Top Ways To Improve Your Amazon Sales Rank
- AMAZON SALES RANK: HOW TO BECOME A BESTSELLER ON AMAZON
- WHERE DO YOU FIND AMAZON SALES RANK INFO?
- WHY DOES AMAZON SALES RANK FLUCTUATE?
- TOP FACTS ABOUT AMAZON SALES RANK A SELLER MUST KNOW
- HOW CAN YOU IMPROVE YOUR AMAZON SALES RANK?
- ACTIONABLE TIPS
AMAZON SALES RANK: HOW TO BECOME A BESTSELLER ON AMAZON
In the 25 years since its creation Amazon has grown to become the top eCommerce platform. More than 200million people visit Amazon.com every month. (Statista). As we move to new quarters, many sellers are contemplating as to how they can get a larger share of this lucrative Amazon Pie.
To answer that we have compiled the top proven ways for you to increase sales on Amazon. Before starting with the tips we here is a list of things a Seller should absolutely know about Amazon Sales Rank. Your Amazon Sales Rank is a significant factor in determining where you appear in product searches which, of course, can have a serious impact on your bottom line. It shows how your product or that of your competitor is selling on Amazon in the same category or subcategory. This also means that the same product can have multiple Amazon Sales Ranks, coming from different categories.
Amazon evaluates by including the historical sales data for a specific product. It is updated hourly and ranks every item within each of their categories and subcategories. Also, keep in mind that the BSR of a product could vary by Amazon marketplaces too. For example, you can be listed as #2 on a subcategory page on Amazon.com but still rank lower on Amazon.co.uk. Getting an Amazon Sales Rank #1 is therefore your ultimate goal. A high bestseller ranking increases your visibility and puts your product in front of a wider range of potential customers and increases the likelihood that you will make a sale.
WHERE DO YOU FIND AMAZON SALES RANK INFO?
You can also keep a track of the Amazon Sales Rank for all the products you are interested in, using DataHawk’s Amazon Sales Rank Tracker and use Amazon BSR Alerts to get daily reporting on your Sales Rank data.
The Tool allows you to potentially unveil the top 100 BSR products in any category or subcategory, it is possible to go up to 5 nodes deeper.
WHY DOES AMAZON SALES RANK FLUCTUATE?
It is not easy to analyze and monitor the rankings jump from one day to the other. The reason being, Amazon sales rank is not necessarily updated in real-time. For a product ranking within Amazon Sales Rank#10,000 in a category, Amazon Sales Rank updates are made on an hourly basis.
For products ranking up to 100,000 updates are made on a per-day basis. This is why making sales on Amazon does not result in an immediate, real-time impact on your Amazon Sales Rank. If a product is falling in the range -Amazon sales rank #50,000 in a given category, one sale could already make some visible fluctuations.
However, it is quite normal to question as to how Amazon Sales Rank for a product can jump from 100,000 to 10,000 within a day. For instance, let us assume that a product’s Amazon Sales Rank is >100,000 and it is being sold once every few days, in this case, the sales can lead to a visible increase in sales.
However, if the product shows no business for several days, its Amazon Sales Rank will plop again slowly.
TOP FACTS ABOUT AMAZON SALES RANK A SELLER MUST KNOW
However, understanding the complexity of the ranking system taking into consideration the theories floating around it to eventually dart the factors responsible can be very overwhelming.
We, therefore, decided to consolidate all that information consolidated within these signals that could potentially make or break the Amazon Sales Rank of a Product.
- SALES HISTORY:
Amazon is very critical about the sales history of a product. To get a good Amazon Sales Rank you must be making reasonable sales. If your product has great listings and is unique in the category or subcategory you are selling in, it still needs to be making sales consistently. Therefore, before launching a product, it is always a good idea to have a set strategy for marketing and selling the product.
Amazon Product research on your preferred category will help to start with. This will help you get an idea of what your competitors are already doing to rank on the shelf.
- SALES CONSISTENCY:
If this happens it is highly likely to experience a negative impact on your keyword rankings. Consequently, it’s better to have consistent sales instead of lower sales with occasional sales spikes. Make sure to monitor your stats using an Amazon Sales tool.
- SEASONALITY:
Always keep in mind that the Amazon Sales Rank indicates how well a product is currently selling (rather than how well it sells year-round), you want to have consistent sales regardless of the season.
You could therefore come across a product with seasonal spikes in sales that start in a season, for instance, a swimwear product before spring break and warmer spring/summer months. These sales will plop in the autumn or winter months.
>> You can check the estimated sales of any product by quickly tracking it on DataHawk. Here’s how you can do it.
- AMAZON SALES RANK DEPENDS ON ORDERS & NOT UNITS SOLD:
After a lot of product research & tracking thousands of products, we came to the conclusion that an order of multiple units was given the same weight as an order of a single unit when it comes to calculating the Amazon Sales Rank.
Therefore, it is more important for more customers to order your product than the number of units each customer purchases.
- BSR WILL NOT PLOP INSTANTLY WITH A DROP IN SALES:
For instance, if your sales drop by up to 40% on a given day, Amazon won’t throw you on a lower Amazon Sales Rank based on that single day’s worth of data.
However, it is given that, the ranking may go down slightly if you have lower sales for a day or two. As long as the reduced sales are for a shorter period, your product’s BSR will not fluctuate much.
- PRODUCT RESEARCH CAN HELP:
Knowing a product’s performance metrics. These will not only help you have insights into how you can boost your products page and your sales and Sales Ranks.
You will also have insights into your seller’s account health, and what you can do to increase your standing.
Read our 5-steps ultimate guide for successfully conducting Amazon Product Research
HOW CAN YOU IMPROVE YOUR AMAZON SALES RANK?
Amazon’s Best Sellers Rank is variable. With all it’s complexity, it can be overwhelming. The solution however is to not spend too much time on your ranking. Instead, analyze to find ways to generate more sales by having positive reviews and better organic keyword ranking.
By focusing your attention on optimizing every aspect of your listing, and not on your product’s BSR, you should see a steady improvement in your ranking.
Here’s are a few ways by which you can improve your Amazon Sales Rank.
- Optimize your product title:
Titles are one of the top ways to catch a buyer’s attention, so optimize it. If you follow the general formula of brand name + product name + features (e.g. color, size, gender, use, etc.), then you should be good.
Not only will you tell your prospective customer what your product is, but you’ll be able to capitalize on high-ranking keywords, too. Keywords will affect your shopper’s search results as well as your ad campaign.
Keep in mind that even if your product shows up, most customers won’t see any details about your product–if you’ve included those details in the features page, then they’d have to click through an additional link just to see. Chances are they’ll look elsewhere for the product.
- Optimize Product Description:
According to research, 90% of product listings do not comply with Amazon’s requirements. Many businesses overlook the importance of optimizing product titles and descriptions. When writing the description for your listing, do not forget about the customer.
Yes, listing optimization is crucial but it must be done well. It cannot just be a jumble of keywords that make little to no sense. You want an optimized listing that will appear in a product search, but you also want to make a sale. Try to answer any questions buyers may have before they have them. Be sure to indicate what makes your product special. If you are able to use A+ Plus Pages or Enhanced Brand Content, it’s wise to do so.
These platforms provide the opportunity to create a more impressive product listing by giving you more space for your product description, the ability to change your layout, the capacity for more photos, and the use of charts and graphs. It gives you the space to demonstrate why your product is the product. Remember, Amazon users are shoppers. They already want to buy the product, you just need to convince them to buy it from you.
- Get Good Reviews:
Increase your sales on Amazon?
You need to develop a review management strategy. Reviews have a huge impact and influence on shoppers’ decisions. Almost 80 percent of shoppers look at reviews for deciding on buying a product.
However, with an ongoing challenge to have more verified reviews many companies start incentivizing reviews from consumers. Amazon does not like it. It is against Amazon’s policies and jeopardizes your online business.
You can however try Amazon’s Reviewer Programs.
You can nudge some reviews by encouraging your shoppers to share their product experiences through several methods.
Amazon Vine and the Amazon Early Reviewer. Amazon operates and manages each of these programs.
Amazon Vine: Amazon Vine invites the most trusted reviewers on Amazon to post opinions about new and pre-release items to help their fellow customers make informed purchase decisions. Amazon invites customers to become Vine Voices based on their reviewer rank, which is a reflection of the quality and helpfulness of their reviews as judged by other Amazon customers. Amazon provides Vine members with free products that have been submitted to the program by participating vendors. Vine reviews are the independent opinions of the Vine Voices. The vendor cannot influence, modify or edit the reviews. Amazon does not modify or edit Vine reviews, as long as they comply with our posting guidelines. A Vine review is identified with the green stripe Customer review from the Amazon Vine Program. (Source: Amazon.com)
Amazon Early Reviewer: The Early Reviewer Program encourages customers who have already purchased a product to share their authentic experience about that product, regardless of whether it is a 1-star or 5-star review. Amazon shoppers depend on reviews to learn more about products, and this program helps to acquire early reviews on products that have few or no reviews, helping shoppers make smarter buying decisions. Customers who have purchased a product participating in the Early Reviewer Program may be asked to write a review and those customers who submit a review within the offer period will receive a small reward (e.g. a $1-$3 Amazon.com Gift Card) for helping future shoppers. (Source: Amazon.com)
Do not forget about Negative Reviews.
>> Read our guide to know how you can manage Negative Reviews the best.
- Shield yourself from competitors:
The SKUs are a necessary part of selling on Amazon, but not necessarily when it comes to your campaigns. When you’re setting up custom labels for compartmentalizing products by cost, try to avoid using SKUs — they can act as a marker for competitors to take notice and undercut you.
Want to do quick competitor analysis?
- Keep track of pricing:
Keeping a track on competitors’ pricing and updating your pricing with the market trend is crucial. Else, you will end up watching your competitors gobbling up your sales because their products have updated pricing while you are on the same spot waiting for shoppers to click.
- Improve your Amazon Photography:
The value of photographing your product in different states is that it provides users with a better idea of how your product can enrich their lives. For instance, your images can help them imagine hosting summer parties or family get-togethers.
That can encourage them to purchase, which means more sales for your business.
Here are a few tips that can help you better:
- Natural light enhances your image quality and makes it look more real. Shooting closer to the window translates to soft light with dark, soft shadows while shooting further away means a more even light with lighter, but sharper, shadows.
- Flash can be avoided. Try setting your white balance to auto.
- Avoid shakes with tripods.
- Use a white or light-neutral backdrop. For instance, use a white cloth to give a seamless background.
- Capture product images from multiple angles.
- Consider putting your product in lifestyle situations so buyers can see how it should be used.
- Amazon Rules and Terms of Service:
One of the best ways to lower product sales is to play with Amazon’s guidelines.
Can’t see sales if you’re suppressed or shut, right?
Knowing what Amazon requires of sellers means you can set up your listings in the high-quality way they want, which leads to higher buyer trust and an increased chance of landing more sales.
Here’s our guide to managing Amazon Suppressed Listings
ACTIONABLE TIPS
Following the above guidelines will definitely help you improve your Amazon Sales Rank. Here are our final few more tips for a more data-driven approach to Amazon Sales Rank:
- Do Keyword Research: Keywords are important for improving your visibility on Amazon. Conducting a thorough Amazon keyword research is the easiest way to find yourself at, or near, the top of any search results. Search the keywords you are using and see what comes up. If products similar to yours appear in the results, you’re on the right track. Study these results. Look at top sellers in your category and niche and see what they’re doing. Do their listings contain keywords that yours is missing?
Consider using long-tail keywords. Long-tail keywords are search terms that contain more than one word. Think about who your ideal customer is. Really narrow it down and try to get inside their head. What terms or phrases might they use to find your product?
- Pull In External Traffic To Your Listings: Social media is a fabulous way to direct people to your Amazon store—
Run campaigns and post relevant material that links to your listing. Social media helps you to develop a relationship with your followers that’s difficult to do through an Amazon listing alone. Your social media followers have a better sense of your brand, who you are, and what you do. They are already primed for your product, so help them cross the finish line by sending them directly to it.
If you have your own website, and you should, you can use blog postings and email campaigns to promote your product and link to your listing. This is a great way to fully educate potential buyers on the benefits and uses of your product. It can help them see how it will fit into their lives and show them why they need it.
Think of ways of maximizing that visibility, and build it into your preparation.
