An online shop, either on your own page or on a selling platform like eBay or Amazon, helps to expand your customer base and sig­nif­i­cant­ly increase sales. These days, if you want to launch a new product on the market, it’s difficult to avoid also selling it online – even if success in e-commerce is anything but easy. As with any offer on the internet, the biggest challenge is getting users to find the offered goods or shop in the first place. Amazon keyword tools, which make use of the online platform’s search vo­cab­u­lary, play an in­creas­ing­ly important role in this task.

Why Amazon keywords are so important for e-commerce

When selling products online, just like when selling in a store, the goal is to turn in­ter­est­ed people who are already in the store (or the web shop) into paying customers. Before you can attempt to optimize these “con­ver­sions”, you first have to drum up business to get people in­ter­est­ed in your offer. Since web users often rely on search engines for their online shopping, it’s also important to integrate the ap­pro­pri­ate keywords into your product and shop pages in addition to or instead of expensive ad­ver­tise­ments. As opposed to classic SEO, it’s not the Google search engine but instead the Amazon coun­ter­part that serves as the most important keyword research source – no matter whether your products are listed directly on the online platform, in your own shop, or with another service provider.

The reason for this is that product-oriented search queries are in­creas­ing­ly started via Amazon. For some time now, the sales platform’s database has been providing better, more precise in­for­ma­tion about the search behavior of online shoppers than Google’s search term base. The strongly product-oriented Amazon search queries can also be used for overall e-commerce keyword research. Amazon keyword tools help with this.

Tip

Ad­di­tion­al in­for­ma­tion on the function of keywords on Amazon as well as the most important steps for the op­ti­miza­tion of Amazon product pages can be found in our basics article on the topic of  Amazon SEO.

Amazon SEO tools for keyword research: an overview

If you’re searching for a tool to optimize the keywords for your product or shop pages, then, for the afore­men­tioned reasons, you should pri­or­i­tize ap­pli­ca­tions that focus on Amazon keywords.  The quality of such tools depends on the reg­u­lar­i­ty with which the Amazon database is checked and how many relevant search queries the database already contains. It also plays a role whether the keyword inventory is in the same language as the intended market: Simple one-to-one trans­la­tions will rarely improve vis­i­bil­i­ty, apart from co­in­ci­den­tal hits.

For Amazon’s keyword research to succeed quickly with a tool, it needs to be easy to operate and present results in the most appealing form possible. Otherwise, both research and further pro­cess­ing become tedious tasks rather than traffic gen­er­a­tors. The solutions also differ in terms of price and range. Some tools, par­tic­u­lar­ly those which were developed specially for Amazon SEO, offer functions that go far beyond the actual research and are therefore a bit more expensive. In the following, we present some useful tools that could be worth­while to you.

Amazon Keyword Tool from SISTRIX

The German-based per­for­mance agency SISTRIX was one of the first to recognize the value of Amazon for e-commerce keyword research, and began to build its own Amazon keyword database at an early stage. This serves as the foun­da­tion for the Amazon Keyword Tool published in January 2016, which can be accessed at any time without reg­is­tra­tion or login using any popular browser. The web ap­pli­ca­tion delivers the most promising keyword com­bi­na­tions for the desired search term, and also presents valuable in­for­ma­tion about the search volume, the average price of the cor­re­spond­ing products, and the average number of reviews.

The SISTRIX tool presents the top 100 hits with the strongest search volumes for the desired search term. If there are also com­bi­na­tions of these that are related to a known brand, the web app marks them with the gray note “(Brand)”. Since its pub­li­ca­tion, the ap­pli­ca­tion for Amazon keyword research has been in beta mode – which you can register for without any com­mit­ment. A single access gives you the pos­si­bil­i­ty to perform up to 250 searches per day for keywords of your choice. Login with another active SISTRIX account is also possible, if, for example, you use the SISTRIX toolbox. The tool can be used com­plete­ly login-free, but in this case you’re limited to 25 searches per day.

Benefits Drawbacks
Huge keyword database No export function exists for re­searched data without login
Free use (up to 25 searches per day)

Sonar

When it comes to op­ti­miz­ing your Amazon products and managing received ratings, there’s no way around using the Mar­ket­place Analytics platform. With Sonar, the software of the Berlin-based startup Sellics includes, among others, an Amazon keyword tool, which is also available sep­a­rate­ly and helps you find the right keywords for your products. For this purpose, the free web ap­pli­ca­tion relies on a database with more than 32 million actual Amazon search queries for around 65 million products (as of November 2017), which Sellics gathers with the help of pro­pri­etary al­go­rithms and regularly expands.

The search engine, which the startup has in­te­grat­ed into the tool for the purpose of Amazon keyword research, provides users with four different available modes: An ordinary standard search can be started via the “Keyword” tab. If you also want to receive syn­ony­mous terms, then select “Extended”. Also useful (for example, for ad­ver­tise­ment analysis) is the ASIN reverse search, which plays out all of the keywords with which a product already on sale is ranked. With “Translate” mode, it’s possible to do cross-market research (currently: German, French, Italian, English, Spanish). Sonar presents the search volumes of the re­searched terms not in exact values, but instead via its own bar grading system, with five bars rep­re­sent­ing the maximum and one bar rep­re­sent­ing the minimum search volume.

Benefits Drawbacks
Enables ASIN reverse searches Doesn’t show exact search volumes
Keyword lists can be down­loaded as CSV files

Mer­chant­Words

In December 2012, the software developer George Lawrence published the online tool Mer­chant­Words, which has since developed into one of the most popular solutions for op­ti­miz­ing Amazon keywords. While the database was initially fed entirely with Amazon search queries, today it also obtains keywords from various other online sales platforms (e.g. Walmart.com) worldwide. In this way, Mer­chant­Words builds a com­pre­hen­sive picture of search behavior for the online shopping com­mu­ni­ties in the USA, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and Canada. In the future, it’s also planned for keyword research to be possible in other in­ter­na­tion­al markets such as Australia, Japan, India, and Mexico.

When you enter a term into the Mer­chant­Words search bar, you receive a list with matching keywords and their estimated monthly search volume as well as the Amazon cat­e­gories in which they’re primarily found. By clicking on the re­spec­tive flag symbol, you can select which languages you would like to search for. Thanks to the in­te­grat­ed filter function, the results can be sorted al­pha­bet­i­cal­ly or by search volume strength. It’s also possible to filter search cat­e­gories for a specific category. After searching, you can export your keyword list as a CSV file if required. To use the Amazon keyword tool, a paid sub­scrip­tion (from 30 dollars per month for the US market or 60 dollars per month for all markets) is required.

Benefits Drawbacks
Supports various in­ter­na­tion­al markets Use only with paid sub­scrip­tion
Delivers in­for­ma­tion on keyword per­for­mance in different Amazon product cat­e­gories

Uberseller

At the end of 2015, Toni Grünert and Dawid Schütte started the beta of their Amazon SEO tool Uberseller. The SEO suite, whose core function is profit op­ti­miza­tion on the online sales platform, is now available as an official live version. All European Amazon mar­ket­places are supported in addition to the US market, the web ap­pli­ca­tion ex­em­pli­fies itself with features such as the sales tracker, which au­to­mat­i­cal­ly keeps an eye on your sales figures as well as selected com­peti­tors. In com­bi­na­tion with the profit dashboard, which presents the top-selling products and days of the week, you have all important data for the per­fec­tion of your selling strategy on hand. Uberseller also has available functions for Amazon keyword research.

With the “Keyword research” tab, you can determine all relevant keywords for a desired search term. In the country code menu, simply select the desired languages that the search should look for. The created list can be fully down­loaded in CSV format. You can also access Amazon products that match the keywords. The “Quick check” tab offers the pos­si­bil­i­ty to determine the Amazon keywords of the com­pe­ti­tion based on ASIN. Both research features are available without limits in the “Free/Prepaid” edition – you only need an Uberseller account. However, access to the tools mentioned above, like the sales tracker, are only available with a purchase of one of the paid packages (from 79 euros per month).

Benefits Drawbacks
Amazon keyword research also possible with free packages No search volume details
Can be quickly upgraded to Amazon SEO complete suite by adding paid packages Keyword search process takes a rel­a­tive­ly long time

AMZ Tracker

AMZ Tracker, launched in 2014 by Travis Jamison, was one of the first SEO tools that was developed specially for Amazon ranking op­ti­miza­tion. The web ap­pli­ca­tion contains various features for this, which improve the con­ver­sion rate and support keyword settings as well as user in­ter­ac­tion. AMZ Tracker also gives tips on how you can optimize your product pages, and shows you which com­po­nents (title, bullet points, product photos, etc.) display a need for op­ti­miza­tion. Thanks to keyword tracking, you also have the rankings of your products as well as the po­si­tion­ing of the com­pe­ti­tion available at a glance. No­ti­fi­ca­tion e-mails, which inform you about negative user reviews, can be enabled so that you can react as quickly as possible. New keywords for your product pages and the Amazon backend can be found with the keyword research tool and the Deepwords app.

With the keyword research tool, you receive useful keyword sug­ges­tions that AMZ Tracker obtains from the au­to­mat­i­cal­ly delivered Amazon search sug­ges­tions. Which of these keywords ul­ti­mate­ly end up on the list is decided by you. You can also use the sug­ges­tions as a basis for a new search. The search engine app Deepwords gives AMZ Tracker users the ad­di­tion­al option to search specif­i­cal­ly for longtail keywords, which play a par­tic­u­lar­ly important role when it comes to con­ver­sion op­ti­miza­tion in e-commerce. All tracking, analysis, and research functions are available for various in­ter­na­tion­al markets (USA, Brazil, Germany, Italy, France, and Spain, among others). Purchase of a paid sub­scrip­tion is required (from around 33 dollars per month).

Benefits Drawbacks
Targeted search for longtail keywords possible Not suitable for smaller Amazon keyword research
Automatic no­ti­fi­ca­tions about negative user reviews

Sci­en­tif­ic Seller

The software company Velluto Tech Incubator out of Las Vegas offers, in its own words, “The World’s Slowest” keyword tool for Amazon. As opposed to a majority of the com­pe­ti­tion, Sci­en­tif­ic Seller doesn’t complete the keyword search within a few seconds, but instead requires sig­nif­i­cant­ly longer to present a list of suitable sug­ges­tions for the desired term. Behind the time-intensive search process and joking self-criticism hides the great strength of the tool, which is not satisfied with a simple search, but instead digs deeper than other solutions into Amazon’s search vo­cab­u­lary. This way, Sci­en­tif­ic Seller presents keyword sug­ges­tions that aren’t found in other research tools.

After you’ve entered one or more search terms, Sci­en­tif­ic Seller begins its extensive research. In real-time, the tool presents the in­di­vid­ual keywords as well as the most important search com­bi­na­tions for Amazon buyers in two columns. For the in­di­vid­ual terms, you also receive in­for­ma­tion on how often they’re rep­re­sent­ed in the searched com­bi­na­tions. You can sort the list at any time so that the keywords with the highest values are displayed in the top positions. It’s also possible to pause the search and resume it at a later time. For the US Amazon platform, you can run up to five search processes per day for free. If you want to use the Amazon keyword tool for other markets as well, then you need a paid account (from around 50 dollars per month).

Benefits Drawbacks
Very thorough keyword research Free edition limited to five daily searches for the US market
Very time-intensive search process

The best solutions for re­search­ing Amazon keywords: overview

Pub­li­ca­tion year Developer Cost Developer
Amazon Keyword Tool from SISTRIX 2016 SISTRIX Free (25 searches per day) Presents data for average number of product reviews as well as average price
AMZ Tracker 2014 Travis Jamison From around $33 per month Targeted search for longtail keywords possible
Mer­chant­Words 2012 George Lawrence From $30 per month Delivers all relevant product cat­e­gories for keywords
Sci­en­tif­ic Seller 2015 Velluto Tech Incubator Free (5 US searches per day) Very extensive research process
Sonar 2016 Sellics Free Use as stand­alone or as part of the SEO suite Mar­ket­place Analytics
Uberseller 2015 Toni Grünert, Dawid Schütte Free Ex­tend­able to com­pre­hen­sive con­ver­sion op­ti­miza­tion suite
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