You’ve been diligent in your search for high sales ranking products for FBA (fulfillment By Amazon). Your search has taken you high and low as you’ve continuously price checked items, cross-checked product ranking, and researched countless suppliers in your quest. Bravo! But, before you count your FBA profits, I want to introduce you to your next hurdle…listing your liquidation item(s) on Amazon. Yeah, anyone can enter product information and upload photos, but let me ask you this: how much time are you putting into optimizing your FBA listings?
Product sourcing is the first part of Amazon seller success. Can customers even FIND your listings on Amazon? Ok settle down….
We have a special treat for our wholesale community today. No, I’m not talking about chocolate chip cookies, I’m talking about a treat that will give you much more satisfaction. I’m excited to introduce you to Karon Thackston, copyright extraordinaire. Let me tell you why you need to stop thinking about chocolate chip cookies and listen to what Karon has to say about optimizing FBA listings.
Who is Karon Thackston? Where do I start? How much time do I have? OK, her experience and background in copyrighting is impressive to say the least. Karon Thackston has over 25 years combined experience in marketing, advertising, copywriting and SEO copywriting.
Karon is the author of several books, including Step-by-Step Copyrighting Course, Writing with Keywords, and How To Write Successful PPC Ads. She is the creator of the Marketing Words Copywriting Blog where she offers all kinds of information for those of us who think we can just write eBay or Amazon product listings without putting much thought into it.
Karon has spoken at industry conferences such as Search Engine Strategies (SES), Search Marketing Expo (SMX), and the Internet Summit where she has taught the importance of getting the right combination of words, emotions, and thoughts into product listings and general sales copy.
I’m out of breath talking about Karon’s background. Let’s get to her post today about the importance of optimizing Amazon product listings:
I Have Great Products, So Why Aren’t They Selling?
By Karon Thackston © 2014
As an Amazon seller, it is critical that you find in-demand, unique items that customers want to buy on a regular basis. After all, without products you have nothing to sell. Liquidation, arbitrage and other forms of acquisition are the core of Amazon success. However vital, product sourcing is only one part of the equation.
Behind the scenes, Amazon has an integral system designed to match customer searches with the products you list. If you don’t understand how this works, and/or you don’t use the system to your advantage, it won’t matter how fabulous the products you find are … no one will be able to find them.
So that’s it, then? Find great products, master keyword matching and you’re all set? Not quite. After your product listing is found by shoppers, you still have to convince them that they should buy from you instead of one of the dozens of other options they have. If your product title, bullets and description aren’t enticing and engaging, Amazon visitors will quickly click to a similar product or a bundle, or decide to wait and not purchase after all.
Driving Traffic With Keywords
This is a typical example of an Amazon keyword field:
This person has entered one keyphrase per line. That’s a common mistake. But Amazon’s system doesn’t use keyphrases: it uses individual keywords, so repetition isn’t necessary or helpful. According to Seller Central:
Following this advice, here’s what you should do instead. Write down all the keyphrases you think people will use to search for your product. Look at your product title. Delete any keywords that were used in your product title from your keyword list. Remove your company name because it is already searchable. Add synonyms and other common abbreviations as long as they are not repetitive of other words you already have on the list.
Take out all repetitions and you should end up with something that looks like this:
You will want to tweak your list and test the results from time to time to ensure you’re getting maximum impact.
Convincing And Converting
Once you have a steady stream of shoppers to your product listing page, you’ll need some convincing copy (text) to get them to actually buy what you’re offering.
Think about your own shopping experiences and tell me … which of these do you find more appealing?
The top one from Trader Joe’s is plain and ordinary. It lacks information and the ability to make your mouth water and your imagination wander. The bottom listing uses a combination of a great image (that had to be cropped to get it to fit here!), an informative title and engaging bullet points. Among other things, shoppers learn what flavors are included, that a unique process is used to create these awesome oils, and a hint about the culture as well as an indication that these are rare and sought-after oils, not just common, mass-produced varieties.
If you’re a cook or chef, or you know someone who is, this would make the perfect gift. That’s the kind of reaction you want to evoke in your visitors.
As shoppers scroll down the page, they also come to find the Product Description section.
This is what was listed.
Product Description
Bestseller! Our naturally flavored extra virgin olive oils are the perfect secret ingredient for your kitchen and a delightful gourmet gift. Wonderful for housewarming gifts, hostess gifts and even party or wedding favors. Within hours of hand-harvesting, delicate adremittion olives are co-pressed with fresh herbs and fruits. The resulting olive oil has an unparalleled bright, pure taste. Six delicious flavors to sample: Garlic, Basil, Lemon, Orange, Thyme and Hot Red Pepper. Try the Basil Olive Oil with pasta and fresh tomatoes. Marinate chicken or top your favorite stew with the Thyme Olive Oil. Drizzle the Garlic Olive Oil over pizza or roasted vegetables. Dress a spinach salad or even ice cream with the Orange Olive Oil. Try the Lemon Olive Oil with fish and in baked goods. Hot Red Pepper Olive Oil is wonderful with chili and on sandwiches. You will discover so many delicious uses for these brightly flavored olive oils.
While I wish they had used paragraph breaks to format the copy, the information they included is very well written and does its job of bringing you to the point of purchase.
What’s more, it sets the gift apart from other, similar items so that it is easier for customers to make a choice. In a crowded marketplace like Amazon, differentiating your products should be high on your priority list.
Once you work through a few products and learn how to create listings that drive traffic and also convert visitors into buyers, you’ll begin to see those stale items start to move.
Need some help with keywords or writing product copy? My new digital book “Amazon Advantage: Product Listing Strategies to Boost Your Sales” takes you step by step through the exact process my team and I use when writing stellar Amazon copy for our clients.
