The algorithm has changed again! Sellers: Ad conversions have deteriorated

When something is abnormal, there must be something wrong!

The horn of the 2024 cross-border e-commerce peak season has already sounded, but recently, Amazon sellers have encountered various situations. In addition to the hot issue of both traffic and order volume, sellers have also found that the advertising system is very unstable and the advertising conversion rate fluctuates extremely. Something must be wrong when things are abnormal, and sellers have speculated that Amazon's algorithm is going to change again.

Amazon's advertising algorithm has been adjusted again? A large number of Amazon sellers have advertising problems

According to feedback from the affected sellers, the effect of advertising orders was good before, but now the advertising conversion rate is like a roller coaster, with no pattern at all:

One product's advertising budget was too high to cover the cost, even with higher CPC. Another product's advertising budget was over budget .

Starting from October , the advertising space was suddenly lost and the advertising pages often displayed abnormally .

The core keywords that have always been stable in the front row have become unstable.

Me too, and the advertising costs are getting higher and higher, but the number of orders has not increased.

Previously, the conversion rate of advertisements was 20%, but recently it is only 5 %.

Naturally , the ranking fluctuates, and sometimes disappears.

…

Xiao Zhao, an Amazon seller, said that recent advertising conversions are very confusing. An old link that was originally very stable suddenly saw a sharp drop in ranking and sales. The ad clicks were more than usual, but the conversion was very poor. The competitor's link ranking not only did not drop, but instead increased a lot.

Xiao Zhou also encountered a similar situation. In the past week, the search ads were occupied by clicks, and the daily advertising budget was spent, but the sales were zero. "Compared with this week, the previous conversions were simply heaven." Xiao Zhou said.

Xiao Liu's situation is more complicated. It is understood that without any operation or adjustment , his advertising sales may be very good today, but there may be no orders tomorrow. The advertising conversion rate fluctuates extremely exaggeratedly. In this case, he has no idea how to adjust and optimize.

In addition to the abnormal advertising conversion, the natural traffic has also been complained by a large number of sellers recently. Many people have encountered the situation of "natural traffic ranking suddenly dropped sharply and sales were cut in half". However, a small number of sellers said that without doing anything, the natural traffic of a certain link suddenly increased sharply and the product was sold out.

In response to this situation, sellers speculated: Has Amazon adjusted its advertising algorithm again? An industry insider revealed that Amazon has indeed adjusted its algorithm again, and the search relevance team has released a new algorithm model. One of the main reasons for the current situation is the algorithm update.

Amazon's search algorithm has been adjusted, and the proportion of natural traffic has increased

The above statement has yet to be officially verified. However, a recent tracking data from momentum commerce shows that Amazon has completed the adjustment of its search algorithm, and for well-known brands, the proportion of natural traffic has increased.

After observing the 10,000 most searched brand search terms, it was found that during the brand search process, more consumers first saw natural results rather than paid advertising space.

Taking popular brand search terms in the beauty category as an example, in October 2024, 18.7% of the natural search results for popular brand search terms on Amazon’s US site were the first result, while this proportion was only 17.3% in September and only 12.9% in August.

This trend started to pick up after the Prime Big Deal Days , with the share of brand terms in “organic first” SERPs (search engine results pages) steadily increasing.

Search algorithm changes further favor well-known large brands. Amazon prioritizes important brand terms over search advertising revenue , and the platform would rather rank top organic results at the top of the SERP than let smaller competing brands take the top spot through product promotion or brand promotion .

This has undoubtedly accelerated the ranking changes in various categories . Traffic is concentrated on the top brands, and the living space of some small brands or non-brand sellers has been further compressed.

The system pushes cheaper white-label products! The price of products on the Amazon platform is lower

In addition, as consumer shopping trends change, Amazon is adjusting its push results based on market demand.

Many studies have shown that consumers' peak season shopping time has been advanced. Not only do they purchase in large quantities to give gifts to each other and celebrate holidays, but more and more consumers are looking for discounted products as gifts for themselves. To this end, Amazon has begun to promote early holiday promotions . In the first five days of November, the share of products on the platform with limited-time promotion labels increased slightly.

Looking at unbranded search results related to the holidays also shows that sellers' product prices have dropped 11% compared to the same period in 2023, further proving that retailers like Amazon are running holiday sales earlier than ever before , and consumers are preferring discounted and competitively priced products.

Changes in shopping preferences of some consumers have further prompted the platform to promote cheaper, unbranded products to consumers. For example, the search terms "gifts for men" or "adult stocking stuffers" ranked 16th and 35th respectively. And Amazon prioritizes promoting low-priced household items. In the past two years, observing the natural search results for holiday search terms during November and December, the top five subcategories that appeared were glassware and drinkware, beauty sets, blankets, night lights, and portable Bluetooth speakers.

Amazon prioritizes these low-priced white-label products, probably because they are easier to convert. For high-end products, it is almost certain that these popular gift search terms will still be "pay-to-play" during the holiday season, and sellers need to be prepared for high click costs (CPC) and lower conversion rates.

Amazon is pushing cheaper products to consumers in categories such as home furnishings. In addition to catering to consumer demand, industry insiders believe that the platform is also trying to launch a counterattack against low-price platforms such as Temu.

As we all know, Amazon reduced the commission for its low-cost apparel products on January 14, 2024, and now this move has achieved significant results. The study found that the selection and sales of clothing under $20 on Amazon's website have increased significantly. In detail, from the time the commission change took effect to August 31, the number of individual clothing items on the platform priced under $20 increased by 27%. In the 32 weeks of the clothing commission change, the sales share of low-priced clothing increased by 13%, compared with -0.4% in the same period last year.

At present, a new round of peak season battles for orders has begun. Amazon sellers are facing siege from external platforms as well as a series of adjustment challenges within the platform. Whether it is Amazon’s recent advertising changes or the platform’s preference for promoting cheaper white-label generic products to consumers, these have hindered the operations of some sellers to a certain extent. A group of sellers may seize the opportunity and see their sales soar.

Amazon Platform