We have all heard the success stories of selling on Amazon; someone brings a product to the e-commerce marketplace and seemingly overnight becomes wealthy. There are numerous sellers who have used Seller Central to sell a product and have become successful at doing so. The process of bringing a product to market and turning it into a successful product on Amazon is very hard and requires a lot of knowledge about e-commerce platforms and Amazon itself.

How is a Landscape Photographer an Expert at Amazon?

In my day job for the last four years, I have been leading strategy and consulting with brands who are looking to expand their e-commerce footprint and want to bring their products to Amazon. Most have already created a Seller Central account, have loaded their products into inventory, and are utilizing FBA to fulfill their orders. After that, they are mostly just hoping for organic sales because advertising on Amazon sounds daunting and expensive. Most brands are not looking to make Amazon their largest sales channel but want to simply have their products available for the over 100 million Prime shoppers in the United States. This is because it is very difficult to communicate brand stories on Amazon, often times shoppers are just looking for a low price and Prime shipping. I know I am a majority of the time.

Brands come to me looking for help to navigate Amazon better, advertise more effectively, optimize their listings, and increase their sales. I have witnessed many success stories working directly with brands along with numerous brands who are just missing a few pieces to truly be successful.

My number one tip to brand looking to sell on the Seller Central or Vendor Central is; what is your advertising budget and how are you managing it? What kind of data are you getting from your campaigns? Are you using that data to make decisions?

Have You Audited Your Seller Central Advertising Campaigns?

The action that comes from those questions is usually in the form of an audit of the advertising campaigns that the brand is currently running. A simple explanation of an Amazon advertising audit is to take a look under the hood at the keyword data and glean insights. Auditing advertising campaigns regularly is a great way to better understand what shoppers are looking for and if they are converting (buying). If a brand isn’t currently advertising through the campaign manager in Seller Central, a recommended alternative path is to audit their listings to see how to improve their listings.

Have Your Audited Your Listings?

If you’re selling on Amazon, search for your most important keyword and see where you rank. Odds are, if you have to go to page 2 you are probably not getting much traffic through that keyword. How can your listings be improved? Here’s a simple breakdown of an Amazon listing and the levers you can pull to potentially increase your product’s visibility.

• Photography improves conversion rates

  • Good photography is key to a great listing. What little media Amazon gives Sellers needs to be maximized with great content. Beautiful photography, lifestyle shots, infographics, and product callouts are all great ways to improve your listing and conversion rates.

• Search Engine Optimization improves search visibility

  • Amazon SEO (search engine optimization) is about knowing what are important keywords to your product and product category, then using them throughout your content on the listing. Titles, bullet points, and descriptions. Using keywords can improve search results, improving search results will lead to getting more traffic to your listings.

• Price is the biggest factor in conversion rates

  • The price of the product is the biggest factor in improving conversion rates. A brand that I worked with wanted to sell through their overstock of product and we reduced the price by 50% to stimulate sales on the slow-selling product. Within two months, it had sold the most units in their entire product line. It didn’t matter to them though because they were just trying to sell through product, but the price is the most powerful factor in conversion rates. Is your price an attractive price?

• Is The Product Prime Eligible?

  • Using Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) is a surefire way to increase conversion rates. It’s proven and real. I recommend it to everyone because Amazon is MUCH better at fulfilling orders than your company will ever be. If you want to get serious about selling on Amazon, the first step to make your products Prime shipping eligible by using FBA. Conversion rates often increase by nearly 50% by just switching from merchant fulfilling to FBA.

Sitting down with a brand to audit their listings and/or audit their advertising is the first step to determine the best course of action for that brand. I was working with a brand recently that has well over 3,000 SKUs in their catalog, has a great and trendy product, has great design, and has a great price. Yet, that brand is struggling because they are relying on merchant fulfilling on the vast majority of their listings. If that brand were onboard with using FBA, they would be doing $100+K per month.

I have hesitated about posting this blog for a long time because it is my day job and not really related to photography. But as I go out on my own as a consultant, I want to offer my services to brands looking to grow on Amazon. Through my consulting, I also work with teams of experts in other fields too such as third-party logistics, design, product marketing, and of course, photography. If you are selling on Amazon and want to grow your sales, let’s talk about your presence on Seller Central. Click on the button below to contact me.