Amazon CRO: Top three actionable tactics to boost sales today

How is your conversion rate on Amazon? Wait, before you look down in dismay, read this short yet actionable post which outlines key tactics to maximize your sales, and then answer the question in the comments below.

Amazon is truly a monster of a marketplace. Here are a few fun facts and figures about this mammoth that’ll please you as an ecommerce seller:

• 1.92 billion people, or 25 percent of the world’s population, are currently shopping online. (Source)
• Each second, Amazon records about $4,722 in sales. This amounts to nearly $17 million an hour. (Source)

From a seller perspective, these numbers must be music to your ears. But, as you’d expect, you are not the only ones rejoicing. In fact, 1,029,528 new sellers joined Amazon in 2017, the equivalent of 2,975 new sellers every day. And this number is growing fast each year.

Needless to say, as great as Amazon is for selling your products online, the competition on this platform is absolutely rife. If, like most sellers, your conversion rates on Amazon are woeful, don’t call it quits just yet. Put the following tactics into practice and witness an immediate bump in sales:

1. Upload several high-quality visuals

When we talk about selling over the internet, people do judge a book by its cover. Would you blame them? The problem with online shopping is that your shoppers can’t actually touch, taste, or try your products first-hand before parting with their hard-earned money.

So, as the seller, it is your duty to reassure them by providing an out-and-out virtual feel of the product. How? With the help of high-quality visuals, of course. Visuals ⎯ images and videos ⎯ are one of the most critical elements of your product listing and can directly drive sales.

For instance, Skinner Auctions tested whether increasing the size of their product images from 250 pixels to 350 pixels wide, thus increasing the quality, would increase conversion rates. Their results were astonishing with 63% more visitors starting the bidding process and a huge 329% more visitors completing all the forms necessary to make a bid.

Invest in professional product photography, illustrations, and even videos. Specifically, strive to include the following types of visuals:

Images

Primary images

These are the standard, high-resolution images you see in which the product is highlighted against a pure white background. All products need to be showcased in this manner to exude professionalism. Make sure you enable the shoppers to view the product from every angle. Use online tools like AutoClipping to swiftly remove the background of your image and make it Amazon compliant.

In a survey by Weebly, 75% of respondents rated product photos as very influential when they’re deciding whether they want to buy a product online Moreover, 22% of online product returns are because an “item looks different than the photos.” Thus, providing high-quality primary images is an absolute must if you want to boost sales and content customers.

Source: Amazon

According to Amazon’s official primary image requirements, images must have more than 72 dpi resolution and should be 1,000 pixels or larger in either height or width. This minimum size requirement enables the zoom function on the website.

Lifestyle images

Lifestyle photography implies showcasing your products as they’re being used in real-life scenarios by ordinary people. Bolstering your primary images with such images will help shoppers visualize what it would be like to own your product.

Source: Amazon

Competitor comparison charts

If you know your product is superior with best-in-class features, then why shouldn’t you brag about it? Competitor comparison charts empower buyers to promptly make up their minds and skip the comparison stage of their journey because you already laid out all the differences for them.

Source: Amazon

Illustrations

Upload illustrations such as infographics to easily underscore your product’s most beneficial features. An instructional “how-to” illustration (such as assembly or usage instructions) can also be used to prove how easy to use your product is.

Source: Amazon

Videos

Consider creating videos instead of illustrations to demonstrate your product being used or to explain its key features. Videos can be of the lifestyle category, where the benefits of your product in daily life can be easily appreciated. Alternatively, you can create “how-to” videos or even a “story” video depicting why (and how) the product came into existence. Make sure to keep the length under one minute, ideally around the thirty-second mark.

Don’t scrimp on visuals by uploading mediocre images taken on your smartphone. Consider hiring a local professional product photographer or hunt a cheap one on Fiverr ⎯ with just a little digging, you can find professionals willing to do it for as low as five dollars.

Investing in high-quality product photography, professionally designed illustrations, and videos will bear fruit throughout the lifetime of your Amazon listing.

Furthermore, high-quality visuals will not only help boost sales but also empower you to increase prices. That’s because customers will know they’re paying for premium quality when they see it.

2. Sign up for Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA)

News flash: Shoppers hate paying for shipping. They would rather purchase extra items just to reach the minimum order value and qualify their order for free shipping.

Enter Amazon Prime, which now has more members than the population of Germany – more than 100 million members. As you likely already know, Prime users receive free two-day shipping on all Prime-eligible products, along with numerous other benefits. This makes them much more inclined to buy products with that pretty little Prime checkmark.

What’s more, according to Statista, Prime members spent an average of $1,400 on Amazon in 2018, whereas non-Prime members spent around $600. Now, as a seller, your products are eligible for Prime only if you opt for Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA). Using FBA also builds trust with customers, which can give you a whopping 30-50% boost in sales in the long run.

Simply put, if you’re not enrolled for FBA, you’re leaving a ton of money on the table. So, if you haven’t already, it is time to seriously consider signing up for FBA.

3. Strive hard to garner more reviews

Last but not least, customer reviews can sink or swim your business. According to Trustpilot, 84% of people trust reviews they read online as much as personal recommendations. Reviews build trust and provide social proof.

As you’ve surely noticed, the products ranking at the top of Amazon search results almost always have more and better reviews than the ones toward the bottom. An abundance of positive reviews will skyrocket your product listing’s rankings, click-through rate, and eventually, sales.

For those wondering, under no circumstances should you think about suborning fake reviews will cheat Amazon’s A9 algorithm.

To earn more reviews, reach out to your customers via good old-fashioned email. Request them to spare a few moments to drop an honest review. As there’s nothing in it for them, they typically wouldn’t comply in one go.

Thus, send them a warm reminder at least a couple of times, making it crystal clear that you deeply appreciate their support. To turn the odds in your favor, you can incentivize the feedback process by offering loyalty rewards and discounts in exchange for an honest review from verified customers.

Also, make it a habit to respond to each and every review. Be timely and courteous about it, as it shows you value your customer’s opinions and have their best interest in mind.

Pratik Dholakiya is the founder of Growfusely, a content marketing agency specializing in content and data-driven SEO. He can be found at Twitter @DholakiyaPratik.