amazon Category Style Guide
Your success on Amazon.co.uk largely depends on the quality of your product pages. Listings in a consistent format with accurate and detailed product information will drive traffic to your pages and can favourably influence the customer’s purchasing decision. Please note that non-compliance with Amazon requirements may result in your products being hidden (suppressed) from search and browse and your selling privileges revoked for this category. For further information, please refer to the respective section in the Style Guide.
The above Watch listing is an example of what a compliant product listing on Amazon should look like. In the section below you will find the basic requirements for setting up similar listings for your products.
- Images must be at least 1600px on the longest side to enable zoom. Main image must be on a pure white background, show only the product for sale, show a front product view, have an aspect ratio close to 3:4 (Width: Height), occupy at least 85% of the image area and show a real representation of the product (no sketches) without extra text or graphics, product must be shot flat. Each colour variation of the product needs an image. Images need to be saved in .jpg, .png, .tif or .gif. For more information, please check down below and onwards of the Watches style guide.
- All variations of a style of product must be placed in one listing under a parent product. In the above example, we have 4 colours of the same watch model. Customer can easily see and select all the colours available without having to change the page. As each customer visit to a variation will be counted under the parent product detail page, this will increase your chances to sell a product (no. of detail page views is one of the criteria used to determine what appears at the top of the search results). For more information, please check down below of the Watches style guide.
- Good product titles build customer trust in you as a seller. The title format must be as follows:
[brand_name] + [target_audience_keyword] + [display_type] + [watch_movement_type] + “Watch” + “with”+
[band_material_type] + “bracelet” + [part_number]
There is a length limit that will suppress products with titles longer than 150 characters. Example of compliant title:
Invicta Men’s Chronograph Quartz Watch with Stainless Steel Bracelet 0076
For more information, please check down below of the Watches style guide. - Bullet Points and Descriptions help customers to imagine the experience of owning or handling the product. The bullet point section shown in the image above will be the first part of written information a customer will see without the use of ‘scrolling’. Make sure to include all relevant information about the product. Product descriptions (not shown in the above example) are situated further down the listing page. To create a well-written product description, put yourself in your customers’ shoes: what would they want to feel, touch and ask? Incorporate information about the feel, usage and benefits of your product to fire the customer’s imagination. For more information, please check down below of the Watches style guide.
This guide aims to help you to create your catalogue easily and maximise your sales.
Your success on Amazon.co.uk largely depends on the quality of your product pages. Listings in a consistent format with accurate and detailed product information will drive traffic to your pages and can favourably influence the customer’s purchasing decision.
How you present your product information on our site is something we take very seriously for the benefit of customers and sellers on Amazon. Please read the guidelines below to find out how we expect sellers to list titles and display images. Failure to comply with these rules may result in your Watches listings being removed and your selling privileges revoked for this category
Images
Good images communicate selling points and features of your product, inform and interest customers and reinforce your brand.
In an online store, the product image is one of your most valuable marketing tools. Listings with low-quality or few images suffer poor conversion rates and over time will appear less and less frequently in search rankings. The best customer experience is a store that is visually clean and consistent, so we require all sellers to commit to and maintain the standards described in this guide.
Important: Listings may be suppressed if they do not meet all required imaging standards. These listings will continue to be visible in your Seller Central account and accessible from the Suppressed Listings view in Manage Inventory where you can upload compliant images and information.
We recommend you to regularly check your Listing Quality and Suppressed Listing Report to identify detected by Amazon opportunities to improve image quality of your listings.
Note: You may only use images for which you own corresponding copyright.
1. Different types of images
Amazon.co.uk can display several images for each product in the catalogue. While only main images are required for all parent ASINs and all child ASINs (e.g. for every colour), customers can make more informed purchasing decisions if you upload several high-resolution product images Image files must be JPG, PNG, GIF or TIFF format (JPG is preferred). You can use three types of images to illustrate your products:
The parent ASIN’s MAIN image: Only one main image is used per parent listing. You must supply a parent main image.
The child ASIN’s MAIN image: Each child ASIN (corresponding to one SKU) must have a MAIN image that shows only that distinct colour option, and only one view of that item. You must supply a child main image for every colour option that you sell. The Main image is extremely important as it is shown on the results search page.
Alternate images: These show different views of the product to help clarify use and details, e.g. from different angles. You can supply up to eight alternate images for each parent or child SKU.
Requirements for images
 Required |
for MAIN images: |
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| for ALL images: |
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 Preferred |
for ALL images: |
Alternate images displaying a silhouette or sizing scale may contribute positively to the purchasing decision and can reduce customer returns. |
 Prohibited |
for MAIN images: |
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| for ALL images: |
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Please refer to the appendix to see examples of compliant MAIN images.
Examples
Compliant images
Non-compliant MAIN images
EAN
EAN (European Article Number or now the International Article Number) is a unique 13 digit code given to individual articles and is used to identify the product.
Amazon expects each seller to have EANs for their products, which should be provided by the manufacturer.
Important: Listings with missing or wrong EANs (external_product_ID) will be suppressed if those listings are for brands with known EANs. These listings will continue to be visible and accessible in your seller central account from the Suppressed Listings view in Manage Inventory where you can upload the appropriate images and information. If you are the manufacturer of the product which includes manufacturer of customised or hand-made products, private label brand owners or producer of branded white-label products, you must have GTIN or Manufacturer Codes. If you are the manufacturer and still don’t have bar codes, you will need to apply for the Amazon Brand Registry Program. Brands registered in this program are assigned a Global Catalogue Identifier (GCID), which can be used as a substitute for Manufacturer Codes or GTINs when you list a new product on Amazon. If the products you sell do not qualify for the Amazon Brand Registry, they might still be eligible for an EAN exemption. For more information, log on to Seller Central and search for the keywords “Brand Registry” or use this link.
For products already selling on Amazon.co.uk, please make sure to list against an existing ASIN. Do not create an existing product with a new barcode as this will duplicate the listing on Amazon. Any duplicates will eventually be removed to ensure we keep the site clean for the best customer experience.
Variations
We call the different size and colours for the same product “variations”. Variations allow customers to find alternative desired colours or sizes for a product on one detail page.
To create a variation, you must create a product called a “parent” without any colour or size that links to all the “children” products, i.e. all the different band colour/size combinations of the product available. All variations related to the same reference must be added to the same product page.
In the above example the parent product is a watch and the variations are all the colours available for this watch (3 colours). All colours have been created on the same product page using variations. It is important to link all the variations of the same “parent” product for two reasons:
- The customer can easily see all the colours (and sizes if any) available without having to change page. A more fluid navigation will lead more often to a purchase as it is easier to see the different choices.
- Each customer visit to one of the “children” pages will be counted under the “parent” item. This will ultimately
increase your chances to sell a product as the number of views is one of the criteria used to determine what appears at the top of search results.
Variation creation rules
 Required |
for Parent ASINs: |
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| for Child ASINs: |
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Supported variation themes for Watches are: BandColor, ColorName, SizeName and SizeName-ColorName.
Important: Please note that non-compliance of the variation principle can lead to a suppression of your ASINs.
Colours
The product colour is one of the key information customer will use to make a buying decision and one of the ways by which customers will judge your quality and professionalism as a seller.
To keep colours concise and informative, make sure you are following the below guidelines for color_name attribute:
 Do’s: |
 Provide the Colour as given by the brand
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Examples:
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 Don’ts: |
 Do not add additional information about the product (i.e. do not add material, multipack, department name, fit type, sleeve type or waist style information)
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Examples:
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Keep the Colour clean and informative
Capitalize the first letter of each word
Use 1-3 words to describe the Colour (we allow max. 50 characters)
Mint Leaves Print
Harvest Gold
Baby Pink
Blue
Grass Green
Navy White Red
Do not use abbreviations
Do not use synonyms and repetitions
Do not use ALL Caps
Do not use too short Colour names
Do not use excessively long Colour names
Do not use extra characters like brackets, exclamation marks, slashes etc.
Nvy Bl
DARK NIGHT BLACK
True Chino 14w Cord Wt 0834 Stretch
Blue (Blue Stone Used With Buffies, Floral Embroidery 928)Titles
Good product titles build customer trust in you as a seller.
The product title is the first impression customers will have of your product, but it is also one of the ways by which customers will judge your quality and professionalism as a seller. Keep titles concise, informative and accurate and make sure you are following the syntax Amazon requires. ASINs with non-compliant titles may be suppressed from the website.
Remember that on Amazon each unique product has just one product detail page, even if more than one seller has an offer against that unique product. Therefore, product titles should never contain information that is specific to just one seller, even if that seller has initially created the listing. Failure to comply with this important principle may result in the removal of your Watches listings and your Watches selling privileges being revoked.
Title requirements
 Required |
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 Prohibited |
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Example of compliant title: Invicta Men’s Chronograph Quartz Watch with Stainless Steel Bracelet 0076
Increasing discoverability
Products created with accurate and complete data will be found more easily by the customer and will therefore be sold more often.
Customers can search for and find products in one of the two ways: search – either within Amazon’s own site or on external search engines such as Google; or browse – navigate through the website. Most customers use a combination of both search and browse. It is therefore very important to ensure that your products are optimised for search and correctly categorized in browse, and have the right attributes (product data) to help customers filter the results.
Basic rules to increase visibility:
- Always assign the most detailed browse node available in the Browse Tree Guide to ensure discoverability of your products in search and browse. Use the browse node ID labelled in black in the Browse Tree Guide rather than a light grey root node which only serves navigation purposes.
- A product description should be used instead of a selling pitch as it helps to increase sales and reduces the rate of product returns: use simple language based on the official information provided by the manufacturer. This description is part of the information referenced in the website algorithm.
- Search keywords make your products appear during free search.
1. Browse node
The browse node allows the product to be classified in the Amazon catalogue. It is comparable to an aisle in a supermarket.
Each department has a node number that you can find in the Browse Tree Guide. If you do not assign a node number to your product, the product will not be found on the website.
 Required |
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 Prohibited |
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On the left is what the browse structure of Watches looks like. If a customer wanted to search for Wristwatches, he or she would click on Wristwatches which would then take them to a page with only Wristwatches (second image). If the customer goes on to search further on the type of wristwatch, your product will be displayed only when it has been correctly classified under the Wristwatches Type. In order to maximize discoverability, the browse node you choose for your product should be as specific as possible.
2. Product-specific attributes / filters
To search for a product, customers can use either the search bar or the refinements (filters) available in the left navigation bar. For each filter, there is an attribute field in the inventory file template. For most attributes, you can find predefined valid values in the Watches Inventory File that you can choose from for your product. Other fields can be filled with free text information. If you do not fill in the fields, your products will not appear in the results when the customer selects one of these criteria and you will miss the opportunity to increase your sales. We recommend that you use these attributes as precisely and completely as possible in order to create customer trust and to avoid product returns.
Main filters used for Watches products
We recommend that you provide as much information as possible and regularly check Seller Central for the latest version of the Watches Inventory File template because the refinements and valid values change periodically. You can download the file to update your catalogue with the new valid values, especially for the following attributes:
- Brand – it is important that you use the official spelling of the brand; do not enter the merchant’s company name in the “brand” field (if your product does not have any brand, please complete the manufacturer field instead)
- Target audience – defines who the product is primarily produced for (Men’s / Women’s / Unisex / Children’s, Boy’s, Girl’s)
- Watch Movement Type – defines whether a watch is for example analogous or automatic.
Important: Listings may be suppressed from search and browse if you do not fill in valid information for required attributes.
Other important attributes for product specific information:
band_material_type
band_width
bezel_function
bezel_material_type
calendar_type
case_diameter
case_material_type
case_thickness
clasp_type
dial_color
dial_window_material_type
max_water_pressure_resistance & max_water_pressure_resistance_unit_of_measure
metal_stamp
water_resistance_depth & water_resistance_depth_unit_of_measure
Example of a good product specification:
3. Bullet points
Bullet point descriptions are keywords or short sentences that summarise your product’s key features. A customer should be able to understand the key features and characteristics and may then decide to read the product description for more detail. The bullet points are displayed on the product detail page in the Technical Details section, above the product description, but also feed into Amazon search and external search results. They help customers evaluate a product, so any information not directly relevant to the specific product can detract from a customer’s purchase decision. Example:
 Required |
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 Prohibited |
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Do not feel obliged to fill in all fields – 3 good bullets are better than 5 weak ones.
4. Product description
The product description allows you to write a detailed description of your product and should replace the sales pitch. Detailed product descriptions can increase your sales and decrease customer returns. You can publish general information about the brand or information about the style or the material.
 Required |
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 Prohibited |
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Example:
5. Keyword search
These are additional terms that can be added to help customers find your product when they search on Amazon.co.uk. They do not affect searches on external search engines, e.g., Google. Note that much of the content you provide in the title and brand fields already counts towards search, so there is no need to add this information again. Search terms can include attributes of the product, and different ways of describing the product, if relevant. Examples include synonyms and specifications, e.g., for a ring additional search terms could be women’s ring, silver ring or materials, styles or occasions.
 Required |
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 Preferred |
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 Prohibited |
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Appendix: Compliant Main Image Examples for Watches
Please use these compliant Main images as reference:
Wrist watches
Watch straps
Pocket & fob watches
Watch boxes
Watch stands
Watch winders
Pocket watch chains
Watch repair tools & kits
amazon Category Style Guide – Download [optimized]
amazon Category Style Guide – Download