Seller Performance Archives - Riverbend Consulting

Do you know the Amazon terms to use when describing your listings?

By: Cathy Ceely

When selling at Amazon, you will encounter many terms used to describe your listings. As well as the product detail pages visible at Amazon. These terms include ASIN, SKU, Offer, Listing, Detail Page.

It’s important to know the difference between listings and detail pages.

Why does this matter?

Amazon staff does not use the terms interchangeably. Therefore, when interacting with Amazon staff, such as Seller Support or Seller Performance, sellers will want to use the correct term.

What is PDP?

It is the product detail page.

This is a shared space that displays attributes common to all offers, or listings, for that product. These attributes generally include:

Title
Image
Bullet points
Product Description
Variations (size or color)
Customer product reviews

What is a listing?

A listing is a seller’s offer found on the product detail pages. Ideally, sellers will use the product’s UPC code to search for, and match to, existing detail pages. If a detail page does not exist, sellers may create a new ASIN for the product. Amazon owns the product detail page once created, regardless of who creates the page.

Sellers may see that Amazon takes enforcement against ASINs and/or listings. Here are some examples of ASIN level enforcement:

Restricted Products
Intellectual Property Infringement
Duplicate ASINs
Variation issues

Here are some examples of listing level enforcement:

Intellectual Property Infringement
Buyer-driven complaints, such as: product condition, authenticity, or safety

Any seller who has an active listing or SKU, even if the quantity is zero, may receive notification of an ASIN level enforcement. Sellers should consider appealing ASIN level enforcement, especially if the enforcement was an error. When listing level enforcement occurs, only the seller whose listing is impact may appeal.

Sellers who appeal ASIN or listing enforcements want to be clear whether they’re appealing on an ASIN or a listing. Clarity will help ensure that an appeal is successful.

This is a brief discussion that touches on some of the differences between ASINs and listings and is not intended to be all inclusive.

If you have further questions or need help with an ASIN or listing appeal, please reach out to Riverbend Consulting at: 877-289-1017; we’re happy to assist.

Cathy utilizes 20 years of Amazon experience to advocate for sellers. She has extraordinary knowledge regarding Amazon selling policies and seller enforcement. Cathy was a founding member of the Amazon Executive Seller Relations and Product Quality teams, and Operations Manager for Seller Performance in Seattle. She was a Senior Program Manager with the Marketplace Growth team (now Strategic Account Services). Cathy has raised, trained and shown champion Doberman pinschers for 40 years.

As predicted, the California legislation will not make Seller Performance any friendlier

By: Lesley Hensell

This summer, optimistic Amazon sellers believed there was change in the air. Amazon made changes to its Business Solutions Agreement (see our previous blog post), and the California legislature began work on a bill that purported to protect sellers from abusive online marketplaces.

Over the last few weeks, as the updated Business Solutions Agreement (BSA) has come into force, it’s unfortunate that my predictions have come true. As I suspected, nothing has really changed in Seller Performance and its actions toward sellers – at least not that anyone on the outside can see. It’s not kinder, it’s not gentler, it’s not more responsive, and there are no 30-day cure notices, as the BSA said there would be.

Also as predicted, the California legislature’s AB-1790 has been watered down to a point that it means almost nothing. The most recent version of the bill strikes out the few provisions that I truly believed would have a positive impact for sellers. At the same time, it’s clear that someone (an Amazon lobbyist?) explained “risk management” to the legislature, as there are now provisos to protect every step of the investigation and enforcement processes in Seller Performance.

Striking out the good

One provision originally in the bill said it would “prohibit a marketplace from destroying products in its possession that are the property of a marketplace seller without offering the marketplace seller a reasonable opportunity to retrieve the marketplace seller’s property.”

That language was struck out completely, however, from the most recent version of the bill.

Why? I’m speculating. But I believe this was far too broad, as it would allow bad actors to place removal orders for counterfeit or stolen goods. The legislation refused to wade further into the devilish details by saying something like, “a reasonable opportunity to retrieve authentic, legitimate goods.” I suppose they believed it would take too much work to define “authentic” or “legitimate,” so they just abandoned the hard work altogether.

Unfortunately, I’ve seen far too many deactivated sellers have their inventory seized and destroyed – even when they attempted to place removal orders and were selling legitimate goods. This will continue to be an uphill battle.

Embracing risk management

The legislature added many provisos to the bill, essentially giving Amazon and other marketplaces complete power to implement their current risk management structure. For example, a section initially said when a marketplace suspended a seller, it then had to provide a “written statement of reasons” including “the specific facts and circumstances that led to the decision.”

Check out the revised version. It now says the written statement of reasons must do this: “Without disclosing information that would result in the disclosure of any proprietary, confidential or trade secret information, or disclosing information that would hinder any investigation or prevention of deceptive, fraudulent, or illegal activity, describe the facts and circumstances that led to the decision unless the marketplace reasonably believes that giving a written statement of reasons could negatively impact the safety or property of another user or the marketplace itself.”

In other words, Amazon doesn’t have to tell you anything. And the word “specific” was removed. So your suspension notice will be generic, just like they always have been.

Another section has Amazon’s fingerprints all over it. The past language stated that the marketplace must “identify the terms or conditions that permit the suspension or termination.” That has been changed to “identify the term, condition, or policy that serves as the basis for the suspension or termination.” This is the same-old same-old, but now California’s legislature is adopting specific language that recognizes what has always been – Amazon’s policies have the force of contract law with sellers. In other words, third-party sellers will see no improvement or relief.

What does it all mean?

Just as the changes to the BSA made very little positive difference to Amazons sellers, the California legislation will have little to no positive effects. The only question I have at this point is what it means for those sellers whose accounts are frauded. Let me explain. Sometimes, Amazon designates an account as “frauded” because Amazon suspects one of a wide range of fraudulent activities has occurred. This can be anything from money laundering to buying/selling fake gift cards to violating laws about overseas ownership, and more.

In these rare cases, the account is closed with no notice whatsoever. The seller cannot login, and there is no appeals process in place. Sometimes, we can get these accounts reinstated if the fraud designation was made in error (yes, it happens – twice in the last month at Riverbend, in fact!). But it is an extremely tough uphill battle.

Under the new legislation, Amazon would have to provided frauded California sellers with a reason for their account’s deactivation. Don’t be surprised if this provision disappears down the memory hole by the time the next version of the bill is considered.

Have more concerns about the California legislation? Riverbend Consulting navigates online retail. Get your Amazon account reinstated, sell with confidence, and increase your bottom line. Contact us.

Lesley Hensell is Partner at Riverbend Consulting, she offers practical know-how to improve retail performance. Lesley’s experience with Amazon compliance gets accounts back up fast.

Seller Performance

ASIN, SKU, Offer, Listing, Detail Page. Are you familiar with these terms?