Understanding Amazon’s
A9 Algorithm


Katherine Khoo // Khoo Systems Ltd
SLIDESHARE.NET/IPAGESCMS
@iPagesCMS @_KKhoo
@iPagesCMS
A bit about me…
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A bit about me…
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Amazon vs Google
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The importance of A9…
70%
35%
63%
don’t get past page 1
of clicks go to the top 3
click on the 1st
product
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“A ruthless
meritocracy…”
Pat Petriello - CPC Strategy
“where new products have the chance to appear on page one
if a coveted SERP as long as they are selling at a velocity and price
which warrants that position"
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What are we going to cover?
What is A9? Contributing
factors?
What tools?
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What is A9?
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What is A9?
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1.2 billion
If you’ve ever shopped at M&S…
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Contributing
factors?
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Direct Indirect
- Reviews
- Customer Convenience
- Page Interactions /
Abandoned Carts
- Order Processing
- Order Defect Rates
etc.
Direct and indirect factors
- Text
- Price
- Availability
- Sales Velocity
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Direct: Text Match Relevancy
How do your text fields match a customers query?
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Direct: Text Match Relevancy
• A concise and unique title, in
Amazon.com title style
• 5 bullet points = most important info
• Accurate description inc. major
features
• Clear product image of EXACTLY what
is being purchased
Your Product Page
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Direct: Text Match Relevancy
“Brand X Fashion Women Plain Square
Chiffon 50s neck Scarf Lovely Colours”
- Lime Green
“Brand Y Women's Scarf”
VS
Titles
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Direct: Text Match Relevancy
• General characters: 80-250
• Capitalise The First Letter Of Each Word
• Spell out measure words
• 1 should be 1
• And not &
• No Variants
Note: Mobile only first 80 characters
Titles
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Direct: Text Match Relevancy
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Direct: Text Match Relevancy
• Descriptive, second most important area
• Chosen based on aggregate seller data
Note: Mobile only first 3 bullets
Key Features
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Direct: Text Match Relevancy
No keyword stuffing,
sell your product to your customers
Product Description
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“for 41% of customers,
price is King”
- CPC Report
Direct: Price
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@_KKHOO
Direct: Price
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First page (55-65 products)
Average price of 1-20
Average price of page 1…
VS
A little experiment…
A little experiment…
Direct: Price
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Direct: Price
£9.18
£7.45
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-18%
-15%
-7%
-7%
Direct: Price
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“the top 3 listings
had 20% lower
prices”
Direct: Price
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How can you help your client
improve their product
availability?
Direct: Availability
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“Amazon care about
getting the customer
the product they
want… quickly.”
Direct: Availability
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Related to internal re-stocking:
- Order Processing Speed
- Perfect Order Percentage (POP)
- Order Defect Rate (ODR)
…
Direct: Availability
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FBA / Fulfilled by Amazon?
Direct: Availability
= set auto reminders for re-stocking
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Multi-channel Retailer?
Direct: Availability
= consider multi-channel sales software?
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Sales
Time
Sales Velocity = —————
Direct: Sales Velocity
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“a steady stream
of sales…”
Direct: Sales Velocity
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Direct: Sales Velocity
Not all sales are created equal…
Full Price
Organic
search
Normal
checkout
Full Price
PPC campaign
Specific
keyword
search
External
Traffic
Sales
Discounted
Products
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Direct Indirect
Direct and indirect factors
- Text
- Price
- Availability
- Sales Velocity
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- Reviews
- Customer Convenience
- Page Interactions /
Abandoned Carts
- Order Processing
- Order Defect Rates
etc.
Indirect: Reviews
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Indirect: Reviews
Rank No. of Review (Av) Average Review i.e. stars
1-3 1594 4.43
2-20 583 4.37
21-40 262 4.23
41-70 426 4.27
eCom Crew Research
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Indirect: Reviews
“your ticket to the
party”
“but doesn’t mean you go home
with the prince/princess”
eCom Crew Research
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Indirect: Customer Convenience
FBA (Fulfilled by Amazons) = Increased conversions (Buy Box)
Prime = Higher CTR from first page
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Indirect: Page Interactions & Cart Abandonments
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Cart Abandonments = signal popularity & missed sales
“Add to Basket”
On product page interactions = “helpful”
reviews, page scrolls etc.
A10…?
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A note on A10
Updated to A9 - dubbed “A10” - all about re-weighting
- Titles - less stuffing , more selling
- CTR is important - get great images
- Sales - organic sales > PPC
- PPC weighted lower
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What tools?
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Tools
1. Why do you want a tool?
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Tools
2. Go Basic :
sonar-tool.com
seotoolsforexcel.com
amzdatastudio.com
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Tools
3. Go Fancy :
www.sellics.com
www.amztracker.com
www.junglescout.com
4. Consider a real life tool/agency?!
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What we covered…
What is A9? Contributing
factors?
What tools?
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Thank you
katherine@ipages.biz
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BrightonSEO - Katherine Khoo - Understanding Amazon's A9 Algorithm - 10am (Amazon)