When you’re the only seller who carries a listing, it means you’ll get to live in the Buy Box. That goes for individual items and bundles. If you follow Amazon’s strict and detailed bundling policies and develop a strategic mix of bundles, you’ll find your bundled product listings living in the Buy Box.
Before we move on, let’s talk about what Amazon product bundling isn’t:
Amazon product bundling is NOT selling multipacks. Don’t mix up bundles with multipacks, as it can only get you into trouble with Amazon. A multipack is a package of several of the same product (5 white crewneck t-shirts, for example) or versions of a product with the same SKU (5 crewneck t-shirts in 5 different colors). Don’t try to sell your colorful multipack of t-shirts as a bundle, as this can get you into trouble with Amazon.
Amazon’s Detailed Bundle Guidelines explain that bundles must consist of products that, when packaged together, enhance or ease the overall customer experience. You’re also responsible for obtaining a new UPC for any bundle you create. And, don’t include generic products in bundles, as you may confuse your customers.
One key takeaway is that you can’t modify a bundle after you create one. Instead, you need to create a new bundle if you want to modify an existing one.
Another important thing to note: you can only list bundles in one category. You should list bundles in the category of the highest-priced item in each bundle, unless that item is in the BMVD category. If that’s the case, list it in the category for the second highest priced item in the bundle.
For more information about how to structure the titles and product descriptions of your bundles, check out the rest of the Amazon bundling policy website.
The benefits of bundling stretch far beyond being a one-way ticket to the Buy Box. (At least until competitors copy your bundles, but we’ll get to that shortly.) If you have certain items that seem like they’re glued to the shelves in your inventory, bundling them with complementary goods can be their ticket out.
Consider a seller whose listings are mostly guitars and guitar accessories. They may have a high volume of poor-selling guitar straps and cases, along with an excess of guitar polish. To drive sales of these underperforming products, they could create a unique bundle with a popular guitar and the less-popular strap, case, and polish.
On top of clearing out space in her inventory, the addition of the case, strap, and polish will add perceived value to the guitar. Buyers will be pleased to receive additional items in the bundle that they may have felt compelled to purchase separately. And, you’ll be able to attach a premium price to your bundle that could boost your profits even more than you would by selling each item individually.
After you create a new bundled product listing in the Amazon product catalog, do a product search for your bundle. If you followed the right steps, you’ll discover that it’s happily nestled in the Buy Box. With no other sellers savvy enough to mimic your product bundling technique, there’s no Buy Box competition to worry about. To get into this prime position consistently, think of products that when sold together make each other even more attractive.
For example, consider this story about one Amazon seller who found a way to beat Amazon at its own game by bundling Burt’s Bees products. First, she halted her listings of each individual product in the bundle, since Amazon was offering each one at a lower price and living in the Buy Box. Then, with no competitors, she was able to make a nice profit selling her Burt’s Bees bundles.
Another success story comes from veteran online seller Skip McGrath, who recently provided insight into his Amazon bundling strategy. McGrath was also trying to find a way around competing against Amazon directly, as the company was selling individual salt and pepper mills that he sourced from the same manufacturer.
At first, he bundled them into a salt and pepper mill combo bundle, but Amazon was quick to copy him. So McGrath decided to get crafty. He added jars of fancy black pepper and sea salt to the mix, created a new bundle, and voila: He was able to sling the sets like a boss for over a year. But what about when competitors are relentless about copying your bundles?
If and when competitors copy your bundles, you can retain the Buy Box against them by using automated repricing. Your min and max prices are tied to your costs and margin requirements, so you may still be at an advantage against any copycats. (Although Informed Repricer now lets you auto-set your min and max prices based on your desired min and max profit per listing, so you can ensure every sale results in a minimum profit.)
But if copycat sellers have lower total costs than you, there are other strategies you can use. Let them sell out at a low price and then set up your repricer to reset your price to its max. Then, when you’re the only seller with that bundle left in stock, you can sell it at a higher margin.
Automation also takes emotion out of repricing, so you won’t be tempted to do anything drastic — even when you’re really peeved. The best part? Since you likely won’t be selling only bundles, automated repricing will help your individual listings, as well.
Informed Repricer is a competitive repricing platform that helps online businesses drive profits using smart algorithms and actionable insights.
