Every Amazon seller aspires to get as many Buy Boxes as possible because it’s the quickest way between a customer looking at your page and actually making a purchase. And while most merchants have a good general idea of what to do in order to secure a Buy Box, a remarkably large number of them commit basic mistakes that count against them. RepricerExpress has visited the Buy Box wizard and learned a few of the most common Amazon Buy Box mistakes!
Set Your Prices Lower Than Everyone Else’s
It’s a commonly-held assumption that having rock-bottom prices is one of the best ways to inch closer to a Buy Box. After all, having the lowest prices on the block means consumers will naturally flock to your listings and buy, and the more purchases you record, the better, right?
While it’s true that lowering your prices to be more competitive does more often than not result in more sales — and is one thing that Amazon will pay attention to — it’s more a matter of how you price them in the context of your competition’s prices and seller performance and standing.
But what’s absolutely false is that there’s some sort of scientific equation where if you lower your prices by X amount, it’ll lead to a Y percentage of landing a Buy Box. Almost always the opposite will occur, with a price war hurting profit margins for all sellers.
Also, you can forget about the so-called “2% Rotation Rule” where a Buy Box will float around a group of sellers if they’re consistently within 2% of each other’s price. Our customer’s experiences with repricing simply doesn’t support that.
Work with the Intent of Being the Sole Buy Box Owner
If you operate your page with the intention of total Amazon domination, we’re sorry to tell you that tactic won’t pay off. You’ll have to share the Buy Box with other top-ranked buyers because Amazon believes sharing is caring!
While it used to be true that sellers could get their hands, and their hands only, on a Buy Box, Amazon has since amended that policy to rotate a Buy Box among sellers of equal or comparable accomplishment. You will have to share the Buy Box among your competitors but how long it remains in your possession has a lot to do with your seller performance and history, as well as price.
Amazon will look at the top sellers within a certain product, like the first season boxed set of Breaking Bad, and rank you all according to its criteria. If all of you perform exactly equally, then you’ll share the Buy Box in equal time allotments throughout the day. But if you outperform your competitors, then you may get the lion’s share of the Buy Box for that day.
If you think of the Buy Box as a time-share condo where your selling history and merchant reputation determine how many weeks of the year you get the condo, you’ll have a better idea of how Amazon doles out its Buy Boxes.
Slacking Off Because You Figure the Buy Box Will Get Awarded Anyway
Just because Amazon has changed its policies in how they award each Buy Box, it doesn’t necessarily mean they’ve lowered their standards, too. You still have to bring your A-game everyday or risk not getting the Buy Box at all.
If there’s such a day when all the usual top sellers for a specific product are having off days, nobody gets the Box. It’s rare, but it has happened before that no sellers meet all of Amazon’s requirements, or their seller metrics are below the standard of requirements.
Another instance in which Amazon won’t award a Buy Box is if the listed price is ludicrous, as in it’s unreasonably higher than the List Price. Items that come from a manufacturer or supplier will have their full retail price listed underneath the product name on the details page and it’s never a good idea to go above it. Cut your prices below your competitors if you must, but never go above the full retail price.
