April 23, 2021

Traffic Insights: Google Organic Growth Hacks for Amazon Sellers

Many sellers already understand that higher online footfall brings in more sales to their listings. The majority turn to Amazon itself in search of ways to expand their product’s reach; they dissect the factors behind the internal product search engine, invest in paid options within the marketplace - you get the gist.

Unfortunately, with over six million third-party sellers on the platform, marketing on Amazon isn’t always cost-effective. Overreliance on internal promotional strategies often feels like playing catch with other sellers. However, there are tried and tested strategies that drive external traffic to Amazon listing. Let’s explore the various outside channels where you can bring new customers to your business!

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What Is External Traffic?

The term external traffic refers to product clicks, page loads and purchases you get from customers who find your product outside of Amazon. For example, let's say you sell shoulder bags. Someone Googles shoulder bags for sale and your listing pops up in their search. They click your product, read the page and make a purchase. Congratulations! You just managed to get a sale from outside Amazon. Google is the external channel that got you your customer. There are several channels that you can tap to get more visitors into your sales funnel. I’ve summarized the differences between internal and external traffic below.

Characteristics

Internal Traffic

External Traffic

Who are they?

Customers that find your product listing within Amazon

Customers that find your product listing outside of Amazon

How do they find your products?

Amazon search, sponsored ads, suggested products, etc

Anywhere on the internet - like Google search, social media ads, link shared by a friend, etc

How much control do you have over marketing?

Very little control - Amazon decides where, how, and to whom they show your product listings

Total control - You decide where, how, and exactly who sees your product listings

Competition from other products

Usually very high

Could be high or low depending on the channels you tap

Why should you drive traffic to Amazon listing?

External traffic on Amazon can help you scale your business and expand faster than just trying for internal traffic. Some of the benefits include:

Increased Sales

34% of product searches begin outside Amazon. It’s huge market worth tapping. Getting more clicks and visitors automatically leads to more product purchases. You can clear out old stock and free locked up cash to purchase more inventory or expand your product base.

Improve Organic Search Results

On Amazon, more sales means higher rankings. Every sale you divert to Amazon fuels your SEO rankings higher. Let's say ten sellers on the platform are selling shoulder bags along with you. If someone searches for shoulders bags on the platform, the first product they see is the one that sells the most. And you definitely want to reach that number one spot.

Now you know why external traffic is important, the next question is how to drive traffic to your Amazon product. There are both paid and free methods of external traffic generation.

Strategies that drive traffic to Amazon listing are endless. This is what’s called external traffic generation - from social media to email marketing, you could try them all and see if it works for your sales funnel. In this section, we discuss four external traffic channels that have wide audience reach potential. They require a marketing budget but can be managed cost effectively.

#1 Facebook Ad Campaigns

Facebook paid advertising is arguably the most popular launch technique used by sellers. With the right creative, you'll get people excited to buy your product. Once your creative is up, you can drive traffic to your listing either by sending people to:

  1. Standalone landing page separate from Amazon directly to your Amazon listing page.
  2. Directly to your Amazon page gets people as close to the checkout button on Amazon as possible.

Facebook advertising costs money but can be cheaper than running Amazon ads if you build an audience base. I recommend creating a Facebook Page, posting useful content and building an audience around your product before running ads. You can also share your product links in Facebook groups in a strategic manner - like answering a question or asking for reviews.

#2 Google Ads

Google is the next big advertising medium, and while it's not quite as popular amongst Amazon sellers as Facebook, it can still be valuable. Google basically has two ad types that are popular amongst Amazon sellers: traditional search ads and shopping ads. You can target the right keywords so your listings show up on top of search results.

The good news with using Google Ads in the way described here is that you can pixel the audience so you can retarget them on Facebook (as well as Google). You may also be able to collect their emails to increase your marketing opportunities. Be careful to have any landing page you serve meeting Google’s quality standards as it can result in either your ad or entire account being suspended.

#3 Using Influencers

A well-selected influencer in your space has incredible influence (hence the word influencer!) on the buying behaviour of the audience. Most people work with influencers on either YouTube or Instagram, but an influencer can be anyone who has influence on an audience of people. You can pay influencers to:

  • Create video testimonials
  • Create product unboxing or usage videos and share tips
  • Use your product in other videos they create.
  • Post about your product/product link to their social media audience

There are websites that can help you find influencers, for example, Famebit, but for our company. Some of them may also create content in exchange for free items.

#4 Email Marketing

A high-converting email list can bring you sales over and over and is one of the silver bullets for an Amazon seller with a large product catalog. Collecting emails is relatively simple as long as you have a website with a bit of traffic. Keeping your list active and engaged is another challenge though and involves consistently sending them high-quality emails beyond pitching your latest sale. This can largely be automated through flows and sequences (check out our guide to email marketing for ecommerce owneersr\\d). You can start emailing for free but need to pay email marketing platforms a small fee as your list grows.

Bringing Organic Traffic to Your Amazon Products

Paid channels are useful but not strictly necessary. If you are on a tight budget - don’t worry! In this section, we’ll focus on the two Amazon external traffic channels that typically have the highest audience reach potential but are organic in nature. Hence, you won’t need to allocate any external budget for trying them out - all you need is time and the right data to guide your sales funnel efforts.

One of the largest traffic sources out there is Google search. While you might have tried, or at least seen, PLA or Google Shopping ads, organic search can actually be a goldmine for new audience acquisition. You may wonder how your Amazon listing’s success can be tied with Google search, but the answer is simple:

  • Every day, Google gets over 5.4 billion searches - chances are, some of the people are looking for your kind of product;
  • Google mainly operates on keywords and user intent - if you manage to meet user intent with the right keywords placed throughout your listing, you can get your Amazon listing up on top of Google’s search results page (SERP) and, thus, get a consistent influx of new traffic, which can potentially be converted into buyers.

Convinced so far? Now, let’s see what you can do to embrace the power of organic Google search and bring tangible results for your Amazon business.

High-impact search tactics for triggering Amazon listings’ organic growth

While Search Engine Optimization(SEO) is a vast area to cover within one post, let’s focus on keywords here. Keywords are simply words and phrases that help search engines understand if your page meets user intent of the entered search query. I’ve outlined critical steps to get started with organic search below. To learn the details, make sure to read how search insights for Amazon can help you.

  1. Analyze competitors for keyword performance - Before you put any effort into Google-related organic traffic acquisition, you have to understand if it’s even worth your time and resources. There is no point in targeting words that people don't search. The Search Insights tool is known for its analytics reports – they provide traffic volume estimation and data for your competitors. The tool includes a handy set of boxes that reveal everything you have to know about the growth dynamics of user demand within Google search.

Enter up to three Amazon competitors into the tool and check whether you’re seeing an upward trend across keywords, traffic, and reach:

  • If all the stats are going up, this may be a good sign that you can capitalize on the growing demand.
  • If some stats are down, don’t get discouraged immediately - chances are, your rivals are simply not doing a good job at keyword strategy.
  1. Discover the most efficient keywords to tackle - Search Insights also reveals each keyword your competing listings are targeting and appearing for within Amazon search.

Make sure to pay attention to the following metrics:

  • Reach reflects the keyword’s monthly search volume;
  • Traffic shows an estimate of how many people may visit a listing that targets the keyword;

You can learn more about a product’s reach, traffic, and the keywords it ranks for during one month or over a six- or twelve-month period. This info should help you navigate through a large list of keywords you can potentially target to receive some traffic from organic search.

3. Uncover some hidden keyword gems - While you can scroll through a lengthy keyword list and simply pick the ones that show high traffic numbers, it’s not a wise strategy: your job is to find the low-hanging fruits. This implies that keywords that have higher traffic/reach counts should also come with higher position potential and lower competition. You can find these gems by looking for individual reports in detail.

Another important and high-potential organic external traffic source is referral links. This means that you might want to acquire backlinks from third-party websites, or links that direct users back to your Amazon listing.

Why consider referral traffic?

From in-content link placement to affiliate partnerships, backlinks aren’t simply directly bringing traffic to your listing, they also amplify your SEO performance. With backlinks, however, you should be careful - Google is pretty good at detecting suspicious backlink activity, so you have to be wary of fishy tactics. What makes a backlink valuable is when it comes from a high-authority, trusted website. The more links you can get from these sites, the higher traffic you can expect - directly and indirectly.

Competitor scouting can prove to be the most effective way of building a strong backlink portfolio. An easy method to achieve this is using the Traffic Insights tool. I’ve summarized the steps below— to learn the details read how to find valuable backlink opportunities.

  1. Uncover which platforms link back to your competitors—With the help of the Referrals report within the Traffic Insights tool, you can find out which platforms already place links to listings similar to yours, and go data-driven in choosing the best partners for link building.
Find out which platforms already link to Amazon listings similar to yours - Sellzone Traffic Insights

Once your competing listings are entered into the tool, it gathers all the platforms that link back to them.

2. Pinpoint referring sites that can bring the most traffic and impact - Typically, you’ll get a large list of sites, but pay attention to the key metrics that will define your choice of partners:

  • Reach will once again show how many people you can expect to visit your site if you get a backlink from it.
  • Authority Score is another crucial metric to consider. Pay attention to sites that have a higher score, as these are platforms Google considers as high value. This way, besides getting traffic, you can grow your listing’s authority in the eyes of the search engine, and thus improve your SEO.
  • Competition, as mentioned, reflects how many Amazon listings get a backlink from this site. In this case, seeing a lot of competition can actually be a good sign as this may imply that you have a higher chance of partnering up. Make sure to use filters and set up your insights in a way that helps you uncover platforms with the highest reach and authority score.

3. Start your link-building efforts by outreaching potential partners—The next step is to reach out to these platforms and arrange valuable backlink partnerships. You can:

  • Ask for link placement where relevant.
  • Create content that links back to your listing. This is what’s called guest posting - when you create content for third-party sites that involves a backlink to your page, or listing in this case. If you spot a site that’s part of Amazon Associates - they monetize their links so they are more likely to favor your request - prioritize them in your outreach efforts.

Conclusion

External traffic gives you better control over your marketing efforts and business growth. You control where, how, and who sees your product placements. There are several paid channels like Facebook, email, Google Ads, and influencers that you can target to begin external traffic generation. However, paid campaigns are not the only option. High-value backlinks and higher search rankings affect your SEO performance and overall site authority in the eyes of Google. You can use Semrush App Center tools s to make the process much faster and more efficient!

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