Split Testing – The Amazon Seller's Secret Weapon [Webinar Recap]

Recently Greg spoke with Andrew Browne, co-Founder of Splitly, on how (and why) split tests are the the best way to dominate your niche as an Amazon seller. Here is a full replay of the webinar, and a written summary below:

Here is a copy of the presentation that was covered in the webinar:

What is split testing?

If there is one mantra that all digital marketers live by, it is “Test everything.” In an environment where everything can be precisely tracked and measured, why leave anything up to chance? Or even worse, intuition. Test it. And then test it again!

You would do this by running Split Tests, often interchangeably called AB Tests: a way to run a randomized and controlled experiments between two or more versions of a website, measuring specific metrics like sessions, conversions, conversion rate, and most importantly, profit.

Traditionally, when running a split test on a website, you would select an element of a page to optimize, and create two (or more) versions of the page to determine which version generates the best outcome. This is a straightforward process on websites, where you can make infinite alterations to website pages with services like Optimizely and VWO.

However, split testing is a different beast for the Amazon seller. Why? Because you have to play by Amazon’s rules, of course! Amazon requires sellers to enter data within a structured format, and traffic can only go to one product page. Therefore, in order to run split tests on Amazon, the listing must be changed once every day, at 12M PST (when Amazon refreshes its sales and traffic data every day).

The 2 Tests To Quickly Improve Your Bottom Line

There are two high-impact tests that are highly recommended as first tests to run on your Amazon listing.

1. Test Your Pricing

The first test is changing your price. Whether you are in a low-priced and competitive niche, or a high-priced niche, you will want to optimize your price to attract and convert your customers.

A good baseline to start is by testing your price by 10% higher or lower than your control price. Increasing the price could position the product as a higher-quality product. As a result, sessions and conversion rates may decrease, because you will lose the price sensitive consumer. However, the upside is that profit margin per sale may increase, therefore overall profits may increase. The outcomes of this test are incredibly interesting.

Lowering the product price by 10% may make your product more attractive to price-conscious consumers, and make it more appealing than your competitors’ offerings. However, the reduced price is most likely coming directly out of your profit margins. Will you be able to increase your conversion rate, and overall sales, enough to increase your daily profits? We have seen some very successful examples of this happening.

2. Test Your Main Feature Image

The second high-impact test to run on your Amazon listing is testing your main feature image. Why? Because your Feature Product Image is the first impression a person has with your product, and they have a fraction of a second to decide whether it is worth clicking on your listing or not.

This is especially important for private label sellers, who are often competing against people selling very similar items. For example, if you were looking for a ring for your special booboo, how would you decide which ring to click on:

It is difficult to stand out amidst a selection of products that look similar, which is exactly why it is important to split test different images. We have seen significant improvements in click through rates, and overall conversions, with different main images. Have you seen any notable improvements by testing different main images?

In Conclusion:

An important thing to note is that while running one test is an accomplishment worthy of high fives, the job does not end there. The true value of split tests emerge as you run tests repeatedly, to really hone in on the factors that move the needle positively. It is imperative to run follow-up tests to continue to optimize your listing and avoid the ills of complacency that can torpedo an Amazon listing.

The key takeaway for split testing, and I suppose for life in general, is to just get started. Greg shared a cool example from the bamboo marshmallow sticks, Jungle Stix, how just a two dollar change in price increased profits by 33% per day. Compounding that over the course of a month, that is a $1584 difference, and over a year amounts to $19k. The small things definitely do add up.

You can learn more about split testing, and Splitly website.