One of the most important goals for Amazon sellers is to win the Buy Box. But while you may compete against other sellers to win the Buy Box, sometimes it’s suppressed from the listing entirely.
But what exactly is Buy Box suppression? What are the main reasons for it? And what can you do about it?
In this guide, we’ll cover all of these issues and more.
TL;DR
- The Amazon Buy Box is essential for sellers, and Buy Box suppression can have a devastating impact on your sales.
- There are several reasons why the Buy Box might be suppressed, with the key reason being uncompetitive pricing.
- There are many steps you can take to avoid Buy Box suppression, and changing your pricing strategy is the main one.
- You can also change your Repricer settings to reduce the chance of the Buy Box being suppressed.
The Amazon Buy Box: A Quick Overview
If you’re still fairly new to Amazon, the Buy Box is one of the most important things to learn about.
When you go to a product detail page, the section on the right contains the price of the product, shipping information, and more. It also contains two buttons: “Add to Cart” and “Buy Now.”
This is the Buy Box.
Sellers must compete for it, and popular items often have multiple sellers that try to win and keep it. Over 80% of sales are made via the Buy Box, so it’s obvious why sellers want to win it.
Amazon uses an algorithm to determine who wins the Buy Box. Whichever seller wins the Buy Box at the time the customer buys the product will get the sale.
You can’t win the Buy Box and then sit back and do nothing. Instead, you must keep competing for it.
There are lots of factors that go into determining which seller wins the Buy Box, including:
- Fulfillment method
- Account health
- Reviews
- History
- Pricing
But another issue to be aware of is Buy Box suppression.
What Is Box Box Suppression?
Buy Box suppression is when the Buy Box disappears entirely from an ASIN.
In this situation, there’s no winner of the Buy Box. The buttons for “Buy Now” and “Add to Cart” disappear. Instead, a link saying “See All Buying Options” appears.
This takes the customer to a list of all the offers, starting with the cheapest. The customer can then choose which offer interests them.
This makes the customer take extra steps if they want to purchase the product. As such, it reduces the chance of them buying, and sales can go down dramatically.
6 Reasons Why Your Listing Is Affected
There are several reasons why you may be affected by Buy Box suppression. Here are six of the most common:
1. Your Product Is Too Expensive
The major reason that Buy Box suppression occurs is to do with not having competitive pricing.
The products that are competitively priced usually get the Buy Box more and keep it compared to other products. So if your listing price is too high, even by a small amount, you can miss out.
Sometimes, none of the offers are competitive enough, and Buy Box suppression can occur.
Amazon has a Marketplace Fair Pricing Policy, and it wants its customers to know they’re getting the best value when they choose Amazon. So it penalizes sellers where the product can be found at a lower price elsewhere.
Offers should be at the manufacturer’s suggested retail price (MSRP) or below. They should ideally be less expensive than on a competing website.
Even if you don’t compete with other sellers on Amazon, you could still find the Buy Box suppressed if you price too high, so make sure you get your pricing strategy right.
2. Your Listing Isn’t Optimized
Problems with your listing can also have an impact on the Buy Box. If none of the sellers have optimized listings, the Buy Box can be suppressed.
Make sure you have a complete listing that is fully optimized. Provide all the required information, make sure it has an accurate description, check that all the images meet the standards, and make sure the title is the right length.
Related: 3 Proven Tactics to Drive Traffic to Your Amazon Listings in 2024
3. You Don’t Have Enough Sales History
When you start selling on Amazon, you may not have enough history and seller credibility for Amazon to reward you with the Buy Box. If no sellers have enough history, the Buy Box may be suppressed.
You often need a month or so of history, showing that you’re a good seller and that you ship your orders on time.
4. Your Account Health Has Dropped
If your seller metrics fall too low because you don’t have good account health, you could see Buy Box suppression occur.
You should have good metrics for customer inquiries, cancellations, reviews, and more to be eligible to win the Buy Box.
5. Your Sales Are Too Low
A lack of sales volume can lead to Buy Box suppression. You might only sell a few items each month on Amazon, and while there’s no specific quantity of sales you have to make, be aware that it could be an issue.
6. You’re Not Eligible for Prime
Amazon likes to promote Prime-eligible products because people pay a lot in fees for Prime membership, and Amazon wants them to enjoy a simple and consistent experience.
If no offer is Prime-eligible, Buy Box suppression can occur. Using FBA makes it a lot easier to be eligible for Prime, so enrolling in FBA can be a great decision.
What to Do if the Buy Box Is Suppressed
If you find that you’ve been affected by Buy Box suppression, you’ll need to do something about it.
Amazon has determined that the sellers of that specific product are not doing enough to win the Buy Box.
Essentially, you need to make your listing Buy Box eligible. The good thing is that if you do this, you should win the Buy Box if the other sellers still fail to meet the requirements.
Go through the points above in order, starting with price.
Consider these problems:
Product Price
Is your product too expensive compared to the MSRP? If so, decide whether you can reduce the current selling price and still be profitable. It may be that it’s not worth it if profits are too low, in which case you might want to focus on other products.
Another option is to set your price to the lowest compared to your competitors. Even if the Buy Box remains suppressed, your offer will show up first for having the lowest price, which could help with sales.
Related: 7 eCommerce Pricing Strategies Every Seller Should Know in 2023
Listing Quality
If your price is competitive, something else is probably wrong.
In this situation, go over the listing and make sure it’s accurate and optimized. If you’re still fairly new to Amazon, you may simply need a bit more time to build up a stronger reputation.
One thing you don’t want to do is ignore it. Winning the Buy Box is an important part of success on Amazon, and it can improve your sales dramatically, so try and do something to rectify the situation.
Change Your Repricer Settings
One of the best ways to win the Buy Box is to use an automatic repricing tool like Repricer.
With this, you can optimize your pricing strategy, make your product more competitive, and win and keep the Buy Box more frequently.
If the Buy Box is being suppressed by Amazon, you may want to change the settings in Repricer or another tool you’re using.
Perhaps you don’t have the minimum and maximum prices set up properly. In this case, you could be repricing too high, leading to suppression of the Buy Box. Alternatively, your rules may not be correct.
We have some guidelines at Repricer where you can find several settings and strategies for when the Buy Box is suppressed on an ASIN.
For example, there’s a Suppressed Buy Box option, and you can choose how you want Repricer to act in this case if no one owns the Buy Box. You can determine exactly what you want Repricer to do. For example, “Reprice up and down” or “Do not reprice.”
You can also find products where the Buy Box has been suppressed. Take a look and see what you can do to get a better understanding of Buy Box suppression and take appropriate action.
Conclusion
The Amazon Buy Box makes life easier for buyers and is crucial for sellers because it’s where most sales are made. You should do everything you can to win the Buy Box.
This starts with making sure you’re eligible to win it by focusing on the points above.
If none of the listings are eligible, the Buy Box can be suppressed. In this situation, take some time to analyze what’s going wrong so you can do something about it, make your listing eligible, and beat the competition.
Winning the Buy Box can give you a serious sales boost. So put some time and effort into improving your Buy Box strategy because the results can make it worthwhile.
