Natural Rapport Case Study
Goat Consulting is thankful for our partnership with Natural Rapport, a pet, and home goods brand that offers products with simple natural ingredients. Natural Rapport relies on mother nature’s tool kit and developed uncomplicated pet essentials — uninterrupted by needless meddling and processes. As pet owners ourselves at Goat Consulting, we take pride in working with a brand that offers a line of uncomplicated natural products that is effective for our pets. We are committed to communicating this focus on simple, natural, and impactful ingredients in the way we merchandise and engage with Amazon Customers.
Branding and Packaging Transition on Amazon
When Natural Rapport started engagement with Goat Consulting, they were going through a rebranding and repackaging of the products in an effort to improve both brand and product image on Amazon with the goal to improve and standardize brand and product presence on Amazon.
Goat Consulting followed best practices related to transitioning packaging and updating merchandising on Amazon to accurately communicate Natural Rapports refreshed look and brand positioning. Here are the projects Goat Consulting focused on to make these improvements:
Packaging and Product Image Transition - Goat Consulting worked closely with Natural Rapport to track the sell-through of old packaging inventory to time the transition of imagery and fulfilled units in FBA fulfillment centers. As old discontinued packaging sold out Goat Consulting worked with Brand Services using manufacturers' proof to update imagery on all listings to the new packaging. When the transition was complete we coordinated with Natural Rapport to have the new inventory for the SKU inbounded to FBA fulfillment centers. This ensured that there was no confusion about what an Amazon customer ordered and what product was received.
Comprehensive Keyword and Competitor Research - Natural Rapport offers a variety of different home goods and pet products. This wide assortment created a challenge to gain a clear understanding of each distinct product category. Goat Consulting performed keyword and competitor research on each individual product category to help Natural Rapport better understand positioning on Amazon.com overall and to learn unique insights for their individual products.
Product Listing Copywriting - Updating the listing content was a key aspect of Natural Rapports’ update branding. Goat Consulting created new content that focused on communicating the simple and natural ingredients and manufacturing methods that Natural Rapport’s brand identity is built around.
Parent/Child Variations - Natural Rapport’s catalog includes products that come in a variety of different sizes and flavors. Goat Consulting created variations for Natural Rapport’s products that consolidated reviews and sales history and increased discoverability of different size and flavor options available. Goat Consulting also worked to standardize the metrics used in size names for branding and listing consistency.
A+ Enhanced Brand Content - A+ Content provided a great opportunity for Goat Consulting to present Natural Rapport’s refreshed look and branding to the Amazon Customer. We created A+ Content for all Natural Rapport product listings that reinforce brand positioning, further elaborates on product value aspects, and introduce the customer to other offered products that they may not be familiar with. We incorporated the color of the packaging into the A+ Content’s color palette for cohesiveness.
Storefront - When designing Natural Rapport’s storefront we wanted to put their new branding and positioning front and center. We also wanted to make sure that all of the different product categories had their own distinct presence. We achieved impactful communication about the brand positioning with an “about the brand” video on the storefront’s home page. We also used category-specific hero banners to achieve a unique feel on each subpage of the brand’s storefront.
Brand Story - Amazon’s Brand Story content presented an opportunity to further integrate our new branding directly into our product detail pages. Goat Consulting created Brand Story content versions that are unique to each SKU and provide FAQ’s and Use Instructions that have the goal of improving both brand awareness and conversion rate on the listing.
Image Graphic Creation - We worked with Natural Rapport to identify key value aspects for each product and we helped them in building out creative guidelines for the creation of additional graphic images that reinforce and communicate additional value aspects of Natural Rapport products.
Selling Strategy and Fulfillment Consulting
Natural Rapport offers seasonal products and products that expire and are perishable. Both of these points add complexity to inventory management. Natural Rapport also wanted to gain a better understanding of their true margins on Amazon.com so that they could confidently set goals for advertising return in order to ensure net margin requirements were met. Here is how Goat Consulting worked with Natural Rapport to develop a selling strategy and improve fulfillment:
Competitor Analysis - We reviewed competitor offers and category standards for fulfillment to determine where Prime shipping speed and FBA fulfillment are expected by the customer and where consumers have a more flexible expectation where merchant fulfillment can be offered. This helped us direct Natural Rapport toward a hybrid fulfillment model that optimized fulfillment cost.
Reducing OOS Rates - We helped Natural Rapport create FBA back up merchant fulfilled SKUs, that prevented Out of Stock situations in the case that FBA inventory runs out.
Seasonal Inventory Planning - For Natural Rapport’s seasonal products we collaborate on inventory management and planning activities, monitoring inventory over time and planning restock timing and quantities in advance of peak season based on historic inventory and sales data.
Resolution of Shipping Issues and Reconciliation - When replenishment shipment inventory is misplaced, we open up casework to investigate the units and to reconcile and receive reimbursement for lost units.
Inventory Age and Expiration Research - We work with Natural Rapport to research inventory age with Amazon Fulfillment Centers to ensure stocked inventory is not expired and that expired inventory is removed or disposed of.
Growing The Natural Rapport Brand Through Amazon Ads
Natural Rapport operates in competitive categories where advertising is a key aspect of strategy. Natural Rapport wanted to make sure that the new packaging and branding were marketed to both existing customers and new customers. We wanted to gain a better understanding of the true margins of their business to guarantee that they were advertising profitably. Finally, we wanted to identify where they were potentially cannibalizing organic sales that would occur naturally without advertising so that ad spend could be utilized as efficiently as possible. Goat Consulting helped create Sponsored Brand campaigns that introduced Natural Rapport's new branding to new and old customers. We analyzed Natural Rapport’s margins on an SKU basis to determine advertising profitability goals on an SKU level. Goat Consulting performed a test over a 6 month period to determine where ad spend was cannibalizing organic sales and where value was being added. We created and manage an ongoing advertising architecture that incorporates all of these findings and goals on an ongoing basis.
Sponsored Products - We utilize sponsored product campaigns to target generic searches and to introduce the Natural Rapport brand to new consumers. We utilize first-page bid up to increase our visibility on page one of the most impactful customer searches.
Sponsored Brands - We utilize sponsored brand advertising to display all products available in specific categories like pet treats, pet hygiene, etc. to show how balanced our coverage of customer needs is.
Sponsored Display - We utilize sponsored display advertising to target unconverted customers to purchase and to serve ads outside of the Amazon.com marketplace.
Continued Growth and Risk Mitigation
Goat Consulting continues to grow sales, mitigate risk, and find ways to reduce costs for Natural Rapport.
Resolving Product Reviews - Natural Rapport’s products will occasionally come under restricted product or pesticide product reviews by Amazon.com. We work with Natural Rapport to appeal to and resolve these reviews as quickly as possible to minimize product unavailability.
Communicating Product Use Instructions - Natural Rapport’s products are consumable and hygiene products that are used on animals. Clearly communicating product use instructions and safety information is an important aspect of our merchandising for Natural Rapport’s products.
Managerial Strategy Reporting - On a monthly basis we provide Natural Rapport with a report that details and summarizes all functions of Amazon performance and activity including but not limited to, SKU traffic and sales performance, Advertising and Marketing, Customer Reviews and Feedback, Storefront traffic data, Amazon Post activity and more.
Amazon Posts - We leverage Natural Rapport social media activity and content to repurpose image content for Amazon Posts which are published on an ongoing basis. Amazon Posts are a great free source of visibility and customer engagement for the Natural Rapport brand.
A Word from the Client
Goat Consulting has helped grow the Natural Rapport brand significantly over the past 2 years and they continue to help us grow to our full potential. When we started working with Goat Consulting, they helped us navigate an entire refresh of our brand, as well as improve our current Amazon listings. They do a wonderful job with account management and helping us make the most informed decisions through market research and monthly reports. Goat Consulting also handles all of our advertising and marketing on Amazon and does a great job of managing our ad spend and promotions. No matter what goals we set, Goat Consulting is always ready and willing to help us determine the best strategy to achieve them.
-Lauren, eCommerce Manager Natural Rapport
The dogs of Goat Consulting love Natural Rapport!
Conclusion
Similar to the Natural Rapport brand ethos, Goat Consulting believes in getting back to the basics of Amazon and retail execution. We don’t rely on blackhat tricks or hacks to improve our clients' businesses. We believe we can provide the best value to our clients through in-depth product understanding and executing best practices in merchandising and advertising. It’s an honor working with Natural Rapport. They set a great example in paying close attention to the basic and fundamental aspects of their business and products from ingredients and manufacturing to customer service and engagement.