Masterclass by Emma (Ep #16)
Today, Emma – a professional copywriter and a sought-after speaker, is going to school us on how to write a winning Amazon listing – listing optimization. Her goal is – no matter what you’re writing, you should be able to communicate effectively and achieve your goal.
Emma and her husband are the co-founders of Marketing by Emma, which was launched in 2016. They specialize in eCommerce copywriting, including Amazon listing optimization, website copy, etc.
In this video, she talks about:
- How to write the best title
- Bullet points mistakes to avoid
- How to do proper target audience research
- How to optimize your photos
- Product description best practices
- Free optimization worksheet
Now, let’s dive right in!
Writing the Best Title
If you want to be found by your customers, you need to have a really strong keyword strategy. This will allow you to get noticed by the right audience. In Amazon, the keyword strategy is the A9 Algorithm, and it’s something you should familiarize yourself with.
This above example, for instance, is something you wouldn’t want to do. The keywords they want to rank and index for, are all there, but this is only detrimental to their customers’ experiences.
If you look at the red-underlined portion of the title, it’s not until the 9th word that we began to understand what this product is. Therefore, when it comes to your title, while there is a lot of valuable real estate there from an SEO perspective; you have to make sure you’re balancing that with a clear idea of your product. This allows your customer to look at it and know that this is exactly what they’re searching for.
How to fix your Title SEO?
- Do your homework
- “Is it too good to be true?” – volume, competitor, misspelling, etc
- Identify customer-friendly keywords
- Keep it natural
- Don’t overcrowd
In the example above (SULKADA), they haven’t emphasized that the product is a “9 in 1 survival tool,” which should be given more attention.
The problem with those generic words is that, while they are useful, they’re not going to be creating consistent traffic. You could lose the opportunity to get eager customers who are searching for a specific niche.
Don’t only look at volume. Going for the most-searched words will place you in direct competition with bigger players, which will not help you in any way. You should use more specific keywords, which will result in less competition and more guaranteed sales.
It’s important to keep it neutral. Don’t think about the ideal number of keywords, but rather the most important keyword you need to incorporate. Then, use them in a way that doesn’t take away from your product.
The improved SEO Title:
All the underlined words are keywords. It still includes a lot of the previous keywords, but it’s reading in a much more natural way. You not only get a clear understanding of the product but also valuable insights beyond emphasizing how it’s good “gift”.
Even with taking the approach of a ‘gift idea’, nothing about the previous description stated why it is the “perfect” gift idea.
Another thing to keep in mind is backend keywords. You can learn more about that here: How to Optimize the Backend Keywords
Using Images right
Another very important part of your Amazon real estate, which often gets overlooked, is your images.
“There are always two people in every picture: the photographer and the viewer.” – Ansel Adams
In the case of Amazon, the photographer is you (as a brand) and the viewer is your customer. You want to make sure that every single customer that goes to your page is getting the exact message that you want to present.
You want to have an image that presents and connects to your product, not get swept away by several unrelated thoughts that keep them from buying your product.
Use words to supercharge your photos
This doesn’t mean throwing in a lot of text. Many Amazon Sellers tend to use a lot of crowded images that have several text circles in one photo. Don’t do that.
Imagine a magazine ad, with a beautiful picture and an impactful, short piece of text. That’s what you should aim for, for a few different reasons:
- Don’t make people zoom – most people won’t take that effort
- Minimum words for maximum impact
- Evoke emotions
- Emphasize benefits
- Clarify points of confusion
- Control the message
It’s great when you can combine imagery and text to help clarify some points of confusion that are not easily described with just text or images. By combining them, you can quickly demonstrate the thing which left people scratching their heads.
Another great way you can use text is to sell your ‘brand’ and not just your product. Effectively placing texts in pictures can help intrigue your customers to make follow-up purchases to complementary products. For example, added attachments to a Stand Mixer which turns it into a pasta roller.
Put your Customers First
The best way to communicate this is through both, a good example and a bad example. On the left, we have Elf, which is a known dupe of Tatcha. One the right we have Tatcha which is a luxury Japanese skincare company.
Elf retails at $7.99, whereas Tatcha retails at $52. Since the products launched, multiple reviews state that Elf’s Putty Primer is identical to Tatcha’s Silk Canvas. To fight those statements it’s Tatcha’s responsibility to convince customers why it’s worth the extra coin.
This is something Tatcha doesn’t do well in, according to Emma. As you can see in the slide above, Elf does a better job highlighting their product. They have categorized their bullet points by capitalizing on each title. This makes it easier for customers to identify exactly what they need from the product. Whereas with Tatcha, it would take effort for the customer to locate any specific point.
Let’s say a customer wants to stay away from a certain substance. With Elf, they can easily find ‘FREE FROM’ and look in that section. However, with Tatcha, they’d have to look for the specific bullet point (5th) to find what they’re looking for. Many customers wouldn’t want to put in that effort.
What to put in your bullet points
Using techniques like capitalization does help focus things, however, this doesn’t mean you can just write whatever you want to write in your bullets. Before you sit down to write your bullets you want to think about: What if those 5 important points that I must communicate? And then focus each of your bullets according to those points.
Don’t cram your bullet points. If something other than those 5 points is important to share, add it to your description. Keep each bullet to the point and focused. You want to convey exactly why your product would benefit the consumer. Make your product shine in the simplest way possible.
One thing to note: Tatcha is a very popular beauty brand in Sephora and the beauty community. It’s a successful company that isn’t adding too much effort into Amazon’s strategy. This means that if you’re in this type of business, you have a real opportunity to compete with big brands with the help of Amazon strategies.
“Don’t tell them what is it, but rather why they need it” – Chet Holmes
Thinking in terms of ‘benefits’, not instead of ‘features’ but ‘benefits and features’ together. So what are the specific features of your product that have some positive feedback on your customers’ life?
In the example above, you can see that they’re mostly highlighting the features of the product. They’re talking about ‘grass-fed’ ingredients, but not about its benefits. There could be different benefits they could potentially emphasize. Like ‘grass-fed’ ingredients from an ethical perspective (that certain customers may be very interested in) or the health benefits of grass-fed dairy products over conventionally fed dairy products.
However, they aren’t doing any of that. Instead, they’re assuming that you as a customer would see ‘grass-fed’ and be automatically drawn to it. It’s important to highlight the benefits of each feature in a way that would automatically hook the customer into buying your products.
Lead with Benefits
- Find the benefit – “why does this matter?”
- Keep asking “why?”
- Use your features to support your claims
With the creamer example, the benefit would be grass-fed ingredients:
- Why does it matter that they are grass-fed? – Because it’s healthier
- Why does it matter that it’s healthier? Does it have more nutrients?
Keep asking “why” until you understand the emotional drive which would make someone buy the product. That doesn’t mean you ignore your features, you use them to support your claims, adding to its credibility.
Mind your Ps and Qs
The majority of people have this perception that nobody reads, but that’s not the case. It’s important to keep in mind your grammar and format to draw the customer in.
Recently Emma had a case, where the client was ready to quit Amazon. They had about a 4% conversion rate and they didn’t know what to do. So Emma rewrote their listing. They did not touch their photos or upgrade them to A+ content. Emma just rewrote their titles, bullets, and description. That alone led their conversion rate up to 29%.
Take the example above, the words underlined are all grammatical errors. Nobody is going to look at the listing trying to find grammatical errors or weird language, they may not even be actively aware of what they are noticing. But it may be just enough to trigger them into thinking that “something feels a bit off here.”
Even though you don’t know what’s wrong, or what the grammatical error is, it gives them that pause and opening to question the validity of what you’re saying, the quality of your product, and the credibility of your brand.
Double, Triple, Quadruple Check
When it comes to grammar, read it out loud. Our brains naturally correct a lot of mistakes when we’re reading it in our heads. Whereas, if you read it out loud it forces you to slow down and makes it easier to find those mistakes.
You also want to make sure that what you write makes sense. Because when you spend time researching a product, you’re going to learn the ins and outs in a way that your customers wouldn’t. You may tend to use and describe your product in a way that your customers won’t be able to understand.
Avoid using jargon which will confuse and discourage your customers. Understand your customers and use terms they would understand and relate too.
Tone of Marketing
If you look at the last bullet in the slide above, it says, “by purchasing our dog paw washing cup you help us save the stray dogs.” This is very poorly written. But it’s also using a tactic that Emma strongly discourages unless you truly have a philanthropic organization that you’re donating to.
It is very tempting to make these ‘charitable’ claims, but people can see right through that. So if you’re not clear and if the claim does not fit into your product line and brand story, it just comes across as a cheap and poorly done sales tactic. People don’t like being sold that way.
One of the biggest mistakes Emma sees is when brands try to do their marketing writing in a way where they come across as ‘infomercial sounding.’ That refers to over the top claims, that feel exaggerated and don’t progress in a platform like Amazon.
Additionally, you don’t want to be making promises that you can’t back up. So if you say that your product is the absolute best at doing a specific task but is not, your account will get suspended by Amazon for having too many returns.
You want to make sure that you’re accurately describing what your product is, not trying to make it sound better than it is, and having an honest representation of your brand. You can still make it attractive, but not beyond what your product is capable of doing.
“It’s best to under-promise, over-deliver”
Ecommerce Copy Fundamentals
In summary, you want to keep the following points in mind when making an Amazon listing:
- Thoughtful and well-researched keyword strategy
- Clear, focused ideas for max ‘skimmability’ (information found immediately)
- Make every single word count
- Benefit-forward, support with details
- Build trust
- Impeccable grammar and spelling
- Customer-centric
- Elevate with imagery
Here is an example of what that listing should look like:
“The moment you recognize that not everyone could or should buy your product or service, you will sell to more of those who can and should buy.” – Zig Ziglar
Alright, guys, that’s all for now!
Connect with Emma:
Website – marketingbyemma.com
Email – [email protected]
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