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Originally published on December 28, 2021, updated May 23, 2023
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Editor’s note: Amazon removed on-site Editorial Recommendations from search results in April 2023. Publisher-Site Recommendations are still available.
Learn what Amazon Editorial Recommendations are and how to access them in this guest article by Maya Harper of Seller Rocket. If you're interested in trying this program, your products will need a 4+ star average rating and more than 100 reviews on Amazon.
Amazon Editorial Recommendations have drawn quite the buzz in 2021, with many sellers wondering what they are and how they can access them. Though they’ve been around for years, they’ve gained some newfound popularity for a couple of reasons:
Since the second is a solution to the first, it's pretty easy to understand why they’ve been such a topic of conversation this past year. Before jumping into how to access Editorial Recommendations, it’s important to understand what exactly they are, how they differ from an ordinary affiliate link, and what benefits they provide for sellers.
Note: There are currently two types of Editorial Recommendations - those that live directly on Amazon, and those that live on the actual sites of publishers. We’ll call the former "Amazon Editorial Recommendations" and the latter "Publisher-Site Recommendations."
Amazon Editorial Recommendations are product recommendations posted on the first page of Amazon search, making them highly valuable to sellers trying to maximize their front-page visibility and sales. The purpose of these recommendations is to enhance the shopping experience and streamline the decision-making process. Now, shoppers won't have to look through multiple pages of similarly-rated products to pick out an item.
There are about 200 publishers that are able to write these recommendations. The publishers were chosen and invited by Amazon through their Onsite Associates Program and include names such as The New York Times, Wirecutter, CNN Underscored, and Forbes.
The Editorial Recommendation is often placed within the top third of a product page and takes up a significant amount of space. Each one will cite the writer and rank the features of three to 10 products. On the left-hand side, there's a link to a full-length article that goes alongside every recommendation.
The publishers who write these recommendations have full literary control over what goes into them, meaning even if the seller is accessing Editorial Recommendations through a third party, they will not be able to influence what the publishers write. Though this is alarming for some sellers, it really shouldn’t be of concern for a couple of reasons:
Amazon Editorial Recommendations have multiple benefits with the most obvious being that they’re an external recommendation placed within the top third of the first search page. This not only provides a huge amount of publicity to the products within them, but also adds credibility because it’s the only content on the first page that comes from an external source (unless you count Amazon’s Choice as external).
Another huge benefit that may be less intuitive is the improvements Editorial Recommendations cause in PPC conversion. This boost in PPC conversions actually causes the bulk of new sales.
As you can see from the case study below, Amazon's Editorial Recommendations can improve your existing advertising efforts and be an effective way to generate new revenue.
Publisher-Site Recommendations are similar to Editorial Recommendations with the big difference being that these are housed off of Amazon, so members are a part of the Amazon Associates Program rather than the Onsite Associates Program. These publishers do not have to be invited and instead sign up themselves. Once in, they get compensated for any traffic they drive to Amazon that leads to a sale.
The Amazon Associates Program includes influencers, bloggers, and publishers who can all post in whatever format they’d like - even just a link in their Instagram bio. Publisher-Site Recommendations, however, are formatted to follow a general template.
These recommendations are often pretty similar to Amazon's Editorial Recommendations but they do put more of an emphasis on the long-form write-up about each product. Some may include a side-by-side comparison within the article (like the Wirecutter recommendation pictured above), a pros and cons list, or really whatever the publisher thinks is best for their personal layout.
Publisher-Site Recommendations have similar benefits to Editorial Recommendations on Amazon. They improve brand and product credibility and help drive new sales.
Another huge advantage to these is the domain rank improvements that result. Amazon rewards products that drive traffic to their site, and the authority of the site driving that traffic influences that reward. When a reputable publisher backlinks your product on their site, organic rank starts improving. Seller Rocket publishers have domain ranks of 80 and above.
These recommendations work best in tandem with Amazon's Editorial Recommendations. The graph below shows results from a Seller Rocket case study where a brand utilized both Amazon Editorial Recommendations (onsite) and Publisher-Site Recommendations (offsite).
Though each of these led to considerable profits for the brand from sales directly from the Editorial Recommendations, the real results came from the improvements in organic and PPC channels. The PPC improvements can be attributed mainly to Amazon's Editorial Recommendations, while the organic improvements can be attributed mainly to Publisher-Site Recommendations.
Editorial Recommendations on Amazon can be accessed organically or through Seller Rocket. Note that members of the associate programs may choose whichever product they want to write about, so you may get discovered that way. It's not very common for publishers to write about products by seller request as they simply receive too many and it takes too long for them to try out each product.
Thankfully, Seller Rocket can help! Seller Rocket is comprised of eCommerce experts who were previously involved with publishing through Amazon's Onsite Associates Program. However, the program's inefficiencies led Seller Rocket's founders to break out on their own and create a company that makes accessing editorials easy for sellers and streamlines the process for publishers.
Every product won't be eligible for Editorial Recommendations. To ensure they are reliable enough for shoppers, products must meet certain criteria, including:
Interested in Editorial Recommendations but need to get more reviews? Automating your Amazon review requests with FeedbackFive is a great way to reach more buyers and ramp up your ratings.
These requirements are strict with Amazon's Editorial Recommendations and softer with Publisher-Site Recommendations. If products meet the above requirements, Seller Rocket will send the ASINs to their publisher partners. A recommendation will then be live within 10-12 weeks.
If you’re interested in accessing Amazon Editorial Recommendations or just want to learn more, fill out this form!
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