What is the Amazon Choice Badge? (Plus How to Get It On Your Product Listing)

Having choices is good. However, too many choices can stress customers out—leading to negative emotions and even decreasing their likelihood of buying a product.

Nowhere else do customers have as many product choices as they do on Amazon. There are dozens of variations of the same product. Additionally, several sellers could be selling the same product. Many customers often struggle to pick; then, they either don’t buy at all or just go for the lowest price.

Amazon knows that customers face this dilemma, so they work to create ways to combat this choice overload. One method they came up with was the Amazon’s Choice badge. Getting this recommendation could help in making more sales on Amazon––positioning your brand as the marketplace-approved option. Read on to learn more about the Amazon Choice badge and how to earn it.

What is Amazon Choice?

The US population is growing, and with it, the percentage of US households with voice assistant devices. As you can see, voice commerce is a fast-growing e-commerce trend; though, voice commerce brings about a problem for customers—filtering through results to arrive at the right product.

Amazon sees this, so they created Amazon’s Choice to assist with voice search, making it easier for consumers to find the product they want. That said, Amazon’s Choice has evolved beyond just voice search, showing up on products in the app and web browser. Acquiring the Amazon’s Choice badge can help with all forms of Amazon commerce.

How Amazon Choice Works

When a customer begins voice shopping, Alexa looks at the customer’s previous orders to suggest the top products. This works fine when the customer has already shopped in that category; but Alexa needs a way to recommend products in categories the customer hasn’t bought from.

That’s where the Amazon Choice badge comes in. Amazon Choice helps Alexa’s algorithm find the best products in this new category and recommend them. For example, if someone has never purchased a laptop from Amazon before, Alexa will recommend the laptop with the Amazon’s Choice badge, as well as similar laptops. Sometimes, Amazon will show several products based on price range, too.

Now, Amazon isn’t clear about how exactly the algorithm works, but it’s based upon numerous factors discussed later.

Amazon Choice vs. Best Seller

Amazon already has another badge sellers can own: the Best Seller badge. When an item has this badge, it generally means it has the most sales out of any item in that category.

On the other hand, Amazon’s Choice is more of a recommendation by Amazon based on several factors. It’s meant to most closely represent what the customer is searching for while considering how good a seller is.

Ideally, you want both badges to draw the maximum amount of attention to your items.

Benefits of the Amazon Choice Badge

Earning the Amazon Choice badge brings about several benefits:

More Voice Search Sales

As mentioned, voice commerce is set to explode in popularity. Many predict that voice commerce will be a $40 billion industry by 2022. On top of that, 85% of customers trust Amazon’s recommendations when it comes to voice sales.

With these statistics in mind, the Amazon Choice badge will help capture more of the voice search market. By grabbing Amazon’s Choice, you can snag most of these sales since your product will be one of Alexa’s top recommendations.

Improve Your Search Ranking

Products with Amazon’s Choice badges tend to land at the top of the searches for the right keywords. They’re usually right above or below the Best Seller item. Obviously, this means more voice sales, as discussed. Additionally, you’ll also earn more revenue from sales through m-commerce and web browser sales. Since you’re making more sales, your general search rankings will increase, too.

No Need For Large Sales Volume

Unlike the Best Seller badge, you can attain the Amazon’s Choice badge without large sales volume. What matters more is nailing the right factors—which comes down to making the listing and product match as closely as possible to what your customer wants, while also being an excellent seller to buy from.

How to Get the Amazon Choice Badge On Your Products

What’s excellent about the Amazon’s Choice badge is that the steps you have to take to earn it will naturally boost your sales. From there, you’ll gain the badge, then make even more sales.

Become Prime-Eligible

Becoming eligible for Prime opens you up to plenty more sales from Prime users. You’ll be able to offer expedited shipping, increase your chances of winning the Buy Box, and improve your search visibility.

In that, you’ll also boost your chances of getting Amazon’s Choice. In fact, it’s pretty hard to earn Amazon’s Choice without Prime eligibility.

You can become eligible for Prime through Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) or Fulfillment by Merchant (FBM). The process differs depending on which path you choose.

FBA

When you join FBA, your products are automatically considered for Prime. No further action is needed, aside from keeping up on your various seller metrics and KPIs.

FBM

FBM sellers handle supply chain logistics. Thus, Amazon makes them do some extra work to make sure they’re up to Amazon’s standards.

If you do FBM, you’ll have to join the waiting list for Seller-Fulfilled Prime (SFP). Once Amazon puts you in the program, you’ll be in a probationary period. To pass the probationary period, you have 90 days to fulfill 50 orders while hitting these requirements.

• Ship over 99% of your orders on time
• Have an order cancellation rate under 0.5%
• Offer your customers premium shipping options
• Use Amazon’s Buy Shipping Services for at least 99% of your orders
• Deliver orders with Amazon-approved carriers
• Agree to and follow Amazon’s returns and refunds policies
• Allow Amazon to handle customer service inquiries
• Show you can fulfill orders with “zero-day” handling time

Use the Right Keywords

Nailing the right keywords is a central factor in optimizing any Amazon listing. But it’s even more crucial to getting your Amazon’s Choice badge. Your goal is to fit your target customer’s search as closely as possible.

Revisit your listings and refresh your keywords. Make sure your title, bullets, and description are filled with keywords but don’t do keyword-stuffing. Amazon can detect when keyword density is too high and may penalize you for keyword stuffing.

Get Positive Reviews

Customers spend 31% more after reading positive reviews. After all, trusting other customers is much easier than trusting the seller.

Since Amazon is customer-centric, a strong record of positive reviews also plays a part in getting the Amazon’s Choice badge. Always ask your customers to leave feedback on your product and their experience. Make sure to respond to your reviews—especially negative ones. Show genuine care for your negative reviewers and see how you can help make things better. They’ll sometimes turn their negative review into a positive one.

Improve Your Customer Rating

Again, the customer is at the center of Amazon’s success. Amazon’s putting their reputation on the line (to a degree) when they recommend a product to customers. Amazon thus puts a heavy emphasis on customer rating when handing out Amazon’s Choice badges.

In general, you’ll want to keep your return rate as low as possible while making more sales. This, again, involves making your listing as accurate to the product as possible. If your listing is true to your product, you’ll have fewer customers demanding returns.

Make Your Products THE Choice on Amazon

Some debate if chasing the Amazon Choice badge is worth it. Many care more about the Best Seller badge.

However, as mentioned, statistics show that many people choose whatever Amazon recommends first. Regardless, pursuing the Amazon’s Choice badge will naturally result in improvements to your presence on Amazon—higher search rankings, more customer reviews, lower returns, and more.

If you’d like help becoming Amazon’s Choice, reach out to Seller’s Choice. We’re experts on all things selling on Amazon. Contact us today to learn more!