Ecommerce can feel like this for many retailers. The vast landscape makes it hard to hook shoppers, and if a retailer wants to succeed they have to invest resources into flashy bait. However, it does not have to be this way.

Imagine narrowing the open waters down to the size of a barrel full of fish. Dropping a line is almost guaranteed success, and it can even be hard to keep up.

This is what it’s like for retailers who sell on the Amazon marketplace, and that’s why it’s important to sell on it.

The Amazon marketplace is chock full of customers, 270m actually. Selling your products to such a massive customer base sounds like a no brainer to any retailer, but of course there are plenty of hurdles to overcome on the marketplace.

Perhaps the most notorious aspect of Amazon is its hyper-competitive landscape. There are more than 2m sellers competing to win customers over, so retailers need to optimize pricing strategies, inventory management, and more to stay ahead.

It’s also important for retailers to improve their customer service and shipping times. Many turn to price intelligence software and inventory management software to stay competitive and profitable.

This helps their chances of winning the Buy Box, which is highly coveted on the Amazon marketplace.

If you win the Buy Box, so many doors can open for you and your business. Namely, visibility in ecommerce, thanks to Amazon’s robust search engine.

It’s so popular that Google’s Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt argued that Amazon is actually Google’s largest search engine competitor. Optimizing your listing with proper keywords and search terms would expose you to millions of customers every day.

But how can you get exposure if you’re a new seller? It’s hard to develop a good seller rating if you haven’t sold anything yet, but that doesn’t mean you’re completely out of luck.

Amazon offers Sponsored Ads for retailers to get exposure with certain search terms. They are cost per click ads, and give retailers of all sizes the ability to get noticed on the crowded marketplace.

Once retailers get noticed on Amazon, it’s time to shine. To wow the customer, the easiest way to manage your services is with Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA).

FBA leaves the shipping and customer service responsibilities with Amazon, so you don’t have to worry about meeting delivery deadlines. And if something goes awry, Amazon will take care of it for you.

FBA can also help you take control of the Buy Box. This level of exposure can help you improve your brand and reputation as a seller. The increase in sales can help you reinvest back into your business, optimizing your strategies on all your selling channels.

Gaining notoriety on Amazon will ultimately help you improve your brand beyond the Amazon marketplace. When customers think about your brand, they’ll think of your prestigious reputation as a trustworthy seller that fulfilled their orders diligently and swiftly.

Taking it a step further, you can implement product listing ads on the marketplace. These ads are cost per click, but they are actually links to your own website. This way you can completely tailor the customer experience to your liking.

Using Amazon as a platform to advertise your site can lead to higher traffic rates, so be sure to prepare your site to turn browsers into buyers with a fast load time, an easy-to-browse layout, and a simplified checkout process.

Amazon is one of the most important marketplaces retailers have to sell on. The shift in retail towards a digital presence shows that Amazon isn’t going anywhere any time soon. If anything, it will only become more popular among consumers and sellers alike.

Act now and start selling on Amazon, before the barriers to entry increase.

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