When talking about how to improve ranking on Amazon, the conversation these days needs to include a discussion of off-Amazon traffic.
In particular Google ads for Amazon products have become increasingly important in improving Amazon SEO (Search Engine Optimization).
SEO is the tactics you use (optimizing keywords, image and title, basically) to make your product ads come up in search results. Ranking (the result of those tactics) is how your product fares against similar products in the Amazon ecosystem.
Both lead to exposure for your product.
Exposure, in turn, leads to sales. Call it a virtuous cycle.
Let’s take a look.
The Ranking Connection
Amazon ranking factors primarily include:
- Conversion Rate
- Keyword relevance
- Sales history
- External traffic
As well as:
- Positive customer reviews
- Product availability
- Shipping speed
- Pricing
- Product Listing Optimization
External traffic is one of the top factors positively affecting that ranking.
Related Reading: 3 Ways to Level Up Your Amazon Advertising Strategy
The World Is Your Oyster
And Amazon wants to pay for your pearls.
When you restrict your advertising to Amazon alone you’re playing exclusively in their sandbox. Granted it’s a big one, but if you can go out and invite the neighborhood over, doesn’t that sound more fun?
Directing shoppers to your Amazon product listing from Google opens up the world.
On average, customers begin their shopping journey as follows:
- Amazon = 50%
- Google = 32%
- Retail or brand websites = 14%
By expanding your ads to the largest search platform, Google, you’re taking your audience from 50 percent of the shoppers out there to over 80. Not only does this increase your odds of nabbing a sale, Amazon rewards you for it.
That’s right.
Amazon, too, sees the value of bringing in those shoppers (after all, they’d prefer anyone not already in their sandbox get their butts in there), so they pay you to do it.
Did you know Amazon offers a Brand Referral Bonus for bringing in those vital external customers?
Crafting your SEO to grab those customer searches is therefore vital.
Boost Your Amazon SEO
Much of how to improve SEO on Amazon has to do with thorough keyword research, which holds true for external ads as well. Optimizing your Amazon product listings to incorporate those keywords is the other part of that process.
Related Reading: From Clicks to Conversions: The Ultimate Guide to Amazon Creative Listing Optimization
The beauty of it is that, with good SEO, not only does your product come up when customers search, your ranking increases as a result of them finding what they want, which means Amazon then sends you more traffic which, in turn, feeds that virtuous cycle.
Simple, right?
In concept, yes.
However, as you may imagine (or be quite aware), achieving “good” SEO – the key to making the most of off-Amazon traffic – can be highly involved. Call it one-half exhaustive research, one-half experienced insight, one-half tedious investment of time, one-half routine monitoring, one-half trial and error.
Which makes SEO, like, a 250% effort or something.
And you thought “giving it 110%” was the ultimate commitment.
Despite that challenge, pulling off highly effective, rank-making SEO can be done by yourself.
Of course, so can building a house.
The biggest questions in both cases are:
- What’s your level of expertise?
- What kind of tools do you have?
- How much time are you willing to invest?
Fortunately, it’s easy to get help.
Google and Amazon: A Symbiotic Relationship
While the players in the Amazon space have evolved, the game hasn’t. For the longest time the Amazon marketplace was mostly third party (independent) sellers of varying size, along with storefronts for known brands.
Those third-party sellers now account for over 60% of sales on Amazon.
Over the last years the landscape has evolved, attracting the interest of agencies and aggregators, but the fundamental unit – the Amazon Storefront – remains the pillar on which everything else is built.
The Amazon landscape now looks like this:
- Sellers
- Agencies
- Aggregators
Agencies help multiple sellers manage their unique Amazon operations; aggregators purchase large numbers of Amazon businesses and run them from the top.
In each case the operational needs for each store remain.
Google ads, in each case, are a vital way to drive external traffic to Amazon product listings.
Related Reading: 3 Little Known External Traffic Types That Will Boost Sales & Rank For Your Amazon FBA Business
The needs of each seller type come down to driving traffic to their products, from within the Amazon ecosystem and without.
Doing that successfully directly impacts profit.
The Future Of Product Ranking On Amazon
The new age of advertising and Amazon ranking means driving traffic from all quarters.
If you’re not already, get started driving that external traffic. Amazon wants you to.
Heck, they pay you to (see above).