Amazon Black Friday Selling Strategy For Sellers

Amazon Black Friday Selling Strategy For Sellers

As an Amazon seller or retailer, are you prepared for the upcoming shopping festival? Amazon, the world's largest e-commerce platform, triggers a sales storm every Black Friday. For sellers hoping to make a significant impact on this day, understanding Amazon advertising strategies and rules is crucial.

Over the years, Amazon has launched various promotions on Black Friday, drawing countless consumers looking for their desired products. Statistics show that many sellers even surpass their annual sales on this single day. This year, with the continuous growth of online shopping, Amazon's Black Friday sales are expected to reach new heights.

So, as an Amazon seller, how should you adequately prepare for this day? Don't worry; we've got you covered. We have prepared a series of professional tips and strategies about Amazon's Black Friday to help you achieve outstanding performance during this shopping season.

How to Prepare for Black Friday and Cyber Monday 2023?

What steps should you take to ensure you're ahead of the game for the 2023 holiday season? The following guide will help you gear up for Black Friday and Cyber Monday.

Eligibility for Black Friday and Cyber Monday

  1. Exclusive to professional sellers with a rating of no less than 3.5 stars.
  2. Products with a rating of at least 3.5 stars or no rating at all.
  3. Products with multiple variations.
  4. Items that are eligible for Prime shipping across all regions.
  5. Restricted or offensive items are not allowed.
  6. Only products in brand-new condition are eligible.
  7. Items must adhere to Amazon's policies on product reviews, pricing, and deals.

Prepare for Amazon Black Friday by Enhancing Your Listings

Optimizing Your Amazon Product Listing

Your Amazon product detail page (also known as your Amazon product listing) is the space where customers explore and decide to purchase your product. It's crucial to have comprehensive information about your product on this page, including the title, bullet points, description, images, and more.

READ MORE | How to do a Product Launch (including Product Listing) on Amazon

Key Elements of an Amazon Product Detail Page:

  1. Product Title: This is the primary product identification information that customers see in the search results.
  2. Images: You can display up to 7 product images, including the main image.
  3. Product Videos: Videos provide a more in-depth introduction to your product.
  4. Bullet Points: You can use up to five bullet points to describe the features and benefits of the product.
  5. Product Description/A+ Content: This space allows for a more detailed description of your product. If you're brand registered, you can enhance this section with images and custom templates.
  6. Reviews: Product reviews and ratings are crucial as customers heavily rely on them when making a purchase decision.

Pro Tips:

  • High-quality images and infographics can help customers understand the advantages of your product while conveying the product information clearly.
  • Adding product videos can set your listing apart and improve the customer experience. Amazon now allows non-brand registered sellers to create a 30-60 second video and add it to the listing.
  • The title, bullet points, and description should be attention-grabbing and contain relevant, frequently searched keywords.
  • The right pricing strategy is vital for maintaining profitability and competitiveness.
  • Make an effort to answer consumer questions on the product detail page.
  • Ensure your product is in stock to maintain organic keyword ranking and bestseller ranking.
  • Avoid keyword stuffing in the title, bullet points, or description. Ensure every component in the listing is readable.

Keep a Close Eye on the Competition

During Black Friday, it's crucial to closely monitor competition when running Amazon PPC ads.

Use keyword tracking tools like m19 Keyword Tracker to monitor rankings. m19's Keyword Tracker provides accurate data, helping you identify the best keywords, optimize product listings, boost sales, and control the frequency and intensity of your presence in search results. Additionally, it allows you to view accurate data on organic and sponsored sales, control advertising costs, and discover competitors' keyword strategies. By combining these tools and strategies, consider increasing your budget and bids, continuously learning new strategies, adapting to market changes, or collaborating with Amazon advertising experts.

READ MORE | How to analyse your competitor's Amazon PPC strategies?

Optimize Your PPC Campaigns

To achieve optimal results from your PPC advertising campaigns, consider the following strategies:

Adjust Marketing Budget and Keyword Bids 2 Weeks in Advance

As Black Friday approaches, click-through rates, conversion rates, and conversion counts all gradually increase. Amazon sellers begin market research two weeks in advance to ensure they don't miss out on this annual sales opportunity. At the same time, consumers evaluate various products and brands during this period, collecting potential discount information in preparation for shopping. During this time, you should utilize Amazon's advertising product suite to attract consumers who are browsing or searching on Amazon, enticing them to explore, discover your brand and products, and make purchases.

Three Phases of Black Friday Ad Campaigns

The three phases—Preparation Phase, Peak Week, and Post-Peak Phase—of advertising campaigns during Black Friday have distinct differences in objectives, focused metrics, and methods.

Preparation Phase (2-4 weeks before the peak week):

  • Objective: Warm up the market, attract consumers' attention in advance, and lay the groundwork for the upcoming sales event.
  • Metrics: Increase impressions, new brand customers, and brand search volume to inform consumers about the upcoming promotions and deals.
  • Ad campaign: Utilize automatic targeting, category keyword targeting, and similar product targeting. Focus on generic category keywords rather than specific brands or products, such as "sports shoes" or "smartphones". This helps attract consumers who are undecided about which brand or model to buy. Also, leverage brand promotion videos and dedicated pages to showcase brand stories and product features to attract attention early on.
  • Bidding: Review past data, especially from the previous year's Black Friday. This will help identify which keywords and ads performed best and which need adjustments.

Peak Week:

  • Objective: Maximize sales by capitalizing on consumers' shopping enthusiasm and increase conversion rates.
  • Metrics: High-frequency, high-intensity ad placements to ensure higher rankings in search results, with a moderate increase in ACOS/ROAS.
  • Ad campaign: Beyond automatic targeting, focus more on brand and long-tail keyword targeting. To ensure higher rankings in search results, consider targeting ASINs similar to your products. Retarget consumers who have viewed your products but haven't purchased, reminding them to complete their purchase.
  • Bidding: With intensified competition, you'll need to increase keyword bids to ensure your ads rank higher in search results. A recommended 10%-30% increase of your bidding budget is a general guideline based on experience, but the exact percentage might need adjustments based on your market and competition.

Post-Peak Phase (2-4 weeks after the peak week):

  • Objective: Re-engage consumers, enhance customer loyalty, and ensure sustained sales growth.
  • Metrics: Strengthen brand image, improve click-through and conversion rates.
  • Ad campaign: Primarily target your brand keywords for both keyword and product placements. This is mainly to reinforce brand image and re-attract consumers. Retarget products that had ads during the peak week to re-engage consumers who might have missed out during the sales event.
  • Bidding: After the peak week, you might want to revert your bids to previous levels. Based on the performance of keywords during Black Friday, decide whether to pause or maintain the bids for these keywords.
  • Strategies for Black Friday can certainly take cues from those of Amazon Prime Day. Many similar strategies and techniques can be applied: Amazon Prime Day 2023: How To Adjust Your PPC Advertising and Avoid Mistakes?
ppc strategies for black friday 2023
Three Phases of Black Friday Ad Campaigns

Organize your Inventory

According to Amazon's survey, 53.2% of customers are concerned that the products they want will be out of stock, so they might switch to other brands and products. This means that if sellers don't have sufficient inventory, they might lose this segment of customers.

Therefore, FBA selles need to ensure that your inventory arrives at Amazon before the critical shopping dates, so you can guarantee ample stock during high sales seasons like Black Friday and Cyber Monday. To maintain sufficient inventory, establishing a good working relationship with suppliers and placing orders in advance is key. Given potential production and shipping delays, it's crucial to prepare ahead of time. As an Amazon seller, understanding the capacity limits of various FBA storage types, such as standard size storage, oversized storage, and apparel storage, will help you plan inventory replenishments better.

Free Shipping Service

Offering free shipping during Amazon Black Friday can be a strategic move for Amazon sellers. Many sellers offer promotions during Black Friday, and free shipping can give you an edge over competitors who don't offer the same perk. But whether it's "better" depends on several factors.

Minimum Purchase Requirement: Instead of offering free shipping on all items, consider offering it on orders over a certain amount. This can increase the average order value.

Factor Shipping into Product Price: Slightly increase the product price to cover the shipping cost, so you're effectively offering "free" shipping without hurting your profit margin.

Limited Time Offer: Offer free shipping as a limited-time promotion, creating urgency for customers to buy.

Free Shipping on Select Items: Instead of offering free shipping storewide, provide it on specific items where the profit margin allows for it.

Become a Part of the m19 Community

Are you looking to amplify your Amazon footprint and boost your sales? m19 provides complimentary Keyword trackers, ACoS management and PPC services to elevate your product listing, visibility, and revenue. Additionally, our PPC customer team will guide you to mastery as an Amazon seller.

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Xuan Xie
April 15, 2024
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