Brand Fortress HQ: Amazon FBA Success Strategies
Welcome to the Brand Fortress HQ Podcast, the ultimate resource for mastering Amazon FBA success. Dive deep into the world of e-commerce with your hosts, Jon Stojan, Mike Kaufman, and Matt Atkins—three seasoned Amazon brand owners who have seen it all and are ready to unveil the secrets of their success.
Your hosts each and every week are Jon Stojan, Mike Kaufman, and Matt Atkins. Jon is a former predictive analyst for the Air Force and brings his analytical prowess to the e-commerce battleground. After establishing his own 6-figure brand on Amazon, he founded First North Marketing, a beacon for brands aiming to conquer the Amazon marketplace.
Mike Kaufman is an e-commerce pioneer, having been navigating the online sales sphere for over three decades. His expertise has not only led to the creation of a mid 7-figure brand on Amazon but also birthed invaluable tools and resources to bolster other aspiring brands.
Matt is the jack-of-all-trades in the e-commerce arena, from building a 7 figure meal prep brand, multiple Amazon brands, coaching new brand builders, to helping brands of all sizes grow at Canopy Management. His passion lies in fostering a community of entrepreneurs, offering them the wisdom and connections needed to thrive.
Join us for Tactics Tuesdays, where Jon, Mike, and Matt dissect the real-life strategies propelling their own brands and companies forward. Plus, tune in every Thursday for enlightening interviews with the brightest minds in FBA—transparent leaders and business owners who are shaping the present and future of e-commerce.
With two episodes every week, the Brand Fortress HQ Podcast is your stronghold for insider knowledge, innovative tactics, and inspiring stories. Whether you’re an established seller or just starting your FBA journey, our hosts are here to guide you through the intricacies of the Amazon marketplace. Unlock your brand’s potential and build your own fortress with us at Brand Fortress HQ.
Brand Fortress HQ: Amazon FBA Success Strategies
049: Tactic Tuesdays: Pixeling Audiences
Can leveraging the power of pixeling take your remarketing to the next level? Discover how Mike uses Switchy, a dynamic redirection tool, to not only track and redirect links but also pixel audiences across multiple platforms like Google, Facebook, and TikTok. We'll uncover how you can capture and remarket to audiences interacting with QR codes on packaging inserts and influencer links, transforming your marketing effectiveness and boosting conversion rates significantly.
Navigating the rapidly changing landscape of customer engagement is crucial, especially with recent iOS privacy updates. Learn how employing QR codes in product packaging can maximize pixeling opportunities, allowing for effective retargeting that sidesteps privacy concerns. By offering valuable, no-strings-attached incentives like free reports, brands can encourage more scans, leading to enhanced customer engagement. We'll also delve into using deep linking and Amazon attribution links to provide valuable information, helping customers fully utilize premium products and fostering brand loyalty.
Emphasizing the importance of building an audience outside of Amazon, we explore how pixeling can be a game-changer. Learn how to create lookalike audiences based on pixeled data and compare powerful tools like Switchy and PixelMe. Discover how PixelMe can optimize ad performance for Amazon sellers by connecting sales to specific keywords, aiding in the evaluation of Google Ads’ viability for various products. By understanding the critical role of owning customer information, you can ensure higher returns on ad spend and long-term success for your brand. Join us as we unpack strategies to re-engage customers through multiple channels, securing your brand's future growth.
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Welcome everyone to the Brand Fortress HQ podcast. On this Tactics Tuesday episode, we're going to be talking about pixeling your audience on social media, email and other places, and we're also doing something new, which is we are going live on LinkedIn. So this is something that we're testing out as well. So if you've got specific questions, either about the topic or just kind of building a brand on Amazon and beyond in general, join us on Tuesdays, where we'll be over on LinkedIn, or you can join us live. You can ask us your questions and we can answer them live as well. So, with that said, we're going to kind of dive in here with pixeling. So, mike, I know this is a topic you've been working quite a bit with, so why don't you kick us off on kind of how you guys are using Pixeling right now and why you think it's important for our brand builders that are listening out there?
Speaker 2:So I think the first thing that I would say is to be as honest as I can about the process. We have not been really good about remarketing and retargeting audiences in the past. Like that's not been something we've really done much of with our advertising, and I imagine a lot of that has to do with the fact that most of our advertising was on Amazon and even though you can do some of that with DSP, we haven't done it Like we had an agency that managed our DSP, so we really haven't gotten a whole lot involved in that side of things in the past, and so the one thing that you know that for me that's interesting about this is the opportunity that presents itself. So I ran across well, I shouldn't say I ran across. I actually was recommended a tool a while back, actually by Leo Segovia and it's called Switchy, and so the tool itself, essentially the, the, the idea behind it is it is a. It's a redirection tool like a, like Bitly or something like that, but the idea behind it and the value behind it is that it has a lot more power there and also it's a. You know, you pay for it once and you're done. You can redirect the ring, the links anytime you want.
Speaker 2:So I went with that route, because a lot of the services out there that you pay monthly for in order to have what's the best way to say it, to have it be a live link that you can change where it redirects to if you want, and so it ends up being, you end up getting locked into that service because once you create the link if it's a link that works now it's out there in the wild and you've got it redirecting someplace. You have to keep paying this company so that you can manage it right. So Switchy is a service that at least the way I purchased it. I got it through AppSumo and it was a single purchase, so I got a lifetime deal on it. But the idea there is you send it a link and it redirects that link wherever you want it, but in the process of redirecting that link, it is going to pixel that traffic and it pixels it on Google, facebook, it might also be TikTok, I think that it'll do and so where I really like that is there are a lot of links that, as Amazon sellers, that we're using in various places and we are not pixeling that traffic.
Speaker 2:So, for example, the scan code that you're putting on your inserts, in your packaging. You're going to get a certain number of scans on that code, but you're probably not going to get 100% of those scans to turn into an actual registration, right. You take them to a landing page. You try to convince them hey, give us your email address and we'll give you XYZ, right, but you're not going to get 100% of those. But you're going to get 100% of the scans pixeled if you use a tool like Switchy on that QR code. So you can actually generate the QR code directly through Switchy. So you put your link in wherever it is you're going to send them, and then it generates the QR code. You throw that on your insert and then everybody who scans that code gets pixeled. So you can advertise them and remarket to them anywhere you like Google, facebook, tiktok, whatever that is. And so even the people that don't end up on your list on the first time around you get a second shot at.
Speaker 2:And the other benefit is, of course, the same thing. Like influencers, you give them a link. You know, maybe you use your Amazon attribution link. You can create a switchy link that's specific to a particular influencer. So not only can you track that and you can redirect it to your attribution link so you could pay them an affiliate commission or whatever you want, but also you pixel that traffic.
Speaker 2:So now it's not just you don't have to necessarily keep going back to that influencer to get that traffic, you get to pixel their audience. Everybody from their audience that scans your code or goes to that link, you get to pixel them. So if you use them for a giveaway like if you did a giveaway through an influencer and you use the switchy link to get to the giveaway page well, even the people who don't register, you get to pixel them and so you can remarket to them later. So I just think it's super powerful and I'll be honest, we haven't utilized yet the opportunity to actually do the remarketing, so we'll see how that goes but the fact that we even can is amazing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think it gives you a couple opportunities there, and I just want to kind of double click on a couple of things.
Speaker 1:The first thing is is that, as much as I love, you know, email and text message and that type of stuff in order to build relationships with customers, the reality is, especially when you're doing some sort of sale or promo and so we're recording this a few weeks before Amazon Prime Days really the more channels you have in order to reach those customers, the more opportunities you have, because some customers are going to open their emails and some are never going to open that email, and so when you can reach out to them and essentially retarget them with whether it be, you know, facebook and Instagram via Meta or Google, it really gives you an opportunity to reach your customers where they're at.
Speaker 1:And then the other thing is to keep in mind that when you segment your customers, especially if you're talking about people that have bought your product, those folks are worth probably 10, 20, 30x what you would get from somebody that maybe just clicked on your landing page or came to your website or something like that. That's not saying I mean you should pixel those people too. Keep in mind that there's different values there depending on what actions you're doing, you know prospects or customers have taken, and if you've got customers, that's really you know somebody who's bought your product is really the most valuable person that you can remarket to, and so it gives you, like you said, mike, a great opportunity to retarget customers. But also, you know, kind of recapture some of the magic and some of the other campaigns you're doing, whether that be with a social media influencer or really almost anything that's off of Amazon, in order to drive that off Amazon traffic. That we know is very valuable for being competitive in 2024.
Speaker 3:I have so many questions. I'm trying to prioritize them in my brain. One of the questions that I have is I know that I think it was Facebook, or maybe it was Google, that made a big, or that Apple made a change to the iOS settings that allowed or didn't allow cookies, so it's becoming more cookie list for privacy reasons. Now, I know that that really hurt brands that were using meta and IG primarily for customer acquisition, but my question is and I have a feeling I know the answer to this if you, instead of targeting someone based on interest and demographics and that kind of stuff, where I think that's what this iOS update broke I think, though, pixeling them and retargeting them, that gets rid of the need for a cookie. Isn't that right? That audience is now not affected by the iOS update. I guess is the way that I'm asking that question. Is that right or wrong?
Speaker 2:That's the way I understand it. I don't want to say that I'm 100 percent certain, but that is the way I understand it. Is that because you're not collecting personalized data on anybody and you're not using personalized data for targeting. You know, I believe it is still functional, even on iOS. And I was going to say something else that I think is important to pay attention to, and that is you know, I mentioned the idea of using a switchy link slash QR code on your insert.
Speaker 2:One of the things about that that I think you should be using multiple in your packaging is that your insert is normally taking them someplace where you're going to request an email from them, and oftentimes they're kind of aware that that's likely. So, in other words, let's take the scenario like we use, that is, a warranty registration. If we're saying on the insert hey, come, go, register your warranty, the customer knows that. On the other side of that, they have to give you personal information, and there's a certain number of individuals that will choose not to scan that code just simply because they know they're not going to give it to you. So I'm just not going to register, right, but that means you don't have an opportunity to pixel that person. The difference here is what if you had a secondary insert or, some of you know, a QR code on the package or whatever it is that you want to put? It is scan the code to immediately receive no personal information required.
Speaker 2:This free report, or this free, whatever it doesn't matter what it is, create some sort of electronic gift that you can give them that does not require them to give you any personal information. All they have to do is scan the code. But as soon as they scan it they're pixeled. And again, as John said, you already know that these are very pre-qualified individuals. They have purchased your product, you know that they're your customer, so if you can then pixel them, from that point you could get a large percentage of the people that bought your product to scan that code and pixel them, and now you can retarget them anytime you like. So I wouldn't just do this on a standard insert where you're trying to collect information. I would actually do some additional. You know, I would put QR codes all over the place for all sorts of different things, and every one of them pixels somebody, so that you have multiple opportunities to get them on that list.
Speaker 3:Do you also get data on like how many times it was clicked?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, it tracks. It tracks how many scans you got. You know. It deep links. So if you were to send them directly to an Amazon link through through a switchy link or QR code, it deep links them into the mobile app, which is massive because a lot of times if you don't deep link, you know and they're on a mobile device, they got to log in or they got to do whatever, and so it breaks the transaction essentially. So switch, you make sure that that's deep link, so they go straight into the mobile app.
Speaker 3:Can the link that you use be Amazon attribution link?
Speaker 2:It can be any link you want. So, yes, it can be an attribution link, it can be. I mean, take your pick, it doesn't matter, you can send them anywhere you want.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there's a lot of things you can do with that, especially once you start understanding the link structure when it comes to attribution and how add to carts and a lot of these other things work, where you could essentially build a process with upsells and all types of things that might be hosted somewhere on your own website or maybe a different site that then drops them into Amazon with those upsells. So there's a lot of different things, once you understand the link structure and like the deep links that you were talking about, mike, that you can do with that. Now I will say so a couple of things, thoughts based on what you said there, mike. The first is is that I know, as brands like we think that we need to give something free or like a super strong incentive for that buyer. But I'd also think about, you know, and there's different ways that you can do this but think about if somebody's spending, especially if it's if you're a premium brand out there, I'd really encourage people to think about how they can provide information and how to get the most out of that product, because if somebody just spent, let's use your brand as an example, mike. You know they just spent, you know, 50, a hundred bucks, maybe more, on a pool poll that they know is supposed to be super high quality.
Speaker 1:If you send them. You know, part of that insert is, hey, here's five ways in order to get the absolute max. You know, out of this, out of our premium pool poll, well, you send them to that website. And again, you know, out of this, out of our premium pool pool poll, well, you send them to that website. And again you can pixel them from that. And then you've kind of eliminated that barrier of hey. I think that they're going to try and grab an email address for me right now.
Speaker 1:I would put that video at the top of the page, so you're delivering exactly what you said you were going to deliver up front. I do think it would be. You know, you probably would be smart to put a, an email opt-in form, at the bottom of that page. You know, once they've seen that video, like I said, you know you could. Essentially you don't have to offer anything in free.
Speaker 1:In that what you're really doing is you're kind of two for one, one. You know you're giving them, you're helping them use your product better, which means that you're more likely to get a positive review because they're going to get the best you know, as much as possible to your product and hopefully you know you're going to address, like, hey, here's the common issues that people have with this product. If you have this issue, here's how you solve it, or contact us If they're. You know this part's missing, whatever.
Speaker 1:There's million things you could put in that video, but then it also, you know, incentivizes them to go over there and click through that without having to collect any sort of information. So I think that's another kind of tool in the toolbox where you may not even have to, you know, have a giveaway or something like that as much as, as a marketer, I love those types of things, it may not have to be that complicated. The other thing that I would just be careful of is thinking about, you know, if you're using kind of a two-sided insert or whatever it happens to be, that really, once you start putting more than one or two QR codes on a side, that you'll probably see your number of opt-ins from it decrease.
Speaker 2:Just because I wouldn't put like on any, any specific what's the best way to say it on any specific offer that you have. You know, I wouldn't. I wouldn't have multiple qr codes for sure. I guess my point was more so like, for instance, we have our insert, which isn't really an insert, it's a hang tag, because I want to make sure that somebody interacts with it. They have to. But we also have on the box, we have, you know, QR codes for troubleshooting. We have, you know, a QR code for, you know, customer support. We have, you know so, and they're all different messages, right? They're all for different things. And so my point is and I think that there's some value in this is that every customer is a little bit different in terms of what they want. Some of the customers who buy our poll as far as they're concerned, it's a poll. I know how to use it. You don't have to teach me how to use it. I'm not scanning a code that's going to take me to a video that teaches me how to use a Google. And then you have others who are like no, I paid $200 for this poll. I want to make sure I'm using it exactly the way that you want me to use it Right. So having different offers of different types, you know, on your packaging, in your packaging, on the product, whatever, I think you just create for yourself additional opportunities to get a scan from somebody who maybe wouldn't have scanned the other offer, but they will scan this and I would test it just with, like everything else. You know you always want to test it, but I think there's a lot of opportunity there and, to your point, John, with the whole idea of you know, like, how to use the product, we literally just now to give some history on this to anybody who has not been listening to the podcast for a while, I've been selling pool products for nine years on Amazon and the first product that I sold was a pool net. So that's the product I've been selling ever since the beginning.
Speaker 2:Since we started the process of really trying to procure UGC, we have discovered that a fairly significant portion of individuals who buy our nets do not know which side is up and it like. I look at it and I think how is it not completely obvious which side is up? Right, but it's not. It's clearly not. And it's not like all of these people are idiots, you know, like it's just I don't know why, but they don't know which side is up, and sometimes that doesn't matter, Like for skimming the surface of the pool and stuff.
Speaker 2:Sometimes that doesn't matter like for skimming the surface of the pool and stuff, it doesn't matter. But for cleaning the bottom of the pool it actually matters quite a bit, because if you orient the rake or the net improperly, you can't really get the product. You know the debris off the bottom as well, and I am nearly convinced that a lot of the one-star reviews that we have received from people who said I can't get debris from the bottom of the pool, I assumed that it was kind of a technique issue, because there is kind of a good technique to use. I don't think it's necessarily technique. I think they're using it upside down and I just found out and so I'm just saying like now I have the opportunity, I can put a QR code on my package. This is hey, you know, want to use this product correctly and I'm like this is the thing, so don't neglect that opportunity.
Speaker 3:Mike, can you create from these pixeled audiences? Can you create lookalike audiences like in meta ads, based on the pixeled audience? Do you know?
Speaker 1:I believe that you can. I believe that you can create lookalike audiences based on your pixel audiences and you can do different percentages 1%, 2%. I think like 5%.
Speaker 3:And then, mike, I know you use PixelMe. Can you compare Switchy to PixelMe?
Speaker 2:So the primary difference between those two things is. I think the thing to recognize is that Switchy, its only purpose is tracking and pixeling. It has some pretty powerful options. There's other things that you can do with it. You know, like I said, it has the deep linking and there's other things that you can do with it, but primarily it is a redirection tool that tracks the number of clicks or scans and pixels people. That's what it does, and it does it really well.
Speaker 2:Pixel me is a different animal in that it does that like, it has that service, and you could use pixel me just for that.
Speaker 2:You wouldn't have to use it for anything else, you could use it for just that.
Speaker 2:But pixel me offers offers more than that, because it's designed to be a tool that allows an Amazon seller to optimize their advertising on Google, and the way that it's doing that is that there is actually, from what I can gather, essentially a two way transfer of data between Google and Amazon. So it's the only service that I'm aware of out there where, essentially, they're learning from Amazon what traffic is actually converting and they're telling Google what traffic Google sent that was converting, so that Google then becomes more effective at sending the right traffic to your ad and that you're actually getting the right people, and so it does a very good job of connecting the sale to the actual keyword, but it's also allowing Google as an entity to optimize your ad even beyond that, and so that would be. The distinction between the two is that Switchy doesn't have that capability. It doesn't tie into Google ads, it doesn't do any of that, it's just a redirection service that happens to have some really cool features behind it some really cool features behind it.
Speaker 1:So it sounds like for the brand builders that are listening out there that if they're running a lot of Google ads and they're using that as an external traffic source on Amazon, that something like PixelMe is probably worth the investment in order to optimize that process.
Speaker 2:I would say it likely is.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 2:If nothing else, I think it gives you a better way to determine for sure whether Google ads is even a good option for you, because there are some products for which and Pixel Me says this you know right up front they're like there are some products for which this is not a good idea.
Speaker 2:You are likely not going to see good results. But the one thing about Pixel Me is that because it's so good at tracking the data and actually connecting the order to the keyword that was searched, is that you know pretty much beyond a shadow of a doubt that you're optimizing this ad as much as you possibly could. And if you still, within a few months, can't get to fairly close to profitability and maybe even better, then probably your product isn't necessarily a good fit, or at least rank. You know like if you can do it and the cost is reasonable and you are seeing some ranking improvements, then maybe it's still worth it. But at least you can track that and you can find out. I would highly recommend testing it. It may not be a good idea, google ads might not be a good option for your product, but I think Pixel Me is probably the best way to test it to know.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I reached out to Pixel Me about a product or a brand that I consult with and they told me that they didn't even want my money. They said, nope, doesn't work in that category. We know that it's not great. And I think they were talking about Google ads in general, not just pixel me. Actually, I should probably dig into the answer to that and find out, cause I I didn't. It was just an email he asked me before we even got on a call, what, what category I sold products in, and we didn't even end up having the call. So I wonder if it was a Google ads thing or if it was a pixel me thing in that grocery category.
Speaker 2:I anticipate it's probably a Google ads thing, because realistically, if Google ads would work for your product, then Pixelme should work better for your product, because the problem with if you were just running a direct Google ad is that you don't have the cross, you don't have the bi-directional data transfer for optimization, and so if Google ads would work at all for your product, it would definitely work. With PixelMe, it would only work better. So I imagine he just means Google ads are not a good option for your category.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and just to bring a full backs, full circle on Switchy.
Speaker 1:So for brands that are like, hey, maybe either my product's not a good fit for Google ads or I don't have the budget yet to where I'm looking at, you know, using Google ads as a as an external traffic source for Amazon, keeping in mind that pixeling that audience because you have quality, you know customers are qualified in one way or the other Typically, what you're going to see with those retargeted audiences that you've pixeled is a return on ad spend that is dramatically better than if you just, you know, kind of trying to get that for sale.
Speaker 1:So, you know, I think, for brands that are listening out there, what I would want them to take away from this conversation is if you're thinking like, well, you know, I don't want to, I'm not sure if we can afford to spend another couple thousand dollars on Facebook ads and then another couple thousand dollars on Google ads or whatever it happens to be. I think the magic in this is if you're already driving traffic with an insert or with social media influencers or whatever it happens to be, and then you just take this extra step in order to pixel them, with a pretty low budget you can have a pretty significant impact on your revenue, whether you're driving external traffic to Amazon just by implementing something, by pixeling them with a tool like Switchy and having a pretty low budget campaign on Meta or Google to retarget those customers retarget those customers.
Speaker 2:Well, I would also say that I think it's important to pay attention to the potential flywheel effect that that has, because if you pixel that audience and you can advertise to them in a more cost-effective way than if you weren't using a pixeled audience.
Speaker 2:If that's true and I believe it to be true then what that means is you could send a lot more traffic to Amazon at a fairly reduced cost to what you might spend via other external methods. If you're trying to procure that traffic on the front end as a new to brand kind of a thing, you can send a lot of traffic to Amazon at low cost and that means, if you're getting those purchases, you're improving your BSR, potentially improving conversion rate, depending on how you're doing it. So there's a lot of things that that traffic could do for you. It may cause an increase in your ranking as well. So everybody's talking about external traffic as a ranking factor. If this is a way that you could utilize external traffic in a more cost effective way, then why would you not be testing it? And, like you said, you're already sending people to these links and these QR codes and stuff. Why would you not pixel them so that you can market to them some more.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely All right. Well, anything else that you think is important for our listeners to know, as we kind of talk about pixeling and using some different tools like PixelMe and Switchy- I think the only thing that I would say.
Speaker 2:I think we've made the point that it's fairly obvious. You should at least try this. I think the only thing that I would say and this isn't any big strategic move but if you are going to look into Switchy, I would definitely check AppSumo to see if they've still got the lifetime deal, because Switchy is a monthly service. I think it's probably still worth it even as a monthly service, but it's a way better deal if you can get it through AppSumo and get the lifetime.
Speaker 3:They say that it takes seven times of someone seeing your product, especially a higher end. I sell in the higher end of the price point in pretty much every category. So I mean this is a way to get three or four of those impressions right out of the gate just from one influencer shout out or one Google ad that you ran. So I mean it really is a no brainer If you're most, if you're not sending external traffic, first of all send external traffic to Amazon and second of all, when you are, you might as well pixel it so that you can remarket to them.
Speaker 2:So yeah, and maybe the other thing that I might mention is just going back to that point that I made earlier. If you're trying to pixel people, yes, absolutely institute this in the scenarios that you're already you know, like your insert and things like that that are already happening. But also take a step back and try to gauge what are some ways that I can get a higher scan rate on a QR code. What are some things that I could offer, whether it be, you know, troubleshooting, whether it be how to use the product, whatever it is, what are the ways that you could get the highest scan rate you can possibly imagine from individuals that you know are your target market, and use that as your retargeting opportunity and your pixeling opportunity, because the more scans, the more people you get on the you get pixeled on your list and the more people you can remarket to. So I would I would really be paying attention to that idea. How do I get more scans?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think that's a great point. All right, so, as we wrap up, what is maybe, you know, kind of one action item that you would give to listeners as they think about, you know?
Speaker 3:pixeling their audience and using this, this strategy, I think the first step is take your Amazon blinders off and start building an audience, and I it still amazes me how many Amazon sellers don't. That's step one, but this is a great way to be able to start building an audience. And I know it's not an email or a phone number, but pixeling is super valuable. So when you start sending external traffic, if you're not already this is a really, really good way to be able to get them. Create a mechanism to where you can retarget them and also use it as a way to get email addresses, whether it be on meta or IG. Owning that customer information is super, super important and this is a really good way to do it.
Speaker 1:I don't think I would add anything to that. I think that's perfect. No-transcript.
