Amazon is not a platform that allows sellers to use a “set it and forget it” strategy. All listings on Amazon must be constantly monitored, updated, and maintained. If Amazon identifies that your listing is failing to meet any of their requirements, the listing will be suppressed or deactivated, and in some cases, your account may be suspended until the issue is resolved. It is extremely important to stay on top of issues with your listing to avoid surprises such as Amazon suppressions.
Reasons Why Your Listing May be Suppressed
Suppressed listings usually occur when a specific product listing doesn’t meet Amazon’s standards. However, Amazon takes down listings for several other reasons, such as customer complaints, violation of Amazon policies, inventory reviews, pricing issues, invalid product information, etc.
There are many instances when Amazon sellers are not notified about listings being removed from the Amazon site, which is why it is highly recommended that sellers take proactive steps to check and monitor their listings on a regular basis.
Meeting Listing Standards
Sellers should include all required product details and information to prevent listing suspension. Common examples of missing/insufficient information that can result in suppression include:
- No main image
Note: If you have one main image that Amazon flags as not meeting MAIN image standards, this will result in your entire listing being suppressed.
- No detailed product description
Note: Excluding certain categories (ex: apparel, books, or shoes)
- Long Title – Any clothing or accessories item with a title longer than 80 characters.
- No defined category type.
How to Fix a Suppressed Listing
- Log in to Seller Central, navigate to the inventory tab, click the ‘Manage Inventory’ button
- If you have any suppressed listings, you will see a ‘Suppressed’ button. If the button is present, click ‘Suppressed’ and select the desired product listings.
- Note: “Suppressed” is only visible if you have suppressed listings to improve. If you do not have any suppressed listings, this option will not be visible.
- Go through and edit listings that need more information, or click ‘Manage Images’ to fix those without product pictures. Every product listing has an Amazon Product Summary page, which lists out all of the suppression and quality issues.
- Once all of the issues have been resolved, click ‘Save and Finish’ to exit.
What if a listing is incorrectly flagged?
Occasionally, Amazon will suppress listings due to an unintentional prohibited claim. This is because sometimes Amazon algorithm incorrectly flags certain claims or keywords. If this occurs, sellers can find out by receiving a performance notification or looking at reasons for stranded inventory.
Stranded Inventory
If a listing is classified as Stranded Inventory, the ASIN is removed from Amazon. It can be found on the ‘Manage Inventory’ page as ‘Stranded Inventory’. On the Stranded Inventory page, Amazon will give a “stranded reason”, such as a missing attribute or an incorrectly flagged prohibited claim. Sellers can appeal or fix the issue.
Performance Notifications
Performance Notifications are sent to sellers when an ASIN is flagged for a performance issue. The product detail page may be removed from Amazon, or sellers may just receive an error that needs to be fixed while they continue selling. To resolve Performance Notifications, sellers must contact seller support and submit a Plan of Action (POA). Plan of Actions has three parts: Root Cause, Corrective Actions, and Preventative Actions.
Why Envision Horizons Offers 24/7 Coverage
Suppressed or deactivated listings immediately translate to lost revenue for every hour the listing is down. That’s why Envision Horizons has a specialized team made up of former seller support representatives. They are able to expedite issue resolution because they have a strong understanding of the internal processes at Amazon.
“With 24/7 coverage, our team of Amazon specialists is capable of handling any listing emergencies. We have a Help Request process and ticketing system for any urgent account and/or listing concerns.” – Lea San Gabriel, Envision Horizons Amazon Specialist
The team conducts daily account audits to keep an eye on stranded inventory, suppressed listings, account health, brand health, and Voice of the Customer issues. The team immediately takes all necessary action to correct listing issues — they are able to investigate, troubleshoot, and fix listing errors such as blocked listings, restricted ASINs, closed listings, search suppressed ASINs, and others.
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