If you’re selling a product on Amazon, you need to understand their algorithms and their platform. The biggest mistake most people make starting out with Amazon is this. They hear SEO and they automatically think of Google. SEO is different on Amazon because it is a transactional platform. Every query is related to a product or a transaction which means the ranking signals are going to be related to the products and there are far fewer of them. It all boils down to relevance and performance in one way or another. There are a few subcategories which influence the algorithm but the two at the top of the tree are relevance and performance. Here are a couple of simple hacks to ensure your product ranks highly on Amazon.

Optimize Your Product Name

First, you need to include the most relevant keywords in your product title. This seems like it should be obvious, but many people just don’t do it. It is important to avoid keyword stuffing, but you should utilize keywords strategically in the title. You’ll also want to include your brand name and a short concise description of the product. Specify key features such as color, size and quantity if applicable.

Use Your Backend Keywords

Your backend keywords equate to meta tags that Amazon indexes about your products. Believe it or not, many sellers leave this blank. Don’t do it. Each line has a fifty-character limit. You’ll want to stay within this limit because if you go over fifty characters then Amazon will ignore the keyword. Avoid punctuation marks, like comma and quotations, because they will count in your character limit and they don’t help. It is best not to repeat the same keywords. Instead use variations and synonyms to capture traffic. You may also want to include common misspellings for your keyword.

Use High-Quality Images

Products with higher quality images historically have a higher conversions rate across all platforms and this is especially true on Amazon. Images should be at least one-thousand pixels or larger in height or width. This allows their zoom feature to work with the images. Amazon recommends using bigger images for customers to explore in the buying process.

Concentrate On the Buy Box

For every product listing, there is a Buy Box on the right-hand side of the screen. There may be one hundred sellers for the same product, but only a few of them will be featured in the Buy Box, which is where most orders come from. To win the Buy Box, you must concentrate on a few key elements. These factors include price, shipping performance and seller rating. Your price must be in line with or better than the competition, even if it is only a penny less expensive. Amazon automatically includes the price of shipping in the total, so keep that in mind if you charge for shipping. Your seller rating must also be ninety percent or better. Only sellers with ninety to one hundred percent ratings make it into the Buy Box. Lastly, Amazon is only interested in using sellers who can provide fast free shipping. The easiest way to comply is to use Fulfilled By Amazon. If you don’t want to be a part of that program, then just make sure your order defect rate (ODR) is low and your order perfect order percentage (POP) is high.

Send A Follow Up Email

Its no secret that reviews help with rankings, but Amazon has been cracking down on fake reviews. They are usually pretty obvious anyway, so just stick to genuine reviews. One of the best ways to get a good review is to send a follow-up email a few days after the customer should have received the item. Thank them for their patronage and ask them to leave a review. Most people will do it and it will really boost your product rankings.

Amazon is one of the most lucrative marketplaces available to work with right now. Getting your products loaded into their system and priced right is only part of the equation. You have to also make sure that your products rank high in their categories and in user search results. Knowing what to do can be difficult, but after reading through these simple hacks, you should be able to rank higher and faster than ever before.