How good does an Amazon listing really need to be?

• Amazon retail readiness 

• Page scores

• Optimal title lengths 

• Number of bullet points and images

• A+ and premium A+

If you have put a product on Amazon then you will likely have heard these terms. But what are they, why do they matter, and do you really need to care about them? 

Ultimately all of them are about the quality of a listing and its “ability” to convert a shopper to a customer. But in regards to do you need to care about them, that isn’t such a simple question. Not all listings on Amazon are equal,  and different categories and product offerings require different levels of “effort”. It is fairly easy to understand that a £1.99 pack of tissues needs to do less to sell itself than £1000 Television. So price is clearly a factor, the less someone is spending the less justification they need to have in their purchase, and for more simple products such as tissues many consumers will just be driven to the cheapest products. 

But even looking at the £1.99 pack of tissues there are minimum requirements to have it work as a functional listing, a clear title and a clear main image showing exactly what customers get, not just for conversion but to prevent returns. But A+ content, optimised bullet points, bullet points at all and product description. Plenty of top-selling examples below the £5 mark show some or all of these can be an “optional extra”.

So when are they worth doing and what benefit do they give? Unfortunately, there is not a clear cut answer to this and there will be exceptions to everything. A good rule of thumb is the lower the price point the lower the requirement, but once past that it becomes a lot more category-specific and requirements getting into the mind of the customer. For example, let's take 2 similar-priced products with different parameters, an external hard drive and jacket, 1 has a lot of technical parameters and the other is more fashion and lifestyle choice. So both obviously require a good title and main image, but beyond that the requirements differ. A customer that cares about an external hard drive is going to be after a certain size, transfer speed and other technical specs, but for the jacket, most decisions will be based on the main image if it suits them and the support info as a double check to justify the purchase. So what does this mean for the content requirements?  

For an external hard drive, detailed bullet points highlighting USPs, images focused on practical aspects such as ports, and showing size via lifestyle shots, detailed A+ showing tech details. Then for the jacket lifestyle shots to show the product off, Bullet points highlighting USPs, but shorter and less detailed. A+ content will be around the brand more than the product, allowing the same content to be used for multiple product ranges.   

So how do you work out what is best for your brand and what the requirements are for a good listing in your category? Simple answer research.

Research competitor listing, research the category and be driven by the data. Many agencies will push you to optimise everything to a “perfect level”, regardless of whether it will actually have an impact or not.

Whether you are looking to grow your existing Amazon presence, or launch to a new region. The first thing that should be looked at is the research. At RT7 we use multiple 3rd party software, as well as 1st party Amazon data to deep dive into subcategories in each region and see what the defining factors are for the category, and lay out a roadmap for how to take your brand through to a new market or expand in its current. We can show the size of the market you are going into and give an honest assessment of the challenge it would be to break into this market and if it is worth it. I see too many companies say we are going to “soft launch” in 5 regions and see what works, this wastes money, wastes time and ultimately unnecessarily spreads resources thin. There is an incorrect perception this is the “cheaper” and lower-risk route, but Amazon is not the market to just dip a toe in the water, you need to pick a point and swim straight to it. Using research we will map out a plan that is more along the lines of hitting regions 1 and 2 first, move to 3 and 4 after and leave 5 alone as it is too small. If a region is not going to work for you then it is not going to  help us to put you there.