Photo Credit: Rod Foster
There’s a little growth hack that every ecommerce site should be using.
It’s the easiest hack… it doesn’t require money, you don’t need a following, and it works instantly.
But you know what? No one is using it.
Can you guess what it is?
Well, I’ll give you hint… just look at the image above.
It’s not related to SEO, paid ads, or anything else you are used to reading about here on the blog.
The beautiful part about it is no one is leveraging it, which means it works roughly 100% of the time. 🙂
A simple way to get more ecommerce sales
Alright, do you want to know what it is? Well, I’ll give you one more hint before spilling the beans.
If you watched a video like this on YouTube about the best makeup products, what do you think would happen?
There’s a good chance you’ll buy one of the products recommended. And if you don’t, someone else will.
The issue is, it only works if you generate enough video views.
And I have a lot of articles breaking down how to get more YouTube traffic like:
YouTube for E-Commerce: The Art of Selling Without Selling
Is YouTube Worth It? 7.6 Million Views Later, Here’s What I Learned
How to Hack YouTube SEO – 26 Tactics for Gaining Top Results
How to Get More YouTube Views
There is one big problem… there is no guarantee that your video will rank on YouTube or get enough views.
But what if I told you that there is a channel that is highly relevant to ecommerce and you can easily get 20,000 plus views per video?
Best of all, there is no competition and you can do it every single time, without even having a following!
How to get 29,090 video views on Amazon
You already know about YouTube Live, Facebook Live, Instagram Live… and you may even know about LinkedIn Live.
But did you know about Amazon Live?
Just like all of the other live platforms, it works similarly, but the whole purpose is to show off and promote your products so you can drive more brand awareness and sales.
The video above is by Skincare by Alana. Alana presented tips in the video about how to reduce puffiness around your eyes and how to make them brighter.
Can you guess how many views that video received in the first week it aired?
Well, based on the headline above you are probably going to guess 29,090. That is correct. 😉
And all Alana spent was $200 to boost the video.
It’s not just Alana who is seeing massive success… I know 2 other people that are getting similar results, but they won’t let me share their stats as they are white labeling other people’s products and don’t want more competition. 🙁
So how do you get thousands of views from Amazon Live?
Well, there is a simple process… let’s break down how you can do it step by step.
Now before we get into that, I need to be transparent: You are going to find it a bit awkward at first. But after you do it a few times, you’ll find that it is easy and fast.
Step #1: Download the Amazon Live app
You probably have an iPhone or an Andriod device. Log into your app store and download the Amazon Live app.
Although you can view Amazon Live on your desktop computer, you can’t post a video unless you do it from your phone.
When you install the app, make sure you allow Amazon to access everything on your phone. This will come in handy later when you try to upload your slate image. I will get into what a slate image is later on…
Step #2: Open the app
Now open up the app. Once it’s opened it will look something like this other than the fact that you won’t have any videos.
On the bottom left you will see a “Streams” navigational option and that will show you all of the videos you have aired.
On the bottom right you will see a “More” navigational option that shows you all the preferences and options you have.
And to get started, you would click the “+” button at the bottom.
Step #3: Getting started
When you click the “+” button at the bottom, you’ll see a screen that looks like this:
Amazon Live has a cool practice mode feature. I highly recommend you start off with a practice run or two.
Once you get the hang of it, create a real live video. But before you do you’ll want to add products that you want to promote. You can select one or multiple.
As for video source, your phone camera will be the easiest. There are other options as well such as an encoder and other things for video ninjas, but I would just use your phone camera (also known as phone cam) as it’s simple and works well.
You’ll also have to name your live stream. This is where you enter the title of the video.
This is very important because if your title sucks, you won’t get as many views. If you don’t know how to write amazing headlines, check out these posts:
The Step-by-Step Guide to Writing Powerful Headlines
How to Write Headlines People Can’t Help but Click [Formulas Inside]
The Definitive Guide to Writing a Headline that Doesn’t Suck (Tips, Tactics & Tools Included)
How to Boost Your Social Shares Through These 10 Headline Formulas
How to Fail-Proof Your Ad Campaigns with These 7 Headline Formulas
Step #4: Boost your video
It doesn’t take much money to get thousands of views. Technically, you will get thousands of views without spending a dollar. But if you want to spend a few hundred dollars it will go a very long way.
Again, this tactic works without spending any money, but a few dollars can help you get a lot more traction.
Step #5: Schedule or post your video
You’ll have 2 options when it comes to posting your video. You can go live and post right away, or you can schedule your video to go out.
If you haven’t filmed your video during peak hours, I recommend that you schedule it. The last thing you want to do is publish a video in the middle of the night or too early in the morning.
Step #6: Add a slate image
A slate image is a cover image. This is what people see when browsing Amazon Live. Here’s an example of a slate image:
Photo Credit: Rod Foster
Remember how I said you’ll want to allow the app access to files on your phone? You’ll want to do that so you can upload a slate image.
Step #7: Show a banner
You need to show a banner. It will change the number of sales you generate.
You have 2 options when it comes to showing a banner. The first is to share a promotion with the views, and the second is to share a custom message.
When you select the “share a promotion” option, your promotion will be displayed as a banner at the bottom of your video. Customers can click on the banner to apply the promotion to their account.
And when you select the “share a custom message” option, your custom message will be displayed as a banner at the bottom of your video. People can hide the message at any point.
You can test both options, but I recommend that you at least “share a promotion” so it makes it easier for people to get a discount with just a click.
Step #8: Watch the sales roll in
Alana only generated one sale on her first video, but that’s because she didn’t push too hard. She already knows how to drastically improve that number and, in a bit, I will go over how to generate hundreds of sales through Amazon Live.
The other accounts I have access to have generated hundreds of sales through Live. One has generated 391 sales so far from 2 videos and the other has generated 328 sales from 3 videos. And I will share below why they were able to generate sales and why Alana wasn’t.
How to maximize your sales from Amazon Live
Here’s how to get more sales:
Buy equipment – if using your phone, get an awesome ring light and a vertical phone holder. It will NOT record horizontally. This will help improve the quality of your video.
Sell, sell, sell – Amazon wants this feature to sell, sell, and then sell some more. This is the big mistake Alana made and she knows it and will fix this during her next live video. If you don’t sell, don’t expect sales.
Offer a discount – Pick an awesome product, and a deep discount. If you don’t offer a discount you won’t generate over 100 dollars in sales from your live video. If you generate more sales, you’ll typically get more video views because when you sell Amazon makes more money. I know I have talked in the past about how giving discounts is a bad long-term strategy for your brand. I still stand by that. However, live videos are a much different way to sell in the short term and offering discounts will drive many sales and more awareness quickly. Because the offer is only accessible during the Live and nowhere else, this is one of the situations where not only do I think discounts are acceptable but necessary.
Be careful – if you are sending tons of traffic to a product and you don’t generate any sales, you will hurt your Amazon organic rankings. For that reason, you really have to sell. If you aren’t willing to sell hard, Amazon Live may not be for you. If you perform well, it can help with your organic rankings.
Create a sign – hold a sign at the beginning of the video that says “UNMUTE ME” or something like that. Amazon appears to track how many people actually listen to your video, and how long they listen. This should help you get more views and sales.
Hook viewers – making bold statements that are true or telling people what you are going to cover later in the video is a great way to keep people engaged longer. Poor engagement will lead to very little video views.
Build authority – although I told you to sell hard, you need to provide amazing information and tips at the same time. This will help you become an authority and it should boost your sales in the long run. Selling without providing value will make you look bad.
It really isn’t that complicated. As long as you follow the tips above, it shouldn’t be hard for you to generate dozens of sales from each Amazon Live video.
Conclusion
Just like every other video platform, the reach will eventually be limited, and it will be harder to get results. And sadly, there is nothing you can do about it.
For the time being, though, you need to jump on the Amazon Live bandwagon and create as many videos as you can. Once you get the process down right and you are seeing sales, I would create 1 video each and every day.
I can’t create videos on Amazon Live as I don’t sell ecommerce products myself, but you can. That’s a requirement that I can’t get around.
So, what do you think about Amazon Live? If you aren’t jumping to create a video after reading this, you are missing out.
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