So we’ve been doing particularly well recently. We went out of stock on a few of our skus in Q4 of last year because we grossly underestimated the size of Q4. This caused us to miss out on quite a lot of potential sales. We also thought it would really damage us with regards to our BSR (ranking on Amazon). However, you live, you learn. We’ll be more prepared for this Q4. We’re planning to put in a massive order in July. But that’s for another post!
Today, I want to tell you what can happen when you start to do well. You become a target. Firstly, what I noticed when I was looking at the session numbers was that we lost the Buy Box last week on one of the days. We hadn’t even noticed. Our Buy Box possession was at 99%. Probably, I thought, just a customer who no longer wanted their item and was reselling it, which is fine. So I thought nothing more of it.
The next thing that happened was that I went on to my listing and noticed that instead of the usual 9 images, there were only 4 and my main image was not the usual one either, it was an old one that I used to use.
My first thoughts were that when we lost the Buy Box, someone had changed our listing. Which cannot happen if we’re brand registered, so it concerned me a little and I was about to raise a case with Seller Central, but then we got an email.
The email was from Amazon and it was informing us that they’d removed some of our images because they’d received a complaint from a customer to say that our photos featured more than one image of the product in them or contained other items that do not come with our item.
Amazon said that they had researched it, had agreed with the customer and had removed the images that did not comply.
Now, in essence, that is correct, some of our images contained multiple images of our product, but it was clearly spelt out that you only receive one item when you buy. We had one image that was split into 4 smaller images, each of which demonstrated a different function of the product. There is no way that this could be misconstrued so that people would believe that they receive 4 of them!
I’ll give you an analogy. Say you were selling a garlic press, and you were doing a lifestyle shot and you had a picture of it on a cutting board next to some garlic. They had removed this image because despite what the description says, someone might think that included in the package, they’d get some garlic too, or the cutting board.
Madness!
They also took down an infographic that I had on there showing all the features and benefits. I still cannot work out why this might be.
So, to comply, I’ve had to put up some different images and for 2 days afterwards, our conversion rate went down. But I think this must be a coincidence because, it’s gone up even higher now.
My theory is that this was not a customer complaint, but rather a competitor trying to destroy us. In the end, it’s done us a favour because we’re converting better than ever. So, thank you! But it has taught me the value and importance of regularly checking your listing to make sure that nothing untoward is going down! Check every day to make sure your listing is live and is as you left it. It has also shown me the importance of checking your numbers on the daily too. Had I not been keeping a regular eye on my listings, I might have missed this and our conversion rate may have tumbled, again causing us to miss out on a number of potential sales.
Check your numbers, and you listing, guys!
Article by Kay Herdsman.
Co-Founder at Give Up The Grind.
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