Product Buyability and Discoverability on Amazon

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Amazon is unlike promoting inventory on Google, comparison shopping engines, or other product advertising channels – it demands a wide array of resources, plays by a different set of rules, and requires a holistic, sophisticated strategy to really be successful. As a third-party Amazon seller, you acknowledge that the Marketplace is essentially an extension of your e-commerce store, requiring its own inventory management, technology, fulfillment, and customer service strategies.

The Marketplace is nothing if not competitive, and so the main challenge in optimizing your Amazon sales performance will be getting your offers front and center when a shopper is looking to buy.

At the core of this challenge are the concepts of product Discoverability and product Buyability. Understanding these ideas and how you can influence them will be an essential step in determining your resource allocation and overall seller strategy.

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DISCOVERABILITY

The ability for a product listing to be found on Amazon. From a consumer’s point of view, Amazon is essentially seller agnostic, focusing search engine results on products rather than the sellers of those products. As a third-party seller of a given product, you have an incentive to increase the overall number of sessions to a product detail page provided that you’re in a good position to win the sale for that product. To relate it to more traditional product ad channels, think driving traffic. Key areas for discoverability include PPC advertising, keyword search terms, Amazon BSR, inventory management, etc.

BUYABILITY

The factors that influence the overall conversion rate of a product page. To relate it to more traditional product ad channels, think converting traffic. Some examples  of buyability factors include price, product descriptions, review scores, enhanced brand content, etc.

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By understanding the factors that influence these two sides of the coin – driving shoppers to product pages (Discoverability) and converting those shoppers once they reach the product detail pages (Buyability) – a third-party seller can start to sculpt their overall Amazon strategy and decide when and where it makes sense to focus their resources on Buyability over Discoverability (and vice versa).

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David Bell - 2017