Amazon Seller Glossary
Common Amazon Terms and Acronyms
We put together this handy guide of the most used Amazon terms and acronyms both for new and old sellers to reference.
Amazon Prime
Amazon Prime is a subscription service that gives members access to a variety of Amazon perks. They include free 2-day shipping on Amazon purchases, Amazon Prime Video, access to exclusive deals on Amazon Prime Day, and a variety of other Amazon-specific benefits.
Amazon’s Choice
This is a badge awarded to listings based on product ratings, price, and availability to ship. Receiving this badge from Amazon is proven to increase sales.
ASIN
Amazon standard information number. Amazon’s internal tracking identifier for each listing in their catalog. It’s similar to a UPC but is exclusive to Amazon.
Amazon Seller Central (ASC)
The portal that Amazon sellers use to list, maintain, and observe their product’s performance on Amazon.com.
Best-Seller Rank (BSR)
Also known as your Amazon Sales Rank, Amazon determines the Best Seller Ranking using sales and historical sales data per product. However, it is dynamic and changes frequently. BSR is an indicator of both how well a product has sold in the past and how well it has sold in the last few hours. It is best to track this number over time to get an accurate representation of a product’s performance.
Brand Registry (BR)
The Brand Registry is where you register your private label brand and protect your brand and products from counterfeiters and fraud. It also gives you access to certain features like Product Display Ads and Enhanced Brand Content. (We’ll get to those later.)
Buy Box
The Buy Box incorporates the large “Add to Cart” and “Buy Now” buttons on each listing. When you’re selling the same product as other sellers, it is vital to capture the Buy Box, as it is responsible for the majority of sales.
Cost of Goods Sold (COGS)
The accumulated total of all costs used to create a product or service, which has been sold. For an Amazon private label product, this may include the cost of materials, packaging, shipping, duty taxes, etc.
Click through rate (CTR)
The CTR is the metric that will tell you how often your (seen) ads are clicked on, ie. how attractive your product is at first glance.
Conversion rate (CR)
An action that a customer completes; this phrase can be used to refer to any number of actions, including clicking “Add to Cart,” completing a purchase, etc.
Drop Shipping
the process of selling a product without the responsibility of carrying inventory or shipping the goods. Notably, dropshippers can set their own product prices. The product manufacturer is responsible for manufacturing the product, maintaining inventory and shipping the goods to the customer.
Enchanced Brand Content (EBC)
An Amazon program for sellers which allows you to create more detailed product descriptions with additional images and text.
FNSKU
Fulfillment Network Stock Keeping Unit. The FNSKU is the way that Amazon identifies a product as unique to the seller that the seller has sent it to an FBA warehouse. Every product that is processed through an FBA warehouse is given this unique identifier
Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA)
Fulfillment by Amazon means you send your product into the Amazon warehouse and they are then responsible for packing and shipping your product when you make a sale.
Fulfilled by Merchant (FBM)
FBM is the opposite of FBA. You, as the seller, are responsible for shipping all orders that come through Amazon. You must handle all customer complaints related to fulfillment.
Forth Quarter
Holiday season during the last 3 months of the year, when sales increase
Gated Category
A division of restricted products locked to sellers without prior approval from Amazon.
Ungated Category
Products in these categories can be listed without specific permission from Amazon.
Invoice
Invoice is a commercial document issued by a seller to a buyer, relating to a sale transaction and indicating the products, quantities, and agreed prices for products or services the seller had provided the buyer.
Lightning Deals
These Amazon deals are available for a limited time to shoppers. Sellers set what the discount will be and how long the deal will run.
Listing
Listing is the product page that includes images, product descriptions, price, shipping methods, customer reviews, etc.
Margin Profit
It is the percentage of a sale taken after the COGS and the expenses have been deducted.
Minimum Order Quantity (MOQ)
The lowest possible order volume allowed by a manufacturer for a particular product.
Negative keywords
Despite their name, negative keywords aren’t bad. These are the search terms that you don’t want your listing or ad to appear on when running a pay-per-click advertising campaign. For example, if you’re selling a stuffed animal shaped like a dog you would use “dog toy” as a negative keyword. While it technically describes your toy, you wouldn’t want your products to appear in the search results.
Net profit
It is the profit before expenses have been considered.
Online Arbitrage
The process of sourcing products cheaply on one ecommerce platform for sale on another ecommerce platform at a higher price.
Private Label
When selling Private Label, you sell products under your brand and work directly with manufacturers to produce your product.
Pay-Per-Click (PPC)
This term is applied to Amazon Advertising. You are charged each time that your Sponsored Product, Sponsored Brand, or Product Display ad is clicked.
Promotions
A series of discount and giveaway options offered to Amazon sellers to promote sales and social media growth.
Retail arbitrage
The process of finding underpriced products in a retail store to sell at a higher price on Amazon.
Search engine optimisation (SEO)
This includes placing the most relevant, highly-searched keywords in your listing to increase your product’s discoverability and organic search ranking.
Sponsored Ad
A pay-per-click advertising solution that enables you to promote the products you sell with keyword-targeted ads (manual or automatic) that appear in highly visible placements on Amazon.com.
Sponsored Brands
Formerly known as Headline Search Ads, this Amazon Advertising option is currently only available to sellers enrolled in Amazon Brand Registry. This campaign option allows sellers to promote their brand and products through banner ads at the top, side, and bottom of the search results page.
Sponsored Products
This is the most popular type of Amazon Advertising. Your product listing appears on the product search results page before non-sponsored listings.
Verified Reviews
When an Amazon.com user leaves a product review after purchasing the respective product, it is considered a “verified review.” Verified reviews carry more weight when Amazon averages a given product’s reviews.
Wholesale Arbitrage
Wholesaling is a form of selling on Amazon. It involves buying large quantities of a product at a low price and then reselling it at a higher price.
More useful resources
B2B Platforms
A list of top B2B platforms
FBA Centers
132 fulfillment centers in 30 states
Live product inspection
QC inspections in LIVE format
