Amazon’s web traffic is always increasing and currently has over 1 million active sellers across a number of vertices in business-to-business and direct to consumer markets. If you’re already selling on Amazon, or looking to start listing your business’s products in it’s merchant centre, then it is important to understand its ranking algorithm, and the part that Amazon Sales Rank plays in determining your positions and visibility. With Amazon’s platform only growing larger and larger, getting the edge on your competitors NOW is paramount.
Understanding Amazon Sales Rank
Amazon Sales Rank is simple – a number ranging from #1 to #1,000,000 (depending on the category) shows you how well your product is selling versus other products. The lower the number, the better. Increasing your Sales Rank will improve your visibility on Amazon. When your product is the best seller, scoring #1, it will have the Amazon best seller badge which will stand out and more likely be chosen by the customer.
How do I improve my Sales Rank?
Amazon have made it challenging to understand the Sales Rank algorithms and so no one knows exactly how it works (except for Amazon). Although, there are some tips we know will help improve Sales Rank and will also lead to your product being featured more (this will also lead to more sales).
Get onto Amazon Prime
Getting your products onto Amazon Prime will make Amazon favour and promote your product over any non-prime product listings. 20 million of Amazon users are prime customers – so if you want to notice quick changes, getting onto Prime will increase volume of sales.
There are two methods for selling through Prime – Fulfilled by Amazon (FBA) and Seller Fulfilled Prime (SFP). Both methods have their pros and cons but both result in the fast building of Sales Rank.
Get Positive Reviews
Gaining as many positive reviews as possible will boost Sales Rank. It is tricky to get customers to leave reviews but the built in ‘Request a Review’ button above each order in your back end can trigger an email to the buyer encouraging them to review your product and their experience. They also provide the Amazon Vine Programme which generates honest reviews from customers quickly.
Get your Prices Right
Competitive pricing is essential as users will often filter their search results by price low-to-high. Therefore, having a strategically priced product means featuring in a better position on this search result. If your product is more expensive than your competitors, you are unlikely to be getting the same visibility. If your product is within 2% of the cheapest listings you’ll be appearing that much more often, and building Sales Rank.
Get Content driven by Shopper Needs
Product listings that have the best conversion rates share many common features, such as, high quality photos, multimedia and professionally written copy with the correct keywords. Customers know what they are looking for and won’t waste their time looking at a product with a poorly written description as this will affect their trust of the product. Boost conversion rates with great product copy, and this will in turn increase your sales rank.
For more great tips on boosting Amazon sales rank, read the Arthia blog.
From Daniel Ansell, Director at Arthia
