Amazon has grown into the world’s largest e-commerce store, shipping over 5 billion products in one year alone. Given its enormous size and impact on digital marketing, you must increase your visibility on this site. However, this may seem daunting if you don’t know where to start. Thankfully, Amazon has its own search engine with algorithms that affect rankings. This means that you can apply some SEO strategies to increase your brand and product awareness. Here’s how to use keywords for better Amazon SEO.
Understanding Amazon SEO
Before jumping into keyword research and other SEO strategies, it’s important to understand how Amazon SEO works. In many ways, it is similar to Google. For example:
- It has a search box for customer queries
- Amazon sorts through customer searches and presents relevant listings
- Results are listed on pages from most to least relevant
Given these similarities, it’s understandable that common SEO strategies and keyword research can help boost your rankings on these pages. With over 2.5 million sellers to compete with, it’s important to use every strategy you can. Just as Google wants to match users with the information they seek, Amazon wants to match customers with their desired products. While you may not rank on the first page, the closer you get, the more likely you will reach your target audience.
Optimize Your Keywords
Finding the right keywords for Amazon is simple enough. They are the words and terms that customers type into the search box. Without the proper keywords, your Amazon presence will suffer, and potential customers won’t find you.
For example, suppose you’re selling a pocket knife. Using the keyword “pocket knife” probably won’t help you that much. This is because the term is too broad, with this term bringing up over 2,000 results. To boost your SEO ranking, you want to be more specific.
Thankfully, there’s an easy way to do this. Amazon automatically fills in keywords while you are searching for a product. If you type “pocket knife” into the search bar, it will auto-fill keywords like “assisted opening” and “with clip”. These are excellent keywords to include in your listing.
Just like with Google, the more your product relates to specific keywords, the more likely it will be listed in the search results. With Amazon, the closer your product description is to their specific search, the more likely you appear in their search results. Make sure to research keywords and strategize which words you will include in your product description to help increase your relevance.
Where To Use Keywords
It is important to know where and how to use keywords once you have them. Amazon may delete your account if you are suspected of “keyword stuffing.” This is when a user fills their product description with nothing but keywords, some of which have no relation to their product. This may seem like a great idea but isn’t worth it in the long run, as you may get banned. Instead, strategically insert your keywords into the:
- Product title. Be especially sure to include any brand name for your product.
- Product description. This is where you can utilize a few extra words to help potential customers find your product.
- Backend keywords. These keywords are in the backend of your Amazon seller account. You get around 250 characters to include extra keywords that don’t appear on your listing but still help customers find you. This is a great place to use keywords like common misspellings of your product or brand’s name (i.e., Fruit Loops instead of Froot Loops).
Utilize PPC
One other aspect of Amazon SEO you should be aware of is PPC or Pay-per-click. When you search for a product on Amazon, the first few listings will have “sponsored” next to them in the lower right corner. This is because companies can pay an extra fee to have their product show up first, even without the highest SEO ranking. While this comes with an extra fee and no certainty that anyone will click on it, it’s still important to know it’s there.
While Amazon SEO may initially seem daunting, it is quite simple to boost your rankings and create more organic leads. Simply identify pertinent keywords, and then strategically place them in your name, product description, and backend keywords. This will allow you to rank higher and boost your sales on one of the largest e-commerce sites in the world.
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