There was a time when sellers would just list their products, pay some money to get 5 star reviews and work their way to the top of the search result pages through PPC. Well, those days are long gone and for good. Amazon is more vigilant than ever and if you are not paying attention to your SEO game, you might as well be shouting in the void. But here’s the catch. There’s so much air about what works and what does not when it comes to Amazon’s A9 (now A10) algorithm.
With so much conflicting advice floating around, it’s easy to feel lost. But here’s some good news. Amazon in one of their recent blogs has provided some clear-cut advice that you can rely on because it’s directly coming from the horse’s mouth. In this article, we’re going to clear some air and bring you Amazon’s tried and true tips for boosting your organic rank on Amazon.
First things first, what is SEO and why does it matter?
To explain in simplest words, Amazon SEO is doing everything you can to rank as high as possible without actually running ads or paying for it. There are a number of things to achieve that – keyword research, review generation, search term optimization and a bunch of other things that we’ll discuss later in this blog.
Now onto the next burning question, why is SEO important. A lot of brands and sellers think of SEO as something of a formality. They are doing it because everyone does it, but most of them don’t actually believe it works. Well it actually does work but it takes some time. SEO does not bring results as quickly as PPC does. That’s because Amazon is so competitive and the first page of any search is jam packed with so many products that it feels like there is no more space left for your product. But that’s not the case. What you gotta do is follow the SEO best practices to the T and have some faith in your product. Also, PPC may bring you results quickly but remember that you are burning more of your fund in bringing in the sales. But that does not mean you should completely stop investing your money in PPC. PPC is essential, but more of your total sales should come from SEO.
Amazon suggested ways to improve your organic search rankings
1: Conduct a thorough Amazon keyword research
Keywords are without any doubt the cornerstone of any SEO strategy. Your keywords can make or break your rankings.
Everyone knows what keyword research is, but only a handful of them know how to do it. Well we’re going to tell everything we know works. There are many ways to do keyword research, below we’ve listed the most effective ones:
- Type your product’s root keyword into Amazon’s search box. Look at the suggestions in the dropdown menu and get some ideas out of it. These suggestions are a combination of words that shoppers type when looking for your product. So, it makes complete sense to add those words in your title or somewhere in your copy.
- Take a look at your competitors, especially the competitors that are ranking on page 1. What keywords they have in their title and copy. Make sure your title and copy contain those keywords.
- Amazon has also launched some tools that can help you explore more keywords for your product. Amazon’s Product Opportunity Explorer is one such tool that can help you find and identify top search terms and trends in Amazon customer search volume.
The best part is that all of these are 100% free ways of doing keyword research. While adding keywords in your listing remember that high volume keywords are not always better. If your listing is relatively new or you are selling in a competitive category, using high volume keywords in your listing can do more harm than good. There are so many sellers trying to rank on the few high volume keywords that it is almost impossible to get yourself heard. Instead, try to rank on medium volume and long tail keywords where the competition is comparatively lower and the chances of conversion are much better.
2: Create high-performing product titles
Creating titles is always a never ending battle between adding as many keywords as possible and ensuring the title remains readable. But if you put in some effort, doing both is possible. To create a concise yet keyword rich title, put yourself in the customer’s shoes and think about the most important details they’ll want to know. Your product title should contain: Brand name, root keyword, quantity/size/color, some important product features and a couple synonym keywords.
Keep in mind that although the character limit of a title is 200, Amazon recommends adding a title that is in between 60-150 characters. A title longer than that is not “SEO friendly” in the eyes of Amazon. Don’t bother fitting all the keywords in your title. You’ll only make your product look bad if you do that. There are other parts of the product detail page where you get to add keywords – bullet points, description, backend fields and search terms.
Pro tip: Test various titles using Amazon’s Manage Your Experiment tool. Using this tool, brand registered sellers can run A/B tests to compare two versions of a product title, image, bullet points and description to find out what resonates better with customers.
3: Highlight key details with bullet points
Bullet points are prominently placed above the fold, meaning they are basically the first piece of information that a shopper sees when they visit your product’s detail page. Make sure your bullet points contain all important features that a customer needs to make an informed purchase decision. Highlight your product’s material, design, size, uses and other special features.
According to Amazon, when writing bullet points, “start with a one- or two-word description, then offer an explanation in 100 characters or fewer.” Amazon recommends using fragments instead of full sentences because they are easy to read.
4: Create informative product description
The product description is where you expand on your product’s features and also weave a story around it. Here you can highlight a shopper’s problem and promote your product as the solution. If you don’t already have a Brand Story uploaded, you can also write a short “about my brand” section in your product description. Amazon’s product description section has a limit of a whopping 2000 characters, so you have plenty of opportunities to explain in detail about your product and brand.
A lot of sellers ask us, “If I already have an A+ Content, do I really need a product description?” And our answer is always the same – YES. Even if your A+ Content is uploaded, your product description is still indexing from the backend, so it is absolutely necessary that you have a professionally written and keyword rich product description ready.
5: Optimize your backend search terms
Remember when we told you not to stuff your title and copy with keywords? If you followed that, you might have a lot of unused keywords. And the backend search term field is where you put them all to a good use. Ideally after you have added all the important terms in your title, bullet points and description, you will have some long tail and low volume keywords that you can add here.
The search term field has a character limit of 249 bytes (NOT characters). Here you can include synonyms, abbreviations, and alternative names for products, but avoid redundant terms or keywords that are already there in your title. If the word “gloves” is already there in your title, it makes zero sense to repeat it again in your search terms. When entering search terms, make sure to use all lowercase letters and separate words with spaces only. Skip articles and prepositions.
6: Add high quality images
It goes without saying that images are what actually sells the product. While all the elements discussed in above points (keywords, titles, bullets and description) help increase visibility of the product, images help customers convert. When made correctly, Amazon infographic images sell in a way that your copy could never. They simplify complex information and also helps shoppers imagine how the product will fit in their life.
Amazon suggests that when uploading images, make sure to include alt text. Alt-text won’t be visible anywhere on the detail page but it will describe the image to visually impaired customers and is ranked by search engines like Google. Alt text should be a simple sentence describing the image and it can also include a couple keywords.
7: Keep on adjusting product prices
Keeping your price competitive increases your chances of winning the Buy Box. Research your competitors and look at their prices to get an idea of how other brands are pricing their products. You can either use a repricing tool, Amazon’s Automate Pricing feature or hire an expert to help you keep your prices always competitive.
Master Amazon SEO with expert help
While these SEO tips may seem like common knowledge, the devil is in the details. Most brands fail to implement them effectively, leaving potential sales on the table.
But by following Amazon’s guidance diligently and ensuring that you’re executing strategies correctly, you’ll begin to see tangible results in your organic rankings and sales performance. And remember that you don’t have to go it alone. Consider taking help of Amazon experts at Sipransh Ecommgrowth.
