Four Ways to “Wow” Your Amazon Customers

Customer service is a vital, double-edged sword for your business. On the one hand, it can help you get a major leg up on your competition if executed well. But, on the other, if poorly executed it can severely damage your business.

Which would you prefer?!

And with the uniform nature of Amazon’s website, there is little that can differentiate you from your competitors based on appearance. All product pages look the same. However, once you have successfully earned a sale, you have a perfect opportunity to stand out from your competitors.

Of course, take some time to do your little touchdown dance and enjoy the sale! It’s a nice feeling.

But after you celebrate, it’s time to get down to business.

While I would venture to guess that less than a quarter of sellers have any follow up sequence in place, it is not enough to send just a cursory ‘thanks’ email. If you really want to be a Top Seller, aiming to build a high volume in annual revenue, you MUST be unforgettable in your customer service.

And since sending emails is the only way you can express your appreciation for your customers, I’m going to share four tactics to show your gratitude for your customers.

1. Educate your customers.

Teaching your customers about your product (or topics related to your product) is a win-win scenario. Customers feel like they’re getting more value than they anticipated, while you ensure they understand and use your product properly. And both increase the likelihood of your customer being a happy customer.

So how can you educate your customers?

Whether you include an ebook, infographic, instruction manual, recipes, or more, there are numerous ways to teach your customers about your product. Here are a few examples of how some Amazon sellers are doing just that:

Like this simple ebook:

free_ebook_included

Or this recipe book:

veggie_spiralizer

These added-value products also help increase conversion rates at the point-of-sale. And when considering what type of content to put together as an educational resource, I ask myself some of the following questions:

  • Do my customers need to learn how to use the product properly? For example, if I’m selling yoga straps, I would include an infographic, or a series of photos, on how to do various poses.
  • Could my customers extract more value, or have a better experience, with some education? For example, if I’m selling a food processor, providing customer with some popular and easy recipes could help them get over any nervousness they might have about using the processor for the first time.
  • Are there additional materials I can include that will complement their new product? For example, if I’m selling coloring pencils, including simple pictures the customer can print out and color increases the chances they’ll use the pencils right away.

2. Offer a surprise upgrade.

Have you ever boarded a plane, dreading the prospect of being squished in the middle seat for seven hours, only to be upgraded to business class? Well, I’ve not had that experience, but it sounds freakin’ awesome!

Now imagine giving that same delightful thrill to your Amazon customers. Sounds intriguing, right?!

Think about what you could do with your product to create a remarkable experience for your customers. For example, one product I sell is bamboo marshmallow sticks. I could, hypothetically, send some accessories for an incredible s’mores experience. I could send marshmallows, a Hershey’s chocolate bar, or graham crackers!

Each of those items are relatively inexpensive, but including them would create a nearly priceless memory for a family sharing in the magic of campfire s’mores.

3. Give to a charity.

For our Collaborative Product Launch case study, when we launched Jungle Stix, we donated all of our profits to Doctors Without Borders. Granted, we were running the case study as a learning exercise and not trying to turn a profit. 

However, there is a wonderful growing trend called “Cause Marketing” that ties for-profit businesses with social missions. TOMS shoes is perhaps the most famous innovator in this respect, creating the Buy One Give One model, where every shoe purchased also means a pair is donated to a child in need.

But you don’t need to donate the entirety of your profits, or give away a free unit of your product to a charity. Even just a small portion of your profits can go a long way in helping other organizations–including yourself.

More specifically, you will be generating good will with your customer base. It’s a wonderful dynamic that can pay dividends in positive word-of-mouth and customer loyalty towards your brand.

4. Offer a discount (& get incremental sales).

Perhaps the easiest way to wow your customers is by offering them a discount on subsequent purchases. This strategy will be a pleasant surprise to the recipient, as well as being an incentive to purchase one of your other products.

And if you only have one product, you can include the coupon code in the email. Just ask your customer to forward it to any friends or family who would also appreciate the discount.

Executing this is also incredibly simple and straightforward. With Jungle Scout, you can easily drop in a coupon code in a follow-up email for your customer to use later on.

Your Move!

Like I mentioned earlier, any post-purchase act that creates a “wow” moment for your customer is a good thing for you as a seller. And it astounds me to see how few of my many Amazon purchases don’t have any follow up acknowledging gratitude for my buy! I’m not asking for anything crazy either.

While I like to go above and beyond for my customers, I’d be happy to get a simple thank you. It would go a long way towards gaining my loyalty!

So what do you do to stand out as a seller with solid customer support? Please drop your thoughts in the comments section, I would love to hear your thoughts!

12 comments on “Four Ways to “Wow” Your Amazon Customers

  1. I have just launched my first product on Amazon using FBA and have a few sales but no reviews yet. Do Amazon send automatic email follow ups to the customer? I read on the seller’s forum that the customer gets three emails from Amazon and if the seller sends their own additional emails the customer may feel swamped by emails for the one purchase and it can have a negative affect?
    Glad of your thoughts as I need to do something to ramp up sales.

    1. Hey Mark,

      Amazon do generally send standard notifications to buyers (these tend to be confirmation of purchase, product dispatched etc). They don’t have any other information other than this and the order details from experience of buying lots of stuff on Amazon 😉

      Sending your customer’s emails as a seller allows you to go beyond this and add a layer of friendliness, added value and to make sure you are approachable. This can be just as much about preventing negative reviews and getting useful feedback from consumers as it is about generating positive organic reviews.

      Many Amazon customers don’t realise they are buying products from a small business, and it often pays off to make it known that you are a small business trying to produce the best products and provide an excellent service.

      As this post highlights, there are many ways you can delight your customers with an automated email campaign. So rather than making them feel ‘swamped’, try to add value and make them feel special!

      Thanks for reading & sharing,

      Kym

  2. Thought provoking ideas, which leads me to a couple of questions:

    1) The 1st idea of including a pdf or ebook with every sale. I have never seen this before and wondered just how Amazon felt about it, and if you have any data to suggest how well this works with your products.

    2) Your last idea was to include a coupon code in your email for a discount on one of your other products or for the same product the customer has just purchased. This seems like an obvious thing to do and something I have considered, but thought would violate Amazon’s TOS. Again have you actually done this (sorry if you can hear some scepticism)? I’m guessing you wouldn’t be able to ask for a review after doing this…..or do you? You would have to be careful, I would think.

    Really looking forward to your comments, and let me say that I always appreciate your ideas and practical advice. I always read through your “stuff”, as I always get something new out of it.

    Grant

    1. Hey Grant,

      Thanks for reading & commenting.

      Including additional content with your product that will improve the customer’s experience and overall satisfaction is definitely not frowned upon by Amazon. So whether it’s an instructional ebook, recipes, infographic – anything that adds value for the customer is a bonus. We don’t have any data to back how this has improved sales or reviews right now but that’s a great idea for a future blog post. (Taking a note right now!)

      Your second point, offering a coupon code for a similar or the same product is not against Amazon’s TOS. Running discounts and offering coupons is still within the rules. The only thing you are not allowed to do is incentivize reviews in any way.

      Asking for a review after a purchase, whether it was discounted or not, is fine, so long as you don’t *require* those customers leave a review in return for a discount. You could even put something on an product insert to ask for a review. Ultimately, the decision to leave an honest review should always be in the customer’s hands & unsolicited 🙂

      Thanks for the kind words Grant, much appreciated.

      Kym

  3. Thank you very much for your time to advice. I am wondering if the seller get customers’ address in order to send the gift.
    Once again, thank you for you great suggestion.
    Akem

    1. Hi Akemi,

      It’s against the Terms of Service for deal websites to share customers’ details. If you want to send any additional content or a surprise upgrade it would need to be delivered with the product.

      Thanks for reading!
      Kym

  4. Hello Greg,

    thank you for sharing tips with us. I am just concerned with your 4th tip. Isn’t promoting through Amazon email system against rules?

    Best regards,
    Jani

    1. Hi Jani,

      Glad that you enjoyed the article. It is within Amazon’s TOS to send follow up email campaigns, and encourage customers to leave honest feedback, you just can’t incentivize reviews by offering discounted products in exchange for the review. I hope that helps!

      Gen

      1. Is there a limit to how many times a buyer is allowed to be contacted by the seller?
        It would be two emails: One feedback request and one email asking for discount.
        Please advise?

          1. Hey Sara,

            Running discounts and offering coupons is still within the rules. The only thing you are not allowed to do is incentivize reviews in any way. That means offering a discount in exchange for a review.

            Customers who purchase a discounted product may still leave a review if they feel compelled to do so, but many sellers have reported that some organic reviews from a discounted product aren’t being approved by Amazon. This doesn’t mean you have broken the rules either, so long as you have not incentivized any reviews 🙂

            Kym

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