Don’t know how to optimize your Amazon listing? Just study these 6 points of your competitors

Whether you are a new Amazon seller or an experienced seller, spending time studying competitor listings is the best way to optimize your own listings. Sellers can study competitor listings from the following 6 aspects to help identify their own advantages and gradually optimize their listings.

To improve your Amazon search ranking, you first need to find out the keywords that your competitors rank for. This helps you determine which keywords are most likely to drive sales for your products. Here sellers can use some keyword tools to conduct keyword research.

The next step is to search for your main keywords in the Amazon search box. After a few searches, you will get an idea of ​​which sellers are currently dominating your product category.

Look at only the first and second pages of results for your main keyword and take note of what you see: keywords that appear frequently in titles, what the main image looks like, the average number of product reviews, who are the main advertisers for sponsored ads. This will help you identify your competitors and understand your own positioning.

For example, if you sell a popular product and notice that most of the main images on the search results page look similar, can you find ways to make your image stand out? Below is an example of a search results page for black Converse women’s shoes. Notice that one listing image stands out purely because it is taken from a different angle.

The same goes for prices, titles, and product reviews. Take note of the patterns you see and keep this information in mind when creating new product listings and optimizing them.

Now that you have an idea of ​​what shoppers see when they search for your keyword, it’s time to narrow down which sellers’ listings are performing well and see if you can spot factors that may be affecting their ranking on the search results page.

Sellers can check if they have low prices and a lot of reviews, and if there are other factors that attract consumers' attention, such as features, pictures or titles. Now look at the search results and compare them to the best-selling products. For example, the product was searched using the broad keyword "tarpaulin", which has more than 90,000 monthly searches on Google.

*Tip : A great tool to calculate keyword search volume is MerchantWords, which provides you with the exact search queries and monthly searches on Amazon for a specific product.

Ignore the advertised products and you’ll find that best-selling products rank well because they are cheap, which in turn leads to a large number of reviews.

As you scroll further down the first page of search results, you’ll notice the second-to-last listing. It’s reasonably priced, not significantly cheaper than the #2 or #3 listings on the search results page, and it has no reviews:

Upon closer inspection, it turns out that the product was listed on June 30, 2017. So what caused it to be ranked on the first page of search results?

This is because the seller has paid close attention to the product listing details, while the competitors have not paid attention to:

However, it is worth noting that if the seller spends some time to get good reviews, there is a high chance that the ranking will be significantly improved.

When analyzing competitor product pages, focus on 5-10 competitor listings on page 1 of the search results for your keyword and carefully review these elements of their product pages:

(1) Title

Your listing title is the primary factor Amazon uses to determine the relevance of your product to a buyer’s search query and is one of the top factors that encourage users to click on the search results page.

Sellers should pay attention to the keywords included in the best-performing listings and those that are omitted. For example, a competitor may rank well simply because of its low price, but buyers seeking high-quality products will be attracted to listings that highlight product attributes.

In the previous “tarpaulin” example, the seller uses words like “heavy duty,” “industrial strength,” and “professional use,” all of which refer to the high quality of the product. Even including the exact thickness and weight of the material shows credibility at first glance and encourages buyers to click.

Here are the titles used by the top competitors. The listing titles are very different and mention the purpose of the tarpaulin:

(2) Bullet points and product description

Paying attention to the language your competitors use to highlight product features and related information will help you provide better, richer information to showcase your product and encourage conversions.

For waterproof cloth listings, few sellers will write detailed product descriptions about the product, but if you write a detailed description, you will gain a lot.

Note that the five bullet points in the listing should use persuasive language to encourage conversions. In addition, you can use capitalization appropriately to draw attention to the main features and ensure that buyers understand everything they need to know.

The same principle applies to product descriptions. Although this listing does not use EBC or images, the seller still works hard to make the product description in the listing stand out from the competitors.

Your product description is likely the last thing a potential buyer will look at before making a purchasing decision, so emphasizing key features and including some creative language will bring your conversion rate closer to Amazon’s 15% average conversion rate.

To be sure, if your product description is something your competitors tend to overlook (which is the case with many sellers), then take advantage of the opportunity to attract the small number of buyers who do read your product description.

(3) Product image quality

Before buyers buy your product, they will look at the product image, so having the right image is key to conversion. If you find that the average image quality of your products is poor, then you have an opportunity to drive your product to stand out and convert with high-quality images. High-quality images require sellers to take close-ups of the product from different angles.

Now that we’ve looked at what your competitors highlight in their listings, it’s also important to see what they’ve omitted or where they have weaknesses. This will give you the opportunity to find ways you can satisfy customer pain points and answer any questions that your competitors haven’t.

Product reviews are not only a great way to find new keywords by discovering how buyers talk about your products, but they are also a place to discover your competitors’ weaknesses. If your competitor has a large number of reviews, then before you try to get good reviews, go directly to the bad reviews to see if you can find his weaknesses.

Sellers can ask themselves these questions:

• What is the biggest problem for buyers with your competitor’s products?

• How does my product solve this problem or differ from the competition?

• What do sellers think of competitor products and can I offer the same deal?

• If so, how would I highlight this in a more attractive way? If not, what other benefits does my product offer?

Sellers can use the answers to these questions as a framework for your product listing description, highlighting your solution as much as possible.

The Q&A feature on Amazon helps you identify key information that customers don’t find on your competitor’s listings. This gives you the opportunity to include these details in your bullet points to encourage shoppers to choose your product.

Remember, the longer a buyer spends researching your product, the longer it takes to make a final purchase, and the greater the risk that he or she will end up buying from a competitor. Therefore, it’s important to react quickly and address any potential conversion blockers in your listing.

*Tip : List the most common repeated questions and make sure to present the answers in your bullet points and product description. For example, if “How do I clean this rug?” is a common question in competitor product listings, you can include the cleaning instructions for the product in your product description.

Text✎ Fang Xiaoling/

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