Amazon SEO: 3 Tested Strategies for Doubling Your Organic Traffic

This is a guest article written by TALENTA Commerce, a certified partner of Zentail.

Amazon is a tough cookie to crack. But after years of managing Amazon for our clients and testing multiple approaches to listing, the team here at TALENTA Commerce has gotten much closer to understanding Amazon’s quirks and nuances.

In this blog, we’ll share three of our favorite (and proven) organic strategies for getting your listings higher up on Amazon’s SERPs and seen by more shoppers. The best part is that they’re easy to implement and have multiple benefits. Aside from improving your rankings, these tips should simultaneously improve your conversion rates by kicking the flywheel effect into motion. 

1. Don’t Shy Away from Longer, More Detailed Product Titles

We all know the power of a good title. On Google, this normally means a title that’s under 60 characters that includes a primary keyword and copy that entices your buyers to take an action.

On Amazon, the mentality is similar—except you have the liberty of using more characters and the advantage of knowing that anyone who’s searching on Amazon is already there to make a purchase. While your experience with traditional SEO may have you conditioned to favor shorter titles, Amazon is a place where longer, more detailed titles tend to thrive. 

Let’s take this title as an example: ‍

RYO Damage Care Conditioner 500ml (16.9oz)

‍This checks in at 42 characters. Traditional SEOs may praise it for being concise and easy to read, but those who are familiar with Amazon’s algorithm will say that it misses out on additional traffic it could capture just by including several more keywords and details that make it more relevant to a user’s search. Let’s take a look at another title as an example:

Love Beauty and Planet Volume and Bounty Thickening Shampoo and Conditioner For Hair Volume and Fine Hair Care Coconut Water and Mimosa Flower, Paraben Free, Silicone Free, and Vegan 13.5 oz 2 count

This uses up 198 characters (two characters shy of the maximum limit)—and it hits a homerun. It includes the brand name, primary keywords (“shampoo” and “conditioner”) and anticipates search phrases, like “conditioner for hair volume and fine hair.” The title also speaks to the brand’s target market: consumers who are environmentally conscious and are actively searching for “paraben free,” “silicon free” and/or “vegan” products. 

This listing currently has over 3,300 reviews and ranks #4 on Amazon in the Shampoo & Conditioner Sets category. The first example, by comparison, has 17 reviews and is ranked #1,502 in the same category.

Using a similar approach, TALENTA helped to grow traffic around Panama Jack's listings on Amazon. One product even saw 7 times more monthly orders within just two months of a title update.

While longer titles don’t always mean first-page ranking, a longer title gives you a better chance of getting on the map. Without a rich, complete title, most listings are bound to remain invisible to the marketplace. 

Here are some other key pointers when creating a title for your product:

• Make sure the copy makes sense when you read it back out loud.
• Use common words that describe what your product can do in three words or less (“Thickening Shampoo,” “Hair Volume”).
• Lead with your brand name.
• Include the size and package count in the title.
• Use all the characters you can. Each marketplace limits them differently, but you’ll want to use as many as you can without going on.
• Avoid abbreviations.

2. Recycle Customer Questions as Bullet Points

While we can’t take credit for this idea (it comes from one of our favorite podcasts, Elevated Ecommerce with Ben Cummings & Traian Turcu), it’s genius and worth adding to your playbook.

Cummings often illustrates this idea by talking from the perspective of an Amazon seller that's selling a dog leash. The leash itself is not a perfect fit for all dogs out there. Some customers (or potential buyers of your competitors’ listings) thereby ask questions like, “Does this leash work for small dogs?”

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This opens up an opportunity for you, the seller, to make your listing stand out. You could use one of the bullet points on your listing to say something like, “This leash fits comfortably on small dog breeds, such as a Pomeranian or Chihuahua.”

With this bullet point, you have:

1. Addressed a potential barrier to purchase. If a buyer came to Amazon looking for a dog leash for his/her small dog, you have validated that your product is built specifically for his/her pet. You have even addressed their doubts before the question was asked, and did so at the top of the page near the buy box instead of at the bottom of the page in the typical “customer questions & answers” section.
2. Indicated to Amazon that your dog leash is for “Small Dogs” like “Pomeranians” or “Chihuahuas.” Plus, it is a “comfortable dog leash.” It’s possible that Amazon will pick up on these phrases, as well as other helpful details about your product, when evaluating your listings. Now, when a customer searches Amazon for “dog leash for Chihuahua” you are much more likely to show up organically.
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You can take this idea a step further and include answers to customer questions in infographics within secondary images or EBC. At minimum, you’ll want to enrich your bullet points and descriptions with phrases and keywords that your target buyer searches for, based on the questions they ask. Put yourself in their shoes. Address their doubts, challenges and goals head on. 

3. Sell Results, Not Simply Features in Your Images

Images don’t have a direct impact on your organic rankings but they’re pivotal in getting the sales you need to earn top-ranking status. And, as we’ve heard many times before, a picture is worth a thousand words. This is especially true in ecommerce.

Yet, too often we see sellers take this saying literally. For example, on Amazon, the first image must fill 85% of the frame and shouldn’t contain any additional text, graphics or inset images. However, we’ve all seen at least one seller push the line and add extra “pop” to their main images at the risk of getting their listing pulled down. 

Our advice: Why take the risk when you can use images 2-7 to tell the full story? Use the rest of your images to illustrate the real-world benefits of your product. Amazon permits these secondary images to include non-white backgrounds, text and other graphics. This gives you the opportunity to showcase your products being used by your target buyer, or located in its intended environment. 

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Not only will a strong series of images help to sell your item. It will also help your buyers get a more accurate idea of your product, so they’re less prone to being disappointed by their purchase and more likely to leave positive feedback and reviews. Positive feedback will, in turn, signal to Amazon that you’re a trustworthy seller and that your product is meeting customer expectations. The combination of increased sales and reviews will have a big impact on your organic ranking on Amazon.

Bonus Tip: Whether in your copy or images, make sure to speak to the emotional experience of using your product. Empathetic content will be far more effective than content that’s strictly informative. For example, say you’re selling a stainless steel BBQ set that includes tools that are 15 inches long. You could state this detail as a fact via text on an image—or, you could tell the customer that these tools are two inches longer than others on the market and are designed this way to keep your hands farther away from the fire as you’re grilling a steak. The extra length is vital to your safety and comfort, something that any grill master can relate with. 

In Summary

The path to first-page ranking is getting narrower as competition only continues to grow on Amazon. But the above strategies will put you in a much better position by making your listings more attractive to both the algorithm and your customer. 

If you’re interested in chatting about more tips and/or getting professional help managing your Amazon listings, contact us at berg@talentacommerce.com. You can also learn about TALENTA Commerce’s partnership with Zentail here.