Small e-commerce sites often have Amazon and Ebay stores running in conjunction with their own e-commerce site. By selling their products on Amazon and Ebay, small e-commerce sites increase their sales potential whilst building their own Brand recognition.
We look at two areas that small e-commerce site running an Amazon and Ebay store should pay attention to:
- Correctly listing and managing your products
- Leveraging the power of Amazon and Ebay with keyword research.
Managing your Amazon & Ebay Products |
The single biggest mistake that an e-commerce site can make when selling the same product on their Amazon and Ebay stores is to use the exact same product content from their website. This is effectively creating duplicate content, which Google tries to eliminate from its search results.
A recent analysis by intelligent positioning shows that pages from sites with the same duplicate product content yo yo through positions and periodically dislodge one another. Not good for either of the stores or your own site and potentially losing sales because of this.
Each store should have their own unique product copy. Describe it, Sell it, Love it. Later in the article we also look at where to optimise specifically for each store.
Leveraging your Amazon & Ebay Products |
Amazon and Ebay have enormous amounts of authority in search results and e-commerce stores should conduct some basic keyword research to leverage these sites authority in search.
Split your research into order of probability:
- High competition keywords – Amazon
- Medium competition keywords – Ebay
- Low competition keywords – Own site
This way you are appearing for a range of keywords around the product, rather then a singular keyword.
I am using SEMrush in the above images, but you can use Google Adwords to research keywords relating to the product. Download into a spreadsheet and separate according to phrase and related keywords and use these to influence your product copy for each store.
More on : Basic Keyword Research
Optimization for an Amazon Store |
Remember there are two factors when optimizing and using an Amazon store:
- Using Amazons authority to leverage more competitive keywords
- Optimizing your product page to rank well within Amazons own internal algorithms.
Customer Reviews:
Just as reviews are important to your own product pages, google business pages, so are customer reviews on your Amazon product page. Put in place a review request strategy across all your sites and product pages.
Answered Questions:
Yes, typically a product page that has more product questions and answers tend to rank more highly within Amazon. If a customer emails a question, answer it, but then ask them if they would not mind posting the question, as it will help other customers.
Image Size & Quality:
Use the maximum size 1000 x 1000 pixel. Try and incorporate all of the product ( if it has multiple parts ) into 1 main image. Use an accurate description of the image when you save it, this becomes the image url. Instead of MUSB1.jpg use micro-usb-to-usb-cable .jpg
Title:
With your Amazon title you can go to town with keywords, (as long as they read well). Most of Amazons top positioned products are jammed packed full of keywords.
High Speed Micro USB to USB Cable, Mini USB Extension Cable, Micro USB Cables 3ft / 0.9
Features ( Bullet Points ) :
Unique keyword rich informative bullet points are crucial to Amazon understanding the product and returning results to users for internal search queries, more so then the actual product description.
Product Description:
Expand on your product features, describe it, sell it, love it
Specifications:
This is where you list technical specifications, product size, weight, etc.
Category & Sub Category:
When choosing your category, use the most relevant and narrow category as possible.
Search Terms:
Amazon provides 5 search term boxes with 50 character limits. Use the full 50 characters.
3ft / 0.9m Micro USB to USB Cable
High speed micro usb to usb cable
2.0 A Male to Micro B usb cable
480Mbps data transfer usb micro cable
Packaging Options:
This is not ultimately a ranking factor in Amazon, but featured items all seem to have packaging options listed. If you provide can provide these then offer it.
Optimization for an Ebay Store |
Ebay is similar to Amazon in that it has its own internal algorithm. One of the most unique features in Ebay positions is your Seller status and feedback. When stating out, I recommend pricing your product the cheapest, to appear within the top 100 and as your seller feedback increases you can slowly increase your price ( within marketplace ).
Title:
Keep to your keywords and relevant keywords, don’t dilute with overly broad terms.
Offer Value:
Use all the offered values where possible: Free shipping, additional shipping methods, 30 day return, best price.
Remember to stay within new UK Consumer Act.
Refresh RSS Feeds:
Refresh you RSS feeds periodically. Go into marketing tools, manage store settings, turn off your RSS feed. Leave this for 10 hours before re activating, this will re index all your products and give you a temporary boost.
Category:
List in the best available category and if you are selling a known brand make use of the Ebay catalog to list UPC or EAN product details.
Item Specifics:
Fill in as much detail about the product. Unique keyword rich informative item specifics.
Messages:
Answer all messages within 24 hours.
Template:
It is worth spending some money on a professionally designed, branded and mobile responsive Ebay template.
Variations:
If your product has variations available in its category, list them.
Images:
For your main image, use the largest size available ( min of 1600 pixel on longest size). It also offers up to 12 images.
Conclusion |
Unique product descriptions and details for each store you list your product on. Use keyword research to target store listing for specific sets of keywords.
Describe it, Sell it, Love it !