What is the Amazon buy box?

The Buy Box on an Amazon listing refers to the ‘Buy Now’ button on the right side of the product detail page, where customers can click to immediately purchase - removing a lot of friction when purchasing from Amazon. 

With over 80% of purchases coming through the buy box, it’s easy to see how important it is as a seller to focus on winning that precious buy box real estate!

By gaining a greater understanding of the buy box, how it works in conjunction with Amazon’s A-9 search algorithm and what metrics give you the strongest chance of winning the buy box can put you in a great position to excel on Amazon. 

 

How does the buy box work?

Unfortunately, not all sellers are eligible to win the Buy Box. Due to increasing levels of competition on the marketplace, only sellers meeting strict eligibility criteria will be given the opportunity to win a ‘share’ of the buy box placement. After proving eligible at a seller/listing level, Amazon’s A-9 search algorithm will then use other factors to determine the best “offer” (which seller of that product) to the customer. This process pins competitors against each other, factoring in all variables and allocating a larger share of buy box placements to sellers determined to be top-ranking for that product.

Winning the buy box is a balancing act between offering the best price and best customer experience (shipping, customer service etc.) on Amazon - Having the cheapest price does not guarantee you will win the buy box placement. 

There is no hack to winning the buy box, rather, you must regularly monitor and improve on a number of metrics.

 

If I am the only seller of a product, am I guaranteed to win the buy box?

Amazon will only highlight offers that it is confident will present a great experience for buyers i.e. its customers.  This means there may be circumstances in which a third party offer would be ineligible to be displayed as the Featured Offer (i.e. something sold by a seller other than Amazon themselves) even if it's the only offer for an item.

For example, an offer would be ineligible if the third party has a history of providing a poor customer experience or presents a high risk of fraud or abuse. Similarly, an offer at a price that is uncompetitive, for a product that is not available or cannot ship to a customer’s location, or for a product about which there may be product-quality or customer-experience concerns may be ineligible to be displayed as the Featured Offer.

Note Amazon does not always promote itself as the buy box winner (usually but not always). If an Amazon retail offer is out of stock with no outstanding purchase orders and that same product is available at the same or a lower price from a Prime-eligible seller with a high-performance rating, then the Amazon retail offer would not be the Featured Offer.

 

How to win the Amazon buy box

Key requirements	Highest impact on Buy Box
Amazon professional seller account	Use FBA (Fulfilment by Amazon)
Amazon account in good standing	Seller fulfilled Prime
Items NEW, in stock	Sale price (price + shipping)
Selling for at least 3 months	Delivery time

 

A seller using FBA has their orders fulfilled by Amazon's high-quality fulfilment services.  Quick, reliable shipping is what customers want.  FBA provides sellers with items being labelled as Amazon 'Prime' eligible and helps seller performance. The featured offer (buy box) is based on factors affecting customer experience, and FBA generally provides a better and more reliable experience for Amazon’s customers than fulfilment through other means; accordingly, that difference may be reflected in the offer that is featured.

Buy box metrics cheat sheet

All metrics to focus on, to win the buy box:

Metric (highest to lowest priority)	Definition	BB Eligibility criteria	Recommended	Lookback period
Fulfilment method	How do you ship the item?	FBA/FBM	FBA or Seller-fulfilled Prime	Real-time
Final sale price	Price + shipping	Lower is better	Lower is better	Real-time
Shipping time	How long does delivery take?	Less than 14 days	Up to 2 business days	Real-time
Order defect rate	Negative feedback + chargeback rate + A-to-Z claim rate	<1%	0%	Last 90 days
Valid tracking rate	Deliveries with valid tracking	>95%	100%	Last 30 days
Late shipping rate	Orders shipped after expected shipment date	<4%	0%	Last 30 days
On-time delivery rate	Orders delivered on-time	>97%	100%	Last 30 days
Feedback score	Total feedback received	Higher the better	Higher the better	All time
Feedback count	Total customers that have left feedback	Higher is better	Higher is better	All time
Customer response time	Response time to customer issues/queries	24hrs or less	Less than 12hrs	Last 90 days
Inventory depth	How often do you run out of stock?	Lower is better	Lower the better	Last 90 days
Cancellation rate	How often do you receive cancellation requests?	<2.5%	0%	Last 30 days
Refund rate	How often do you receive refund requests?	Lower is better	Lower is better	Last 30 days