Ranking high in Amazon search results means higher conversion rates and more sales for your business. Reaching your desired customer base can be challenging when you’re just one of the more than two million businesses using Amazon to sell their products. How do you increase sales when your product listings get lost behind competitors? 

Developing a solid keyword ranking strategy on Amazon can help attract more customers looking for products like yours. Keep reading for a brief guide on Amazon SEO and how to develop a successful Amazon keyword ranking strategy.  

What Is Amazon SEO?

Like other search engines, Amazon uses an algorithm to provide searchers with the most relevant product listings. Sellers and marketers leverage search engine optimization (SEO) to help Amazon find their products and rank them higher on result pages. Their products rank highest when they follow the best practices for Amazon listings.

One of the essential aspects of successful Amazon SEO is the keyword ranking strategy. Ranking high for a keyword means Amazon displays your product among the top results when a searcher types in a specific keyword, such as “cotton T-Shirt” or “wireless phone charger.”

When your product listings rank higher for relevant keywords, your business enjoys increased brand awareness, more qualified traffic, and more sales.

Optimizing an Amazon Product Listing 

A large portion of your keyword ranking strategy on Amazon will involve product listings because shoppers rely on these to get to know the offered items. Amazon wants to present every searcher with the most relevant results and ranks product listings higher when they include the following elements:

Valuable Keywords

Sellers on Amazon must use relevant keywords to drive interested traffic to their product listings. Use the Amazon search box to learn what shoppers are searching for to find products like yours. Type in a relevant word, such as “T-shirts,” and review the other search terms in the drop-down area.

Try to collect a list of short- and long-tail keywords for a comprehensive keyword ranking strategy. Short-tail keywords, such as “pants,” boast higher search volumes, thus enhancing brand visibility. Long-tail keywords are more specific, such as “black work casual pants for women,” drawing in a smaller number of searchers looking for a certain product. 

Optimized Product Title

A product title should let the shopper know what the item is without any tactics the Amazon algorithm doesn’t like. Your product titles could hurt your rankings if they contain the following:

• More than 80 characters
• All capital letters
• Subjective language (“best seller,” “amazing,” “fantastic,” etc.)
• Promotional language (“free shipping,” “guaranteed,” etc.)
• Decorative characters 

Amazon also prefers brand names at the beginning of product titles and numerals for numbers (e.g., “1” instead of “one”).

Optimized Product Descriptions

A product description offers the shopper detailed information on the product they won’t find elsewhere on the listing. Optimized product listings include keywords throughout the product description. Keep the following in mind when optimizing an Amazon product description to avoid doing more harm than good:

• Do not use a keyword more than once. Amazon considers this “keyword stuffing.” 
• Include the most vital keyword in the heading and subsequent keywords in the description.
• Do not include reviews or false information.

Remember to keep your product descriptions detailed but concise. Many shoppers scan product descriptions, so you want to make it easy to find descriptive and essential information. 

Optimized Key Features

Successful Amazon product listings include bulleted lists of key features. These should also include relevant keywords to help the listing rank higher in Amazon search results. Keep the following tips in mind when writing your key feature bullet points:

• Each product should include up to five bullet points.
• The bullet point section should be 1,000 characters at most.
• Use sentence fragments without ending punctuation.
• Do not include promotions.
• Do not include prices.

Try to keep your formatting consistent across products. For example, you may include size options for every product’s first bullet point.

Backend Keywords

Another way Amazon helps shoppers find the most relevant products is through backend or “hidden” keywords. Your customers can’t see these keywords, but Amazon still uses them for product indexing. When adding backend keywords, keep the following in mind:

• Include a product’s abbreviations and synonyms 
• Include keywords in a logical search order
• Include singular or plural versions, not both 
• Do not include repeated words

Amazon limits these keywords to 250 bytes, so be strategic about your choices.

Amazon Tools for Keyword Ranking

Many tools exist to help you with your keyword ranking strategy on Amazon. These include the following:

A+ Content

Amazon’s A+ Content feature (formerly Enhanced Brand Content) provides businesses with more multimedia content options for product listings. Added content like comparison tables, high-definition videos, and high-quality images helps engage shoppers and increase sales. 

You must be an Amazon Brand Owner or Professional Seller to access A+ Content.  

Manage Your Experiments

Amazon’s Manage Your Experiments tool allows sellers to conduct A/B testing to determine what kind of content performs the best for the products they sell. When you run an A/B test, you create two versions of the same product listing. After the experiment, you publish the version with the highest conversion rate. 

Amazon Search Terms Report

Amazon Brand Owners can access the Amazon Search Terms report tool, which provides valuable information on product rankings. A Search Terms report includes the most searched terms within a certain period, the three products most clicked on for each of these terms, and each term’s search frequency rank.

Let Click Fluency Manage Your Keyword Ranking Strategy on Amazon

The marketing professionals at Click Fluency want to help you optimize your keyword ranking strategy on Amazon. Our team can serve as your dedicated Amazon team. We’ll take care of your keyword ranking strategy, Amazon PPC management, and more.  

We know the best ways to increase Amazon conversation rates and help grow your brand on Amazon. Learn what the Click Fluency team can do for your business by scheduling a free strategy call today.