Amazon seller rating is one of the most important aspects used to evaluate sellers on this marketplace. It is the feedback a seller receives from previous customers about their overall experience shopping with the store. It is part of the customer feedback mechanism provided by Amazon to improve customer satisfaction, along with other measures that help grow your eCommerce business on the platform.
By building trust among new visitors, the rating system helps sellers beat the competition. Higher seller ratings can also improve product listing rankings as Amazon’s A9 search algorithm has been known to show highly-rated sellers on top of the search results pages. Thus, good ratings further add to the brand image of the seller store and its profitability.
With more people preferring to shop online, the value of this rating is only increasing for sellers. So, are you ready to increase your sales figures and return on investment with the help of your customers’ goodwill? Then continue reading to find out how you can make the rating system work for you with some easy-to-follow tips.
How Does The Amazon Seller Rating System Work?
To make the rating system work in your favor, it helps to first understand how it functions. Learning about its behind-the-scenes mechanism and intricacies will help you gain better situational awareness and target your efforts to specific points of the problem. This saves money you would otherwise have lost trying to solve non-existent problems related to your seller ratings on Amazon.
The first thing you’ll notice about seller ratings is that it’s based on a Five-Star valuation concept. Here, the more the number of stars reflected in your store rating section, the higher the value. A single-star rating is the lowest that customers can award you while five stars are the highest. The rating present on the seller page is the average of all the ratings you’ve received until then.
Your customers can rate you multiple times, with the opportunity to increase, decrease, or retain their rating choice. Thus, it is up to you as a seller to provide the kind of service and product portfolio that will make the customer want to keep giving you good ratings.
The ratings are made visible to buyers alongside every product description. It is placed below the Buy Box so that they can easily view it before making the purchase. Clicking on it will take them to your seller page that displays the rating in a larger, more prominent format along with other information about your store.
The Top 5 Tips That Can Boost Your Seller Rating On Amazon
Now that you’re aware of how the Amazon Seller Rating system works, you can proceed with its maintenance. As there are many factors influencing it, you must be able to multitask and work on them all. Not to worry, as the following tips can give you the guidance you need to get that desired boost in ratings from your new and loyal customers alike:
● Recognize The Reasons For Your Present Score
You can trace back your performance using the metrics on your Seller Central dashboard to learn about mistakes and oversights that may have caused your low seller rating. That will help you figure out what is working and what isn’t. You can then devise an effective marketing and listing strategy to keep your rating positive.
Enlisting professional Amazon virtual assistants helps here as they can extract the relevant data from important KPIs and other sources like the review section to understand the merits and demerits of your present strategy. They can also perform KPI report structuring, rating factor review, and comprehensive strategy development for improving the review management process.
● Interact Well With Your Customers
Everybody likes to be heard, and on online platforms like Amazon, that need is very pertinent for buyers. How you listen to your customers’ concerns (positive or negative) and respond shapes their shopping experiences. And, that experience gets reflected in your seller rating.
Make sure to keep your audience engaged. Respond to every feedback or query. Answer all their questions. Thank them when they leave behind compliments and good reviews as they will feel appreciated as well for their purchase. Acknowledge negative feedback, learn the reason behind it, and work with the customer to see how the situation can be improved.
Additionally, you can send out emails, text messages, or feedback forms asking for feedback and ratings about their purchase experience. Just, don’t overdo it as that might negatively impact a customer. Negative feedback appearing on the seller feedback section is unwelcome too as it will turn away prospects. You should report any such writing to Amazon at once so that they can remove it quickly.
If you are using the Fulfilled By Amazon (FBA) facility, then Amazon takes responsibility for your shipping and packing functions. Check your Amazon seller rating and comments column for negative feedback about shipping and packing. Report any to Amazon immediately for quick resolution as they can cause brand image issues and demotivate your customers from engaging with your store.
● Maintain Your Product Listings
The first thing a potential customer wants to know about your store is if you are selling what they want. When your product listings match their requirements (variety, price, delivery window, etc.), they are more likely to buy from you and return with a review.
Getting the product listing right, along with the necessary description and other marketing aspects, is a tricky endeavor. It requires an objective, in-depth look at your mission and vision, besides other influential factors. Therefore, it’s best left to expert Amazon listing services who know how to list your products just right.
These experts go through your catalog and decide on the best products to list based on market trends and your business objectives. Their selection is combined with creative product descriptions that are SEO-friendly for better ranking. Such a potent combination of an in-demand product and an appealing listing description will skyrocket its rankings and increase brand visibility. The frequent high ranking of your products builds vital brand trust.
● Keep In Line With Amazon’s Guidelines
Amazon is fully committed to offering the best possible experience to the customers shopping on its platform, whether they transact with an Amazon affiliate store or a third-party one. To ensure this outcome, it strictly enforces its guidelines on all sellers. Not adhering to those rules can result in a temporary or permanent ban.
There are many reasons why you could face an account ban by Amazon, and these are also reasons that lead to poor seller ratings. With good knowledge of related guidelines, you can preemptively identify the problems and rectify them before they can lead to a ban.
You should also warn customers about the consequences of adding inappropriate content that violates Amazon’s guidelines. If left unchecked, it’s certain to attract Amazon’s penalties towards you and that customer, including bans. Flag repeat offenders and report them to Amazon’s seller support so that necessary action is taken against them soon. Remember that you can’t directly block customers on Amazon so you must report such behavior as soon as you come across it.
● Follow Up For Feedback
Online shopping is created with convenience at the forefront. Seller reviews add to that convenience by giving a glimpse about the seller and their service quality based on their past sales. Ironically, many customers find it inconvenient to leave a review about their experience as they just want to be done with the quick purchase. 95% of buyers don’t leave any feedback after purchasing on Amazon. Every such missed feedback is a lost opportunity for you.
The solution is to ask for that feedback via a follow-up message. The easier you make it for them to leave feedback, the more likely that they will do it. Any reminder must be sent out soon after the purchase as otherwise, they are not likely to respond or even remember it. Sometimes, you may need to send out multiple reminders to get their feedback. If so, ensure that the frequency of those reminders is in a sweet spot, i.e., not too frequent to annoy them nor too infrequent to be forgotten.
The content of your follow-ups should be pleasing and formal at the same time. It must allude to their shopping experience and the benefits they are enjoying as a result of it. Doing so invokes a positive response from their end which they will reflect when they rate you. It works even if their experience was a neutral one. In case of a negative experience, a follow-up asking about its particulars and what you’re doing to help them can improve the low rating you receive.
Applying the above-mentioned tips to your daily seller practices is guaranteed to help you avoid the downward spiral in performance that occurs due to bad seller ratings.
Some More Tips To Help Maintain Your Seller Ratings
Learn About The A9 Algorithm
Amazon’s famed A9 search algorithm is responsible for pushing up your products in search results. Seller and product ratings can influence the algorithm’s ability to notice your offerings, so you must learn about its functioning to manipulate it to your advantage. If you find it too technical for your liking, then you can rely on a professional, like an Amazon virtual assistant. They keep track of updates to the algorithms and create new feedback management approaches accordingly for maximum visibility gains.
Automate As Much As Possible
This is the age of AI, so make it work for your seller rating advantage. Use AI chatbots to handle the large volumes of customer interactions to ensure that nobody goes unheard. AI voice assistants can handle voice-related responses to customers interacting through calls. Algorithms can also respond to textual feedback that customers leave, as well as the star-based ratings according to context.
Automated follow-ups take away the hassle of having to send that content out manually across various communication channels. The AI can collect data, analyze it, and produce a report about the overall status of your customer outreach.
Advertise Frequently And Broadly
Organic marketing through search rankings only goes so far; you must pursue paid marketing for your brand too via PPC. And your advertising should cover all available avenues like other search engine results pages, third-party apps, social media sites, etc. While you are at it, mention your seller ratings in those ads too. They create a positive feedback loop where high ratings bring in more customers who convert and give more high ratings. Doing it frequently while maintaining your RoAS gives good brand visibility across platforms.
Conduct Competitor Research
You can make your competitors your allies by studying their activities and understanding the underlying strategy. Check Amazon seller ratings of your competitors regularly and look at what’s making the top performers tick. Adopt beneficial tactics to your seller practice too while learning from the mistakes made by your competition.
Employ Professional Customer Feedback Services
You may take on more responsibility than you can handle in your enthusiasm to be the best Amazon entrepreneur. But that option will overwhelm you and you will fall behind on your obligations, with your customer management taking a hit. Avoid this outcome by outsourcing your customer feedback management activities to a dedicated agency. Such agencies have the necessary number of experts and other operational capabilities to manage any number and type of feedback you receive.
They use carefully constructed responses to change disgruntled customers into pacified ones, persuading them to change their minds about any negative feedback they may have left. This leaves you free to work on those aspects of your business that can further satisfy your customers, like listing and pricing strategy.
Finally, devise strategies that will help your Amazon business gain positive feedback. Learning about the minutiae of your operations over time is sure to give you an idea of what works and what doesn’t for your unique situation.
Conclusion
Selling on a competitive yet rewarding platform like Amazon requires you to be at your best all the time. Your seller ratings stand as a testament to your efforts toward providing a satisfactory shopping experience for every customer. Proper feedback maintenance and seller rating management serve as the icing on that cake. Altogether, they won’t just sustain your business but give you the thrust needed to thrive in the market.
Summary
Amazon has put in the effort to ensure that its seller marketplace is as user-friendly as possible for both customers and sellers. One of the facilities provided in pursuit of that goal is the Seller Rating mechanism. It allows customers to directly rate the sellers they are buying their products from based on their experience. As a seller, you can do many things to keep those ratings positive, including following some tips for it. Additional measures, like hiring professionals to manage customer feedback, aid those implementations in bringing you the coveted customer response. With more stars in your ratings, you experience stellar performance figures and brand loyalty, increasing your ROI and prospects.
Author Bio
Sophie Hayes is an eCommerce consultant and a keen blogger. She holds eleven years of experience in SEO, eCommerce PPC, online website, marketplace & store optimization, and performance management. She is currently engaged with Team4eCom in the USA. She has written articles and contributed posts to several websites. Her most-written niche includes eCommerce store setup, SEO, social media marketing, listing optimization, marketplace-specific content like Amazon listing and marketing, eBay account management and Walmart marketing.
