Amazon Success Strategies for Food Businesses

We talk a lot on the Real Food Brands podcast about having a Brand Strategy in place to align everything on both the front and back end of your food business to deliver on your brand’s vision. The same concept holds true within every area of your business; your strategy needs to come to life through your operations, marketing, customer service…even Amazon.

Today on the Real Food Brands Podcast, host and Brand Strategist Katie Mleziva is joined by Shannon Roddy, an Amazon expert who helps brands develop their Amazon strategy and grow their businesses on Amazon. In this episode, we talk about how to build brand equity, control who’s selling your product and why Amazon is so important as a product research and branding platform.

Why Your Food or Beverage Brand Needs to Be on Amazon

Fifty-five percent of all product searches start on Amazon. “You have to think of Amazon as a branding platform before it’s an eCommerce platform,” Shannon says, “so to say that you don’t want to be on Amazon is equivalent to saying that you don’t want to be on Google.” It’s important to realize is just as much a product research platform as it is a place to buy things. “Your customers are going to Amazon and doing product research, even if they’re planning on buying it in retail,” he says.

It’s also important to realize that distributors use Amazon for very much the same purpose—to learn everything about your product and take a close look at reviews. “We’ve seen retailers pull out of deals because of Amazon,” Shannon said, “Amazon, in effect, sets the tone for the rest of the industry.” This kind of research goes on whether you want it to or not, so the smart strategy is to take an active role in managing your brand and making sure it aligns with your values.

How Food Companies Can Build Brand Equity on Amazon

You never want your entire food business to rely on Amazon, and in fact, Shannon recommends that it should never be more than twenty-five to thirty percent of your sales, at most. You just don’t have control and can run into problems out of the blue. “In fact, almost every company that I’ve worked with at some point has had listings shut down or their account suspended even temporarily, it’s just the way Amazon is,” Shannon says. There’s just not enough control to rely on the platform for the majority of your business.

If you’re going to start selling on Amazon, Shannon recommends building brand equity. “Brand equity is a customer’s perceived value of your product line and your brand on the Amazon platform,” he says. This perception relies on a number of factors: price, the quality of the images and copy, and the quality of the customer service. Shannon gets into strategies for how you can control who sells your product and for how much, including getting a trademark and using Minimum Authorized Pricing.

The Keys for Amazon Success

“We definitely recommend that every brand tell their brand story in their product description,” Shannon says. Over sixty percent of Amazon customers read that description, so it’s incredibly important. For photos, you don’t just want pictures of the product (although that’s important). Use lifestyle photos to really get across what your brand is all about. “Don’t be afraid to show who you are, it’s almost like Simon Sinek, people buy why you do things, not just what you do, so give them your why,” Shannon says.

“The number one reason that most brands fail selling on Amazon is that they don’t know what they don’t know,” Shannon says. There are a lot of great tips he has in the full episode, so be sure to take a listen, and you can get started with S hannon’s free Ten Minute Food Brands course to learn more and advantage of our special offer to give you a free hour of coaching if you sign up by 1/31/20 using this link.

Now, let’s go shake up shopping carts!

In This Episode:

Why the value of selling on Amazon goes beyond just sales.
The differences between Amazon Vendor Central and Amazon Seller Central.
Why you shouldn’t rely on Amazon for too much of your sales mix.
How to get more control over your Amazon listings.
Strategies to protect your brand on Amazon.
The keys to creating a good product listing.
The special offer Shannon put together for Real Food Brands listeners.

Quotes:

“You have to think of Amazon as a branding platform before it’s an eCommerce platform, so to say that you don’t want to be on Amazon is equivalent to saying that you don’t want to be on Google.” – @SellerCourses

“Your customers are going to Amazon and doing product research, even if they’re planning on buying it in retail.” – @SellerCourses

“Don’t be afraid to show who you are, it’s like Simon Sinek says, people buy why you do things, not just what you do, so give them your why.” – @SellerCourses

Resources: