Why Your Listings & A+ Content Are Losing Shoppers

This, this is the Billion Dollar Sellers Podcast. Your go-to source for cutting-edge strategies and success stories from the world of Amazon and e-commerce. Buckle up and get ready to take your Amazon business to new heights. Don't forget to subscribe to the Billion Dollar Sellers newsletter. Welcome your host Welcome your host Kevin King. Hey everyone, welcome to the Billion Dollar Sellers Podcast. I'm your host Kevin King and today is February 26th, 2026. We've got a lot to cover, so let's jump right in. First off, I've got a question for you. Walmart says roughly half of its app users have used Sparky. That's their version of Rufus. How much bigger are the product baskets that customers build with Sparky? Think about it and we've got the answer at the end of the show. Before we get into the meat of today's show, I want to mention something quick. E-commerce is shifting faster than ever and we want to check in. Dan Ashburn, myself, and Athena Severin have put together the 2026 e-commerce seller survey. It takes just 3 minutes. Yet the answer report more [clears throat] than $4,000 in tools and access to verified seller communities in your region. Plus, there are more than $25,000 in prizes. We're talking about luxury mastermind in Greece, a 12-day sourcing trip to China, and a VIP ticket to ECom Mastery AI in Nashville. No account required, works on mobile. Head to 2026sellersurvey.com before it closes on March 4th and I've put a link in the show notes. Now, let's get into something that could really change how you think about affiliate marketing on Amazon. Jesse Lakes recently posted on LinkedIn with contributions from a bunch of other people a complete rethinking of how to map the Amazon affiliate ecosystem. If you're a brand or seller working with affiliates and creators to drive external traffic to your listings, pay attention cuz this framework changes how you should be looking at the entire ecosystem. Most people organize the affiliate landscape by tool type. That's the wrong approach. The smarter way is to follow the creator journey from discovery all the way through to optimization. Jesse laid out a clean five-layer model that maps how creators actually move from asking, "What should I promote?" to figuring out what's actually working. So, let me walk you through each layer. Layer one is what he calls creator commerce intelligence. This is where creators decide what to promote and who to work with. They need confidence before they invest time into content and put the trust they've built with their audience on the line. We're talking about influencer discovery tools, creator connections, seller networks, and product seeding platforms. And here's why you should care as a seller. If you're not showing up at this layer, creators aren't going to know you exist. Layer two is demand creation, and this is all about audience and intent. This is where creators actually influence shoppers before Amazon ever sees them. Trust and purchase intent get built before anyone even lands on your product's page. This layer covers content publishers, social creators, deal sites, and AI or programmatic content. The reason this matters is that this is the external traffic Amazon keeps rewarding. Creators operating here are building demand you simply can't buy with PPC. Layer three is conversion infrastructure. Think of these as the pipes that turn creator influence into trackable Amazon clicks. Great content on its own isn't enough to drive results. You need completed attributed actions. This is where your CTA tools, widgets, plugins, and link management platforms all live. And if this layer is broken, you got lost attribution, which means you're paying for traffic you can't even measure. Layer four is tracking and monetization models. This is the tech that determines how traffic gets credited and how everyone gets paid. Attribution, tracking, reporting, and payments are the backbone here. We're talking about Amazon Associates both on-site and off-site, attribution-based seller networks, creator connections-based networks, and CPC or CPA alternatives. Understanding this layer is really the difference between running a profitable affiliate program and just lighting money on fire. Finally, layer five is content performance optimization and intelligence. This is the feedback loop that tells creators and tells you what to scale, what to fix, and what to kill. Creators grow by learning, not by guessing. This is where boosting platforms and reporting and link health solutions come in. The best affiliate partnerships are not set and forget. This layer is how you identify your top performers and double down on what's working. So, here's the bottom line. If you're building affiliate or extra traffic strategy, stop thinking about individual tools and start thinking about which layers of this ecosystem you're strong in and where you've got gaps. The brands winning with creators in 2026 aren't just doing affiliates. They're operating across all five layers. And speaking of creators, if you want to meet more than 100 of them in person and strike deals, then you need to be at my ECom Mastery AI event in April in Nashville. Don't worry, that's linked in the show notes, too. Next up, here's something worth thinking about. In an AI-driven world, human insight is still your edge. AI can generate your listing creative and predict performance, but at the end of day, real shoppers decide whether to click add to cart. As AI content multiplies across Amazon, validating what truly resonates with customers becomes a real competitive advantage. That's where PickFu comes in. You can instantly test your packaging, main image, A+ content, and even product concepts with real shoppers in your target audience. You're getting authentic feedback from people who would actually buy your product, and you get it before you scale ads or commit to inventory. Brands like MaryRuth, Carpe, and EarthRated are using PickFu to choose higher converting main images, validate new products before launch, optimize against competitors, and figure out exactly why shoppers click or hesitate. And once results come in, their AI Insights report uncovers key themes and winning elements in seconds, and PickFu AI helps you dig deeper and turn that feedback into action. Sign up for free and use code BDSN2026 at checkout for a $100 credit, which is enough for a couple of free tests. There's also a link to that in today's notes. Next up, I want to bring your attention to something you've really got to see. Everyone thinks direct mail is outdated. Meanwhile, it's still delivering $12 for every $1 you spend, reaching every household in America 6 days a week, and producing engagement rates that digital marketers can only dream about. In the latest episode of Marketing Misfits, Norm Farrar and I sit down with Dr. Wilson Zehr, the founder of Zearmail, to break down why direct mail still works, how it integrates with digital marketing, and how automation is bringing this old-school channel into the AI era. If you sell online, run e-commerce, build lists, or care about ROI, this episode may completely change how you think about marketing channels. Now, let's look at some interesting stats. There's a fascinating graphic from ECDD showing the share of revenue generated through direct-to-consumer channels among the top 100 retailers in different regions back in 2024. North America sits at 15%, and Europe is a little higher at 17%. South America is at 13%, and then you get to Asia, and it's just 1%. That's a massive gap. The reason is that Asia's e-commerce landscape is completely dominated by marketplaces, which leaves almost no room for retailer-owned direct-to-consumer channels. It's a pretty striking anomaly. I've got the full graphic in the written version of today's podcast, and there's a link at our show notes. Now, let's talk about something that could be a really big deal for your advertising. Rufus is currently showing sponsored product ads for free. BDSS Jared 100 member and ECom Mastery speaker uh Rich Java recently posted about this in the Billion Dollar Sellers Club, and if you're not in it, you really are missing out. Here's what's going on. Amazon has been placing your sponsored products inside Rufus conversations, and most advertisers don't even know it's happening. It's called sponsored products prompts. So, a shopper asks Rufus something like, "Does Mrs. Myers have a dish soap that's plant-based?" Your sponsored product ad can now show up as the answer, not as a banner, not as a search result, but as a conversational response inside an AI chat. Amazon is auto-generating two types of prompts. The first is comparison style, like why choose this brand's product category, and the second is feature-specific, like does this brand have a product with this feature? You didn't write these prompts, but Amazon AI did. It pulled from your detail pages, your brand store, and your campaign data generate them. And your campaigns were automatically enrolled without you doing anything. Reach you pull the SP prompts report for one of her accounts covering January 5th to February 14th of this year. What she found was really interesting. There were 35 prompt entries across 18 unique questions, about 5,000 total impressions, 41 clicks, and here's the best part, $0 in total spend because it appears to be completely free during the beta. It resulted in four orders totaling about $513 in sales. So, that's $513 in sales with zero ad spend during a beta that most advertisers haven't even noticed yet. Amazon generated 18 different questions about just one brand's products. Things like, does this brand have a dish soap that's plant-based, or does this brand have a laundry detergent safe for sensitive skin? These aren't random questions. These are real questions shoppers are asking Rufus. And Amazon is matching your product as the answer. Now, here's the gap most people are running into. If you click the prompts tab inside Magroup, you'll probably just see no data available. You actually need to download the SP prompts report to see any of this data. So, here's what you should do today. Go download your SP prompts report and study the questions Amazon is generating for your products. Look at whether these questions are actually relevant and whether Rufus is positioning your product correctly. If a prompt doesn't make sense for your products, toggle it off. But if it's spot-on, make sure your detail page reinforces that answer. These prompts reveal how Amazon's AI understands your products. That's free competitive intelligence that most brands are completely ignoring right now. Here's Ritu's prediction, and I think she's right. Right now, prompts is just an on-off switch. No bidding, no targeting, just a simple toggle. Enjoy that simplicity while it lasts. Amazon will eventually turn this into an option, and the brands who took the time to study their prompts data during the free beta will have a massive head start over everyone else who's scrambling to figure out what just happened. The free ride is now, but the toll booth is coming. And don't forget to subscribe to Ritu's weekly AI for e-comm newsletter, which I've got linked. Speaking of AI tools, let me tell you about today's software tool of the day. Doodle Labs just upgraded its free AI marketing tool called Promeleon with a new feature called Photoshoot, and this is a game-changer for product imagery. You upload any product photo, even a rough iPhone snap, pick a template like studio or lifestyle, and Promeleon generates professional-grade images using Google's Nano Banana image model. It automatically applies your brand aesthetics, so everything looks cohesive. You can even paste your product URL, and it pulls your listing info to match your brand. So, why should Amazon sellers care about this? Well, think about secondary images. Most sellers have really weak slots two through seven. With Promeleon, you can fill them in minutes instead of spending more than $500 on a photographer. For eye creative, you can generate fresh batches for sponsored brands or social campaigns instead of recycling the same three photos over and over. And for new launches, you can test concepts with AI-generated images before investing in a real photoshoot. Now, Amazon does have its own AI image tool in Seller Central, but Promeleon's lifestyle shots are noticeably better. It also supports image editing, so you can say something like, "Change my background to a forest," and it handles style transfers and campaign generation from product URLs, too. The catch is, it's It's available in the US and Canada for now, but it's completely free. The bigger picture here is that this is Google packaging its own AI models into targeted tools specifically for merchants. It's a common move that should make paid image generation software tools pretty nervous. It's not ready to replace your photographer entirely, but it's a serious compliment to their work and a no-brainer for filling content gaps. All right, now let's get into something I think a lot of you need to hear. Let's talk about why your listings and A+ content might be losing shoppers. Most sellers build their listings like they're writing a product manual, but your customer isn't sitting down to study your listing. At mid-scroll, half distracted, one thumb away from your competitor. If your great content keeps underperforming, it's probably not the product. It's how you're presenting it. Shoppers don't reject value. They reject effort. Your job is to make the value feel instant. And this applies everywhere. A+ content, carousel ads, brand story sections, even your bullet points. Every element should remove doubt, not add it. The moment a shopper thinks, "Wait, what does that mean?" you've created friction, and friction kills conversions. Here's a hard truth. Nobody reads your listing. They scan it. Their eyes move in an F pattern or Z pattern across your content hunting for a reason to stay or a reason to bounce. They're not reading for comprehension. They're checking for a point. And if they can't find it fast enough, they leave. So, what is the brain actually looking for? The mind is drawn to contrast. What's big versus small, what's light versus bold, what's short versus shorter. These visual cues create a hierarchy that tells the eye where to look first. That's what great listing design does. It guides the scan. On the flip side, the mind avoids three things. Too much text, too little structure, and no obvious point. If your A+ content modules are stuffed with paragraphs no one asked for, you're not adding value. You're adding friction. And here's the kicker. Annoyance is a faster emotion than curiosity. You will lose them to frustration before you ever win them with information. So, how do you fix this? You design for the scan first, then you write for the read. Think of your listing content two layers. The first layer is for the scanners. Use white space, font hierarchy, and visual contrast to make your key points pop instantly. More space means faster scanning. Less space means more work for the shopper, and trust me, they won't do that work. They'll just leave. The second layer is for the readers. These are the people who slow down because your design earned their attention. Reward them with clarity and a single clear point per section. And here's the cheat code. Make your headline and your supporting text do different jobs. A headline grabs attention. The subtext clarifies and builds buying confidence. If both say the same thing, you're wasting prime real estate. If neither one clarifies anything, you're relying on hope. And hope doesn't convert. The goal with every piece of listing content should follow a three-step sequence. First, you earn attention with your design hierarchy, that's the scan. Then you reward them with clarity and a plan, that's the read. And finally, you give them something structured off to act on, that's the save or the buy. Stop writing listings like product manuals. Start designing them like someone's deciding in 3 seconds whether you're worth their time, because that's exactly what they're doing. Before we wrap up, here are a few more hot picks for you. First, there's a great piece on how to use Rufus to check price history, find deals, and even auto buy. Next, an article on the $10 trillion state of e-commerce, which is worth a read. There's also a look at how Amazon rules product discovery, at least for now. And finally, TikTok Shop US GMB grew 68% in 2025 to hit $15.1 billion. You can find links to all of those articles in our written newsletter at billion dollar sellers.com. And here's your parting shot for today. It's not the best product that wins, but the one with the best marketing. Oh, and remember that question I asked you at the beginning? Well, the answer is that Sparky product baskets are 35% larger than normal. Pretty interesting, right? That's all for today, folks. Have a great weekend, and I'll see you again on Monday. This is Kevin O'Leary signing off from the Billion Dollar Sellers Podcast.