Click here to download a pdf of the slides, Aug 11 2020 Amazon Webinar
The world is adjusting to the current COVID world, and Amazon remains a central figure in that adjustment. Vendors need to prepare for the upcoming events through Prime Day and Q4, and Navazon has the right tools and tactics for the job.
Ongoing COVID impacts on Amazon
Amazon remains a “stay-at-home” winner with E-commerce sales continuing strong despite COVID, economic, and employment worries as consumers buy from home to minimize human contact. Since physical stores are suffering, malls are also suffering, leading Amazon to consider that space for more fulfillment centers.
Because of Amazon’s success through these difficult times, Navazon’s clients have had sustained ordering, and new companies starting business with Amazon are looking into Navazon’s services.
Q4 and promotion planning
Prime Day is currently set to occur in the 2nd or 3rd week of October (possibly the 13th and 14th). There are rumors of cancelling due to overlapping events and increasing COVID risk for employees during increased activity. Consider coupons if deals can no longer be submitted in your category. Promo codes can also be used to drive traffic from social media platforms during any event. Do much of the same to ensure you are Black Friday and Cyber Monday.
If you want to grow your Amazon business, there are established levers to utilize for that success. These levers include ensuring available inventory, improving traffic with AMS and other marketing, improving conversion with improved content and best offers, and promotions that drive improved inventory, traffic, and conversion. Remember a simple formula for successful growth on Amazon: Revenue = Price x Traffic x Conversation.
As an integral part of that formula, promotions through Q4 can create a great boost to revenue. To use them effectively, ensure general holiday readiness with supporting drop-ship inventory, coupons prior to a promotional period to get a lift in forecasting, and increasing AMS spend before and during promotional period. These tactics will improve search rank before a main traffic period to ensure impressions through the events.
Amazon Updates
- Amazon’s Vendor Central interface has a new main page and features rolling out across accounts. The new focus of the main page highlights bulk buys and listings that are lost or suppressed. They have also added a financial scorecard to inform vendors of missing invoices, shortages, supply chain defects, and more.
- Chargeback updates for vendors include having until 5:00 p.m. PST on the day before a scheduled pickup time to reschedule the pickup. Drivers must also be loaded within 60 minutes of their scheduled arrival time. There are also changes to the requirements for SIOC dimensions that will go into effect on January 1, 2021.
- The Drop-ship or Direct Fulfillment program is also been affected by the COVID epidemic and vendors need to be aware of difficulties with it. Because of increased demand, there has been a rise in canceled drop-ship orders. Vendors have 7 days from the ship-by date to confirm the shipment of the order or the order will be cancelled with a $10 chargeback.
Retail Readiness, Content, and the Navazon Spotlight
- Amazon wants the products on the website to be retail ready to ensure positive customer experiences. Becoming retail ready is a very organized journey that involves inventory, winning the “Buy Box”, and all the content on the detail page of the product, including titles, bullets, descriptions, images, enhanced content, ratings, and reviews. If all these things come together effectively, the fundamental part of your Amazon business is in place, allowing you to run effective advertising.
- Monitoring your retail readiness is essential to ensure your products are constantly ready for your customers to buy. Navazon’s Spotlight helps you track your content across an entire catalog and identify opportunities at scale. In one month, Spotlight saved an estimated 182 hours of manual labor for vendors.
As we move into the busiest time of the year during a year with some of the greatest online retail growth in history, it is essential to make sure your catalog is streamlined to get your products into the hands of shoppers. Contact Navazon today for help optimizing your account and providing you with the solutions to your Amazon difficulties.