We’ve experienced a lot of economic uncertainties, ups and downs in the stock market lately. All this volatility has caused fear about a recession looming on the horizon – and panic amongst online store owners to recession-proof the products they sell.
That being said, now is the time to be proactive, not worried. Online store owners and e-commerce brands are indeed just as at risk of economic downturns as brick-and-mortar companies. Luckily, there are steps you can take to recession-proof Amazon products and safeguard your business.
In this post, we’ll lay out 12 Amazon marketing strategies that online store owners should focus on to recession-proof their businesses. We’ll also show you how to stay a few steps ahead and minimize any damage in case of a dreaded economic recession.
Strategy #1: Monitor Your Expenses
One major way to mitigate risk is to first minimize your expenses. As they say, you want to stop the hemorrhaging first. To do this, monitor your expenses closely and pay attention to any excess expenditures. You will also want to work on minimizing your overhead costs where possible.
Here’s the thing:
There may be times for experimentation and testing out new marketing strategies, but now is not that time. With the threat of a recession coming our way, you want to avoid any wasteful spending or testing any new strategies for the time being.
Strategy #2: Automate Your Business
Making sure your business is optimized and running smoothly can ensure the kind of efficiency you want and need at a time like this. The question is, how can you make your Amazon business run on autopilot? Here are a few ideas for automating your business to minimize spending:
- Use helpful tools that manage tedious tasks for you (Ampd for automated Google Ad optimization is one of our favorites)
- Spend your time doing things that increase revenue
- Use your employees' strengths to delegate easier, time-consuming tasks
- Ask yourself which tasks could be done using automated software instead of humans
Ensuring your business is running seamlessly can save you a lot of time and free up your money-making resources. Above all, an organized, well-operating business increases your bottom line and the likelihood of selling for a higher multiple when you exit.
Strategy #3: Optimize Google Ads To Amazon
What’s another way you can recession-proof your Amazon fba business? Optimizing Google Ads is a big one. Optimizing your ads management is one of the quickest, most profitable ways to increase your conversions, and what’s a better way to scale your business than that?
If you’re not already using Google to drive traffic to your Amazon listings, you’re missing out. Chances are your competition is already leveraging this strategy and getting ahead.
This off Amazon marketing strategy of generating higher rankings and sales volume plays perfectly into Amazon’s strategy, which is to attract shoppers from the internet at large – not simply their marketplace. This is so important to Amazon, they pay you to do it. That’s right. Amazon offers a Brand Referral Bonus for bringing them those vital external customers.
If you’re wondering how to increase Amazon sales by doing this, Ampd can help. Our team and software specialize in optimizing Google Ads to dramatically increase conversions for Amazon sellers. Sometimes, the best defense is an offense. In this case, the most promising way to defend against a recession could be to get more conversions for your business.
Strategy #4: Don’t Stop Marketing
Don’t stop marketing...ever. It sounds counterintuitive to encourage more media spending in a recession. But Amazon marketing strategies must continue, recession or not, because your competition will likely stop. If done right, these always-on marketing efforts will make your brand and products stand out. The bottom line: keep ads running, even if it’s done with a low ad spend.
If you need to figure out how to increase Amazon sales, maintaining a presence and staying relevant on social media is key. This alone can help keep your brand alive, make a connection with a massive audience of potential customers, and will even lead to new conversions. Additionally, you’ll want to make sure you utilize email marketing if you haven’t already.
We'll dig deeper into the benefits of email marketing in a few, so keep reading!
Strategy #5: Understand Your Customer Wants & Needs
One of the key ways to recession-proof your e-commerce business is understanding what your customers want – and delivering on all of it. You should always, always make customer service a priority. That’s nothing new. With the current economic atmosphere, it’s even more important.
Some ways of learning and delivering on customer needs are by answering customer questions immediately and being highly responsive, helpful, and friendly. These positive brand characteristics will uphold your reputation as a quality Amazon seller that cares and keep customers loyal to your business, resulting in more positive reviews and more sales.
Strategy #6: Use Email Marketing
To expand on our previous Amazon seller tip, it’s worth investing time (and some resources) into email marketing. In fact, we suggest you go big...but why? The truth is, email is one of the most effective Amazon marketing strategies out there because it keeps leads warm and customers nurtured when Amazon makes it difficult to communicate with customers. Plus, email marketing is an extremely cost-effective way to cross-sell other items in your product line and keep sales flowing in.
You can automate how you grow your email subscriber list by using product inserts that highlight product warranties and/or offers for future purchases in your Amazon storefront. You might even want to consider buying quality email lists because email marketing can be such a powerful tool that protects the future of your business on and off Amazon. You can even use these email lists to retarget customers on a variety of platforms like Google Ads.
Strategy #7: Keep Current Customers In The Loop
If you’re not leveraging your existing customers, you’re missing out on sales and brand building opportunities. You’ve worked hard to land them, so make sure to offer them even more value. This is where remarketing comes in handy.
How remarketing works:
If you have a consumable product or multiple products in your product line, you can market to and retarget past customers to increase their customer lifetime value and your sales velocity. Give them an offer they can’t refuse – like trying a newly launched product at a major discount in exchange for their feedback in an Amazon review.
If it’s an irresistible offer that aligns with their interests and you’ve done everything right up until that point in terms of customer service, you’re likely to get that sale.
Strategy #8: Stock Inventory Wisely
Just as it’s important to find out how to increase Amazon sales, It should be just as much a priority to stock wisely. Be strategic about it. Figure out what products are recession-proof. Some products boom in a recession, and that’s what you’ll want to focus on.
Similarly, you will want to move underperforming products now that are not likely to sell in a recession. Get them out while you can, and stock fewer of those items as things become more economically volatile.
Strategy #9: Optimize Your Pricing
Optimizing your pricing strategy is also key to protecting your Amazon business in tough economic times. You can do this by making sure you have a pricing plan for the coming year so that you’re staying organized and ahead of the ball. You also want to ensure you stay competitive without lowering customer confidence or underpricing since this can hurt your brand’s reputation down the road.
Look at factors like your previous year’s sales fluctuations, seasonality, and product trends. Knowing how to properly price your products to keep sales consistent or increasing is key to surviving a recession as an Amazon seller.
Strategy #10: Keep Your Amazon Listings Honest
You know the saying…honesty is always the best policy. At least, if you want to uphold your brand’s name to a high standard. Doing so only leads to beneficial things like higher customer ratings, more positive Amazon reviews, higher conversion rates, and a lifetime of brand loyalty. Optimize your listings and be completely honest and transparent in your product detail pages.
Don’t forget about:
Images and videos! Product images are among the most important aspects of your success as an Amazon seller. High-quality professional images, graphics, and attention-getting videos can help to boost conversions and demonstrate to potential customers exactly what they’re paying for and receiving.
The bottom line? Honest and accurate listings lead to more satisfied customers and positive reviews.
Strategy #11: Have a Strong Brand
This may be Marketing 101, but it’s worth mentioning when facing economic turmoil. It’s more important than ever to establish a strong brand and brand story – one that can withhold the test of a recession. If you haven’t quite developed your brand from a foundational level, now is the time to give your brand identity and brand story some extra love and attention.
Consider what sets your Amazon products apart from others on and off Amazon, and scale into that. Create a brand that builds trust with shoppers and makes them feel good. They need to be confident in what you’re selling as much as you are. Look at the best-selling Amazon brands for inspiration and strive to outperform your competitors.
Strategy #12: Utilize Videos
Videos have become today’s hottest commodity for entertainment. Utilizing videos is our final, but no less valuable strategy because today, content is king. You can use Amazon product videos to stay relevant in the social media game and Amazon search results by investing in product videos, user-generated content, influencer videos, demo videos, and more.
The best part:
The content you post doesn’t have to expire. It’s a tool that can work for your business for many years to come. It’s recyclable and re-workable, making it an underestimated strategy for Amazon listing optimization and even Google Ads or Amazon PPC.
Recession Proof Your Amazon Business
If you’re worried about trying to recession-proof products and your Amazon business as a whole, don’t stress. Instead, be proactive and implement some or all of these Amazon sales tactics immediately. Taking the right steps now will protect your business and ensure its survival throughout the coming economic uncertainty.
Follow these 12 strategies listed above, and discover a faster, more efficient way to get more Amazon conversions using Ampd for Google Ads.
