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Amazon A-Z - terms you might have heard and what they mean
Episode 189 • 10th November 2023 • Bring Your Product Idea to Life • Vicki Weinberg
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In today's episode, I want to demystify Amazon for you. You might be selling on Amazon now, thinking about it, or in discussions about it. You may have heard lots of terms, phrases, and acronyms that you don't understand. I want to give you the ultimate A to Z guide to explain common Amazon terms and acronyms simply. 

I’ve written an accompanying blog post, so you can listen along, or read, whatever suits your learning style the best.


The Bring Your Product Idea to Life Podcast  - Best Business Podcast Award, Independent Podcast Awards 2023


USEFUL RESOURCES:


Blog Post

Amazon A-Z Terms You Might Have Heard Of And What They Mean


Podcast Episodes:

185 5 things nobody tells you about selling on Amazon (that I will!)

183 How to rank higher on Amazon

159 How to start selling on Amazon

151 Should you sell your product on Amazon?

107 Common Amazon issues and how to resolve them

79 What to do when things go wrong on Amazon


HOW I CAN SUPPORT YOU ON AMAZON:

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Is Amazon Right For You? Mini Strategy Session

Amazon Account Audit

Amazon Launch Package

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Mentioned in this episode:

Amazon Account Audit Checklist

Whether things are going well on Amazon or you feel there’s room for improvement, this free audit checklist will help you review the areas that matter. It’s based on the process I use when I audit client accounts and is a simple way to spot opportunities to strengthen your setup. Grab it here: https://checklist.vickiweinberg.com/audit

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Transcripts

Vicki Weinberg:

Welcome to the bring your product idea to life podcast.

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This is the podcast for you if

you're getting started selling

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products, or if you'd like to

create your own product to sell.

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I'm Vicki Weinberg, a product

creation coach and Amazon expert.

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Every week I share friendly practical

advice, as well as inspirational

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stories from small businesses.

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Let's get started.

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Hello.

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So in today's episode, I want to demystify

Amazon for you, because you might be

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selling on Amazon now, it might be

something you're thinking about, perhaps

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you're in discussion about it, and you

might have heard loads of terms and

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phrases that you just don't understand.

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Um, lots of acronyms, you just

don't know what they mean.

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And so what I wanted to do in

this really brief episode is give

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you the ultimate A to Z guide.

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So I'm going to talk you through lots

of terms and phrases and acronyms you'll

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hear around Amazon and explain to you

exactly what they mean in a really simple

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way, um, to make life easier for you.

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So this might be one of those episodes

that you prefer to actually read, so

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there is a blog post to accompany this.

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Um, I think that would also be useful

even if you do listen to this episode.

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And by the way, I hope you still

do listen because I, um, depending

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what type of learner you are.

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I mean, I know that I, am better

understanding things when I

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hear them rather than read them.

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Um, and of course we all are

different, but it might be that you

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want to listen to this episode and

then go and bookmark the blog post

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so you can refer back to it easily.

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So with absolutely no more ado or waffle

from me, I'm going to get straight in

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and talk you through my A to Z of Amazon.

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So the first one is A9.

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So A9 is the name of the Amazon

algorithm and I covered the

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algorithm in another episode.

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So I'm not going to go into great

detail now, but basically the Amazon

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algorithms' main goal is to show the

customer the most relevant products,

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whatever it is they've typed into the

search bar and they're searching for.

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So A9 analyzes every listing

in really great detail.

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It figures out what the listing is

about, it looks at the sales history,

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it looks at other performance metrics.

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So reviews is something that gets

looked at here, and then decides which

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listings they're going to show you.

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And I should say that A9 also does

all of this in like nanoseconds,

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which is pretty incredible.

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So if you hear someone talk

about A9, that's what they mean.

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It's basically Amazon's way of deserving

which product listings go on the front

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page when a customer makes a search.

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The second thing I'm going to

talk about is A plus content.

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This is quite a hard one to

describe, um, because it's something

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you need to look at visually.

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But essentially, A plus content is that

additional content you might see when you

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scroll down a product listing on Amazon.

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So this is extra descriptive content,

and the type of things you might see

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are large images, some infographics,

some extra text, there's sometimes a

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comparison table at the bottom of A plus.

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This is something that's available to all

sellers who have Amazon's brand registry.

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Don't worry, I will talk about

brand registry when I get to the Bs.

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And it's definitely something

worth considering if you're

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selling on Amazon because it just

provides a way for you to add extra

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information to your product listings.

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Um, and, you know, make them look

really professional and help you

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stand out from everyone else.

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The next one I want to talk about is API.

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API stands for Application

Programming Interface.

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This is something that you, by the way,

may never ever come across, but I wanted

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to mention it just in case you do.

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And it basically is a way for,

in a simple term, it's a way for

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computers and different systems

to communicate with each other.

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So, for example, you may need to set

up an API between Amazon and your

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distribution centre if you wanted your

distribution centre to manage your

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orders, and rather than it all go via

email, you wanted it to connect up.

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So perhaps so your stock is aligned and

all orders go through automatically.

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For example, that's just one

of the ways you might use API.

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You also might use it if you were

using a third party, um, applications

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such as jungle scout, perhaps to

request reviews or to track how well

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you're selling or anything like that.

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So if you want to fight, get another

application to connect with Amazon,

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you do that via what is called an API.

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The next one I'm going to talk about is

ASIN or ASIN, depending how you say it.

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So this is a unique 10 character

alphanumeric identifier

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for a product on Amazon.

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It always starts with a B0 and yes,

it has 10 characters and is linked

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to a unique SKU or EAN or ISBN,

basically a unique product code.

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And it is used by Amazon as a

reference to manage your products.

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This is an attribute that

is assigned by Amazon.

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So when you set up a product listing, you

would tell Amazon the SKU if you wanted

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to, and you would provide the EAN or the

ISBN code unless you had an exemption.

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And the ASIN is something that

Amazon attributes to your product.

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Something that makes it unique, something

that's different between a SKU and

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an ASIN, is you can have two ASINs.

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So for example, you might have your

product listing set up twice because you

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want to offer fulfillment by Amazon, which

we'll cover and fulfillment by yourself.

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And so you would set up the

product twice with the same ASIN,

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but crucially a different SKU.

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Um, one would be for you to fulfill

and one would be for Amazon to fulfill.

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I promise that's not as complicated as it

sounds, but just know that you can have,

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to a sense, for that purpose and all of

the reviews, the sales history, the image,

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the text will be aligned across to do.

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Our next B is brand

registry and brand registry.

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It's a free program where you can verify

your brand to access enhanced analytics.

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Brand protection features

and other features on Amazon.

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So for example, if you have

brand registry, you get

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extra advertising options.

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You get to use a plus content and

a brand story, which is something

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we've spoken about earlier.

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It is completely free to apply.

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And all you need to do is have

a registered trademark in the

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country in which you're selling.

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So for example, if you're listening

from the UK, as long as you have a UK

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registered trademark, you can apply

for brand registry on Amazon in the UK.

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The next thing I want to talk about is

something else you can have if you have

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brand registry, and that is a brand store.

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So you can think of a brand store

as a mini website just on Amazon.

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So you can have all of your products

here with links to buy them, you can

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have extra information, you can put

videos in there, you can have a page

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all about your brand, you can do all

kinds of things in a brand store.

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And if you sell a range of products,

I particularly think this is

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a super useful thing to have.

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Next thing we're going

to cover is brand story.

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So I mentioned A plus content earlier.

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So A plus content is that additional

content I mentioned that you would see

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on a product listing that gives you lots

more information about that product.

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A brand story is also a type of A

plus content, but this would apply

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to all of the SKUs across your brand.

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So this is where you might share

information about your brand values,

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about the founders, about your

mission, your goals, whatever it

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is, but it's information that's

brand specific, not products.

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specific and it sits above the A plus

content on your listings and again you do

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need brand registry in order to have this.

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Next we're going to

talk about browse nodes.

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So browse nodes are basically a

numerical code which are used to

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identify an Amazon product category.

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So you probably know that When

you list your products on Amazon,

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you have to choose a category.

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Each category has a code, which

is also called a browse node.

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You won't hear this

talked about very often.

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The only time this might come up is if

you decide to use a flat file upload,

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which is basically a spreadsheet.

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Add your products to Amazon.

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You will be asked to

provide the browse nodes.

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Um, handily, if you do this, they

will tell you which one to use.

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It will be in the sheet.

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But if anyone asks you for a browse

node, that's basically what it is.

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It's the code that identifies

the correct category.

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Our next B is BSR, which sells,

stands for bestseller rank.

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So this is basically information

you can see on any product listing

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on Amazon that says how well that

product ranks in a particular category.

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Um, personally, I do know that

people will sometimes want to list

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in certain categories over others

because they feel they have a

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better chance of ranking higher.

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But honestly, I don't think that many

customers actually look at this ranking.

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So while it, you know, is nice to

know where you, where you rank among

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all the other similar products on

Amazon, um, as long as you're happy

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with your sales, personally, I

wouldn't get too upset about this.

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The next thing I want to

talk about is bundles.

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So these are single items that can be

identified with different ASINs and

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are sold together as a single offering.

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So at the moment in the UK,

if you want to sell bundles.

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So you want to sell groups of products.

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You do have to set them

up as groups of products.

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So you'd have to set up a

separate bundle listing.

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If you're fulfilling orders yourself,

this is obviously really easy.

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If you are fulfilling orders via

Amazon, you would need to send the

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products in your bundle into Amazon.

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Packaged up as a bundle.

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If you are selling products in the U.

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S.

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you can, they actually have a virtual

bundle tool now where you can create

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bundles of any products in your catalogue.

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Um, it's super easy to set

up, um, works really well.

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And I mentioned this because

what usually happens is anything

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that's offered in the U.

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S.

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ends up being offered in the U.

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K.

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in sort of 6 to 12 months.

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So hopefully sometime in

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easily sell bundles in the U.

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K.

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too.

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My final B is buy box.

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So the buy box is the area on the

Amazon product detail page where

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customers click an orange button and

add the product to their shopping cart.

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So it usually says buy now or add to cart.

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Buy box is something that can be an

issue when you first start selling

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on Amazon because you don't always

have it and that is really annoying.

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Um, people can still buy your product,

but unfortunately, without the buy

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box, you can't do any advertising.

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And of course, you've probably heard

me say advertising on Amazon is a

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great way of getting those fair sales.

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So if you don't have the buy

box, um, unfortunately, the only

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things you can really do are

trying to get sales and reviews.

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Um, that's the only way around it.

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And I appreciate it, that's

a really hard thing to do.

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When you don't have the buy box

and you can't advertise, it's one

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of the things that Amazon seller

support, and we'll talk about them

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later, aren't or can't help you with.

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Um, but in every single case where I've

worked with someone who hasn't had the

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buy box, the moment they've got a sale.

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They've suddenly had the buy box.

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So don't lose hope if this is you, um,

if it's something that you don't have

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at the moment and you can always contact

me and I can help you come up with

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some ideas on how you might get that.

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The next thing I'm going to talk

about is a C and that is a child ASIN.

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So what a child ASIN means is, it's

a product listed under a parent ASIN

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and we'll talk about parent ASIN a bit

later and it's basically a variation.

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So you can think of a parent ASIN like

an umbrella, so let's say you were going

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to sell socks, and you sold your socks

in different colours and different sizes.

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So the sock in size 4 in pink would

be a child ASIN, as would the size

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5 in pink, and the size 4 in blue,

and the size 5 in blue, and...

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All of the other options would

be what is called a child ASIN.

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You heard me mention this

one earlier and that's EAN.

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So the EAN is the

international article number.

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So it's basically your barcode number.

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That's a really easy

way to think about it.

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You can use different numbers.

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You might not have an

EAM for your products.

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You might have a GTIN.

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I'm not going to use that in this glossary

because it'll get really confusing,

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but basically this is an identifier

that you've registered with GS1.

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That's the only place you

can now buy barcodes from.

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You register your products with GS1

and you get your barcode numbers or

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EAN and you provide these to Amazon

when you set up your listing, unless

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you have some sort of exemption

that means that you don't need to.

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My next E is EBC, which stands

for Enhanced Brand Content.

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So this is basically the equivalent

of A plus content that is available to

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Amazon vendors and when we get down to

these, we'll talk a bit more about that.

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My final E is EFN and what EFN means

is the European Fulfillment Network

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and the way this works is that you can

choose to have all of your stock stored

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in the UK in a UK Amazon distribution

center, but you can set up product

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listings in other European countries

and Amazon will fulfill those orders

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using the stock based in the UK.

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That is the simplest

way of explaining that.

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Which moves us on nicely to FBA.

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So FBA is where, again, you send your

products into Amazon for them to store

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and deliver to customers on your behalf.

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And the standard FBA, or fulfilled

by Amazon, is where you send in your

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products, again to a fulfillment center

in the UK, and your UK orders are

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all fulfilled using that FBA stock.

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FBM, or fulfilled by merchant, means

that you are fulfilling orders yourself,

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so you're listing your products on

Amazon, but when an order comes through,

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you are distributing it yourself,

whether that's from your home, a

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fulfillment center, or however you do it.

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And this leads us on very nicely

to Pan EU or Pan EU FBA and this

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basically means that you're holding

FBA stock in the UK and at least

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two other countries in the EU.

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And then if you are doing that,

you can then fulfill all the

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other companies in Europe from

these three distribution centers.

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Well, actually from two distribution

centers, because, um, unless you're

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doing EFN, you can't use your UK

stock to fulfill the European orders.

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So you have to hold stock in two

different European countries, and

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then you can fulfill orders in all

of the European countries from these

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warehouses, these Amazon warehouses.

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Um, there are lots of VAT and

tax implications of doing this.

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So I'm, this is designed just

to tell you what the terms mean.

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If you want a bit more information

on how it works and how that would

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work for you and what the tax

implications are, then I definitely

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recommend looking into this a bit more.

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There are lots of different options

for fulfilling orders in Europe and

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it's definitely something to look

into in detail before deciding.

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My next P is parent ASIN.

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So as I mentioned earlier when I spoke

about child ASINs, this is, you can think

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of this product as an umbrella, it's

not actually a product, it's kind of a

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placeholder that groups products together.

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So if you have a product that has

different variations, a parent

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ASIN is something you set up, it's

not an actual product, it's just

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a holder under which all of those

child ASINs or variations sit.

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Next P is Prime.

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So Prime, as you probably

know, is Amazon's subscription

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service for free delivery.

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And if you have Amazon Prime, then

you also get other things like

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Amazon music and video and, um,

all kinds of other good things.

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I've had it for so long, can't

even tell you what I have.

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So if people talk about Prime,

that is what they're talking about.

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And if you fulfill your orders by

FBA or fulfilled by Amazon, which

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is where Amazon, so, um, stores and

delivers orders for you, then customers

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who have Amazon Prime can benefit

from that because they get free next

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day or sometimes same day delivery.

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Moving on to R and my only R is

ROAS, which is return on ad spend.

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So this basically describes how

much revenue you get in return

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for your advertising budget.

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Um, so it's basically a way of saying for

every pounds you spend on advertising,

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how much are you making in sales.

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That's the easiest way of describing that.

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That is the measure that I use when

I'm managing advertising on Amazon.

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Um, you don't have to use that.

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Um, you can use ACOS or actual

cost of sale, but ROAS is something

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that most people use to sort of

measure how well ads are performing.

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My first S is Seller Central.

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So Seller Central, which you

may have heard of, is the portal

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that you use to sell on Amazon.

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So the first thing you would do if you

were looking to sell your products on

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Amazon is set up a Seller Central account.

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Next is Seller Support.

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So Seller Support is basically

Amazon Seller's Customer Service.

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I guess you could call it that.

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I'm not going to say any more about them.

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I've recorded episodes before

on approaches to handle

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Amazon customer service.

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I think the only thing I will say is, um,

it's probably not what you would expect.

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Um, but know that if you have an issue,

seller support is who you can go to.

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My next S is shipping plan.

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So what this basically means is if you

are sending stock into Amazon for FBA, so

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for Amazon to fulfill for you, you need

to set up what is called a shipping plan.

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And this is basically where you tell

Amazon what products you're sending

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in, how many of each, how big they are,

what they weigh, how you're sending

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them in, you know, so how many boxes.

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And you put all that information

in, you generate some shipping

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labels, and then you're all ready

to send your stock into Amazon.

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A SKU, spelt S K U, is something

that I mentioned earlier and this is

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the way of identifying your stock.

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This is probably familiar to you,

um, you probably or possibly use

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SKU codes for your products now,

if you're selling on Amazon.

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My best, I don't know if this is an

advice episode, but I would say if

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you have SKU codes already and you

use the same ones on Amazon, that'd

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be really helpful, particularly if you

are planning on linking up with another

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system to align your stock, for example.

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And my final S is Sponsored Products.

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So Sponsored Products is what some people

will be referring to is when people talk

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about Amazon's advertising portal, which

is actually called a campaign manager.

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Um, but lots of people will talk

about Amazon sponsored products.

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You'll hear me talk about it as well.

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And that is basically Amazon advertising.

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Um, there's lots of things you can

do other than sponsored products.

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So you can do sponsored brand ads where

you're showing a range of your products.

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There's all kinds of other advertising

available, but if someone mentioned

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sponsored products to you, what they're

talking about is Amazon advertising.

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Variations we have covered, I

think, when we were speaking about

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parent ASINs and child ASINs.

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So variations is, as I said, when you're

selling a product and you have different

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sizes, colours, flavours, whatever, you

know, whatever it is of the same product.

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Vendor Central, and I promise we're almost

there, Vendor Central is very similar to

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Seller Central, and this is for sellers

who are using the Amazon Vendor Programme.

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And the way Amazon Vendor works is that

you, Amazon take orders from you to

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buy your products from you directly.

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Um, they buy those products from you

that you still manage the product listing

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and any advertising and everything else,

but they are shown as sold by Amazon.

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So you're selling your products to Amazon.

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They then retail them on Amazon with the

listings that you set up and for whatever

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price they decide and you can, you know,

set your RRP with them and then that's how

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:

that system works and RenderCentral works

slightly differently to sell essential.

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Um, but that's what

that's system is called.

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And my final final one is a Vine.

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So Vine is an Amazon programme

where sellers can register their

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products to receive reviews

from verified product testers.

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I believe to be a vine product tester,

you have to already be buying a lot on

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:

Amazon and reviewing a lot on Amazon.

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:

And it's not just volume, but also writing

like really good quality reviews as well.

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:

And if you are someone who's

doing that, you might get

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invited to be a Vine reviewer.

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:

And this basically means that you

have the opportunity to have products

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:

for free in exchange for a review.

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:

And as a seller, it means that you

are offering your products for free.

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So you might say to Amazon, I

will give you 20 products that

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:

you can send to Vine reviewers.

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Amazon will then say to their pool

of Vine reviewers, we've got 20 of

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:

these, who would like to review one?

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:

And they get sent them and

then they leave a review.

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:

Um, you also pay a fee to

do that, I should mention.

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:

And there is no guarantee that they

will leave you a positive review.

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:

So it's not about getting good

reviews, it's about getting reviews.

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Although of course, if you've got a great

product, which I'm sure you do, then

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you should get a great review as well.

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:

So that is my fairly quick run through

of lots of Amazon terms that you may or

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:

may not have heard of and what they mean.

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:

Um, had to take lots of

breaths while recording this.

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That's an awful lot to say.

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:

I don't know if I've missed anything.

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I...

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Ask my Facebook group, for example, for

examples, I asked some clients for things.

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Um, I use some of the ones that I know

that I came across when I started.

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Um, so hopefully I've

covered most of them.

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:

I'm sure I've missed out a few.

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If there were any Amazon terms that

you have heard of and you're thinking,

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:

I really don't know what that means.

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:

Please just send me a message

and I can let you know.

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:

So thank you as always for listening

and I will see you again next week.

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Thank you so much for listening

right to the end of this episode.

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Do remember that you can get the

full back catalogue and lots of free

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:

resources on my website vickiweinberg.

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:

com.

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Please do remember to rate and review

this episode if you've enjoyed it

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and also share it with a friend

who you think might find it useful.

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:

Thank you again and see you next week.

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