Easy Optimisation & Marketing Tips for Amazon Australia

With Amazon Australia’s launch right around the corner, the best Aussie brands and sellers are already gearing up to make the most of this industry shake up. It’ll be a whole new ball game when Amazon finally arrives down under, and with it a whole new set of rules about how to achieve success selling online.

Australia’s old dogs of ecommerce will have to learn a few new tricks if they want to have any kind of success on the green and gold version of the world’s most successful online marketplace.

That’s why we’ve put together our tips for how to optimise and market your product listings on Amazon Australia when it finally lands on our shores.

Amazon Sponsored Products

In the US over 50% of product searches begin on Amazon, making Google the number #2 search engine for the eCommerce industry. Despite this, for all the time and money invested by sellers into Google AdWords to market their products, we hear a lot less about Amazon’s own PPC platform for 3P sellers, Amazon Sponsored Products (ASP).

Whilst we can predict a strong performance from the traditional consumer brands that are household names, there will be plenty of room for smaller brands and private label sellers to share some of the air at the top of the mountain, and launch day for Amazon Australia will be a race to the top.

3P sellers will need every advantage they can to muscle their way past the competition to establish themselves amongst the best sellers in their category, so it may be worth investing some time and money into your Sponsored Products strategy.

Luckily for those without PPC experience, Sponsored Products caters to beginners and professionals alike. For those dipping their toe in for the first time, it can be as easy as starting an auto campaign for your products and setting a bid and daily budget that you’re comfortable with. For more experienced search marketers, Sponsored Products has a full range of keyword match types and a similar Campaign / Ad Group structure to AdWords, so you should feel at home in no time.

Marketplace SEO

SEO is a term that is more commonly associated with general use search engines like Google and Bing, where visibility for your website is key to success. Well Amazon is no different, and if you want to have a successful product on Amazon people need to be able to find it.

Marketplace SEO is all about knowing how marketplaces like Amazon index your product listings and decide which products to show customers based on what they are searching for.

The good news here is that you don’t have to be a technical SEO whiz to give your products a leg-up on Amazon, there are plenty of easy steps you can take to ensure your listings are optimised for Amazon’s A9 algorithm to be able to find and serve your products for customer searches.

Listing Quality

A successful Amazon product all rests on listing quality – no matter how much traffic you get to your listing with Sponsored Products or SEO, if you can’t showcase your products in the best possible way to your potential customers they just won’t buy them. If you’re new to Amazon, the good news is it’s easy to put together a quality listing if you have the time and commitment to do so.

So what goes into a good quality, high converting product listing?

1. Images – High resolution (1000x1000 minimum) photos of your product that showcase its best features whilst adhering to Amazon’s strict image guidelines.
2. Engaging Titles – take time to write engaging titles for your product that are optimised to include your most valuable keywords without being ‘spammy’ or overlong.
3. When writing descriptions and bullet points, try and put yourself in your customers shoes and think of what features they’d be most interested in. Your description is a great chance to differentiate yourself from your competitors – don’t just write another boring list of features, have some fun with it and try and create something that adds value to listing.

Sales History, Reviews and Star Rating

These are the big three when it comes to ranking factors for Amazon’s A9 algorithm, and they are all very much interrelated.

Products that sell more often and have lots of positive reviews are the ones that Amazon will put in front of the most customers. When starting out, focus on sales and reviews more so than generating revenue and profit.

A successful listing needs a good foundation of positive reviews, so consider launching at a lower price point – the lower the price, the faster you’ll sell and the sooner the reviews start coming in.

We’ve also observed an inverse relationship between pricing and star rating – Amazon customers expect more from products with high price tags, and will be quick to voice their disapproval when expensive products let them down, yet they can be a little more forgiving when prices are low.

Review management and solicitation is another must. Always follow up on negative feedback and try and turn those 1 star reviews into 5 stars as often as possible.

And don’t be afraid to ask your customers to leave their reviews, just be sure to brush up on Amazon’s guidelines before doing so.