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What Influences an Amazon Shopper Buying Choices

Last updated on August 13th, 2024 at 10:02 am

This study looks at the different things that Amazon buyers think about when they decide what to buy. It tells third-party sellers what American customers like and how they react when product details are changed.

The results from the last study are also compared in this 2023 report to show how much customers’ tastes have changed over the past year.

Better Product Selection

Some people choose Amazon because it is a one-stop shop,” even though free shipping is nice. Amazon is preferred by many shoppers because it has a huge selection of items and reviews for each one. This helps customers decide which one to buy. Even though it won’t make things equal with Amazon, it’s a good start.

Limited-Time Offers

Retailers use limited time offers to boost sales volume, particularly during slower periods or to clear out inventory. These promotions can generate a spike in sales as shoppers rush to take advantage of the temporary deals.

During Amazon’s Prime Day, for example, the combination of exclusive offers and limited availability can lead to record-breaking sales figures. The urgency and excitement created by these offers drive higher-than-usual traffic and conversion rates.

Get Free Shipping

Out of the people who answered the survey, three out of four said they joined Prime to get free shipping on their orders. Also, they want it quickly.

67% of those who signed up said they did so because Amazon offers cheap (or free!) same-day, one-day, and two-day shipping. Now this shouldn’t be a surprise, and if you want to stay competitive online, you need to plan for it.

The stores that are most at risk are the ones that sell items that aren’t unique to their brand. You have a better chance of making the sale if your price is the same as or slightly higher than the competition. Free shipping is a bonus.

In your ad copy and extensions, make sure to try out offers for free or discounted shipping. These might get more clicks than other choices. Businesses that have stores in real life have an edge over online businesses.

Online shoppers can get their goods right away by seeing ads that tell them to pick up their orders in nearby stores. By turning local shops into small fulfillment centers, stores can also cut down on shipping costs. With local delivery services, customers can get their purchases faster and for less money.

Product Authenticity Guarantees

The presence of authenticity guarantees can significantly influence consumer purchasing decisions. Shoppers are more likely to choose products with clear authenticity assurances over those without.

For example, a customer deciding between two similar products may opt for the one that comes with an authenticity guarantee, even if it is slightly more expensive. This preference highlights the value consumers place on the assurance of authenticity.

Amazon’s Social Media Strategy to Inspire Buyers

Amazon has invaded almost every facet of our lives, from books on our shelves to technology in our smartphones to car parts. But how did it do this?

Amazon’s success has many reasons. The company’s social media management has been spot-on for years, even before it came to be.

Facebook

Amazon’s Facebook page has more than 28.7 million likes right now. Wow, that’s a huge number. But its popularity is clear after a quick scan of its news feed. Amazon responds quickly and politely to the huge number of comments people leave on its posts.

It gives helpful information and links and adds a personal touch by calling users by their first name and having an Amazon employee sign off on each comment with their first name as well.

Amazon solves problems when people ask them. People are quickly and helpfully helped when they say they are frustrated. It’s also important for a brand’s success on social media that Amazon starts and joins talks.

Customers with Facebook-linked accounts will see product reviews written by Facebook friends as well as products that these friends have put on their Amazon Wish Lists. This is part of Amazon’s social media efforts to make them feel more like a community.

Twitter

A lot of Amazon’s 2.7 million Twitter fans used to follow the company for ads, but now the account is mostly used to promote other Amazon services, like Prime Video and Amazon Music.

People who sell on Amazon can get a lot of useful business advice from the company’s blog posts, which are promoted on Twitter. The feed also shares news about the company’s activities and new products.

Pinterest for Amazon works a lot like Amazon’s main online store. Pinterest is the only social media site where a lot of people go to look for things they want to buy.

But when they see an Amazon Pin, they can click on it and be taken either to a page on Amazon.com where they can buy the item right away, or to the seller’s website where they can finish the purchase through Amazon.

Why a Good Buying Experience on Amazon Matters

You can delegate some customer service tasks to the Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) service, but that doesn’t mean you don’t have to do anything to make sure your customers have a good experience. You, as the seller, are still in charge of many important parts of how buyers connect with your items and listings.

To do that, you should first make sure that customers have all the information they need before they buy. When people see your listing, they might not be able to tell if your product fits their needs. They might then click back to the results page to find a competitor with a more detailed description.

But there are other risks besides lost sales. It’s a problem when a customer buys something and then finds out it’s not what they wanted when it gets to them. A lot of people may return the item, and some may even write bad reviews about it, which can hurt future sales and the image of your brand and product.

Influence of Amazon’s Best Seller Rankings

Building Trust Through Best Seller Badges

Amazon awards Best Seller badges to products that top the charts in specific categories. These badges act as a powerful trust signal.

For instance, a shopper looking for a new pair of headphones may be swayed by a product adorned with a Best Seller badge, interpreting it as a sign of quality and widespread approval. This can lead to a preference for that product over others without the badge, even if the latter are of similar quality.

Case Study: The Rise of Instant Pot

An excellent example of the influence of Amazon’s Best Seller Rankings is the success story of Instant Pot. This multi-cooker became a household name largely due to its strong performance on Amazon.

Achieving and maintaining a high BSR in the kitchen appliances category, Instant Pot benefited from the visibility and trust associated with being a best seller. The product’s popularity surged, leading to widespread recognition and an impressive sales record.

Ways to Improve the Amazon Buying Experience

Lots of information on your product pages will make shopping on Amazon more enjoyable. Additionally, you should quickly answer any questions your customers may have. You can make yourself more remembered by buyers by using these smart tips.

Allow Amazon Product Questions for FBA orders

Amazon customers can’t just walk up to an employee and ask them about a purchase. They can get the next best thing—a way to get the answer they need before deciding whether to buy—if you let them ask questions about the products.

Because you’re the seller, you know the most about your goods and can give customers the best answers. Looking at the questions buyers ask about your products is also helpful for planning. Insights into their goals and other ways your product could be used are gained.

Click on Notification Preferences in your Amazon FBA account’s Settings menu.
Select Edit under “Messages.”
You can send questions to the email address you give when you tick the box next to Buyer Messages.
“Save” it.

It was simple there. Checking your email and responding to questions as soon as possible is the more important part.

Provide a Detailed Product Listing

You can avoid Amazon product questions by including all the information a customer might want to know about your item in the offering. Among other things, a full product description should include:
how big the item is. In this case, it might mean giving a more thorough size guide for things like clothes or just listing the sizes of others.
It also works with these other things. For things like technology, where customers need to know if a product will work with others before they buy it, this is especially important.
The thing’s materials or the things that are in it. Those who have allergies, for example, need to know exactly what materials are used before they buy.
Usage examples. Customers will know exactly what the product can do if you list some of the main ways they can use it.

The thing you’re selling and what people need to know about it will determine what you put here.

Include High-Quality Images and Video

You can say a lot with words, but pictures of your goods will help people understand what they’ll be getting before they order.

People will expect you to include high-quality pictures of your products in your listings—they won’t buy something they can’t see. You can also add movies that show your items in even more detail, though. Videos can serve as both small ads and ways to show how to do something.

Pictures and videos are both great ways to show people what your product looks like and what it can do. This helps them picture how they will use it, which choose to buy even easier. Amazon FBA says that your product page should have at least six pictures and one video.

The Amazon Last-Mile Delivery Process

This is the last part of the delivery process that gets an order to its final location, which is usually a customer’s front door.

The hardest part of eCommerce for sellers is the last mile. It is easy and cheap to move things from a factory to a warehouse or shop front because you can handle the details of many things at once and send them all to the same place (or a short list of places). But for the last mile, every order needs to go to a different location.

When driving a delivery truck on a map, the addresses of the different places are often far apart. Others are in crowded towns where drivers have to deal with traffic jams, while others are in remote areas that are hard to get to.

This makes last mile transport a tough and pricey issue to resolve. Problems with routing, failed delivery efforts, and bad weather can all make the problem worse.

How Amazon Handles Last-mile Delivery

For a long time, Amazon has been linked to fast and cheap shipping. To do that, it has had to come up with smart ways to handle the last mile. Amazon has made a few important changes to make sure that its last-mile shipping option is always top-notch:

Dynamic Delivery Planner (DDP)

The DDP software from Amazon is used for last-mile deliveries. It uses machine learning to find the best route and delivery window for faster last-mile deliveries. Trying to figure out how to send thousands of packages to different places as quickly and cheaply as possible is hard for people.

DDP does more than just figure out the best plans for the next day. It can also figure out real-time rerouting based on things that are hard to predict, like traffic and weather. Being able to change quickly helps when you have a lot of deliveries to make, and customers have high standards.

Amazon FBA not only uses DDP for its packages, but it also sells it to customers of Amazon Web Services (AWS).

Amazon Delivery Vans

Amazon has spent money to build its fleet of delivery vans and drivers to handle most last-mile deliveries. At the same time, that gives it more power over the last mile of the Amazon experience for customers and lets it work towards its climate goals.

Amazon Hub Delivery

Amazon’s Hub Delivery program is a fairly new idea that works with local businesses to make it easier to send packages in those areas. Amazon finds it easier to meet the needs of a few local businesses than hundreds of customer addresses when delivering orders.

The scheme gives small, local businesses a chance to make extra money. During slow times, they can use their current workers and cars to send Amazon orders, which will help them make more money.

The Top Amazon Buying Factors in 2019

A whopping 41.1% of Amazon customers say that price is the most important thing that makes them decide what to buy.
With a rate of 22.7%, the quality of the shopping experience is ranked as the second most important thing that affects people’s decisions to buy things on Amazon.
With a rate of 7.7%, the number of scores or reviews is the next thing that surveyed Amazon customers say affects their decision to buy.

The Top Amazon Buying Factors in 2020

As we move into 2020, several things can affect our choices about what to buy on Amazon. Most of them are listed below:

Price

80% of shoppers say price is the most important thing to them when they’re shopping.
Before they buy something on Amazon, 49% of buyers check the prices on other websites.

Reviews and Ratings

Before buying something, 91% of people read reviews online.
Items with more than 15 reviews are bought 12.5 times more often than those with none.

Brand Reputation

Statistics from Statista show that 63% of Amazon buyers say that the reputation of a brand is very important to them when they shop.
47% of Amazon customers say they have a favorite brand that they use often.
Users can protect their intellectual property and make sure that their goods are properly shown on Amazon’s platform through the Brand Registry program. This can help customers trust the brand.

Top Ideas of What to Sell in July 2024

You need to find the right category to help you choose the best thing to sell on Amazon. There may be more potential in some categories than others, and some categories may not be as competitive or require as much effort.

Also, keep in mind that selling some categories requires permission, which can be hard to get. That’s why you should carefully think about these things so you can pick the best product area for your Amazon business.

It’s time to choose which areas to focus on. Here’s a list of some of the most-bought items on Amazon organized by category:

Gardens and lawns
Electronics
Dining Room and Living Room
Sports & Nature
Outfits and shoes
Baby Items
Playthings and toys
Pet Supplies
Costume jewelry
Makeup and personal care

Evergreen Products

Evergreen goods are ones that people are interested in all year long. Some of these are basic or traditional things that people always need. There is a steady flow of sales and money for sellers, not affected by trends or changes in the seasons.

Pet supplies (dog beds)
Water bottles
Tools for cooking
Essentials like socks and pants
Kids’ educational books

Seasonal Products

It’s common for seasonal goods to be in high demand around holidays, certain seasons, or big events. As a result of higher demand during certain times of the year, seasonal things sell the easiest and fastest compared to evergreen items.

To make sure you don’t overstock and have enough goods on hand, it’s important to plan your inventory well, especially if you’re an Amazon FBA seller and may have to pay high stocking fees.

Christmas and Halloween displays
Dressing for the seasons (like shorts in the summer or coats in the winter)
Sending gifts (like for Valentine’s Day or Easter)
Back-to-school tools

Small and Light Products

It’s easy and cheap to send these items because they are small and light. Because they don’t cost much to ship, they’re great for selling online.

It is important to keep in mind, though, that small and light items may not have high-profit margins, and the FBA method may not be the best choice for these items because of the high fees that come with it.

Phone covers
Earrings, necklaces
Luggage tags, travel bottles, etc.
Lip balm and travel-sized cosmetics
A pen or notepad

Branded Products to Resell

There are usually wholesale agreements that let sellers use the brand’s name when they resell branded goods. Brand recognition puts these goods in high demand, so people want to buy them. Products in this group are usually in high demand, which makes them easy to sell online and ensures a steady flow of cash flow.

Brand-name trainers
Designer bags
Electronics
Cosmetics brand
Trendy toys and board games