How To Manage Account Health on Amazon

How To Manage Account Health on Amazon

Maintaining a good health of your Amazon account is definitely among the most critical factors to succeed on Amazon. The visualization Amazon offers through Account Health was intended to improve the level of performance and motivate sellers to seek out customer problems. This score is determined from factors such as your order defect rate, late shipment rate, valid tracking rate among others. The higher your score, the greater the possibility of the listings to acquire higher visibility and faster sales velocity. However, if such problems persist you could be barred or even have your account frozen or closed down. That is why it is important to keep a close eye on your Account Health page and ensure all the numbers are green

Here, you will find all the necessary information concerning how to avoid the problems connected with Amazon account health. In this guide you will find out what metrics affect your score, how you can improve them, and how to run a healthy and compliant seller account. Let's get started!

Amazon evaluates each seller account with an overall Account Health Rating, reflecting performance across three main areas:

1. Customer Service Performance: This measures things such as your order defect rate, cancellation rate, late shipment rate, and refund rate.

2. Policy Compliance: Regarding policy offence linked to the listings, intellectual property, authenticity of products among others, Amazon takes necessary actions.

3. Shipping Performance: Here the following data counted; Tracking information, Valid Tracking rate, Estimated delivery date errors and Successful delivery rate.

Your rating can be Excellent, Good, Fair and At Risk or Poor. A poor score results in restrictions and bans while a fair score means limitations. Account health therefore needs to be optimized across all its features for ease of selling in addition to growth prospects.

Key Metrics to Monitor

It is crucial for sellers to register how they perform on the account since this is essential of keeping their Amazon or any marketplace healthy. These two perhaps are some of the key KPIs that one should check include the Order Defect Rate (ODR) and the Late Shipment Rate (LSR).

Order Defect Rate (ODR): The ODR stands for the descriptive percentage of your orders that had complaints from the buyers, A-to-Z claims, or even a chargeback in a given month. To maintain excellent health, keep your defect rate under 1% by:

• Effectively guiding the perceptual expectations of the buyers regarding the condition of the products; the time it will take to deliver to the customers; prices; and other factors.

• Offering great customer service and immediate money-back guarantee if required

• Proper packing through adjustable retaining wall, to deal with damages.

Late Shipment Rate (LSR): The LSR is the percentage of your orders that fall in the range of time beyond your estimators’ delivery time. Achieving a good score means that the LSR should be below 2 percent. Strategies to improve it include:

First of all, it is quite effective when setting accurate/conservative shipment estimates.

• Order fulfilment more effectively by refining the inventory and orders.

• Allowing tracking of 100% of shipments

Valid Tracking Rate - For Self-ship Sellers (VTR): VTR refers to the ratio, in a given month, of the orders to which a valid tracking code was applied. Amazon demands sellers to maintain a VTR of at least 95%:

• Allow tracking and enter the right information about the shipment of every order.

• To reduce errors on the tracking details make sure that it was correctly validated.

• Generate and print your shipping labels using Amazon for ease of tracking

Case Study:

Let’s discuss real-life example of Amazon seller effectively managing account health:

A popular seller of educational toys, was facing challenges with its Order Defect Rate (ODR), During the holiday season they have exceeded Amazon acceptable ODR of 1% and it peaked at 1.114%. Specifically, it attributed the major problems to issues with packaging where products were damaged and shipping delays, which led to concerns such as negative reviews and A-to-Z claim.

Challenges:

• High rate of negative responses to customers.

• The increase of returns because of damaged products.

• Delays in delivery due to wrong information regarding the stock available in the store.

• Lack of customer confidence that poses a threat to the selling account.
  

Steps Taken:

Improving Packaging: They had to put vast investment in better strength and security of packaging to enhance the spares handling quality during transit.

Enhanced Shipping Processes: They had to integrate and coordinate their supply chain with the help of a third-party logistics provider to also increase the shipping velocity and decrease the number of errors.

Customer Service Focus: The team started actively searching for such customers and offered refunds and replacements before the clients uttered a word about it.

Inventory Optimization: They started tracking and predicting the availability of their products more effectively using Amazon’s inventory control features and cut down on late shipments.

Results:

In three months, Their ODR reduced down to 0.8%, a figure which was apparel with Amazon’s acceptable rate. They were also able to reclaim customer trust through their product through proactive measures in their customer service which also led to more positive feedback to their product. By the end of that next holiday season, they were again in good account and recorded a 20% growth in sales.

About Adsify

Adsify is an Amazon Ads Partner that has successfully collaborated with over 100 brands to help them grow their business profitably on Amazon through effective ad strategy, implementation, and technology.

Need insights on your account? Hit us up at hello@adsify.digital OR book a free audit with our team.

The most frequent examples and how to avoid them

You also have to refrain from policy violations that may put your account in danger. Some common issues sellers face include:

Infringements of Intellectual Property

One of the most common violations on Amazon is the infringement of intellectual property rights. This means that using products which have a trademark, patent or copyright can see your listings withdrawn and your account deactivated. Here are a few proactive measures to prevent this from happening:

Select reliable suppliers: Use only accredited vendors with genuine and quality products. Check the appropriate authority that they have to sell those products and to ensure you had a purchase order signed with the terms of purchase.

Avoid prohibited items: Amazon has a list of banned products that circumvent the company’s policy against the selling of counterfeit, unauthorized replica, or items that violate patent, trademarks, or other proprietary rights. Make sure that all item listings are Amazon compliant with all the rules of a marketplace.

Obtain licenses and permissions: If you are selling products that have trademarks or brands on them you may require permission from the owner of the trademark or license to sell the products. In many cases, brands are protective of their intellectual property rights and getting formal permission or distribution licenses may not be a problem.

The issue here is that several of the violations occur due to a lack of knowledge, or simple negligence. Hence, it is important that adequate research is conducted and compliance with all the legalities in place in order to list their products on Amazon.

Product Authenticity and the Condition

Another main concern for many Amazon sellers is either product authenticity and the state of the goods that are being offered for sell. Customers are often quick to report cases that they feel have been swindled into buying either fake products or products of inferior quality. Sellers can avoid such issues by following these steps:

Accurate inventory counts: It is advisable to perform a stock audit before releasing fresh stock into the market to the public. Count the products accurately so as not to sell what you do not have and do not use wrong labels that may mix up your product assortment.

Accurate Description: It becomes evident that the untruthful description of the products in the market is one of the reasons that contribute to the discontentment of the buyer. Make sure that your listings do state what the product entails, whether it is big or small, black or white, made from leather or plastic etc. By depicting authentic images which are coordinated with correct specifications, it could help in avoiding cases and complaints on the condition of products.

Amazon cares about product authenticity and a high rate of complaints from buyers negatively affects your account. Make sure that the items you are selling are authentic and that the product listing is a true representation of what is being sold.

Listing Policy Violations

• The most common reason for policy infringements is improper or inaccurate content placed in the listings. Some ways to avoid this include:

• Technical and legal authors often use Amazon listing guideline documents in their personal communication.

• Avoiding the excessive usage of keyword dense titles, images and descriptions.

• Exempting relevant listings for non-compliance.

Effective Account Health Management:

Proven Strategies Proactively manage account health by:

1. Reviewing measurements daily using Seller Central’s Account Health scorecard.

2. Negatives and product condition complaints replies as soon as possible.

3. Ensuring that the product inventory is indicated leftover out of stock items and buying more inventory to avoid going back to the customer that the item was sold out.

4. Updating the product list frequently for the best buyer experience.

The Account Health Assurance program also provides goodwill and shield to sellers with an option to join the program once drafted.

With Account Health Assurance, Amazon will not deactivate your selling account provided seller engage with them to resolve any issues. It is a benefit designed to give sellers greater peace of mind as they grow their business on Amazon. There is no charge for Account Health Assurance.

How does it work?

Any time Amazon identify critical policy issues with your selling account, an account health specialist will personally review the issues and proactively guide you to resolve them. As long as they can reach you within 72 hours and you work to resolve the issues, your account will not be deactivated.

Amazon team will contact you at the emergency contact number that you've provided, so please make sure that it’s always up to date in Notification preferences.

You also have access to Amazon Account Health Support if you have any questions, or want help addressing issues or advice on maintaining great account health. Use the “Call me now” button on your Account Health page in Seller Central to reach support. You can monitor your account health performance to ensure that you have uninterrupted access to the program on the eligibility page.

Methods and Facilities for Reflective Practice

Use the online resources such as Amazon Seller Central and Account Health Reports for tracking and changing. Amazon’s free Account Health seminars and Seller Forums are great resources to check for the most up-to-date information on seller best practices as well. It is also possible to find paid software or agencies that will track one’s health and suggest optimal sharing patterns.

Conclusion:

For a steering Amazon seller business account health to be excellent, continuous monitoring and the right policies specific to problem optimization is crucial and sometimes best practiced when disciplinary issues surge. One needs to make time to self-assess and access the Amazon’s available tools and programs on a more frequent basis. This vigilant approach assists the sellers to maintain standards and be wary to avoid accounts restrictions besides opening up chances for the business.

With any luck, the best practices described here will assist you in making Amazon your success story. Happy selling

Additional Resources:

Amazon Seller University Account Health Videos:

1. What is Account Health?: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GrHGIiAuY9Q

2. Order Defect Rate Explained: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l2kv6xvdPP8&list=PLyrrqKCT7jFIsJ_c-cVYhc3LGekc--6sR

Recommended Blog Posts:

1. How to become successful Amazon FBA seller: https://www.adsify.digital/ultimate-guide-how-to-become-a-successful-amazon-fba-seller

2. Reducing Return Rates on Amazon: Strategies for Sellers: https://www.adsify.digital/reducing-return-rates-on-amazon-strategies-for-sellers