Success on Amazon starts with optimizing your product listing organically. Including targeted keywords in your product detail page content will help customers find your product and improve its performance. So, how do you find keywords to choose from? How do you know which keywords will get results? Where should you use them in your content?
We will answer all of these questions and provide some insight from our years of experience optimizing Amazon listings.
Build your Keyword List with Amazon Tools
There are plenty of tools available that can spit out a huge list of keywords to choose from. Amazon’s own keyword research tool, Brand Analytics, provides highly relevant search results and is almost always the best place to start. Note that Amazon Brand Analytics is only available to Brand Registered Sellers. Skip to the next section for alternate methods.
Of all the methods of finding keywords, we have found that reverse engineering competitor keywords is perhaps the most efficient. Sales velocity and relevancy are both critical components of Amazon’s search algorithm, so start your keyword research with top performing competitors to ensure you know what customers are looking for.
Brand Analytics is a great tool for this. Start with a basic keyword search that is relevant to your product, and Brand Analytics will tell you the top clicked ASINs for that search. You can copy and paste those ASINs right back into the search bar and see which keywords they are ranking for.
Brand Analytics shows Amazon site wide search rank for a keyword rather than its search volume. This means that lower numbers are better. There are millions of searches on Amazon every day, so any keyword rank close to or under 100,000 is very good, and under 10,000 are some of the best keywords.
We generally like to have 50-75 keywords for each product before we start optimizing the content, and prefer to compare search volume and rank from several sources. If your Brand Analytics query provides you with a sufficient number of keywords right off the bat, then download the list and paste them into other tools such as Helium10 or Jungle Scout for comparison.
Brand Analytics will occasionally return minimal keywords. In these cases we will use alternate methods such as those covered below.
Build a Keyword List with 3rd Party Tools
Helium10 and Jungle Scout offer some of the best Amazon research tools. Both of these platforms allow you to research keywords by starting with a basic keyword search. The tools then present many alternate suggestions similar to your search. While this works well, we find that reverse engineering competitor keywords often provides more relevant terms that you can be sure will convert.
Similar to the process outlined for Brand Analytics, start by finding the top selling ASINs that are most similar to your product. If you are unsure how to find this information, Amazon provides a ranking of the top selling products in every category. Just click on a product similar to yours and scroll down the page until you see the best seller ranking. Click on that and you will be directed to a page with the top 50 ASINs in the category.
The Jungle Scout Keyword Scout tool and Helium10 Cerebro allow you to search for keywords based on competitor ASINs. Collect the products you want to analyze and paste the ASINs into the search bars. Both Helium10 and Jungle Scout will return thousands of potential keywords from your search. Helium10 and Jungle Scout also allow you to save keywords and add your keywords to a list. Again, you only need to choose the top 50-75 highest performing and most relevant terms. This raises the question, how do you know which are best?
Try to look for keywords that have good search volume, high relevancy, and lower competition. Long tail keywords will have slightly lower search volumes, but they are preferable because they will be easier to rank for due to lower competition. Long tail keywords will usually be more relevant to customer searches, and have lower PPC bids. Ensuring that your product is relevant to the customer will often result in higher conversion rates.
Take your time to familiarize yourself with the best selling products in your chosen category and understand which features are preferred by customers and what questions they are asking. Try to spot common themes and use that knowledge to help organize and select keywords for your products.
How to Optimize Your Content
Once you have your list of keywords you will need to place them within your content. In order of strategic importance, place valuable keywords in the Title, Bullet Points, Description, and backend keywords.
Title
The title is the most important piece for all listings, and is of even greater importance for a new listing. Your title tells both customers and Amazon’s search algorithm what your product is. Your highest value keywords should go in the title.
Amazon allows up to 200 characters in your title. We have found that keeping it under 150 characters usually provides the best customer experience, but can change based on category. Consider A/B testing your titles in order to find what works best for your product.
optimize your title with your highest search volume keywords and keep readability in mind
Make sure to keep the title readable and refrain from stuffing your title so full of keywords that you forget to explain the product. High search volume short tail keywords are usually better for the title because they help increase discoverability and generally don’t subtract from readability.
Bullet Points
If you can’t fit many of your high performing keywords into your title, don’t worry. The bullet points are a great place to include unused high volume keywords.
optimize your bullet points with a few keywords each, and use them to highlight the most important unique selling points
Foremost, your bullets should explain the product and highlight important features. Choose the most important product details and assign each a few keywords that fit naturally. You should be able to include 2-3 keywords in each bullet point. Make sure to prioritize clarity; some bullet points may only be able to fit a single keyword and still provide the best customer experience.
Description
Your description can fit the most keywords of any product detail page content and is vital for SEO. Try to include many of the lower search volume keywords in your description that could not fit in your title or bullets. Make sure to keep it readable and discuss product features in depth. The description is an important informational section for customers that want to learn more about your product before making a purchasing decision.
optimize your description by including 10-15 keywords and highlight the product benefits using highly detailed language
Backend Keywords
Amazon allows you to use 255 characters in the backend keywords section. Fill the field with words on your list that have not been used in your other content. Some prefer to double up on certain keywords, but we have found that repeating words does not add value to SEO. Use the limited space for new keywords rather than those which were previously included. Both Jungle Scout and Helium10 offer listing builder tools that help figure out which keywords have been used and which have not. The tools save a lot of time and allow you to copy all unused keywords after you fill the fields with your listing content.
Create Great Listings
Future sales success for a new product is often largely dependent on optimized content. This makes keyword research the vital foundation for all product listings. In addition, SEO focused reader friendly content improves not only your organic results on the Amazon search engine, but improves PPC performance and offers other as well. An optimized Brand Registered listing will draw additional traffic from day one and become eligible for benefits like A/B testing much faster, which helps to further increase conversion rates.
Do you have any questions about how to find high converting keywords or how to write SEO focused content? Reach out to our content team today and we will be happy to help launch new products or improve existing ones.
