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analyzing competitors’ sales data, using its customer review networks—to steer shoppers to its private
labels—a product category that we hypothesize as having the largest margins for the company. As a novel
example, it leverages its voice-recognition technology to steer consumers to its products. When consumers
ask Amazon’s Alexa to buy batteries, they get only one option: AmazonBasics.
Amazon also behaves in an exclusionary manner when deciding product order on search results pages. For
example, if you were to search for batteries, you would likely see a large sponsor ad at top—for which, big
brands, such as Duracell, pay up to six figures per month—closely followed by AmazonBasics batteries,
which are flagged with badges that denote them as “Best Seller” or “Amazon’s Choice,” two highly
influential badges for driving onsite conversion. The underlying parameters of the two badges are not fully
transparent and have led to speculations in the market. While the “Best Seller” badge strongly relies on past
sales, and is therefore less susceptible to Amazon’s influence, the parameters that lead to “Amazon’s
Choice” are highly controversial.
According to Business Insider, the badge mainly relies on the following
parameters: low return rate, high customer ratings and best-seller ranking.
Other possible factors are image
size and quality, low price, and fast shipment.
Most of these factors are critical because they are
susceptible to influence by Amazon. For example, customer ratings can be influenced by the Amazon Vine
program (discussed below). Similarly, the Best Seller rank is determined by Amazon. Shipment by FBA is
also treated preferentially over third-party delivery shipment.
The third category of products that appears high on the first search engine results page (SERP) are
“Sponsored Products.” Sponsored products are products for which the third-party seller pays a fee each
time a customer clicks on the link—hence, simple ads.
To become a Sponsored Product, products must
be eligible for the Buy Box.
To be eligible for the Buy Box (the yellow box where it says “add to cart”),
third-party sellers have to meet multiple factors—again, not fully transparent—that are set by Amazon.
According to insiders the most important conditions for Buy Box eligibility are: fulfilment method, either
by FBA, Fulfilment by Merchant (FBM) or Seller-Fulfilled Prime (SFP), fast shipping, high stock
availability, good customer feedback, and low price.
However, it is important to note that the lowest price
will not guarantee the inclusion into the Buy Box.
Similar as with the other two labels, Amazon exerts a
lot of power on the inclusion (or exclusion) of sellers into the Buy Box and therewith on Sponsored
Id.; see also Amazon, AmazonBasics,
https://www.amazon.com/stores/AmazonBasics/AmazonBasics/page/947C6949-CF8E-4BD3-914A-
B411DD3E4433.
Dennis Green, Here's what it means when an item is marked 'Amazon's Choice' (Aug 4, 2018)
https://www.businessinsider.com/what-is-amazons-choice-2018-5.
Dennis Green, Here's what it means when an item is marked 'Amazon's Choice' (Aug 4, 2018)
https://www.businessinsider.com/what-is-amazons-choice-2018-5.
RepricerExpress, 21 Ways to Rank Your Products Higher on Amazon (last visited May 6, 2020)
https://www.repricerexpress.com/rank-your-products-higher-on-amazon/; Marc Schenker, Amazon SEO: How
to Rank Highly for Amazon Searches (August 27, 2019),
https://www.wordstream.com/blog/ws/2018/05/17/amazon-seo.
Amazon Advertising, Sponsored Products, https://advertising.amazon.com/products/sponsored-
products?ref_=selld_s_acq_1478168135&ld=NSGoogle.
Amazon Advertising, Sponsored Products, https://advertising.amazon.com/products/sponsored-
products?ref_=selld_s_acq_1478168135&ld=NSGoogle.
21 Ways to Rank Your Products Higher on Amazon, RepricerExpress (last visited May 6, 2020),
https://www.repricerexpress.com/rank-your-products-higher-on-amazon/.
Amazon Buy Box: the ultimate guide, Repricer Blog (last visited May 6, 2020)
https://blog.repricer.com/resources/amazon-buy-box-ultimate-guide/.