TAS 155 : Amazon's NEW Listing Optimization UPDATES with Karon Thackston

Every person who lists a private label product on Amazon is playing in Amazon’s playground. That means Amazon makes the rules, and man, do they set the rules! There are all kinds of guidelines and rules that govern how you list your products and a host of other things. You want to make sure you’re doing things right. Amazon is not shy about banning people from their sales platform for breaking the rules. Recently, some changes are happening within those rules, and they’re things you need to know about if you’re going to stay within the guidelines. Today’s episode features Karon Thackston, an Amazon listings copywriter whose business creates done-for-you Amazon listings for sellers. She’s got the low down on all the changes, so make sure you listen.

Rolling it out changes a little bit at a time.

Karon Thackston and her team deal with Amazon listings all day, every day. It’s their job to write incredible product descriptions and copy for Amazon sellers. As part of her role she interacts with seller support technicians often. Lately, she’s struck up a relationship with a support guy named Peter who’s been helping her address some of the inconsistencies within Amazon’s rules and system. Many of the changes we’re beginning to see are a result of these interactions. On this episode you’re going to hear how Amazon is rolling out small changes in certain product categories and how they might wind up being added to other categories as well.

Why do some product listings have images in their descriptions but I can’t put them in mine?

Listing your products on Amazon means that you have to play by Amazon’s rules. One of those rules has to do with the way product listings are formatted. Up until this point, basic Amazon sellers are not allowed to put images within their listings. But you still see images in some listings. That’s because Amazon extends special privileges to big name brands and what they call A+ sellers, as well as their own Amazon branded listings. It’s somewhat of an unfair advantage those companies have, but again, it’s Amazon’s rules that govern the listings.

Character restrictions for bullet points in your product listing have changed!

Previously, bullet points could only be so long, but Amazon has increased those (in certain categories) to 200 characters. Now your bullet points can be longer. But don’t get too excited. Today’s guest, Karon Thackston recommends that you not overstuff your bullet points with unneeded words and descriptions. She believes it will actually detract from your listing and cause shoppers to click away. Find out why she thinks so on this great interview episode of the Amazing Seller.

Entering your keywords on the Amazon backend is not as simple as it may look.

There can be lots of confusion about what format your keywords should be in when you enter them in your product description. Should they be comma separated? What about spacing? Should I include multi-word keywords? These and other issues are very important because the Amazon software handles each of them differently. Karon Thackston is on the show today to clearly define these keyword issues to help you get your products seen and purchased. You’ll want to hear this one, for sure.

OUTLINE OF THIS INTERVIEW EPISODE OF THE AMAZING SELLER

• [0:05] Scott’s introduction of his guest, Karon Thackston.
• [1:49] Overview of what we’ll be talking about today.
• [2:00] Your invite to Scott’s live Q&A workshop online.
• [3:55] The new changes to the Amazon listings guidelines.
• [8:00] Changes to formatting that are likely to roll out across all categories.
• [11:00] Why some listings have images in the product descriptions and why you SHOULDN’T do it.
• [12:35] The top conversion tips for Amazon product listings.
• [16:16] Character limit changes for titles and bullets (in some categories).
• [18:55] Additional dos and don’ts for the title.
• [23:21] What if your competitor is breaking rules? Should they be reported?
• [25:51] Updated opportunities to mention compatibility issues.
• [28:22] Taking care to use the sections for their intended purposes
• [29:41] Rules regarding bullet formatting.
• [32:41] Rules regarding descriptions.
• [34:42] How to work around description formatting issues.
• [36:57] Changes to search term field guidelines.
• [40:00] Using PPC data to discover search terms.
• [43:47] Are descriptions used for indexing in Amazon’s system?
• [49:00] Unknown things about search terms you need to know.
• [55:00] Karen’s done-for-you services for Amazon listings.

LINKS MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE

www.TheAmazingSeller.com/86 - Karon’s first episode

Amazon Advantage: Product Listing Strategies – Karon’s book (Use the code “scott20” to get 20% off) – NOTE: this is case sensitive

www.MarketingWords.com – Karon’s company website focused on Amazon copywriting

Scott’s free workshop  - http://www.TheAmazingSeller.com/workshop

www.TheAmazingSeller.com/FB - the TAS Facebook Community