As more and more consumers embrace online stores for all their shopping needs, businesses are hard at work devising new e-commerce marketing strategies to sell on Amazon. With the introduction of Amazon Marketing Services (AMS), companies can leverage a range of advertising solutions—including headline search ads, product display ads and sponsored products—to connect with millions of shoppers and drive sales. Sounds great, right? But to thrive in the burgeoning world of e-commerce, you’ll need to pull maximal ROI from every single dollar you spend on Amazon marketing. Here’s our advice on how to build a comprehensive Amazon marketing strategy that positions your business for success in 2018.
Amazon Marketing in 2018
Most brands looking to sell products online view marketing on Amazon as an essential investment. After all, who’s going to pass on the opportunity to reach hundreds of millions of potential customers who are already ready to purchase? Regrettably, it’s not enough to just toss your products up on the store and support them through a few AMS ads. To really push products on Amazon, you’ll need in-depth strategies that account for your competitors and Amazon SEO. That’s right; Google isn’t the only search engine you need to tango with on the digital marketing dancefloor.
Did you know that around 56% of shoppers start their product searches on Amazon first before any other online site? That figure alone makes it clear why Amazon marketing is so valuable—and why a number of sellers are upping their advertising budget even further in 2018. Amazon’s ad business swiftly became one of the company’s core growth drivers in 2017, and you can expect this facet of the business to grow further this year as more brands use Amazon ads to optimize sales. While it’s still imperative to optimize your brand’s presence on Google, Facebook and other online channels, Amazon marketing will play a key role in your sales numbers for 2018 and beyond. So then, without further ado, let’s dive into crafting your Amazon marketing strategy for this fiscal year.
Scoping out Competitors on the Amazon Market
Before you start brainstorming ideas for new Amazon ads and other awesome marketing initiatives, take a moment to see what your competitors are doing on the platform. How many of them already have a strong presence on Amazon? Which brands are dominating the top of your searches? Are your rivals utilizing product display ads or headline search ads? This step will give you a great understanding of the competitive landscape and may reveal powerful opportunities your brand can capitalize on to gain an edge. Be sure to take note of how your competitors are pricing their products, too. This information will be invaluable when we touch on your pricing strategy later.
Using Keywords to Optimize Your Amazon Product Pages
Keyword research can help you understand which products and brands in your industry are thriving on Amazon and optimize the visibility of your own product pages. Just performing normal searches on Amazon can help you determine which keywords you should keep an eye on, but you’ll need specialized keyword tools to get optimal results. Keyword Tool is a solid choice if you’re looking for a free resource to get you started. This program uses Amazon autocomplete and the search suggestion feature to generate relevant long-tail keywords for your optimization efforts. More advanced tools (or strategic marketing partners like Snap) will allow you to track local and national searches and assess the current effectiveness of your product pages in regards to search visibility. No matter which approach you use, doing your keyword homework will pay dividends when building out your Amazon marketing strategy this year.
Strategically Pricing Your Amazon Products
Competitive pricing is essential for success on Amazon, and many brands underestimate how significantly a product’s price influences its ranking on platform searches. Strategically pricing your products based on how your audience searches can make all the difference when doing a product push on Amazon. Are the shoppers you’re targeting refining their search queries to view products with the lowest price first? Can you afford to slash the costs on a few of your products to dominate these searches? These are just a few of the pivotal questions your Amazon marketing strategy has to address.
Balancing your pricing with sales opportunities can be very challenging, but there are a few tactics that can help you. We recommend leveraging the Automate Pricing tool included in the professional selling plan. This resource is built into your selling account and makes it easy to automate pricing through custom price limits and rules. Employing Lightning Deals is another great tactic you can use increase sales on Amazon through big promotions. There’s also the Early Review Program, which you can use to generate reviews for your new products. Not only can user reviews help to increase the visibility of your product pages on the Amazon central search engine, but they can also make customers more confident about investing their hard-earned money in your items—increasing their likelihood to purchase.
Devising a Dynamic Amazon Marketing Strategy in 2018
By combining compelling AMS ads with a comprehensive Amazon marketing strategy, your company can pull ahead of the competition and generate exceptional results. But if you need some help building a flexible marketing strategy for the platform, you should give our digital marketing gurus a call. Snap understands the importance of creating holistic marketing strategies that draw synergy between SEO, SEM and all other channels. We can assist with everything from Amazon marketing strategy analysis to Amazon SEO, positioning your products at the top of customer searches every time. 2018 is shaping up to be an incredible year for Amazon—and it could be for your enterprise, too. Take the first step toward success by contacting us today. We look forward to hearing from you.