10 Amazon Selling Tips to Increase Sales

Web Retailer recently reported that 4 times as many people make a million in sales on Amazon compared to eBay. With $88,000 being spent every minute globally on the site, we thought it would be a good idea to share some tips and tricks to help you increase sales.

1. Optimize Product Details for Search

Amazon is a crowded, competitive marketplace for sellers. If you want customers to buy your products over others, you first have to make sure that they can find them.

Amazon makes this possible by allowing buyers to continually drill down their initial search by different attributes. Think how a customer can go from Women’s shoes > Loafers and Slip-Ons > Sperry’s > Top Sider > Tan > Size.

Or, a customer can type in very specific product information like “AC Power Cord Cable for VIZIO LCD TV 10 feet”. Either way, that customer can narrow down to the exact item they’re looking for.

In both cases, Amazon uses your product information and details to match a customer’s search to your items. Therefore, it’s critical that you provide Amazon accurate product information, and as much of it as you can.

This includes product title, description, product identifiers, search terms, size, color, etc. Don’t skim on this type of information. It’s how customers find your products and know they’re buying the right thing.

2. Use Competitive Pricing

A lot of customers shop on Amazon to find better prices. Price is usually one of the biggest factors that decide whether or not someone makes a purchase.

Therefore, you need to know what prices you’re competing against, and how to list products at a competitive price.

If you’re not selling unique items, be prepared to do some research on what items are selling for. Having a lower price can help your items show up at the top of search results.

You can use Amazon’s Match Low Price feature to help you continually match lowest prices on Amazon.com for your products. The tool allows you to set your own preferences so that you always compete on price.

3. Take Professional Product Images

When buying online, it’s crucial that customers can physically see what they’re going to buy. And to do that, you need professional pictures of the items you’re selling.This definitely excludes all grainy picture taken on your cell phone 2 years ago.

You’ll want to continually keep your images fresh and up to date. Having quality pictures makes you appear as a more professional, and trustworthy seller.

4. Try to Own the Buy Box

All Amazon sellers strive to own the Buy Box. If you don’t know what that is, it’s the box on a product detail page where customers can begin the purchasing process by adding items to their shopping carts. So, those who win the Buy Box often see an increase in sales.

The buy box is critical for sellers that offer the same products sold by multiple sellers. You’re competing with them for the Buy Box.

What makes winning the Buy Box difficult is that Amazon uses a top secret algorithm to determine whose products are shown in the Buy Box.

While we can’t tell you the exact steps you need to take to win the box, we do know that low price, inventory availability, fulfillment options, seller ratings, and positive customer reviews are all important factors in winning.

5. Work to Continually Improve Your Performance

Your Amazon business isn’t going to run yourself. If you’re serious about selling large volumes of your items, you’ll need to monitor your performance regularly. In this way, you can continually improve your efforts.

Pay attention to your sales (both increasing and decreasing), return rate, and seller rating. All of these are important in determining where you have room for improvement.

6. Consider Using Fulfillment by Amazon

Fast, accurate fulfillment is a critical when selling online. If you can’t deliver orders to customers, you’re not going to be in business long. But, fulfillment is also usually a sore point for sellers.

You can fulfill orders yourself, but you may also want to consider using Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA). FBA is a service offered by Amazon, in which Amazon fulfills your orders for you. FBA allows you to provide your customers with the same level of fulfillment service that Amazon is famous for.

However, FBA isn’t for everyone. In some cases, you might find that the fees are too high for its advantages.

7. Follow Amazon’s Rules

This should be an easy one. Just follow the rules.

You’re not going to get away with cutting corners and trying to “take advantage of Amazon.” It’s also good to keep up to date with policies so that you don’t make any honest mistakes.

When you don’t follow the rules, your account will be penalized, or even suspended.

8. Leverage Product Reviews to Your Advantage

Product reviews can go either way for sellers. Great reviews can attract more buyers. Bad reviews can quickly lead to a decrease in trust and sales. The hardest part about reviews is that they aren’t required, and you can’t control what people say.

But, that’s also the exact reason why customers often turn to reviews before they determine to make a purchase. It’s in your best interest to monitor and seek customers to leave positive reviews of your products.

One of the best way to increase reviews is to simply ask customers to do so.

I’ve bought many items from Amazon that I then received an email from the seller asking me to leave a review. These types of emails are a great way to start a conversation with your customer to monitor how their buying experience was with you. It also gives you a chance to fix problems, before the nasty review is ever left.

Customer reviews really can make or break your success when selling on Amazon.

9. Make Customer Service a Top Priority

Customer service can go a long way when shopping online. It’s how you interact with customers, and shows that there’s a human on the other end of the computer.

Customer service is  important for customer retention and turning first-time buyers into lifelong customers. Customers like to shop with sellers that they know will go extra the mile to make sure that their needs are met.

When selling on Amazon, this means responding to customer inquiries, quickly dealing with disputes in a professional matter, and handling returns with ease. In short, always put the customers’ needs first.

For some companies, proper customer service process can mean a lot of extra work. One of the benefits of using FBA is that Amazon handles returns and customer service for you. Take this into account if you’re considering using FBA.

10. Manage Inventory Proactively

As w selithling anything online, you need to proactively manage your inventory. Nothing’s worse than when you sell someone an item online that you don’t physically have the stock for.

If you do this on Amazon, your account can be penalized.

Item availability is also important for winning the Buy Box. Amazon will take into account how many items you have left, and how quickly you’re selling them.

That’s it.