Optimizing Your ECommerce Presence On Amazon: It’s Trickier Than You’d Think

Direct-to-consumer ecommerce websites have become a must-have for most successful brands, but many find their brand sites reach a saturation point and sales level off. Having a presence on Amazon is a great way to supplement sales, but selling on Amazon is different than selling on your own website. Why? Because there are a host of specific rules, policies, and best practices to follow. There’s also an algorithm to contend with. It’s not enough just to host a sales presence on Amazon; you really need to know how to leverage the platform for ultimate sales results.

I recently spoke about this with Adam Weiler, founder and CEO of Emplicit, an Amazon optimization partner that helps brands achieve their maximum potential on Amazon. Emplicit is itself a Top 500 Amazon seller, has shipped over 2 million orders on the platform, and is using its specialized expertise to help hundreds of brands successfully grow and scale their businesses on Amazon. Here are some of the pointers he had:

Gary Drenik: Why do you think it's important for businesses to sell their products on Amazon? What are the advantages of selling on Amazon compared to other e-commerce platforms?

Adam Weiler: The simple answer- it’s where the people are. Selling on your brand’s own website is a great start, but the data is clear; customers love shopping on Amazon. The platform has massive reach, with some 300 million active users worldwide. Consumers also now view Amazon as a shopping destination to browse, rather than just somewhere to pick up something they need quickly, so it represents a brand discovery channel more than ever. To top that, these users trust the Amazon portal and stay loyal to it, largely due to Amazon’s Prime program.

Prime is a significant competition killer - especially with its free 2-day shipping feature. According to a recent Prosper Insights & Analytics Survey, 75% of Amazon shoppers cite Prime’s free 2-day shipping as the reason they signed up for Prime. And fast and free shipping is just one of Prime’s many benefits. No other e-commerce platform really comes close... and even if they did, Amazon has already established a loyal base of customers who will be wary about switching.

Drenik: With millions of products and countless sellers on Amazon, how do you recommend businesses stand out and capture market share?

Weiler: Having a quality product, with great reviews and low returns, in a niche that isn’t already super-saturated, are all ingredients to a winning formula. It comes down to the same principles that apply to all businesses; what can you do to differentiate your product compared to others? It could be more attractive packaging, lower prices, (or sometimes even, premium pricing), better materials or ingredients, established branding, patents or other IP protection. All of these contribute to success on Amazon.

Selling in the right category is also a contributing factor. A recent Prosper Insights & Analytics survey found that apparel and clothing accessories were those most popular selling categories among Prime subscribers. Similarly, health and wellness products did very well. Sporting goods, for some reason, not so much. But whatever category your products fall into, the goal is to stand out from the rest.

Drenik: With Amazon's constantly changing policies and algorithms, how do you recommend businesses stay up to date with the latest trends and changes?

Weiler: Successful companies on Amazon have a similar internal structure. They typically have an ecommerce division that is dedicated to website and marketplace sales including Amazon. Depending on the size of the company this can be a dedicated person for each marketplace or a single person handling it all.

By utilizing external ecommerce agencies (like Emplicit) which provide a team of experts across different aspects of ecommerce businesses can leverage all the algorithm changes and new features and functionality available to sellers on the platform. No one person can really be an expert on all aspects of ecommerce or stay up to date with all the developments.

Amazon itself offers various tools to keep sellers educated. Subscribing to Amazon's newsletters and blogs is a good way to stay up to date. The company also sponsors webinars and conferences where businesses can learn about what new policies have been enacted. And finally, one of the best ways to keep abreast of algorithm changes is to engage with Amazon’s seller communities. Most of these members stay current, and very vocal, about changes to the platform.

Drenik: Why is the right pricing strategy on Amazon important and how do you develop one?

Weiler: Amazon is a highly competitive marketplace, and businesses need to price their products accordingly if they are going to stand out from competitors. The right pricing strategy can help businesses attract customers both by offering lower prices or value-added services.

To price correctly you have to understand the Amazon flywheel and what they are looking for. Amazon rewards sellers with higher sales and conversion rates with better organic and paid placements in the search results, and typically a lower price tends to increase sales and conversions (and capture Amazon’s Buy Box). However, Amazon can also reward premium pricing in search results because that increases their revenue, so pricing high can also be a beneficial pricing strategy on Amazon depending on the niche and competition.

Drenik: How do you recommend businesses manage their inventory on Amazon to avoid stockouts or overstocks?

Weiler: Inventory is often one of the most overlooked aspects of selling on Amazon but, in our opinion, it’s one of the most important things a business has to manage. The reality is, if you don’t have inventory in stock, you can’t make sales. It doesn’t matter how good your advertising is, how engaging your product descriptions are, or how pretty your listings are, if you don’t have inventory, you basically don’t exist. Amazon also rewards brands whose sales velocity versus their inventory is high and deprioritizes brands with low inventory. So, it pays to be able to tread the line between being over-stocked and being under-stocked.

At a basic level, a company can use Amazon inventory recommendations and send in a recommended amount of product - but more savvy brands will utilize agencies like Emplicit who have access to more sophisticated models and tools to accurately stay in stock - while not sending in too much inventory.

Drenik: Can you share some examples of successful brands that you have helped optimize their sales presence on Amazon? What strategies did you use to help them achieve success?

Weiler: One of our most successful client brands is one that does remarkably well in their home country of Japan, but it was having trouble breaking through on the Amazon platform. The brand, GOSHI, launched on Amazon with a single product - their signature exfoliating shower towel. The product was based on a traditional Japanese washcloth and something like 90% of Japanese households use these types of washcloths - so selling them on Amazon seemed liked a no-brainer.

They soon discovered that the single listing wasn't doing the brand justice. They simply weren’t seeing the growth they had anticipated so they came to us for assistance. We decided to lean heavily on the brand identity to change the blocky and uninspiring content of their product detail page into a heavily branded and impactful experience which helped their content stand-out from other products. We also revamped their display ads that get featured on other Amazon listings. We also had them expand their product offering to include their body washes and lotions, which ensured they secured more real estate in search results.

The result was a 45% increase in sales.

Drenik: Thanks, Adam, for taking the time to share how selling on Amazon can bolster a brand’s sales revenues and some of the approaches you need to take to be successful at it. It’s clear buyers small and large can take advantage of Amazon’s tremendous selling platform, but you need to know the best techniques to do so. Thanks for walking through some of those with us.