Prepping for Prime Day: What You Need to Know
A huge event for business owners and sellers worldwide is Amazon Prime Day. This E-commerce holiday is a 2-day event where Amazon Prime members, new and current, gain access to great deals and sales. Prime Day this year is set to kick off on July 12th, 2022, and run through July 13th. The event is a perfect opportunity for sellers to not only reap a profit and generate brand awareness, but to attract new customers. So as a business owner, what can you do to prepare for this epic event? Here we’ll go over several strategies sellers can implement to have the most successful Prime Day for their business.
Advertise
One of the most important ways to ensure success on Prime Day is through advertising. You’ll want to draw attention to your brand leading up to the big day to get as many customers as possible. A great way to advertise is through social media. Create custom Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter posts that inform your followers of the upcoming sales. In addition to posting images or graphics, releasing promotional videos is a great way to garner attention for your brand.
The TikTok app is arguably the most popular social media around right now. Making creative TikToks that center around Prime Day is a quick and simple way to spread the word and build your brand. Another fun way to advertise for Prime Day is contests, where the winner will get coupons, promotional codes, or free items. For example, if a customer orders something from your page on Prime Day, he/she will be entered for a chance to win free products. Contests are an easy and effective way to get people excited and increase web traffic on the big day.
Another useful way to advertise is through email and SMS (text message) marketing. These messages can be simple and to-the-point advertisements reminding customers to buy from your company on Prime Day. With email and SMS, take advantage of fun colors and graphics. Just like with any other advertisement, you want these to look appealing to consumers.
Lastly, there are advertisements you can take advantage of on Prime Day itself such as Amazon Sponsored Ads. These ads will push the visibility of your products, making them more prominently featured when a customer searches your category. Due to the competition on Prime Day, sponsored ads can get pricey, but are a great way to allow customers to see your product first upon searching.
Plan Your Promotions
When getting ready for Prime Day, it is vital that you plan your promotions in advance. As per Amazon rules, there are deadlines for business owners to apply for specific promotions. For instance, you must apply for Lighting Deals and coupons by specific dates in order to utilize these discounts on Prime Day. There are also deadlines for ordering your inventory and setting up shipping. Thus when preparing for the event, it is important to be organized and ensure you apply for whatever promotions and deals you would like to offer before Amazon’s deadlines. Additionally, you’ll want to be sure your promotions make sense for your bottom line- you still need to make a profit after all.
Also keep in mind any changes Amazon may make to their costs/fees or rules and watch for announcements from the company. For this year’s Prime Day, there will be a 5% fuel and inflation surcharge added to FBA fulfillment fees. The FBA fees refer to orders that are “Fulfilled by Amazon”- regarding the shipping and handling. The fee is determined by the item’s size, weight, and category. Ensure you take this fee into consideration when calculating your discounts and profit margin.
Optimize Your Listings
Another way to ensure a profit on Prime Day is to optimize your product listings prior to the event. On Prime Day, there are millions of shoppers searching for products that may come across your listing. Thus, you must confirm that your product listings are looking great and ready to go. This includes updating your product photography and optimizing the text of your listing-Title, Bullets, and Product Description. Having text that is optimized with keywords will allow your page to be more visible when customers search for products. Keywords are key (no pun intended) as there will be serious competition between various E-commerce brands during the Amazon event. You’ll also want to ensure your text reads nicely and that everything within your listing appears appealing and professional.
Reviews and ratings are a huge factor with Amazon buying as well. Make sure the products you are promoting have good ratings and reviews. If your product does not have at least a 4-star review, customers will likely find a competitor product that does rather than purchasing yours.
Additionally, if you are registered to use A+ content, you’ll definitely want to take advantage of it for Prime Day. A+ content allows sellers to post longer product descriptions, larger graphics, and more images. Sellers will often display charts or measurement information on product pages with A+ content. This gives buyers a fuller picture of what your product is and how it works.
Diversify Your Discounts
On Prime Day, there are many options to choose from regarding how sellers want to discount their products. One popular way to create sales prices is through coupons. Creating a coupon requires a few simple steps via Amazon Seller Central (the sellers’ platform). Sellers can create either percentage-off or money-off coupons. Coupons are a great way to increase product visibility and catch customers’ attention. Once your coupon is created, you will also have the option to submit your products for the Sponsored Products designation. This helps your product come up in search results and can attract more customers to your page.
Another way sellers can get creative with discounts is through social media promotional codes. Promo codes allows sellers to share discounts with a targeted audience. Promo codes give sellers more control over how the discount is marketed. Once you create a promo code, you will get a URL and custom page that offers your products. Promo codes can even be customized to include your brand or product name
A final type of discount sellers can utilize is the Prime Exclusive Discount. This sale price is exclusively for Amazon Prime members. Products with this discount will display the new, lower price with the original price crossed out. Prime members can also view these discounts on their Featured Offer page.
If you want an additional edge on the big day, you can use Amazon’s Automated Pricing feature. With automated pricing, Amazon will adjust the pricing of your products for you once Prime Day begins. Sellers can set rules beforehand and adjust them as needed. This is ideal for sellers who want their prices to change during Prime Day to stay competitive.