Most people now know Amazon Prime Day as the year’s biggest shopping day. Prime Day is like the Black Friday of summer. Savvy Amazon sellers enjoy an excellent opportunity to draw in customers and increase sales.
Last year, Prime Day was a huge success, with 300 million+ items purchased and over $1.7B saved in U.S. online spending over two days. Prime Day 2023 has the prospects to be even more significant with eager buyers looking to save big.
The big question is: Are you Prime Day ready? To prepare for Amazon Prime Day 2023 and make the most of it, sellers need to develop an effective strategy to maximize their success on Prime Day.
Continue reading to learn what you should do before Prime Day to maximize sales and make this Prime Day campaign the most successful yet.
Table Of Contents:
- What is Amazon Prime Day?
- When is Prime Day this year?
- Benefits of Amazon Prime Day
- A quick overview of 2022 Amazon Prime Day
- How to prepare for Prime Day as a Seller
- Conclusion
What Is Amazon Prime Day?
Prime Day is a global annual savings event that falls over a two-day period and is exclusive to Amazon Prime members. Amazon introduced Prime Day back in 2015 to remark its 20th anniversary, and since then it is typically held in mid-July.
During this sale, shoppers can expect steep discounts across categories including beauty, tech, home, fashion, kitchen and more. In past years, we saw impressive deals on bestselling products from top brands like Apple, Samsung, and Philips.
The first Amazon Prime Day was a one-day summer retail holiday, which now usually lasts 48 hours. Amazon reveals new deals every few hours during this big event.
When Is Prime Day This Year?
The 2023 Prime Day date has yet to be announced by Amazon officially. They made an announcement in Seller Central on March 30, encouraging sellers to prepare for the big sales event.
We can most likely expect Prime Day 2023 to fall in mid-July, as Prime Day 2022 took place between July 12-13.
Benefits Of Amazon Prime Day
You should be excited about this event and take full advantage of it for many reasons.
Increased Sales
Millions of customers get exclusive deals, discounts and offers during the annual Prime Day event. As a result, participating sellers can benefit from the increased sales and revenue generated.
Exposure To New Customers
Prime Day can be an opportunity to expose your products to a wider audience of potential customers who may not have been familiar with your brand before.
Launching New Products
This is one of the best times of the year to launch and test your new products. If you want to get your brand new products out there and in front of millions of eager shoppers, now is the right time to do it.
Promoting Brand Loyalty
Offering exclusive deals and discounts to Prime members can help you build brand loyalty and retain customers.
Improved Discoverability
Amazon’s algorithm promotes products that perform well during Prime Day, which means you can see an improvement in your product’s discoverability and organic ranking.
A Quick Overview Of 2022 Amazon Prime Day
“Prime Day is a celebration of our Prime members, who look forward to this event every year, and we’re thrilled to have delivered incredible savings to them once again,” said Doug Herrington, CEO of Amazon Worldwide Stores. “This special event is made possible because of the support of our employees, vendors, and sellers, and I want to give a big thank you to all of them for making this a Prime Day to remember.”
Amazon Prime Day 2022 was the biggest Prime Day event yet. Here is the summary of 2022 Prime Day stats.
- Over 200 million customers have signed up for Amazon Prime membership.
- Customers purchased over 100,000 items per minute worldwide.
- Customers purchased more than 300 million items worldwide and saved over $1.7 billion, more than any previous Prime Day event.
- Electronics and Home categories were mostly top-selling.
- Amazon live streaming was a hit with more than 100 million views.
- The average order amount surged to $52.26.
- Men spent more than women.
- Customers supported small businesses and purchased over 100 million items in the three weeks leading up to Prime Day.
How to Prepare for Prime Day As A Seller
You must be fully prepared by the time Prime Day is here. Developing an effective Prime Day strategy requires careful planning and execution. So here are some steps you can follow for a winning Prime Day campaign.
1. Order Inventory
To ensure your Amazon Prime Day is a great success, it all starts with solid inventory planning. Ensuring you have the right amount of stock on hand is vital to maximizing your sales and profits during this big event.
You need to replenish your FBA (Fulfilled by Amazon) inventory for that. If you use FBA, one of the most important things you can do to prepare for Prime Day is to replenish your inventory with the increased demand that comes with this event. You need to start ordering inventory now to have it ready before Prime Day. Amazon says, “Make sure your inventory arrives at our US fulfillment centers by June 15, 2023.”
To get started, closely examine your current inventory levels and evaluate how much more you will need to order. It is also important to check your FBA capacity limits before ordering too much inventory. You do not want to overstock and risk negative impacts on your account in the long run. Be strategic about how much inventory you order and aim to balance meeting customer needs and adhering to Amazon’s policies.
You can read Amazon FBA New Capacity Management to learn more about FBA new capacity limits policies.
2. Optimize Your Product Listings
Ensuring your product listings are up-to-date and optimized for a smooth Prime Day is crucial. Missing out on essential information can make it challenging to manage your listings on the big day, and customers may quickly look for alternatives if they do not find what they expect.
Take the time to review and optimize all aspects of your listings, such as product descriptions, images, customer reviews, etc., so potential buyers have everything they need right at their fingertips. If you are a member of the Amazon Brand Registry program, you can even use the split testing feature to test whether your content is a plus.
3. Pricing Strategy
Budget management is an essential aspect of maximizing your sales during the event. Always think ahead and consider budgeting for Prime Day. Allocating your budget wisely can make a difference in the success of your promotions and advertising efforts.
Before the event, you should ensure you have enough budget allocated to your advertising campaigns and promotions as well as to your inventory.
After the event, you will want to review your sales data and adjust your budget accordingly for future events.
4. Take Advantage of FBM (Fulfilled by Merchants)
One way to make the most of Prime Day 2023 is to create FBM offers on your listings. This program allows sellers to ship orders directly to local customers using their own warehouse (or by using a third-party fulfillment center).
If your FBA capacity limits are too low for what you expect, or you may need more time to ship inventory to FBA, you might miss out on sales. By creating FBM offers on your listings, you can still provide deals and maximize your sales.
5. Offer Customers Multiple Options To Save
As Prime Day is the biggest event of the year, customers expect massive discounts and deals. You can offer multiple ways to save on this big day, including coupons, lightning deals, BOGO deals, and more.
One strategy you can use is to create and distribute coupons to your customers, giving them early access to your inventory. This is especially useful for products sitting in your warehouse for a while or having a low tone-over rate. Amazon charges $0.6 for each coupon, which will appear in a bright green tag next to your listing price.
Another option is to offer Lightning Deals, a limited-time promotion sellers offer. FBA sellers can apply for Lightning Deals by flashing the number of items left in their inventory. These deals instantly grab shoppers’ attention and encourage them to purchase quickly.
You can adjust your listing price to lower prices directly from your listing. Amazon does not recommend lowering your prices, you can do so on big sales days like Prime Day or Black Friday to attract more customers.
6. Target Your Competitors’ Keywords & Products
Targeting your competitors’ keywords and products can be an excellent strategy for Prime Day. By keeping an eye on the CPC (cost-per-click), you can ensure you get a decent return on ad spend. It is crucial to track their prices and inventory levels to find opportunities to capture their sales.
Feel free to get creative with your targeting and messaging to differentiate yourself from the competition.
Conclusion
Amazon Prime Day is a golden opportunity for e-commerce brands to boost their sales, increase brand visibility and reach new customers. Following the tips above, you can ensure your brand stands out and maximizes its Prime Day success.
Take advantage of this most significant shopping event. Start preparing now to make the most of Prime Day 2023.
Have you planned your strategy for Prime Day 2023 yet? Let us know in the comments below!