The Ultimate Guide to Understanding Amazon Stores and Learning Their Data Tools

Back in July 2017, Amazon introduced a new concept: Amazon Stores. Since that time, Amazon Stores has gone through numerous updates, creating a robust base from which your branded storefront can thrive. But why would you bother with creating this Amazon storefront when you can be a regular seller?

In this article, we plan on addressing what it means to utilize this program. We will let you know what it is, who it is for, and how you can use it successfully.

Amazon Stores is a platform from which sellers can drive brand loyalty. A branded storefront provides you a method from which to increase sales. This strategy can be beneficial for people who are consistently looking for items in your market.

For example, The Vermont Teddy Bear Company (seen above) releases teddy bears for kids, easter, and other special occasions. People who love stuffies may frequent this store; you may find this with the brand analytics tool.

Amazon allows any seller, agency, or vendor who manages a brand to create using Amazon’s Store Builder Tool. The one requirement is that you need to be part of the Amazon Brand Registry. To find out more about the brand registry, we recommend checking our blog on the Brand Analytics Tool.

Once you get that part done, the rest of this process is straightforward. There is no cost to build a store, so you don’t have to worry about adding another expense to your list. Those who do not manage a store cannot use the tool.

You also have to be located in one of the following regions:

• North America
• South America: 
• Europe
• The Middle East
• Asia Pacific

When creating an Amazon storefront, they offer a variety of features:

a) Simple Drag-and-Drop Design

With a variety of design templates, you can easily customize a store to be unique. By selecting high-quality product images and hiring (or having) a graphic design specialist on staff, you can easily make your store stand out. These templates make things easier.

b) Multiple Pages with Targetted Products

Part of this ultimate customization with Amazon’s Store Builder Tool allows you to create as much or little as you want. If you sell a small group of products, put them all on a single page. Sell multiple types of products? You can have multiple pages for your work. You can have whatever you want.

c) Integrated Promotion

We mentioned earlier that you could direct ad campaigns to your branded storefront. You can also place social sharing buttons directly on your storefront as well. That means if you have a loyal customer base, they can easily share your latest releases.

d) Access To Amazon’s Store Insights

Amazon’s Store Insights tell you a variety of important metrics. Here are just a few of them below:

• Visitors: It tells you about the number of unique visitors in a selected date range.
• Views: Number of views on your storefront.
• Sales: It tells you the number of sales you made in the past 14 days from store visitors.
• Units Sold: The estimated number of units purchased by visitors within 14 days of their last visit.

There are many more metrics inside of Amazon’s Store Insights which will provide you actionable data of your most robust products.

e) Tracking Attribution

Amazon Stores provides you with a “last discovery” attribution method to determine where the buyer made this decision. This attribution method allows you to gauge your storefront’s effectiveness compared to other forms of direct advertisement.

They also allow you to determine what page of your store provides greater effectiveness. Are people more likely to buy your product after selecting a specific product tab or seeing it on the first page? You can find that out through attribution.

Amazon Stores work for you in the following ways:

• They provide you a unique platform from which to showcase your brand story.
• It is a platform from which to apply a well-designed storefront format without any coding knowledge.
• You can have your web address, another potential to improve your SEO. Ex. https://www.amazon.com/vermontteddybear/
• You can use information from Amazon’s Store Insights to optimize ad campaigns and direct people to your branded storefront.

Amazon Stores is an incredibly easy-to-use platform that is not complex at all.

Amazon Stores are very customizable, but they do have a few consistent design elements among all storefronts.

You can expect the following on all brand pages:

• Header Image: The header image is the image located on the very top of the screen. It is typically located just above the navigational bar and sometimes has a logo built into it.
• Logo: A small logo is on the left half of the screen. This logo is either built into the header or the navigational bar.
• Navigational Bar: The navigational bar is linked to other sections of your Amazon storefront. You can sort these into different product categories. You can also choose to feature some collections, including best-selling items.
• The Product Location: This is the entire section just below the navigational bar. You can feature these products using three types of media: text, images, and videos.
• Text Boxes: Text boxes can be located anywhere on the product grid. They can take up as much width or height as you wish, depending on your style preference. Text boxes are an excellent method that you can use to improve your storefront’s SEO potential.
• Image Boxes: Image boxes are a low-impact method you can use to engage customers with your product. You can feature excellent pictures and examples of people using your products in any images.
• Video Boxes: You can place short brand videos to tell people about your story. These are typically less popular, as people find them to be pretty invasive.

Amazon’s Store Builder Tool allows you three different general templates: 

• Product Grid: This template showcases your products in a standard grid format.
• Highlight: This template allows image, text, and video content spaces. It seeks to highlight small products with more engaging combined content.
• Marquee: This template allows you to combine image, text, or video content spaces with product ads. It is known to be a bit more engaging.

Your branded storefront is an excellent method to engage the shopper. The one way you can ruin this opportunity is by failing to create an engaging experience. You must be unique, but the products must be easy to scan and focus on why people shop.

With a benefits-driven focus, you inform your shopper you are thinking about them. Here are a few examples:

• Use content elements to show customer testimonials on how your product solved a problem for them.
• Place your most effective products front and center, so people don’t have to look hard for things commonly associated with your brand.
• Utilize the navigation bar to set up different zones for shoppers who have other priorities. If you sell men’s clothing, people who want shirts don’t want to see shoes.
• Make your best sellers noticeable to let people easily find other customers who have rated your products well.

As an Amazon storefront owner, you can access Amazon’s store insights and the Brand Analytics tool. Both of these provide essential information that you can use to improve your business. Ignoring them is paramount to throwing out a step-by-step instruction booklet that says “more sales here!”

Here are some examples of decisions you can make:

• You find that people order your items in bulk quantities, so you have a specific Amazon listing advertising your bulk quantity sales to increase profits.
• Research shows that people go to an Amazon Affiliate website to look for reviews of your product. Utilizing DSP, you perform repeat target advertising to encourage shoppers.
• You find that one of your products has a high number of sales due to an influencer mentioning it. You decide to feature that product using the “highlight” or “showcase” template option.

By utilizing valuable insights from your resources, you will find that those shopping on your branded storefront will increase traffic. Whether you use the Brand Analytics Tool or Amazon Store Insight, either can help you improve your performance.

While we talk a lot about products having an engaging product portfolio, hitting the correct search terms, and increasing volume, there is one area that is constantly missed on Amazon: the brand story.

By using storefronts and some creative advertising activities, you will find your product can become more engaging. People connect with a good story; make sure that your brand is telling it.

Utilizing Amazon’s storefront is a powerful tool to grow your brand. Through the proper usage of this storefront, you can gain a new base of customers who engage with the story behind your brand. Some of them might even enjoy the products you sell.

Using actionable data from insights, brand analytics, and utilizing this complete suite of tools is all part of the intent of Amazon Stores. The combined effort will work in combination with PPC campaigns to provide you with a comprehensive campaign to draw your website traffic.

We hope that this article provides you with a greater understanding of the use of Amazon Stores. For more detailed dives, subscribe to our blog here at DataHawk. If you need help with your own Amazon Store, feel free to reach out to us.