach by using multiple channels like Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, etc., to market their products and get better visibility. Your target audience is present on many digital media channels, and advertising through influencers, Google ads, Facebook ads, or other mediums on these channels widens the prospects.
The soundest way to optimise your product page for search engines is by using keywords while writing your product name, description, and captions. When you use relevant keywords to describe your product, write alt-text for your product images, etc., it helps you with effective SEO (Search engine optimisation). This optimisation enhances your visibility in common Google searches made by people. Consider following Amazon’s SEO algorithm and adding rewarding keywords to your product listings. They bring more traffic to your product page. Be very specific about product descriptions, feature material, colour, etc.
Additionally, you can use professional product photos to grab your customer’s attention. Your sales increase when you use attractive product images that showcase the product from all angles. It gives a clear idea to the customer for what to expect on receiving the order.
The SEO segment keeps evolving, and staying up-to-date with changing keywords is also essential. The words customers use to search for products change frequently, and seasonal, cultural, and economic factors tend to impact them. Amazon offers many keyword research tools like Helium 10, SellerApp, Jungle Scout, and AMZ that can help you find the right keywords by gauging their rating search volume, competition level, and other metrics.
Online reviews are essential for spreading confidence through word of mouth and building brand credibility. Most buyers these days make their purchase decisions based on product reviews from commoners like them. They will filter through reviews to get to the genuine ones and the reviews with low star ratings to confirm the authenticity and quality of a product.
Hence, businesses must aim to get some genuine and positive reviews for their products on Amazon. It has a substantial effect on the product sales. Provide excellent customer service, deliver high-quality products, and follow up with buyers for feedback. Use Amazon’s automated email system to request reviews while complying with Amazon’s review policies.
Amazon is all about providing the best shopping experience to customers. The focus of this platform is mainly on creating happy customers. Hence, it becomes highly critical for sellers to ensure customer satisfaction and effective consumer-seller communication. Amazon’s Account Health rating, available in the Amazon seller account, gives you relevant customer satisfaction metrics to gauge your overall performance.
You must check this rating from time to time to know where you stand as a seller and identify the areas that need improvisation. There are different ways to analyse these ratings:
Order Defect Rate: Amazon calculates this rate by accounting for the number of defective orders among the total orders you receive. These defective orders result in bad customer experience with your products and the negative reviews you may have gotten. A negative ODR rating may adversely affect your account’s health rating.
Pre-fulfillment Cancellation Rate: This rate determines the number of cancelled orders out of the total orders received in a specific period. If a seller lacks sufficient stock to fulfil a customer’s demand, it leads to pre-fulfillment cancellation. It would be best if you stocked up your inventory in time to meet Amazon’s pre-fulfillment cancellation rate target, which is above 2.5 %. It can positively impact your account’s health rating.
Violation of Policies: You must adhere to Amazon’s policy to avoid a lousy health rating of your account. The seller account page notifies you when you violate their policies. These notifications act as metrics to judge your performance and indicate details about unread messages. A green tick tells you there are no unread notifications, a yellow exclamation mark indicates unread messages and a red cross portrays your account’s health as being in danger. You must pay attention to the alerts.
You must also remember that if an order is due over three days after receiving it from a customer, it falls under late orders. These metrics also inform you about the percentage of orders you dispatched late. The ideal target to maintain, suggested by Amazon, is above 5%.
Pricing is a vital aspect when it comes to selling higher volumes of products on Amazon. You want to set competitive rates while ensuring it doesn’t cut into your profit margins. Amazon’s repricing tool is the perfect way to achieve this goal. It automates the pricing model to help you get competent rates compared to your competitors. The repricing tool also manages demand fluctuations, like seasonal demand. As the software factors in everything and you’re able to price your products appropriately, you can expect higher sales.
Another sure-shot way of performing well on Amazon is managing your inventory with precision. Stocking up your products on time and always having sufficient inventory in your warehouse is essential. This part needs focus because inventory management can be tricky. Overstocking products can levy additional charges on you, while understocking may lead to delayed orders. Inventory management is also crucial for your business’s overall performance. A study by Capgemini says that 70% of companies consider warehousing management critical in improving their supply chains. You can use effective inventory management software to optimise and control your inventory.
Mostly, violating Amazon’s policy guidelines invites trouble for sellers. You run a high risk of having your account suspended by repeatedly avoiding the strict terms imposed on sellers by Amazon. You must stay up-to-date with and follow Amazon’s policies or terms of service to keep the health rating of your seller account in check and improve your performance on the platform.
It’s a good idea to analyse your competitor’s moves and performance to keep pace in the market with cut-throat competition. A lot of brands are competing to catch the customer’s eye on Amazon. Consumers have a pool of options to dive in. In such a situation, you should stand out to your audience. The fastest way to increase your sales on Amazon is by constantly having your products displayed in the Amazon Buy Box. As the mobile shopping trend is increasing day by day, the buy box is becoming more important. You can see the Amazon Buy Box in the top right section of a product page, where buyers can ‘Add to Cart‘ or ‘Buy Now‘.
But how can you win this buy box? Well! There is barely any clarity on that from Amazon. But there are a few essential factors that can help you win it. You may become eligible for the buy box by getting positive product reviews. You can ensure fast delivery to customers by opting for Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA), maintaining the inventory volume, placing competitive pricing on products, managing the number of refunds and return rates, and your sales history.
You might wonder how can an agreement boost sales. Obtaining a Service Level Agreement shields you from situations where you’re unable to meet customer demands due to emergencies or natural calamities. For instance, unexpected supplier shortages could be one of those situations outlined in the SLA.
This agreement defines a seller’s capacity to deliver or fulfill orders on time. It helps set the expectation bar for your customers and explains situations where you fell short of delivering shipments to your customers. Having an SLA in place helps you prove that you’re committed to providing them with the best customer experience and quality products, as a trustworthy seller.
Amazon’s comprehensive platform accommodates millions of buyers around the globe. There are many strategies you can employ as a seller to increase your sales and profits on the shopping platform. Various factors contribute to your sales performance. Some of them are achieving product listing optimisation, applying shrewd pricing strategies, getting positive customer reviews, effective and consistent advertising, and deploying suitable fulfillment methods. They also enhance the visibility of your products.
Amazon is a highly competitive marketplace, where increasing your sales is essential for business growth. Improved sales boost your revenue and the credibility of your brand, leading to a bigger customer base for your brand.
It depends on your product and business strategy. Many sellers succeed in niche markets, while others benefit from a broader approach. Take your product’s unique selling points and target audience into consideration when deciding on your approach.
Mitigate the harmful effects of negative comments by responding professionally to them and address any concerns promptly by offering relevant solutions. Negative reviews can impact sales as customers use them to make purchase decisions. However, actively managing them and improving customer satisfaction can downplay the impact.
While you can fulfill orders yourself, utilising the Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) service can enhance your customer experience. It provides faster shipping and Amazon Prime eligibility. FBA can positively impact product sales with its reliable and efficient fulfillment process.
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