Amazon is perhaps the biggest platform on the Internet to sell your things. Everyone including your competitors is using the same and that puts you in a bit of a tussle as you want to sell more compared to others.
This is where social media can help. Amazon too has an internal algorithm that decides which items to show up first when people search for a product on the platform. Visibility is an overall internet issue and what is more visible, will sell more. With the help of social media, you can make your product listing more visible.
In this article, we will cover some of the methods by which you can make more sales on Amazon with the help of social media.
1. Choose Your Social Accounts
Yes, you should have an account on every social site out there to reserve your brand name, and if time permits you can even be active on all of those. But that said, every social site targets a particular section of people for example Pinterest is for women and Linkedin is for job seekers. So depending on your niche, you would want to be more active on a social site that has the same target audience as your product.
Naming the popular socials is easy because everyone knows about them but your niche will have tons of smaller social sites with thousands or even millions of users and yet they are small and very few people know about them. Ultimately, it is all down to your research. If you are selling books then GoodReads is a social site that will fit your category and chances are that you haven’t even heard about it.
2. Do The Basics
Before you start to plan anything related to promotions, your profiles should be all filled and customized. Your profile image should be catchy and visible, and the description sections and about sections should clearly state who you are and what you are up to.
It is always preferable to upload your image in the image or avatar section. If you are not feeling up to it or you have a brand profile then make sure you upload a really good company logo that connects you with your audience. The image is the first thing people are going to notice in your profile and it must be top-notch.
3. Make Use Of The Communities
Every social media site has a relevant community, Facebook group, Pinterest board, etc. Find them and be active on them. Do note that self-promotion isn’t tolerated everywhere, so before you start selling, make sure to share relevant content, make yourself familiar with other members – and then when you are all set, start promoting your stuff.
One of the easier methods to break the ice when getting to know others in a community is to read more and post less – even less if you are planning to make new topics or posts. When you are ready to post, start with the replies to the existing new topics. If someone has shared a relevant post on the community that makes sense then simply make a constructive reply to that post and wait for others to respond. Keep doing that till you have made yourself familiar with the active members and moderators and earned yourself a reputed name.
4. Make A Content Calendar
Social media followers are often seen as pure numbers – but they aren’t just that. They are after all people who are just like you. Yes, some of them are bots – you can’t do anything about it, but all the same – treat your followers as real people. Make a content calendar and stick to it. That way, you know what you are sharing and when you are doing so. Your followers will appreciate your planned content and based on what they like and re-tweeting, you can tweak and customize your calendar.
Every content calendar is different from the others because there are so many factors that need to be checked and followed. On Twitter, even ten status updates, separated by an hour or two might work and some status can even be re-written and tweeted again because there’s just too much content on Twitter that unless you constantly keep tweeting, you will make yourself invisible. The same isn’t true for other networks and if you start doing it on Facebook, people might start unfollowing you at an equal pace.
5. Decide Upon Spacing Your Content
If you are planning five posts a day, you can’t just share all of those at the same time. The social updates must be spread out, throughout the day. A tool like Buffer might come in handy, there are so many other such tools that are equally helpful and keeps your content posted throughout the day.
Do make sure to keep your content queue full otherwise you will run out of your buffer queues pretty quickly. Do note that you need to space out differently on different social networks and based on what is working for you, keep tweaking your content spacing.
6. Use Graphics
There are tools like Canva that make your boring product images stand out. When you share an eye-catching product image, perhaps even better with a small infographic that explains much more about the product – getting sales becomes far easier. With this method, you will send many targeted people from social media to your Amazon product listing page.
The process surely starts with finding a good image. No amount of editing can make a bad-looking image good – and why waste your time that way? Look for a catchy image on Flickr commons or buy stock photo licenses or even look into Canva’s image collection. Once you are narrowed it down to a photo that looks good and is relevant as well, it is finally time to start editing. Again, not all social networks like the image size to be of the same dimensions. Pinterest likes it a bit longer than it is wider – research the image dimensions. A good place to start is Canva because it already tells you what image size works best on which platforms.
7. Reviews
Getting Amazon reviews is a very touchy subject and one should treat it as such. However, asking to give feedback for things that they have purchased is a common request and if done wisely on social media, product listings will gain a lot of reviews and feedback.
The easiest way to approach this situation is to build an email list. If you have an active email list and your followers are happy with your content then you can ask them to give their feedback once in a while. This can be even nicely done by sharing a status update on a social site about a review that you have received and doing a follow-up email newsletter that links to this social update.
8. Influencer Marketing
Your product pages are places that need to be shared but you alone can only do so much. But it does not need to be like that because there are so many influencers out there who are willing to help you share your content if you are doing the same for them. Social media marketing can be outsourced as well, so think about it and plan well.
Some of these influencers can be managed for free as well. These influencers are after all followers too and they take action when someone makes a genuine request. But then, these are product pages and once some of these influencers share them you are going to get some sales, right? So why not return the favor to these influencers, they must surely deserve it.
9. Look For Mentions
the Internet is a gold mine and just like any other mine – it needs digging. Look for mentions on sites like Facebook, Twitter, etc. Check Youtube for videos that are related to your products, you can find full reviews if you look hard and why stop at that, there are blogs and other places where you can find relevant mentions. Once you get something good – share them on your social handles and keep promoting the good things.
To make these things easier to track there are social listening tools whose main reason to exist is to find relevant mentions. There are many free tools too which will allow you to find some of these mentions. Make good use of these tools and reply to as many people as you can.
10. Follow Up
None of these tips will work if you don’t reply to the questions that are posted, or for that matter angry reviews, etc. Reply to your mentions, whether they are on Amazon itself or social media – take a stand and reply to them all.
Responding does not necessarily mean solving the issue as there will be some issues that are impossible to solve but if you are clever and can articulate a reply that does at least help in some way or others reading your reply might think that you are trying to do all you can – will make a world of difference.
11. Share Positive Reviews On Your Email List
On Amazon, you will find that the product that you are selling is getting some reviews. Some of those reviews are good to hear, they are positive and anyone reading them will get motivated to buy the product. Use these reviews to your benefit and share them in your email newsletter.
Or better yet, form these reviews in a success story – use your creativity and craft a story around it and share it on your Facebook page, your newsletter, or even your blog. The better you write, the more newsworthy it gets and most of all – give it a clickbait title and let it go viral.
12. Create Instagram Stories
Stories work well in almost all forms of social media, be it Instagram or WhatsApp, or even youtube and Facebook. Use this feature well and do it regularly. Pictures of successful reviews of products can work well on these social media stories. The self-life of these stories is smaller on social media, so feel free to repeat some of them over time.
13. Whatsapp Group
Make a WhatsApp group for your customers and send them regular updates related to your Amazon listings. Let this group be a simple read-only group where you will be the only one that can post. Use it for updates and keep sharing pictures of your customers’ reviews.
14. Facebook Live
Going to life can be helpful as this is the finest way online to make yourself more human. There are so many updates on social media and from so many people and businesses that most followers start to take these for granted. Going live allows them to interact with you and post messages if there is anything they wanted to say – and it allows for quick communication.
15. Contests
Contests work well when you are running them on a social channel. The easiest of the contests requires your audience to like, tweet, share, comment, or answer something easy – basically everything that makes your posts or your social profiles active. And in terms of rewards, you can give coupon codes, and discounts on the very products that you want to sell.
You might even want to give away some of your cheaper products that you can afford, and in the process, you can get some easy feedback on how your products are. Giving away does not always mean freebies – after all, if you are giving discounts that mean your customers are buying it, at a price less than what you were originally planning to sell.
Social media is huge and people are using it for connecting, selling, and promoting stuff. Your competitors are doing it so there is no reason why you can’t do the same.
Implement a few steps at a time, and don’t over-exert yourself with too much of this – It is best to apply a few techniques at a time and see the results before moving further.
Dilip Tiwari
Dilip Tiwari is Digital Marketing Expert at USS LLC he likes to share Tips on Digital Marketing Services, Google ads management, Amazon ads management, and other blogs ideas.