Amazon listing optimisation, done properly.

What Amazon listing optimisation actually changes

An Amazon listing has two jobs: get found and get chosen. Amazon’s search indexes the words in your title, bullet points, description and backend search terms, and ranks the detail page partly on how often the shoppers who reach it go on to buy. Optimisation lines up both halves. Our Amazon account management retainer includes this for managed accounts; this page is for brands that want the listing rebuilt as a defined project, in their own Seller Central, without handing over the rest of the account.

Title, bullets and backend keywords: the structure we use

We start from a search-term list, not from the existing listing. The sources are your Sponsored Products search-term report if you have one, Brand Analytics search query data where the brand is registered, the titles of competing products in the same browse node, and the questions and complaints in reviews. Each term is tagged by intent — what the product is, who it is for, what problem it solves — and the tag decides where the term goes.

• Title. Brand, product type and the two or three highest-intent terms first, then the attributes shoppers filter on: size, count, colour, material. Written inside the character limit Amazon applies to the category at the time of writing, and front-loaded because a phone screen cuts the title after the first few words.
• Bullet points. One benefit per bullet, with the specification that proves it. Terms that did not fit the title go here in plain sentences rather than keyword lists, because bullets are read by people as well as indexed.
• Backend search terms. Synonyms, regional spellings (colour and color, trainers and sneakers) and misspellings that would look wrong on the page. Nothing already in the title or bullets, no competitor brand names, and no claims Amazon’s listing policies prohibit.
• Description. Kept as plain, complete copy even when A+ Content will replace it on the page, so the ASIN never depends on a single module set.

Images: the rules, then the sales

The main image is governed by Amazon’s product image requirements. Amazon’s guidance indicates that the main image must show the product alone on a pure white background and fill most of the frame — roughly 85% is the figure usually quoted — with no text, logos or props, and that images which break the rules can get a listing suppressed from search. The remaining slots are where conversion is won. Our standard set is a dimensions graphic with the product beside something familiar, an in-use shot for the main audience, a close-up that answers the most common review complaint, a comparison image that explains why this one, and a packaging or what-is-in-the-box shot. We write the brief and the on-image text; the photography itself is produced by our product photography team or your own studio, or built from the files you already have.

Conversion and the Featured Offer

Copy and images move the conversion rate, but on an ASIN with more than one seller the Featured Offer decides who gets the sale when a shopper clicks Add to Basket. Amazon’s published guidance is that the Featured Offer commonly goes to the offer priced at or below the lowest alternatives on total price including delivery, that faster delivery helps, that an out-of-stock offer cannot be featured and that only Professional selling plans are eligible. So the project includes a pricing and stock check: a perfect page losing the Featured Offer to a reseller is not converting for you. Where resellers are a recurring problem we also review what Brand Registry tools would add.

Where A+ Content takes over

Once the title, bullets and images are settled, the next lever is the lower half of the page. For registered brands we hand the optimised listing to our A+ Content and Brand Store team along with the search-term map and the objections we found, so the modules answer what the bullets could not. Brands without Brand Registry get a fully written product description instead.

What we need from you

• Seller Central user access with listing permissions, set up under your account, not ours.
• Product specifications, certifications and any claims you can substantiate — we will not write a benefit we cannot evidence.
• Existing image files at full resolution, plus brand guidelines if you have them.
• The three products or competitors you treat as the benchmark, and the last 90 days of Business Reports if the ASIN has history.
• A named person who can approve copy within a few working days, so the project does not stall at sign-off.

How we measure the work

Before any change we record sessions and unit session percentage (the conversion figure in Business Reports) by child ASIN, organic position for the ten terms that matter most, and Featured Offer percentage where there are other sellers. After publishing we read the same numbers at 14 and 30 days, noting Sponsored Products spend so that paid traffic does not flatter the result. Every figure in the report is one you can open in your own Seller Central.

How it fits with account management

Listing optimisation is a project with an end date, usually run before a launch, after a product change or when conversion has slipped. If you then want someone watching the listing — stock, pricing, hijackers, suppressions, the next round of search-term data — that is monthly Amazon account management, where listing work carries on inside the retainer. Catalogue faults such as suppressed ASINs, broken variations or GTIN errors are handled by our catalogue management service, usually before any copywriting begins, because a listing that is search-suppressed will not rank however good the title is. Our guide to scaling an Amazon FBA business puts listing work in the wider sequence.

How pricing works

Start with a free consultation: we open your listing and your competitors’ side by side and tell you what we would change first. You then receive a written plan with the ASINs, deliverables and measurement period, and work begins once that scope is agreed. The price depends on the number of ASINs and variations, whether images need producing and whether A+ is included, so we quote per project rather than publishing a rate card. Contact us to book a time.