Amazon SEO: 6 Tips to Optimise Your Listings

Amazon sellers and vendors need to understand Amazon’s ranking algorithm in order to experience success on the site. Just as with ranking on Google, those selling through Amazon need to consider the optimization of their listings in order to improve their visibility against competitors.

To help improve your listings and, as a result, conversions, here are six tips to help you optimize your listings on Amazon.

1. Gather a collection of ‘seed’ keywords

Everyone has to start somewhere and for keyword research the best place is to start with some relevant seed keywords. These will allow you to have a basis to find relevant and long-tail keywords that are relevant to the seed list.

If the products you are looking to sell are vegan, plastic free shampoo bars then the seed keywords would be “vegan shampoo” “plastic free shampoo” “shampoo bars”, for example.

To find these seed keywords you could take a look at the listings already ranking highly in Amazon and note down the keywords these competitors are using.

There are also a range of tools which can help with the discovery of Amazon keywords too:

• AMZDataStudio
• io
• Keyword Inspector

1. Expand your keyword list

Once you have your seed keyword collection you can use each one as the basis for further keyword discovery. Use these keywords as the core keywords and find secondary and tertiary keywords which are relevant in order to give a broader list of targets.

For example, if you start with “vegan shampoo” as your core keyword you can add “cruelty free shampoo”, “cruelty free toiletries”, “vegan bathroom essentials”, “vegan haircare” and so on. Do this for each of your seed keywords to flesh out your list.

You can also take each seed keyword and enter it into Amazon’s search box and take inspiration from the predictive results as it will show the searches most relevant to what previous customers have been looking for when entering that term previously.

1. Go after the high search volume

There is no point going after keywords that no one is searching for so it is vital that sellers and vendors check the search volume. For this you are likely to need a tool to see the search volumes of keywords on Amazon itself.

These tools give you an estimate of search traffic and indicate how difficult it would be to rank on page one for key terms. Some will also show the search trends for these terms too.

You will want to focus on three types of keywords:

– Those with a lot of traffic, but less competition.

– Those with moderate traffic, but little competition.

– Those with a lot of traffic, but there is also a lot of competition.

You can also set up a free account with Google Keyword Planner to see the search volume range of keywords related to your seed keyword list. Although over 60% of online consumers begin their search via Amazon, it is safe to assume that some will be doing research prior to purchase, so if money is tight, this may be a good way to see which keywords are popular on Google to give you an idea of their potential on Amazon.

Using these tools will also help you expand your list of keywords by showing related terms, prepositions and questions people are searching for too.

1. Filter out the noise

Once you have your list of high-volume keywords it is important that you take a sensible approach. Of course, all the keywords will be relevant to your seed keywords, but are they all relevant to your brand.

An example of this is if a brand specific keyword makes the list. “Herbal Essences Vegan Shampoo”, for example, yes the product you are looking to sell is a form of vegan shampoo but your brand is not Herbal Essences.

Although using these keywords is likely to help with rankings, the benefit will be overshadowed by a low click-through rate, as those searching for a specific brand’s product are likely to have done their research and be looking specifically for that product, meaning rankings in this case do not equal conversions.

Go through your list with a fine-tooth comb and remove the keywords that don’t directly relate to YOUR product.

1. Optimize your listings

Once you have done all the groundwork it is time to put it into practice. Use as many of the keywords in your listings as possible, but make sure it looks natural.

Use them to construct your listing titles, the bullet points, a long form product description and not forgetting the backend search phrases.

This doesn’t mean you should be keyword stuffing, the listings are being read by humans so need to be written in a way that is easily understood, otherwise you will lose the conversion, no matter how high you rank. You need to find a balance between optimized copy and a customer friendly listing.

If this is something you struggle with, an Amazon Marketing Agency can assist with this process.

1. Stay on top of it

Unfortunately, you can’t pat yourself on the back for a job well done, because when it comes to keyword research the job is never done.

Keyword research should be a task done regularly to ensure you are constantly staying on top of consumer and competitor behavior. This way, you’ll be able to spot any new, high search volume terms consumers are using as and when they grow in popularity when they’re looking for products similar to yours.

You will also need to observe the updated listings to see how they perform, if they are not doing as well as you hoped, you may need to switch up the keywords or take a different approach.

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