Are there any little-known facts about ranking on Amazon that could hinder my success?

Yes, I know a couple of little-known facts about ranking on Amazon that are too often drawing a line between a stunning business success and a complete failure on that crowded marketplace. I mean a rather common situation when you may be using the main target keywords for your product listing optimization not fully correctly. Or, for example, when you’re actually failing to get the whole product listing optimized the right way, particularly through the most specific keyword-oriented fields. All that things taken together can not only prevent you from getting that deserved ranking on Amazon, but can actually cost you real web traffic, and ultimately – net sales over there. So, below I’m going to show you the main pitfalls for you to avoid them, or at least quickly get everything adjusted so that any potential negative effect for your ranking on Amazon will be minimized. 

Fact 1: Amazon’s A9 Algorithm Sees Title as Keyword Field

Too many sellers on Amazon believe that putting the same keywords both in their product title and the backend keyword fields is a MUST. But they all are terribly wrong. Why? Simply because Amazon’s internal algorithm gives the exact match to every individual keyword found in your product title or elsewhere in the keyword field – with those typed in the search box by the live shoppers. And those familiar with SEO know it well: using duplicates is hardly a positive thing indeed.

Fact 2: Product Title and Keyword Fields Have Equal Weight

It’s a widely seen deception when people give certainly more weight particularly to the product title, rather any other field or section within their product listing. But the truth is that the title tags really hold more weight – of course, when observed in the eyes of Google search engine. And this doesn’t necessarily mean that the same thing must be true about ranking on Amazon. Those who assume the same about product listing optimization on Amazon are incorrect too.

Fact 3: Long-Tail Phrases Won’t Do for Keyword Fields

Let’s face it – Amazon’s A9 search ranking algorithm is never looking for any exact phrase match. In fact, it works by combining only individual words so that there is no need to waste your product listing space by entering repeated words. Instead of that, you’d better just get rid of any duplicates and put the rest of keywords into a clean & clear, logical order. Doing so, you will have a certainly bigger room left for locating your other target keywords.

Fact 4: Stemming, Commas and Plurals Do Matter

Amazon’s A9 does account for stemming. I mean the situation when you can take a root word and simply add different ending variations to it. For example, “diet,” “diets,” “dietary,” and so on. So, each of those keyword variations will be considered as another individual search term. As for commas and probably any other means of punctuation – Amazon simply ignores them all. That’s why there is no need to waste your time on any manipulations over there – they simply got no effect towards your ranking on Amazon.