Improve Amazon Ranking: The Best Tips for Top Positions

1. What is meant by Amazon ranking?
2. 10 tips for a better ranking on Amazon
3. Conclusion

Your brand is launching a new product on the market and you are sure that the high quality and the well-known brand will drive product sales? Think again! A key influence on sales success on Amazon is the Amazon rankings. In the following article, our expert Fynn Drees explains what Amazon rankings are, what influencing factors there are, the importance of Amazon PPC tools for optimizing Amazon rankings, and tips on how to improve the ranking of your products.

What is meant by Amazon ranking?

The Amazon ranking indicates the organic placement of a product in search results and within the category in which a product is sorted. The bestseller rank is one of the decisive influencing factors for the product sequence on the Amazon search result page (SERP). If a product increases in ranking, this results in better findability and an increase in performance.

In addition to the placement within a parent category, the ranking on Amazon also indicates the placement in the more specific categories. Thus, a product can be placed far back within a parent category, but rank in one of the front positions in the more specific, detailed categories.

Source: Amazon

Why is the Amazon ranking important and how is it calculated?

The Amazon ranking is important to increase the findability of products within the product categories in the Amazon catalog and in search results. If your products are only sold in small quantities despite high quality and an attractive price, you should improve your Amazon ranking.

The Amazon Algorithm A9 is responsible for the placement of the products. This is less transparent than with search engines like Google & Co., as Amazon gives very little information. The two biggest influencing factors on Amazon's A9 algorithm are product performance (sales, conversion rate) and the match of the keywords contained on the product detail page with the customer's search query.

Do paid Amazon campaigns influence the Amazon ranking?

In addition to the factors of search engine optimization (SEO), sponsored ads also have a major impact on the Amazon ranking. On the one hand, most Amazon campaigns are played out within the search results pages and on the category pages. They are therefore almost independent of the ranking and are better found by the customers. If the ads increase the sales of a product, the product increases in the ranking. Especially for products that are facing a product launch or are product variants, the Amazon campaigns are thus an important driver to optimize the Amazon ranking. Maintaining the ranking positions is also important for Amazon Ads, not only to improve your own Amazon placement, but also to keep up with the competition, who want to catch up in the fiercely competitive Amazon market with their (often aggressive) advertising strategies.

10 tips for a better ranking on Amazon

With the following 10 tips, you can improve the Amazon rank of your products and the findability of the products of your seller's account in the Amazon search results.

1. High-quality main images for Amazon ranking optimization

The main image is the most important part in your product images and often the first visual point of contact between the potential customer and your product. It should initially lead users to the product detail page of your product. A professional and high-quality presentation of the item thus leads to an improvement in the click-through rate. Furthermore, the main image should also convey the most important product features so clearly that the customer already knows as accurately as possible what your product is before clicking on your product. A bad and inaccurate representation, on the other hand, increases the risk that users will bounce after visiting the product page. Both an improved click-through rate and an increase in the Amazon conversion rate have a positive effect on Amazon product ranking.

Source: Amazon
 

2. Optimize the product title for better findability and an increase in the conversion rate

Besides the main image, the product title is the second area that serves as one of the first touch points with customers. Even before visiting the product detail page, the title provides the most important information about your product. Thus, it increases the click-through rate with an attractive formulation just like the main image and the conversion rate with a target-precise formulation. A title that is only designed for click baiting is therefore not advantageous for the Amazon ranking, as a larger part of the customers could bounce off and a resulting weak conversion rate negatively affects the ranking of your product. Since the keywords in the title are also SEO-relevant for the Amazon product search, a precisely fitting wording also supports the findability of your product.

Tool tips for an optimal product title: With Helium 10 and AMALYZE you can filter out optimal keywords to formulate the product title precisely.

Source: Amazon

3. Improve Amazon listing through SEO optimization

In order to achieve a good ranking on the Amazon marketplace, your product must first be found by potential buyers. For this, it is important to understand that Amazon's search algorithm, similar to other search engines, is designed to display the search results that most closely match the product search. This is done by comparing the entered search terms with the keywords that are on the product page. The most relevant sections for search on the product detail page are the product title, the bullet points and the backend keywords, and to a lesser extent for longtail keywords also the product description. If a keyword is not stored in these sections, the chance of visibility under this term is almost excluded. For the ranking, this means that all keywords that have a high relevance for the product and are wide-reaching should be stored in one of the sections in order to optimize your Amazon listing.

Tool tips for an optimal product detail page: Helium 10 and Amalyze help you find strong Amazon search terms that describe your product optimally and create a professional Amazon listing.

4. Increase Amazon rankings through Amazon PPC

When introducing new products, inventory problems or poor product performance, the ranking of a product is at a weaker level. In this case, the targeted use of a Amazon PPC strategy helps to quickly push the Amazon ranking and consequently increase organic sales. With Sponsored Products Auto campaigns, it is very easy to generate additional reach without your own keyword or ASIN research. By using manual Sponsored Products campaigns (Broad, Phrase, Exact), your product is displayed for desired and previously researched keywords that are very suitable for your product and - with good preparatory work - have a higher conversion rate than auto campaigns. The Sponsored Products campaign type with product targeting (PAT) can be directly aimed at the item numbers of the competition and thus in addition to strengthening your own product, simultaneously weaken the competition. New or weaker products can also be promoted together with already strong performing products through Sponsored Brands campaigns in order to benefit from their strengths and strengthen brand awareness. Together with the Sponsored Display campaigns, this type of campaign is available after a successful brand registration. Sponsored Display campaigns can make a very positive contribution to the ranking by targeting very large reaches and transforming clicks into purchases and single buyers into repeat buyers through retargeting campaigns. A strong campaign setup is therefore essential for a good Amazon ranking and a prerequisite to bring the organic sales to the highest level.

Tool tips for optimal Amazon PPC campaigns: The Amazon PPC tools ADFERENCE and BidX currently offer a huge range of functions in the area of Amazon PPC optimization and Amazon PPC automation. Depending on the scope of the setup and product catalog, the tool Finch is also suitable. For researching the right product targets for PAT campaigns, Helium 10 and Jungle Scout are very useful.

Source: Amazon

5. Use DSP and improve your ranking on Amazon

Reach-strong display advertising is done programmatically today. What is required for this is a Demand Side Platform, or DSP for short. Amazon DSP is one of the more cost-intensive forms to increase brand awareness and product performance on Amazon, but all the stronger to place target group-specific advertising with enormously large reach. Amazon DSP also reaches a large number of people outside of Amazon who can generate clicks and purchases bypassing the search results and rankings. On the one hand, compared to the Amazon Sponsored Ads, the targeting is stronger, and on the other hand, by placing the ad outside of Amazon, numerous users are reached who have not actively searched for your products on Amazon before. DSP is ideal for significantly improving the ranking of your product. For managing campaigns with your own DSP access, a deeper Amazon knowledge is necessary, and the costs are relatively higher than with Sponsored Ads. Alternatively, DSP can also be booked via a managed service from Amazon. However, this is associated with higher costs or certain minimum budgets.

6. Use A+ content for ranking optimization on Amazon

The A+ content or the Premium A+ content that can be used under certain conditions indirectly takes on an increasingly important role for the product ranking. The A+ content provides deeper details about product features and composition, as well as other functional characteristics, special features and the brand in general. Especially for mobile display and users who are triggered by picture and video elements, the A+ content improves the conversion rate and therefore the Amazon ranking. An optimal A+ content contains information in many forms, so that both texts and images are available and all questions arising among interested groups can be answered in advance. In addition, you can link other own products in the A+ content for cross and upselling so that your bestseller products can strengthen the rankings of additional products.

7. Dynamic prices can improve Amazon ranking in the long term

Another tip to improve your rankings on Amazon is analysing and working out optimal prices for the Amazon marketplace. Since the algorithm wants customers to have an optimal shopping experience and generate as much shopping cart turnover as possible, the price of your products is always important for the position of the product display. An ideal pricing strategy on Amazon does not necessarily mean that a cheaper product always stands out from the competition and is clicked or bought more often. The optimal price varies for each category. Often times, from the users' perspective, a slightly higher price is an indication of a higher quality product. In categories for pets or toddlers, where buyers want to buy the best possible product quality for their loved ones, this can then be a great advantage that ultimately increases the click-through rate and conversion rate. A temporary price reduction through an incentive strategy, which dynamically adjusts price reductions to market events such as Prime Day or a season start, is always very helpful for the rankings. This makes the buying decision easier for the buyers and both the click rate and the conversion rate increase.

Tool tip for product prices: The tool from Priceloop dynamically optimizes your prices of items on Amazon. In this case, price points are constantly tested to find the optimal price for your product.

8. Discounts, offers, coupons

All types of deals that Amazon offers to marketplace sellers are important instruments to improve the rankings of your products. These include participation in major shopping events such as Spring Sales, Prime Day, Black Week, and the Fall Prime event, as well as ongoing deal promotions which ensure that your products rapidly improve their ranking in the short term – and subsequently benefit from this in the long term. The increased purchase interest during discount events almost always leads to a rapid short-term improvement in ranking. With targeted use of Amazon SEO and Amazon Advertising, deals also influence the ranking in the long term. It is always important to adjust the discount level to the margin and competition and select the right time spans: These vary depending on the product, seasonality, and competition.

Source: Amazon

9. Product availability as a key factor for Amazon rankings

One of the most important influencing factors for very good Amazon rankings is product availability. A product is only found in the Amazon search when sufficient stock is available. During periods when the product cannot be sold, other products can overtake in the ranking. If you use Amazon's own fulfillment program Amazon FBA, you should always consider that shipments to the Amazon warehouse and the storage take some time. Shipments should therefore definitely be sent several weeks in advance to ensure continuous product availability.

10. Reviews, ratings, returns

Reviews and ratings influence the algorithm in the sense that a product with a multitude of positive products appears more interesting to users. The number and quality of reviews ensure that customers are given a positive feeling before the purchase decision and that the conversion rate increases. With Amazon Vine, you can collect detailed reviews for your new products. Returns can also influence the Amazon ranking, as items that are returned significantly more often than competitive products perform slightly weaker in ranking with very similar products. Stable packaging and precise product descriptions ensure that the return rate decreases.

Source: Amazon

Conclusion

To be able to use the Amazon marketplace as an optimal sales channel, the Amazon rankings are essential. The weighting of individual ranking factors on the algorithm, which is responsible for the rankings, is however less transparent. What is certain, however, is that above all the product performance and product visibility have a decisive influence on the ranking.

There are several ways to improve the rankings for products. Professional keyword research and targeted SEO as well as the use of Amazon Sponsored Ads and Amazon DSP can increase the visibility of products and ranking-relevant KPIs such as conversion rate and click-through. However, factors such as prices and optimized inventory management are also of great importance for long-term ranking success.