We know Amazon is the world’s largest online marketplace. And with such a big marketplace comes a lot of competition. The site has over 6 million total sellers worldwide, with active sellers rounding around 1.5 million. This year alone, there have been 482 thousand new sellers, and that’s 73 new sellers every hour.
How can you stand out in such a crowded environment? Two words: Amazon SEO. At the end of the day, the Amazon marketplace is just another search engine. That means you can apply SEO techniques to your product listings and descriptions.
Here’s some data to put things into perspective:
According to a 2019 Consumer Behavior Report from Feed Advisor, 44% of the people searching on Amazon scroll through the first two pages, with only 26% making it to the third. Over 54% of the people that buy daily always buy the first product listed, and less than 21% of all buyers buy something that isn’t the first product they see.
Customers are satisfied with the way the Amazon search algorithm works, and they trust it. So, you need to play nice with it. You need to put in place an Amazon keyword strategy to help your products rank higher in terms of searches.
Backend keywords are how the algorithm understands your page and how it positions it for searches by extension. If you don’t know how to choose your keywords or use them properly, your product won’t rank high in the marketplace. With only about 250 characters to work with, you have to have a clear idea of what you need. Because as we have previously established, not ranking on the first page means losing a huge number of prospective sales.
Not sure where to start? Don’t worry. Let us walk you through the essentials when it comes to your Amazon keyword strategy.
How to Choose the Correct Backend Keywords for Amazon SEO
Follow Amazon’s Guidelines
To woo the Amazon search algorithm, you need to pay attention to their requirements. Amazon asks that your keywords are relevant to your product. Don’t try to use popular keywords from things that have nothing to do with it. Amazon doesn’t care for searches that end in irrelevant products. Use a keyword tool to find relevant keywords for your products.
Furthermore, organize your keywords in a way that makes sense for searches. If you are writing about sneakers, you want to have the size and color first. “Sneakers big red” doesn’t make much sense as a search, but “big red sneakers” do.
Don’t Repeat the Same Keyword
Don’t use a keyword in your backend if you already have it in your title, product listing, or other areas. This redundancy might be encouraged in other search engines, but it doesn’t work for Amazon SEO. They don’t recommend that you use a keyword more than once. That means not using keywords you already have on your front end and not repeating them in your backend.
Include Variations
Your backend keywords are where you can add as many words related to your product as you want. Titles and product descriptions shouldn’t be redundant, but your backend can be because customers don’t see it.
Use synonyms, abbreviations, alternate names, and other words that are relevant to the search. But don’t include brand names and plurals, punctuation, and don’t overdo the similar words.
Remember the 250-Byte Limit
You have a limit of 250 bytes for your backend keywords. This is not always the same as 250 characters. Not all characters have the same byte size, with certain symbols being 2 or 3 bytes. You won’t be able to save your backend keywords, or they won’t be indexed properly if you exceed the byte limit. You can use a byte counter to help you figure out if your keywords will fall within the necessary count.
Monitor their Performance
If you’ve followed all the steps so far, you might think you are done. You write down your keywords and call it a day. That’s a mistake many businesses make. The job isn’t finished after you find the right keywords. You have to check that they are driving traffic to your Amazon listing.
The effectiveness of your keywords can be verified by periodically reviewing their index and rank performance. But you need to give them time to perform and only make changes if things haven’t improved after a while.
Final Thoughts
Now you should be a little savvier when it comes to choosing the correct keywords for Amazon SEO. If keeping all of this in mind sounds like a hassle, or you still aren’t sure where to start, you should consider hiring a team of experts. And what do you know, we have such a team! At Vserve, we offer content optimization services for Amazon SEO. From full-service marketing support to optimized product descriptions and keywords, our team will take care of everything for you. Reach out to us to get a free consultation.
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