How to Research and Analyze Your Amazon Competitors

AMZ Seller Financing • September 10, 2018
To be successful on Amazon, you need to stay ahead of the game. Each day, new people register as Amazon sellers and the numbers show no signs of stopping. So, if you really want to grow your online store and sky-rocket your profit, it’s important that you keep track of your Amazon competitors.
Many people still shy away from this, thinking that catching up with your competitors simply means – spying on them. This is far from the truth. You are not trying to steal their secrets, but learn as much as you can from their business practice. After all, there is no success in any line of work unless you keep a watchful eye on the competition.
As we have said many times before, Amazon is a huge marketplace – and it’s getting really hard to succeed. Every aspiring online seller has to put a lot of effort into building a reputable store. And what can you do to learn from your Amazon competitors? There are a couple of things worth pointing out. Here they are.
How to Analyze Your Amazon Competitors
1. Quality of Product Listings
Simply put, your product listings can make or break you. Thus, they are a great place to start your research. Take a closer look at your Amazon competitors’ online stores and see how they worked out their product listings. You will find plenty of useful information there. Pay attention to their keyword placement, bullet points, product descriptions, and product titles. Then, compare this with your product listings. If you were your competitor’s online store, would customers purchase a product based on your current descriptions? In the end, you will be able to promote your listings in a better way and generate more income.
#ProTip: Just because a product description is long doesn’t mean that it’s any good. Make sure that you provide all the relevant information to your customers while maintaining brevity. Remember – customers came to make a purchase; the sooner you lead them to a purchase, the better.
2. Price Range
This is another very important aspect. Take a look at your competitor’s prices and see where you fit in. Are you charging too high, or too low? Now, here’s one thing to remember. Don’t worry if you’re charging a bit higher. This doesn’t immediately disqualify you. Also, if you’re a bit lower than others, it still isn’t a big problem. The real problems start when you’re way up or way down. On average, a customer will research at least three products before making a purchase decision. If your price is too high or too low, a customer will most likely choose your Amazon competitors.
#ProTip: You can put a much higher price, but only if you are selling high-quality products that you know will soar above the Amazon competitors. In that case, customers will immediately choose you because they are looking for quality above all else.
3. Sales Numbers
The Amazon selling game is all about finding the most profitable niche. It’s not enough to make a sale – you have to do it consistently and generate substantial income along the way. But in order to do so, you will need to make sure that you are in the right “line of work”. The demand for a specific product is what will help you sky-rocket your profit. And there is a good way of finding the most profitable i.e. most sought-after products. Online tools such as JungleScout are simply made for this. You can research keywords, sales figures, and sales trends – all that you need in order to set your business in full swing. Check out our post on the 7 essential tools you can use for Amazon selling.
#ProTip: When researching sales trends, be sure to avoid products that are showing signs of purchase decline. You should focus on the up-and-coming products and product lines, so that you position your online store well in the months to come.
4. Customer Reviews
If you are focusing on particular products (or a line of products), a good thing would be to research the customer reviews. There is a lot of valuable information to be found there. Pay close attention to what customers are complaining about. You can learn what to avoid, as what as what to improve in your online store. People are generally honest and they will “tell it like it is”. If they really like a product, they will write about it. Also, if they don’t like it – they won’t shy away from sharing it with the online community. Customer reviews are the safest way of making sure that a product “does the job”. If it doesn’t strike a chord with the customer base, something is definitely wrong with it.
#ProTip: Pay special attention to those things customers would like to see in a product. This is one of the best ways for improving your lines of products.