#323 – Tips for Product Images, Video, A+ Content, And More

Today, we speak with Saddam Hasan and Kamaljit Singh of AMZ One Step to talk about various topics on the current strategies that work to improve your Amazon sales. From listing optimization to product photography to A+ content, and how you can utilize all your digital media assets to promote your brand inside Amazon. 

Make sure to listen to the end as our guests share the different “auras” of an Amazon product and how to improve your main image by using the 4-step “label it” strategy.

In episode 323 of the Serious Sellers Podcast, Bradley, Saddam, and Kamaljit discuss:

• 02:30 – The Pakistani Wedding Story From The Groom’s Perspective
• 04:30 – Where To Find Saddam’s Backstory
• 06:30 – Kamaljit’s Backstory And How He Got Started In E-commerce
• 10:30 – What Is Helium 10’s Trusted Partner Directory?
• 12:00 – Photography Studios Based In China And All Around The World
• 17:00 – When Is The Best Time To Get A Complete Shot For Your Product
• 18:30 – 3D Rendering Vs. Photography
• 20:30 – What Working For Video Assets Today
• 22:30 – Having A Second Video For Your Listing And Other Placements
• 24:00 – What Is The Most Common Thing That Sellers Need Improvement On
• 27:30 – International Marketplaces That We Need To Focus On
• 29:30 – Using International Models For Your Images
• 31:00 – What’s Working For A+ Content In 2022
• 36:00 – The Auras Of An Amazon Product
• 37:00 – 4 Step Process For Your Main Images Plus The Label It Strategy
• 39:30 – Increasing Your Customer Lifetime Value
• 41:30 – Catch The Helium 10 Buzz Live Every Wednesday!

Transcript

Bradley Sutton:

Today, we’ve got the founders of the Canada based Amazon agency, AMZ One Step, one of the largest companies out there providing photography and listing optimization services for Amazon sellers. So they’re gonna share with us everything that they see that is working on Amazon in 2022. How cool is that pretty cool. I think

Bradley Sutton:

Hello everybody, and welcome to another episode of the Serious Sellers Podcast by Helium 10. I am your host Bradley Sutton, and this is the show that’s a completely BS-free unscripted, and unrehearsed, organic conversation about serious strategies for serious sellers of any level in the Amazon or Walmart world. And we’ve got a couple of individuals here on the show who help tons of serious sellers out there. We’ve got a Saddam and Kamal, how’s it going guys

Kamal:

Going pretty well. Bradley. How about you?

Bradley Sutton:

I’m doing just delightful. You guys have been listening to this podcast, you actually heard a little bit ago that you know, some of my adventures in Saddam’s wedding and how I went to the wrong wedding. So, you know, check out the episode. I did recently with his sister who actually works for Helium 10, Lailama. I don’t remember what number that is. I think it might be 312, but you’ll have some fun stories there, but, but thanks again, Sadam for inviting me to your wedding, my first wedding there in Pakistan. And I was able to see Peshawar, which is a beautiful city. I went in the marketplace, you shop in that marketplace? Or that, you know, that one I went to, you weren’t with me, but where it’s just all kinds of endless streets with street vendors and other stores.

Saddam:

You know what, I’ve only been there a few times. So it is, you did get the local experience so to speak, but yeah, it was great to have you at the wedding. I’m glad that I was the one giving you that experience to be at a Pakistani wedding. And I’m sure, you know, you covered a story on your side, but from my end, I was at the wedding. And funny enough before the wedding, just random people were messaging me asking about your schedule. And I’m like, who are these people I need to maybe cooperate. Maybe they’re just planning the schedule out for Bradley. So I gave them more information, but it was just random people just texting me throughout the week, either on Facebook, even LinkedIn. And then on the day of the wedding, I don’t see you for a few hours and I got a little bit worried cuz it was Peshawar.

Saddam:

And I kept asking my sister I’m on stage guys. And I kept asking my sister where Bradley is, have you heard from him? And her phone was off for some reason. So luckily obviously, you know, we got in touch with Bradley, you, even my partner Anis. He was at the wedding and I told him maybe he’s at the men’s side because weddings in Pakistan, you know, we have segregation between men and women and all the action happens on the women’s side. So I didn’t know if Bradley was stuck on a men’s side, just talking to some random person, but he wasn’t there, but it was good that he finally got there and–

Bradley Sutton:

I came at the perfect time. It was right when your sisters just started to dance. I got to see all of your dances and a lot of choreography went into that. I mean, that was like 15 dances. I think overall that were all choreographed dances. So it was kinda like, just like you see in the movies guys, it was pretty cool experience and really great food as well. So thanks again for inviting me over. Now, you and your wife are now back in Canada?

Saddam:

We are. Yes.

Bradley Sutton:

Excellent. Excellent. All right. Now, first of all, Saddam, by the way, guys has been on this show before. So if you wanna get into like more of his backstory about how he got into e-commerce, you know, look up his name on helium10.com/podcast us. I don’t have the exact episode number there, but it should come up and it’s really great. How interesting how his story went from, I think he wants to do something super boring before like banking or accounting or something like that. And now he’s living the life you know, working and helping Amazon sellers. Now, this is the first time Kamal has been on the show and both of you founded AMZ One Step together. Is that how it works?

Kamal:

Yeah, it’s yeah, that’s correct. You know, w are, you know, both the founders. It’s a funny story, you know I was actually an Amazon coach. I used to, you know teach people how to sell on Amazon. And you know, I was organizing one meet up there. So, you know, Saddam showed up with, you know, with one of his friends and he was over mutual friends. So that’s where we met. And I was already working on, you know, AMZ One Step, a little bit, you know, Saddam was, you know, one of, you know, he was really interested in how to sell on Amazon. He learned how to sell on Amazon. And then, you know, one of the meters on the Saddam, you know, you sound like a really smart guy, you know, you wanna be a part of AMZ One Step and he was you all in for that. And since then, you know, we’ve been together again.

Bradley Sutton:

Okay, cool. Now, I kind of like call you guys sometimes the United Nations of the Amazon world, because, you know, typically not this doesn’t go for everybody, but you know, sometimes people who don’t know much about, you know, geopolitical or different things, you know, the one thing they know, like, wait a minute I thought people from India and people from Pakistan, like, they’re not very friendly to each other, but here one from India, one from Pakistan and you guys have joined together to make a company. And you’re not trying to kill each other or fight each other or things like that. Huh?

Kamal:

That is true. That’s quite a story, you know Indians and Pakistanis, you know, they don’t get along really well when they’re in India and Pakistan, but once you move out of Indian-Pakistan, once you’re, you know, living in USA or Canada, if you’re just one, you know, there’s–

Bradley Sutton:

I love it.

Kamal:

Yeah.

Bradley Sutton:

So Amazon world breaking down barriers and bringing people together. I love it. Now, let’s talk a little about your backstory, Kamal. Cause since this is the first time you’ve been on here, like, you know, were you born and raised in Canada?

Saddam:

No. I moved to Canada in 2010. I was born and raised in India. So I finished my high school year. So I moved to Canada for electronics engineering. So I took that for about three years in Niagara Falls, right across the boarder. So took, took that and, you know then I moved to Calgary did telecommunication job for about two to three years then, you know, all of a sudden somehow I found, you know, a YouTube video, how to start selling on Amazon. Started doing some retail, arbitrage, joint arbitrage, wholesale. Then I ended up doing a private label.

Bradley Sutton:

Well, what made you even get into that? Like, you weren’t really satisfied with that job that you had or was like, yeah, I don’t know if I wanna do this the rest of my life or what even made you look for videos on selling online.

Kamal:

There is an interesting story, you know, behind that. So when we were students, you know, we were a bunch of, you know, we were like five guys living in the house, you know, three guys upstairs, and there’s two guys in the, in the basement. And one of the guys living in the basement, you know, I think it was in 2013 and he always did in his room and we were always asking him, Hey, let’s just go out. Let’s go out and hang out and, you know, have some fun, but, you know, he was always locked up in his room and all of a sudden, you know, after two to three years, you know, all of a sudden he started posting on Snapchat. Hey, I teach people how to do Forex exchange.

Saddam:

You know, you can do trading and stuff like that. He was into Bitcoins and cryptocurrencies back in the days. And you know, he started doing well, I message him one like, Hey, you know what, I wanna learn Forex exchange too. If you’re making that much money, teach me as well. And he is like, Kamal Sure. But I do charge $2,000 for this and that’s USD, which is like 2,700 Canadian. I’m like, but bro, you’re my friend, you know, we, we live together and you’re like, I, I know, but you know, this is what it is. I’m like, okay. So can I split into three different installments? Cause I didn’t have money that time. He’s like, ah, Kamal, that’s really tough. You know, maybe save up some money and come back later after, you know, maybe three or four months.

Saddam:

And I kind of, you know, I kind of took that to heart. I’m like, oh, you know what, there’ something I need to do better with my life, you know, not just go to the job and come home and watch TV. And that was the moment when I realized that, okay, I’m not just gonna sit home and watch TV. I need to find something of which what he did with his life. You know, he was locked in his room, he was learning crypto. He was learning Forex exchange. And I kind of followed, I was inspired by him and I followed his route and that’s how I found the YouTube video. I started learning watching like how to make money online and on YouTube. And there’s one he showed up and he was teaching how to make money on Amazon. So I heard of Amazon selling before, but that moment and that video had me started.

Bradley Sutton:

Cool. Go ahead.

Saddam:

That guy ended up being our client by the way. So yeah. Good story.

Bradley Sutton:

I love it. You know I always ask this kind of back stories because it just shows, you know, sometimes I think there’s a feeling out there that, ah, man, you know, there’s no, you know, I can’t get into Amazon, you know, like I’m a veterinarian or I work as a nurse’s assistant or my education was about geology. Like, you know, what knowledge do I have to get on Amazon? But I’ve asked this now over 300 guests and not, no two people have had exactly the same backstory about their education or the exact same backstory about how they got into e-commerce or what their first jobs were. So it really, you know, the point I try and make when I ask these questions is guys, you can come from any background and really get involved in, e-commerce, you know, there prerequisites as it were for it.

Bradley Sutton:

So, it was nice to hear your story. Now, let’s fast forward. You know, you guys have AMZ One Step, which is a part of our trusted partner directory. For those of you guys who don’t know out there, we have a directory of partner service providers who offer services and things like shipping and photography and things that Helium 10 doesn’t have, but, you know, Amazon and sellers need. And so they were one of the first members that we had of that directory AMZ One Step. So make sure to go to directory.helium10.com, you can find their contact information and find out about what they do and, and other companies do. But I really like interviewing people who are agencies, as well, as opposed to just individual sellers, because you guys have a lot more experience or a lot more varied experienced because you’re dealing with like, you know, 50 to a hundred different sellers at a time.

Bradley Sutton:

And so you’ve seen a lot more as a singular seller, as far as like crazy things that happen on the good side or on the bad side. Now, one of your main things of how you guys came into my network was you kind of have a good reputation of having some great photography studio. And a lot of sellers have told me good things about how they send their images to you and you can do videos and stuff. And so we’re actually in the midst of a case study right now. I know we’re, you know, for Project X where we sent you all of our Project X and we’re like, Hey, let’s do new photoshoots and we’re gonna repurpose this for Amazon post. And then we’re gonna use some to update our A+ content.

Bradley Sutton:

So we’re not gonna talk too much about that because we’re doing a detailed case study and we’re gonna come up with blogs and some videos about that later on. But one thing that we haven’t really talked about much in the show, and you guys also do, which I didn’t know until like one month ago or two months ago is you guys have actually like a photography studio based in China. Do I have that right? Okay. So then I’m assuming then the advantage of that is like, if I’m in Canada, I’m in the USA, I’m in Europe and I’m sourcing from China instead of having to have samples FedEx to me and, and, you know, pay possibly more money, you know, in my country that I can just send it. And it gets there the next day in two days to your studio, is that mainly the kind of people who use your services over there?

Kamal:

Exactly. You know, for example, if you have an oversized product, you know, it would cost you, ship ton of money, you know, shipping that product to either Canada or USA. And also it will take a lot of time and plus paying customs and everything. So that saves that problem. If your manufacturer is in China, you can ship your product directly to China studio, not just that, you know we also have models from different demographics. So it’s not like, you know, you’re getting Asian models only. You can get like models from like any demographics. So I think it saves you time. It saves you money and it’s, it’s a lot quicker and easier. So I think that’s the benefit of having a studio in China. For example, if you’re a seller, who’s like, you know who’s selling oversized products, or if you have like multiple products, if you have like maybe a hundred SKUs or 500 SKUs and you need consistent photography or videography, then having a studio in China is one of your safest bet.

Bradley Sutton:

Okay. Cool. We’ll definitely try that out. You know, I have another Project 5k case study product that, you know, it’s not new, but the images are dated, I think. And we’ll get that a try, and I’ll give you guys a report on how that works, but I think that might be new. So a lot of people like, you know, maybe they’re like, Hey, no, I don’t want only, you know, Asian models, you know, there’s, there’s people with blonde hair, there’s people with blue eyes, there’s people who are Latino, who are living in China and work as models. And so you can kind of pick your, your demographics. You know, there’s old people, there’s young people, you know like you can kind of pick your demographics. That’s pretty cool. Now, now then Saddam, like what’s why would somebody use the Canadian studio that you guys have? Like, I’m assuming it costs a lot more money for a user to use your studio in Canada as opposed to China. So like, in what circumstances is it better to use like your North American studio

Saddam:

A hundred percent? So the reason behind the Chinese studio was essentially to help expedite the branding piece. If you’re launching a product and it’s in China, you can ship it to Chinese studio. Similarly, there’s a lot of products that are being manufactured within North America. Let’s say supplements for the most part are manufactured within the US or Canada. So it makes a lot more sense to have another base studio in all these different countries, including, you know, we have one in the UK, if they prefer a European touchpoint, then that’s what we give them. So in those cases, usually clients prefer to send to the Canadian studio. Another thing that we’ve noticed is with our Canadian studio, of course, we have a little more diversity. So last year we created our own custom studio and think about it as a massive Ikea store where you have different rooms differently staged like a bedroom, gym setting, washroom kitchen. There’s a lot of these settings available within our studio. And I’m happy to do you a virtual tour with you someday, Bradley.

Bradley Sutton:

Didn’t know that I thought you guys were just doing like renting out Airbnbs or something like that to do. I didn’t realize you had all that in-house man.

Saddam:

Exactly. And the whole premise behind that was to create a production house. So if you go to like video sets, movie sets, I mean in Hollywood, it just takes care of a lot of additional issues. So you have all your lighting equipment there, you have all your production crew there, you have all the props staged there. And you will notice when you have everything in one place the end results also come out phenomenal. So usually, when they compare between different studios, the agencies, or freelancers that are using maybe Airbnbs and hotels they have to take care of a lot of different steps. And as a result, sometimes the quality gets compromised.

Bradley Sutton:

Yeah. Yeah. So, now just, just some kind of best practices. I mean, we have Lailama here talking about a lot of this already, but something we didn’t really cover is, for example, like, let’s say I’m doing the initial photo shoots. You know, regardless if I’m doing it in the Chinese studio or I’m doing the Canada studio, or I’m doing it myself, like what’s the best practice. Like, should I just focus for that first shoot, if this is a brand new product on only my main images, like my main image, and then, you know, the supplementary infographics and lifestyle images, or should I all at once start doing a whole bunch of other like shots that I eventually would use once I do A+ content or once I, you know, try and, and make my store storefront my brand page or if I want to put it in social media or should I wait to do those until I kind of get some idea about what my customers really appreciate about my product? Or should I just go ahead and take care of all that from day one?

Saddam:

So it’s going to depend on number one, your budget, and number two, your end objective. And the second part is more important. So a lot of people think about budget, you know, okay. I have a few hundred dollars to spare, let’s say on the images they get the necessaries done and they launch the product. But ultimately you need to ask yourself the question, are you trying to create a brand or are you just trying to make a product move on Amazon? If it’s the brand that you’re after, then everything needs to be taken care of regardless whether you do it on day one, or you do it after a while, once you have brand registry access, I would recommend once you approach an agency or you have someone vetted go for the complete shoot, so that shoot should have raw assets for your images for A+ content video, as well as the storefront, everything should be taken care of because what’s gonna happen is down the line if you do the images first and afterward, you do A+ content from, let’s say someone else, it’s not going to have the same consistency that you need to have for a brand to be successful and have a consistent brand messaging across all platforms.

Bradley Sutton:

Okay, good to know. Now, Kamal, when would you suggest like maybe I’m not, I think you guys offer this as well, but just in general, 3d renderings as opposed to photography, should it be a mix or if I go one, if I’m doing any 3d rendering, I need to make all of my images that three renderings and not have it look weird because some are photography might look different. Or can you talk a little bit about that?

Kamal:

Yeah. So I think it’s a great question. So it’s a mixture of everything. So at first, we need to take a look at what your competitors are doing. For example, if in order to get you that click, if your competitors are doing 3d rendering, then we have to go that route. And second, let’s say, if there are not, what kind of product it is? Is it a transparent product? Is it a highly reflective product or is it you know, depending on like what your product is, then we decide if we wanna go with the 3d rendering or not. Let’s say we do decide that we want go with the 3d rendering route. Then the main image has to be 3d rendered just because it looks so flawless, but we’re when it comes to the lifestyle images, it has to be a mixture of 3d rendering plus, you know, the stock footage where you can Photoshop them together so that it looks real. If you’re going to render the entire lifestyle, it’s not gonna look real. And also it’s gonna take longer and it’s also expensive. So, the best practice is to have a mixture of both of them.

Bradley Sutton:

Okay. All right. Switching from pictures or photography a little bit, let’s talk about videos, you know, back in the day, unless you were like a vendor, you can even do videos. So this wasn’t even a topic, you know, but now there’s multiple ways that you can use videos with your Amazon listings. You know, some of them are in your main image stack. Another common use would be for video advertising sponsored brand video ads. So I’m sure, I’m assuming that you guys, you know, handle tons of customers to do both what’s working, what’s not working, you know, the last few months in the video world for, for each of those different use cases.

Kamal:

Okay. So what’s working at the moment is the highly engaging in action with visual references, those kind of videos are working really, really well at the, at that moment, you know, back in the days when everyone was using the pure white background and with some infographics and basic editing that was, doing the job, but Amazon is getting like more and more competitive. So if you wanna stand out, just think of this as not just a listing video, but a product ad, you have to engage your audience in the first few seconds, maybe start your video with the highly engaging content. Let’s say, if we’re selling you know, for example really sturdy glass, maybe compare it with something, the glass cup falls down and it breaks. And so that it captures that moment. So, the lifestyle videos are working really, really well when it comes to the listing or PPC video or wherever you wanna use that. So I would say lifestyle video which connects emotionally are working really well at the moment.

Bradley Sutton:

What would you guys say is the ideal length, like, do you suggest to customers, or do customers, you know, ask you, or what do you, regardless of what your answer is like, what would you say is the ideal length for like a product image stack video, and what would be the ideal length of like a sponsored brand video ad for somebody to film?

Kamal:

For the video add ideally 20 seconds is what you wanna aim for. But for the listing video, depending on what kind of product there is and what you wanna–, let’s say if it’s a testimonial video, you can go with the 40 to 45 seconds. If it’s like how to use or how to assemble kind of a video. It may extend as well, because now you’re not trying, it’s a problem solving or instructional video that can be longer too. So it really depends, for the listing video it really depends what your motive is, but for the video ad, 20 seconds is the sweet spot where you wanna be.

Saddam:

And just one thing I’d like to add to this is we can upload multiple videos to your listing. So let’s say for some products that are more, you have to create an infomercial, or you have to educate the customer first. It’s a supplement that was clinically tested as an example that study, or if it’s a long video, you can put it essentially as a second video on the listing as well. And what we also need to keep in mind is there are other video placements. So as an example, you can put a video on the storefront, same with A+ premium content. You know you can put a video there. So I would highly encourage taking advantage of all those other placements to especially storefront you know, you have access to it if your brand registered. So even for storefronts, same kind of concept, you want it to be sort of an elevator pitch. What is your store about, what kind of products there are, and more and more now a is it’s becoming important to talk about the brand as well. How did you guys create the brand? What’s the inspiration behind it? Just like you do with your podcast, you know, the same kind of story that resonates with customers that then become part of that ecosystem and promote the brand outside of the platform.

Bradley Sutton:

Okay, good to know. Now, this next question is kinda like for either or both of you. Again, I’m assuming this, but I’m assuming that sometimes clients reach out to you. They just want you to kind of like do an audit on their whole operation and like, Hey, you know, do I need listing optimization? Do I need new images? You know, what about my keywords and things? So, you know, you guys having so many different clients, can you talk about what is one of the biggest things or the most common things that’s like an easy win that you guys kind of take over them. And that in other words, that the sellers they’re doing really bad at, like, what’s the most common thing that you guys are improving for them? Is it their images? Is it their, their keywords? Are they doing something stupid with their bullet points? Or what is it?

Kamal:

Yeah, I can take that maybe. So, you know, we have one of the call directions on our website is the listing audit. And we do lots of listing audits every single month. And, one of the most common ones, which is the low hanging fruit, is the main image. You know, what you can do. First thing what we do is look at the brand analytics search for the main keywords, see what are the top three most click ASINs and what are they doing differently? And we do just a keyword search on the Amazon as well, and see if their main image is really standing out or not. So I think main image is the smaller piece, but it has the huge impact on your listing because the more people that opens up the gateway you’re listing just by changing the main image, or just by optimizing it so that get that click is the low hanging fruit and which many sellers are doing it wrong. And that’s one of the first thing that we point out, Hey, you know what, your click through rate your competitors are getting, you know 15% click share on that specific keyword looks like you’re not even on the top three. It’s like, you know, it’s gonna be, it has to be less than 4%. So, you know, those are some of the low hanging fruits with the huge wins that we see.

Bradley Sutton:

Interesting, any more, Saddam?

Saddam:

I was gonna say sometimes it’s what I see common is sellers don’t understand what the issue is. So at times I would just run a Cerebro report and show them that problem is not the conversion. It’s the traffic. You know, you’re not organically ranked on any of the keywords, and from the looks of it, there’s no sponsored listings on any of the keywords either. And just to show them that data, you know, helps them quite a bit. And then we can navigate from there, whether, you know, they want their advertising strategy fixed. And like Kamal said, if it comes to creatives or if it comes to just a product page itself main image of course is a big one. The other one is that again goes back to the debate, right? Do you go with a freelancer or do you go with an agency?

Saddam:

Because what I find is when I audit these listings the sequence of images is not sought out from a standpoint of conversion. So it’s usually a designer or a photographer doing all those images and they don’t understand how to do that research. I’m all for DIY photography, because that’s done by the brand or the seller themselves. But when they outsource to an external photographer or designer, their expertise only lies in that specific area. It’s either design or photography. They don’t have image optimization specialist. They don’t have a team of photographers or designers to create that whole project and make that conversion ready for Amazon.

Bradley Sutton:

Interesting. All right. That’s really good to know. As we know–, I don’t know, there’s something like 16, 17 different Amazon marketplaces, you know, from Japan to Israel, to Netherlands and just a bunch of new ones too. I know you guys have clients all over the world. I’m just curious, like, are there any particular marketplace where you guys have just thought, man, like, it seems like more people are all of a sudden, you know, interested in this marketplace, I’m sure Amazon USA is probably your biggest customer base, but are there any other international marketplace as you think we, we need to start paying attention to because you see some trends moving in that direction.

Kamal:

I think Germany is one of the interesting ones after USA, you know and UK, Germany the listings third, most, you know the country where we have done the listings for is Germany basically. So I think that should be on the lookout for. And we haven’t seen much on Australia or any other countries other than, you know, in the European side. I think Germany has the potential. I don’t know if Saddam has seen anything else.

Saddam:

Yeah, yeah, no completely Germany. I think if there’s one more European country that we start seeing, I think the whole EU is going to pick up, right. Because essentially with one subscription, you get access to all of them. So UK and Germany, for sure.

Bradley Sutton:

Okay. Now, speaking of that, and also going back to what we were talking about having different races of, of models there at your Chinese office. And I’m assuming you have that at, at, in Canada too, but, but like, let’s say I sell on multi marketplaces, like for my lifestyle images, should I be, for example, using Indian models, if I’m gonna be selling an Amazon India if I’m in America, should I use North American, Western-looking people et cetera, you know, if I’m selling the UAE, should I have, you know, models that come from that region or you pretty much, Hey, just use the same images, the same lifestyle images with the same models for any marketplace.

Kamal:

I think we haven’t really come to, you know that kind of situation before where you need like different models for different marketplaces. And what we believe in, Bradley, is it’s not the lifestyle environment, or it’s not the more which sell your product, it’s your product with the visual references, which makes the difference. You know, so as long as you’re–, let me give an example of a visual reference. If you’re selling you know, anti-slip bathroom mat, you know, there is a one image. I came across, there’s a pregnant woman, you know, she’s just stepping out of the bathroom and she’s, she’s just stepping on that mat. It just shows that it’s the extreme emotions and it doesn’t really matter what kind of phrase what kind of, you know what kind of model or environment there is, as long as the image is speaking for itself. Now the buyers that are gonna think, wow, the pregnant lady is using this product, which it has to be safe. You know, it’s an anti-slip so models and the locations they’re the secondary, but how we’re trying to cap that picture and how we’re trying to showcase that benefit and feature of the product is more important than models.

Bradley Sutton:

You know, that’s good to know because if your answer was the opposite I say, that means, oh, there we go. Another thing we gotta budget hundreds of dollars more if we have to take different images with different models, so I like that. Now, A+ content I haven’t updated A+ content on Project X in a while. Actually, Lailama is working on that project with Shivali here. There we go, there’s another Indian and Pakistani collaboration there. I told you, Amazon is bringing countries together, but anyways for you guys, for your clients, is there a certain template that you’re like, oh, this template is outperforming the other templates or, or every single A+ content needs to have this certain module or, use this kind of theme, or make sure not to use images that you use in your image stack for A+ content. What are some tips and tricks you can give us about what’s working in A+ content these days?

Saddam:

Yeah. So there are some best practices. We first want to see the whole catalog of the store. You know, if there’s any opportunities for cross-selling as an example, we will definitely do a comparison chart module. It’s the only way where you can hyperlink different products on your product page without Azure paying for it. So you can do it through sponsored listings, but again, that’s paid. Then we look at the nature of the product. Do we need to forward–,

Bradley Sutton:

Wait a minute. Are you saying that an A+ content–, I see this shows you how long I’ve been away from this in the, A+ content. There’s a module that you can add where you can actually hyperlink and have an image, like a thumbnail of your products. Like, if I have the black coffin shelf and I have a green and blue and red, I can put that right there in my A+content and somebody just clicks and it goes to it?

Saddam:

Affirmative. Yes.

Bradley Sutton:

I didn’t even know that. Oh my goodness.

Saddam:

Yeah. So that’s what I’m saying. So again, A+ content, that’s a great cross-selling opportunity where you can not just hyperlink and put an image, you can actually give their features as well. So that customers know exactly which one is better suited for their needs. We also look at the nature of the product, if it needs to be something that we need to purely focus on the premiumness, let’s say it’s a home decor product. As an example, coffin shelves. We want to showcase maybe hero shots of the product so that people can take a better look at the quality and the material that is made out of. If it’s a product where we need to educate the customer, then we will use or reference modules where we need a lot of content to be inside it. So there are some tricks that we do when it comes to A+ content, as an example, we can merge the banners and we sometimes either make it clean as in just putting all the text within the banners or if it’s more of a professional outlook, let’s say, some brands, they want to be, they want to go for the minimalist approach. Then we just keep it on white and then have a lot of content callouts and have CTAs in there. So that’s my take on it. I don’t know, Kamal if you wanna add.

Kamal:

I think you already touched on that, you know, merging two different modules is a really one of the best ways to make your, A+ content. If you wanna take your, A+ content to the whole next level, just merge modules together and have them on a white background that will, you know your competitors will keep scratching their heads, that how the hell did you guys do this? Because it just looks so clean and you can’t even tell them, what kind of module is this, because you can make it look like a launchpad A+ content. You can make the same, A+ from the basic A+ content, you can make it look like you know, any module. So that’s, that is the beauty of, you know of merging different modules together. So, so to answer you in short, what you can do is merge 970×600 banners. Like you can stack them five and then could design them like a one image, and then, then cut them between 970×600. And I hope I make sense.

Bradley Sutton:

Yeah, yeah. That’s super valuable. I never even thought about that, but yeah, like as long as, you know, they’re not putting border around each module, so then you can just blend them or even if they were putting borders, the borders are white. So, you know, they just kind of blend together. That’s super, super cool. Speaking of this, you know, this actually kind of leads into our next thing that we always do towards the end of episodes is our TST 30-second tip. So I figured instead of just having one each or something, we’re gonna go back and forth for however much time we have left. And each of you can give your 30-second tip of something, you know, kind of unique strategy that you and your team has used, or that you know, is working that you think most of our customers don’t know about.

Saddam:

Yeah. Sounds good. So 30-second tip there is an aura of a product on Amazon and what that aura is consists of three things, what the brand is talking about that product, what the customers say about that product, and what Amazon says about that product. So the brand is basically your digital assets, all your images, videos, A+ content, the customers is your reviews and ratings, work on that. They have to be good. And then Amazon, sometimes if you get lucky or, you know, if you have a superior product, you get these badges from Amazon. So all these three things included actually make the persona of your product. And it gives out an aura which appeals customers at the end.

Bradley Sutton:

I never heard of be being referred to as aura. I like that. I like that a lot. Kamal. What about you? Well, you have a 30-second tip for us.

Saddam:

Okay. So I’m gonna talk about the main images. So your main image is a four step process. One. It has to be attractive. Number two, it has to be clear enough so that people are not guessing it. Number three, should build up that interest, that they wanna know more about it and force that’s when they click on your listing. So this is the four step process for your main image. And the bonus tip would be use a label it strategy. People do not to read. They don’t need to read the title or look at the price or reviews your main image can do this, can renew that click by using the labeled strategy. I don’t know if I can explain the label it strategy in 30 seconds or not. Okay. So if I can–,

Bradley Sutton:

The T in the TST now stands for two minute strategy. So go ahead.

Kamal:

Okay. So how label it strategy works is for example if you search on Amazon, search for protein powders, you’re gonna see lots of bottles and everything, and you’ll see that 25 grams of protein popping out or something. It looks like it’s part of that label, but it’s not. And it kind of deceives the Amazon’s bot system that Amazon would still accept that and try to come up with the years unique selling point, using the label it strategy. Let’s say if your product does not have a label or packaging, how do you use it? Best example is, you know, take a look at the cutting board on Amazon. You’re gonna come up with a bestseller, the person, it’s the gorilla brand. They are the masters of the strategy.

Kamal:

So they have three cutting boards in a set of three different sizes. They have labeled it around, it comes, maybe it comes with the label. Maybe it does not. But they have used their unique selling point as info graphically extra large curing boards, which gives you a competitive advantage. It looks like it’s the label and Amazon system cannot catch it. You have a competitive edge using the label it strategy, and it can be used on many others. And we have broken down the main image strategies into like 12 different strategies. If you wanna take a look at go amzonestep.com/blog. You’ll find that so this is one of the strategies that you can use for your main image. So

Bradley Sutton:

Interesting. I hadn’t heard of that. So since Kamal took, took like pretty much three 30-second tips, Saddam, and why don’t you give us one more tip on your side just to even it out here.

Saddam:

Yeah, for sure. I’ll talk about customer lifetime value. So we talked about A+ content where we have a cross-selling opportunity. There are a lot of upsell opportunities and recurring buyer base opportunities too. So the way to upsell is introduce virtual bundles or give again visual references that Kamal likes a lot. So instead of one lamp show, maybe two lamps and create a promotion around it, buy one, get one 50% off, same thing with recurring clients. So with the help of, let’s say, subscribe and save now the 15% discount that you’re giving to recurring repeat purchases that will be lower than your ACoS. So basically your customer acquisition cost is more than what you’re giving them as a discount to be a repeat customer. So this is how you kind of increase your customer lifetime value, and that’s important in order to establish a brand on Amazon.

Bradley Sutton:

Awesome. Awesome. Right. Well, I knew you guys were gonna be a wealth of information and you definitely have been. Guys check them out, you know, amzonestep.com or you can see their info in the directory.helium10.com. We’ve been using them for Project X and now, like I said, we’re gonna try out their Chinese photography studio services with Project 5k. So lookout for the blogs that talk about that. And so, you know, hit them up if you wanna ask them any questions you guys in social media at all, or any other links you’d like to plug that people can find you guys out there.

Kamal:

Yeah. So you can follow us on Facebook and Instagram. It’s facebook.com/amzonestep, Instagram, instagram.com/amzonestep on Twitter, it’s @azonestep.

Bradley Sutton:

Got it. All right. Well again, thank you guys for coming on here. Thank you for a great employee that we have that came from your company originally. Now, guys, I did not steal her from the company. She at the time was not working for AMZ One Step, but these guys are probably like, we don’t want anybody listening to this podcast here because Bradley might steal you guys a way to come to Helium 10 now, but we’re gonna, we’re gonna bring one of your other employees on to like we have another show called the Helium 10 buzz. So by the way, guys, if you want to get every week you probably hear this on the podcast already, cuz we redo it on the podcast, but you wanna catch it live every week on Wednesdays in our Facebook group at 10:00 AM.

Bradley Sutton:

We have this thing, this show called the Helium 10 buzz where, it’s just kind of like a shortened podcast where we talk about the news stories. And then sometimes we interview people out there instead of like a 45 minute episode like this it’ll be just like a 5 minute. So we’re definitely gonna bring somebody else from AMZ One step to give some more tips and strategies on for photography and listening optimization and things like that. So be on the lookout for that. So again, thank you guys so much for helping us out on our case studies here and for being part of our directory, and for coming in and sharing your secrets and, and tips with our audience. So we’ll be definitely reaching out to you in the future. Again,

Saddam:

Thank you for having us on a podcast. Always a pleasure to be on this.

Kamal:

Thanks Bradley.

Bradley Sutton:

Now, one more quick thing now, Kamal, are you married?

Kamal:

Not yet. I was gonna say at the beginning that you are already invited to my wedding.

Bradley Sutton:

Okay. I was about to say better. I want to go and hopefully, I’ll come to the right wedding this time, unlike what happened to me in Pakistan with Saddam’s wedding. So there we go. No pressure, no pressure to hurry up on that process though. So

Saddam:

We’ll meet him for a few years,

Bradley Sutton:

All right. We’ll see you guys next time.

---

Enjoy this episode? Be sure to check out our previous episodes for even more content to propel you to Amazon FBA Seller success! And don’t forget to “Like” our Facebook page and subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever you listen to our podcast.

Get snippets from all episodes by following Bradley on Instagram at @H10bradley

Want to absolutely start crushing it on Amazon? Here are few carefully curated resources to get you started:

• Freedom Ticket: Taught by Amazon thought leader Kevin King, get A-Z Amazon strategies and techniques for establishing and solidifying your business.
• Helium 10: 30+ software tools to boost your entire sales pipeline from product research to customer communication and Amazon refund automation. Make running a successful Amazon or Walmart business easier with better data and insights. See what our customers have to say.
• Helium 10 Chrome Extension: Verify your Amazon product idea and validate how lucrative it can be with over a dozen data metrics and profitability estimation.
• SellerTradmarks.com: Trademarks are vital for protecting your Amazon brand from hijackers, and sellertrademarks.com provides a streamlined process for helping you get one.