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Rewrite your Listings

It may sound obvious, but it’s all too easy to lose a sale to sloppy copy. Take the time to proofread your text so that it’s free of grammatical and spelling errors, while ensuring the message is informative yet concise.

There are other things often overlooked which you can do to improve your listings: by cutting down on additional text like seller policies, requirements for returns, you can simplify your listing to make it much easier to read. Don’t let the desire to place well in search results dictate your description length: if it turns your customers off it could potentially result in a lost sale; the traffic’s not worth it.

Bonus Tip: use a single colour font, preferably black. Ensure you left-align text (best for mobile shoppers). Also: use a font big enough to read on a mobile device.

Get Reviews

Humans are social animals. If the majority like something, there is a strong tendency for others to flock to it. Statistics bear this out: according to a survey by BrightLocal, 92% of website visitors now read reviews online before making a purchase. What other people think of a product massively affects the likelihood of a purchase. Frustratingly, however, roughly the same amount of people (90%) fail to leave feedback on Amazon – a clear disparity what people expect and what they do themselves.

To remedy this, there are a number of methods you can employ: using programs like Feedback Five can help increase the volume of feedback submitted by sending out feedback requests. Alternatively, including a message on your packing slip (bright visible colours like red seem to work best) which state: “Please remember to leave Seller Feedback & a Product Review” has been known to work according to sellers over at Seller Central.

Bonus Tip: an Amazon buyer can adjust/remove their feedback up to 60 days after they post it. If you do receive any negative or neutral reviews, reaching out to the buyer can result in these reviews being removed.

Give it away for free

Although it may sound counter intuitive, giving away products can dramatically increase your sales. As mentioned before, buyers love to buy products which have been reviewed positively by other people. In the early days, where you are still trying to improve your ratings, giving away products for free is a quick and easy shortcut to building your seller rating: offer customers a one off 99%, discount code (Amazon doesn’t allow discounts of 100%), in exchange for a review.

But there’s extra incentive hereif you have a ‘stale’ inventory that’s proving hard to shift, one way to get rid of it is to give it away using the same method. Even if this doesn’t lead to positive feedback, it will almost certainly generate goodwill; meaning they will be more likely to revisit your store. Linking your Amazon Seller Central account with your other sales channels allows you to identify items appropriate to ‘gift’ to your customers and also helps you manage your inventory.

Bonus Tip: attaching a coupon to the bottom of your packing slip is another effective way of establishing customer retention. Flash deals, one time promotions and free shipping are all effective ways of getting people to reorder.

Don’t Just Sell Products, Offer “Intangibles”

It’s an often heard phrase in marketing, but what are “intangibles”? Put simply, they are all the indirect, taken-for-granted things you expect when purchasing from a business, in addition to the main product or service. Intangibles can include: trust, security, convenience and speed of communication. In order to become a reputable seller, as opposed to a seller who sells lots of products, you should then focus on these positives as well as the items you’re selling.

You can actually define your intangibles by stating in your profile things like 1. Shipping times, 2. Response time for returned products and 3. Ensure you are always operating with your stated stock levels.

How to Sell Intangibles

Peace of Mind

As on the eBay platform, buyers want to be assured that the product they’re purchasing will be as stated, and that it will arrive on time. On the first point, assuming you have a good supplier, make sure that your stock flow is consistent to ensure there are no gaps in your fulfilment. Failing to fulfil an order, or having to send it late, will both negatively impact your buyer’s perception.

Secondly, to create a sense of reassurance from the outset, you will want to make it clear on your seller channel how long it takes for you to ship your items, plus any guarantees you can make. The more you can pledge as a business – so long of course as it’s something you can deliver – the better.

Trust

The best way to establish trust is via reviews. We’ve already covered a number of ways to earn positive reviews, but there are a number of things you can focus on in the worst case scenario, that is, if you get negative feedback. In this instance, you should examine if it’s against Amazon’s guidelines. Amazon will remove feedback where it contains “obscene language” or any “personally identifiable information”.

To fix the issue: So long as you are accommodating and reasonable in approaching the issue, Amazon should be willing to remove or adjust the feedback on your behalf. Just remember that you have a maximum of 60 days to do so.

Credibility

Following on from trust, establishing credibility means being as comprehensive as possible in your listings. Firstly, if you have images you have created yourself, in high resolution, from a multiple of angles, with the option to zoom in, this will obviously make you appear much more credible than someone re-uploading low res thumbnails from other people’s listings.

On a similar point, although it’s important to keep your listings snappy and concise, if you are selling high-cost items it’s essential to append tech specs at the footer of your description. If, for instance, you are selling items like TVs or ovens (i.e. products with a large number of components/features) you will want to create a list bullet-pointing all the tech specs. You can usually take this information directly from the product manual.

Protect Yourself: Avoid Scams

One thing often overlooked by Amazon sellers new to the platform is how easy it is become a victim of fraud. Though not widespread, it is unfortunately not that uncommon either: it should therefore be factored into your business plan as something to look out for. Here are the top 3 types of fraud Amazon sellers should look out for:

Friendly Fraud

Also known as Chargeback Fraud, this is where a customer makes a purchase and then claims their credit card has been stolen. The fraudster then asks for a chargeback – via their bank – despite having in actuality received the goods or services. Although there is little you can do it prevent this, it is worth bearing in mind as something that can happen – it’s much less likely to throw you off course that way, if or when it does occur.

Refund Fraud

A less common but still typical form of fraud, Refund Fraud is where a fraudster uses a stolen credit card to make an overpayment. Having done this, the fraudster contacts the merchant to inform them of an accidental overpayment and request a reimbursement. Typically, after the merchant has refunded the excess amount, the fraudster will claim their credit card is closed and that they will send the money using an alternative method. This will then make the merchant, rather than the buyer, responsible to the card owner for the full amount.

The Forwarding Address Fraud

This particular scam works like this: when you opt to fulfil an order yourself (via merchant fulfilled), Amazon requires that you must ship to the address provided by Amazon. Yet this opens up a loophole the fraudulent buyer can exploit: the customer can purchase an item, wait until you’ve shipped it out and then contact you to request a change in address claiming that they have moved. The fraudster can then complain and/or file a charge back that the item was never received and as a result Amazon will issue a refund.

Bonus Tip: where possible, study the buyer’s profile before sending an item, and request a signature to confirm receipt of the delivery for transactions over £750.  This should give you suitable recourse if you do get stung with a fraudulent charge back.

Unsure whether to sell on eBay or Amazon? Weigh up the options of these two giant ecommerce marketplaces here.

 

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