So, how does the badge play into it? As seen on the official Alexa Voice Shopping FAQ section, Amazon’s Choice also happens to be Alexa’s first choice. But only if its owner never bought that particular item before on Amazon, or the one they bought is no longer available with a Prime offer. 

Since people often impulse buy and new products are listed every day, Alexa often ends up picking the Amazon’s Choice badge. So, if you can live with Amazon’s free return policy for non-digital Alexa Voice purchases, you should do your best to earn the badge. Especially if you sell newly listed, non-essential products. 

After all, voice shopping is bound to grow due to the Voice Interoperability Initiative. OC&C Strategy Consultants say voice shopping is “the next disruptive force in retail”. And according to Statista, 3 out of 4 households will own a smart speaker by 2025, many of which will probably be Alexa enabled. 

But it’s not just about being featured in search results or being Alexa’s top pick. Amazon’s Choice is also the go-to for the Gift Finder and other official holiday guides. So, if you’re the Brand Owner or a seller with few competitors, this badge can boost your holiday sales too.

3 Things You Should Know About Amazon’s Choice

• It’s keyword dependent. For instance, when you look up lava rock steak, lava rock stone, and lava rock oven on Amazon.com, you’re always shown the product in Fig. 1,2,3 on the first results page. But this product won’t always be Amazon’s Choice for your specific search phrase.
• It’s only available for in-stock Prime eligible offers. This doesn’t mean that the buyer will always end up ordering a Prime item, with or without the Buy BoxThis refers to the situation where a sel… More. But it goes to show that one FBA unit alone (even if it’s a competitors) can affect the badge’s continuity. 
• Unlike the Best-sellers badge, you don’t need massive sales volume and velocity to qualify. But you should do your best to make sure your product attracts new Prime buyers who trust Amazon’s recommendations and have little time to spend browsing and comparing offers. 

How to Get the Amazon’s Choice Badge

7 Factors Affecting Amazon’s Choice Eligibility

You can’t just enable the badge. You can’t buy your way into Amazon’s good graces. And when it comes to badge eligibility, Amazon keeps its cards close to its chest. This badge is especially elusive, because it’s given to a product listing, not to any particular seller. So, you can’t link it to seller performanceA measure of how well Amazon sellers are… More. 

But here’s what you can link it to: 

• Prime eligibility.
• Stock levels.
• Availability to ship.
• Low return rate.
• Popularity & sales.
• Great product reviews.
• Competitive price.

7 Tips for Earning the Amazon’s Choice Badge

1.    Optimize Your Listings

To get buyers to click on your product, you want to make a great first impression because the competition is fierce. So, the images and product information you share must be appealing as well as compliant with Amazon’s listing rules. Here are a few tips on optimization for product images, titles, and bullet points.

2.    Refresh Your Keywords

Your product description, bullet points, and title must be easy to read and rich in keywords. But you should also work on the keywords that users can’t see. Access the Keywords tab from the “Edit Product Info” screen in Seller Central, and enter your backend keywords in a logical order and with single spaces.

Make sure that there are no repetitions or duplicates, no brand names or ASINs, no stop words (e.g. an, by, such), and no typos (unless you’re doing it on purpose because the product is often misspelled). Keyword stuffing is another big no-no since buyers usually go for short phrases when they look up items.

3.    Improve Organic Sales

Easier said than done. But there are ways to boost sales on Amazon without advertising or dishing out vouchers and coupons. You could try boosting your product ratings or winning the Buy Box more often. Brush up on Buy Box rotation and repricing tips with a glance at our Amazon Seller Strategies post.

4.    Reprice Intelligently

To keep prices as low as possible without losing money, while also winning and keeping the Buy Box, you should use Sellery , our real-time repricer. In our post titled How to Win the Amazon Buy Box Using Sellery’s Smartlists, we show you how to compete with top sellers, Brand Owners, and price gougers.

5.   Advertise to Boost Visibility

There are several ways to advertise on Amazon, and we talk about them in more detail in our Amazon PPC post. Third-party sellers usually opt for Sponsored Product campaigns and bid on high-velocity keywords. But bear in mind that these ads only go live when you own the Buy Box. 

6.  Keep An Eye on Stock Levels

It only takes Amazon a few minutes to pass the badge onto a different product if stock levels plummet. So, if you have the tech and you’re keeping an eye on a competing item’s stock levels, you can swoop in and earn yourself the badge just by having a decent chunk of Prime-eligible inventory on hand.

7. Use FBA as Backup

Prime shipping is an important factor in Amazon’s decision. To make sure that you offer Prime shipping and stay eligible for the badge for as long as possible, split your inventory between FBA and MFN, and charge a bit more for the first. 

Alexa shoppers will go straight for the Prime offer. But other buyers will likely choose MFN offers instead. As long as you always have at least 1 FBA unit in stock, you tick the ‘availability’ box, as far as badge eligibility is concerned.  

That brings us to the end of today’s post. We leave you with a reminder that the benefits of the Amazon’s Choice badge are hard to quantify because it passes on quickly from one product to the next. But sellers would be wrong to underestimate the importance of Amazon’s Choice Badge this holiday season and beyond. 

Now that you know what Amazon’s Choice Badge is  – and what it isn’t-, what better way to put what you’ve learned into practice than with Sellery? It’s the one tool that lets you monitor and take control of your stock levels, price, and Buy Box eligibility for all your items, be they Used or New, FBA or MFN.