When selling on Amazon, the more prominent your products, the better. There are few more effective ways to do this than with an Amazon’s Choice badge. Getting an Amazon’s Choice label is a great way to establish credibility and appeal to shoppers, as well as drive sales and rack up reviews. This is how to get the Amazon’s Choice badge—and what you can do to keep it.
What is Amazon’s Choice Badge?
An Amazon’s Choice badge is a way to indicate products Amazon’s algorithms determine are the best purchase decision for a particular category. There are multiple forms of Amazon’s Choices, including overall and brand-specific picks, and landing one of these labels is an amazing opportunity to elevate your brand. Customers often put faith in Amazon’s assessments of product quality; therefore, shoppers are more likely to trust these products and commit to making purchases.
This feature was originally related to the introduction of Amazon Echo to aid in purchases made by voice. Shopping by speaking to a device without the ability to evaluate products visually can be challenging, so this became a quick and easy way for buyers to narrow options from the start. However, due to its popularity, this has become just another tool Amazon uses to help best satisfy customers.
While other labels, like Best Seller, are determined using sales metrics, Amazon’s Choice badges are applied to products that are perceived as the best match for a particular keyword. Products can earn an Amazon’s Choice badge for just one keyword or an array of related keywords.
How to Get an Amazon Choice Badge
Want to get an Amazon’s Choice badge on your products? You’re not alone. As such, the process of getting this coveted label can be competitive. These are the best ways to get your products noticed by Amazon’s keyword match algorithms.
Optimize Your Product Listings
Amazon isn’t going to prioritize products that don’t have quality product pages with clear images and an expert approach to keywords. Optimizing listings is a good way to increase product sales in general, but it’s a critical part of scoring an Amazon’s Choice label. Ensure these steps are a part of your plan when building out product detail pages.
- Create compelling product titles and product descriptions, including descriptive language, keyword placement, key features, and product highlights.
- Use product videos and high-quality photos; follow all of Amazon’s best practices for images, including showing multiple product angles and products in use.
- Research keywords thoroughly and ensure they’re worked in a natural way throughout the page.
- Utilize bullet points to make important information easier to read.
- Use A+ Content when possible to create a more robust user experience.
Get More Reviews
Amazon’s Choice products need to demonstrate a stellar track record, and that means customer feedback. Without a substantial and consistent base of reviews, there’s no way for Amazon to vouch for your products.
Increasing your product reviews can feel like a serious struggle, and for new brands, this can be somewhat true. However, it’s not impossible. To increase your product reviews:
- Sell high-quality products that customers will be compelled to review.
- Add information, like barcodes or QR codes, on product inserts that are packed into shipping boxes that lead to review forms.
- Reply to negative reviews promptly, demonstrating to your shoppers that you take criticism seriously.
- Utilize Amazon’s “Request a Review” tool, which allows sellers to send periodic notices encouraging customers to leave feedback.
Optimize Advertising Campaigns
As noted, the assignment of Amazon’s Choice badges relates directly to keywords. If your product is determined to be a top fit for a keyword, that keyword will likely play prominently in your approach to PPC campaigns.
Regardless of whether you take an automated approach, a manual approach, or rely on a third-party AI-driven platform to help you optimize your PPC campaigns, ensure your keyword strategy is robust and you’re consistently monitoring the terms you’re using, your budgets, and your bidding. If you’re seeing fewer clicks and conversions with keywords that were at one point successful, it may be time to dig into the changing state of the market to identify whether you’re missing out on new opportunities.
Use Dynamic Pricing
Pricing has long been one of the factors Amazon considers when assigning things like Buy Box wins, so it’s not surprising pricing can play a role in Amazon’s Choice selections as well. Dynamic Pricing is a strategy in which pricing moves with the market, shifting based on everything from seasonality to inventory levels to competitor performance. Pricing that’s too low may not make the best impression in terms of quality, while pricing that’s too high might drive business elsewhere due to the balance of value. In working to offer customers the most appealing deals for the sake of driving sales, sellers who ensure pricing consistently in strategic motion are more likely to be prioritized.
Maintain Inventory
If you don’t have inventory to sell, there’s nothing for Amazon to recommend. As such, maintaining consistent inventory levels can improve your odds of achieving this desirable label.
Enrolling in Amazon FBA can improve your positioning in this space. Since Amazon is handling fulfillment and not your brand, there’s a layer of efficiency that many self-fulfilled sellers can’t accomplish. With FBA, Amazon has direct access to your inventory levels and sales patterns, and that can go a long way.
If you choose not to utilize FBA, being Prime-eligible will be to your benefit. Amazon doesn’t want to recommend products customers paying for Prime won’t be able to receive quickly, so no matter how you approach packing and shipping, be sure you’re delivering a competitive experience to customers.
Why Did You Lose Your Amazon’s Choice Badge?
An Amazon’s Choice badge isn’t something you achieve and keep forever; like many aspects of Amazon’s algorithm, it’s always in flux. You may have the badge for months on end, only to lose it to a competitor overnight.
The best way to maintain an Amazon’s Choice badge is to stay committed to the activities that Amazon prioritizes. Continuously evaluate the content on your product detail pages, place ongoing focus on your PPC campaigns, and work to drive reviews. Providing the best customer experience possible will always be to your benefit, so doing what you can to beat the competition on all levels may bring the Amazon’s Choice badge back to your page.
Amazon’s Choice vs. Best Seller
Amazon’s Choice and Best Seller badges seem similar but aren’t the same thing and don’t use the same criteria. One is keyword-forward, while the other is driven by metrics.
While both badges can do a lot for sales, the key benefit to Amazon’s Choice is that you don’t have to out-sell your competition to get ahead. Bigger, more established brands tend to be bestsellers by default, which can make it hard for newer products or brands that aren’t household names to overcome existing top sellers. However, the Amazon’s Choice badge can still indicate a great purchase option for shoppers, even if it’s not the absolute most popular product or brand on the market.
How Long Does it Take to Get the Amazon’s Choice Badge?
Unfortunately, there’s no average time that applies to receiving an Amazon’s Choice badge. The situation can vary significantly from one product or product category to the next and will differ based on other sellers in the same space as well as a brand’s current footprint on Amazon. For example, an established seller fine-tuning a strategy and successfully racking up reviews is more likely to make quick work of landing an Amazon’s Choice badge, while a brand-new seller will likely need far more runway.
However, it’s important to keep in mind that this process isn’t a race. The objective of getting an Amazon’s Choice badge is to demonstrate your place as a top-performing seller with high-quality products, no matter what. Whether you do or don’t get a badge or get and keep a badge, establishing your brand is a worthy goal in itself.
Make the Most of Amazon’s Choice Badge
Anything sellers can do to stand out on Amazon is going to be a benefit, particularly in product categories that are more saturated. An Amazon’s Choice badge can make a considerable difference in accomplishing sales goals, particularly for sellers looking to overtake big-name competitors.
While it’s possible to do the legwork to grow your brand and manage every aspect of eCommerce selling alone, leveraging the right tools provides a significant benefit. With the innovative dashboard from Trellis, companies can make the most out of complex and AI-driven resources to streamline everything from keyword research to dynamic pricing. Learn more and book a demo with our team today!