Our 9-Point Amazon Audit Checklist for Vendors

Managing an Amazon Vendor Central account isn’t just about ticking boxes – it’s a chance to uncover hidden growth opportunities and tackle gaps that might be holding your brand back. When it's done right, an Amazon audit can help you stay ahead of the game. 

In this guide, we’ll walk you through the key steps for auditing your Amazon account, highlight mistakes to watch out for, and answer some FAQs to help you get the most out of the process.

The Amazon Audit Checklist for Vendors

1. Amazon Listing Audit

Your Amazon product listings are the first thing customers see, making them critical to your success on Amazon. By focusing on clarity, keywords, and compelling content, you can improve visibility and conversions while standing out in a competitive marketplace.

• Optimise your product titles with the right keywords. Ensure they’re clear, keyword-rich (without stuffing!), and highlight key features to boost visibility and click-through rates. You can explore this topic further in our Amazon listing optimisation guide.
• Highlight benefits and unique features in your product descriptions. Use compelling language to show how your product solves problems and stands out from competitors.
• Make your bullet points easy to scan. Keep them concise and focus on benefits rather than just listing features.
• Include high-quality images in your listings. Ensure they meet Amazon’s guidelines, showcase your product from multiple angles, and include close-ups of key details.
• Use enhanced content to elevate your listings. Amazon A+ Content Manager lets you add visuals and storytelling to improve conversion rates and build trust with shoppers.

2. Advertising Campaigns

Amazon advertising can be a powerful tool to drive traffic and sales, but only if managed effectively. This section highlights how to target the right audiences, optimise ad spend, and maximise campaign performance.

• Ensure your campaigns are reaching the right audiences. Setting clear objectives and targeting the right customers will maximise engagement with your brand.

• Reviewing your ad spend regularly ensures your budget is working efficiently. Collaborate with your Amazon Ads manager (whether in-house or at an external agency) to focus investment where it delivers the highest ROI.

• Sponsored Display Ads are an effective tool for brand-building. They help extend your reach across Amazon and beyond, complementing your overall advertising efforts.

• Tracking campaign metrics is key to success. Use data from the Amazon Ads console to analyse customer journeys and refine strategies for better performance.

3. Account Health

A healthy Amazon account is the foundation of long-term success. Monitoring metrics like OTIF, resolving Amazon chargebacks, and maintaining compliance ensure your account stays in good standing and avoids unnecessary disruptions.

• Keep your Vendor Scorecard in top shape by monitoring key metrics like OTIF (On-Time, In-Full) and defect rates. Staying on top of these helps you avoid penalties and maintain a strong partnership with Amazon.
• Meeting Amazon supply chain requirements is also essential. Address any chargebacks promptly to prevent disruptions and ensure a trouble-free partnership with Amazon.
• Addressing negative customer feedback is critical for maintaining trust. Resolving issues flagged in product reviews protects your brand’s reputation and builds customer loyalty.
• Ensuring shipments comply with Amazon’s standards helps you avoid delays and penalties. Double-check that all packaging and labelling meet Amazon’s guidelines to keep things running smoothly.

4. Data and Analytics

Making data-driven decisions is essential for identifying opportunities and staying ahead of competitors. Learn how to use Amazon analytics tools to uncover trends, address underperforming SKUs, and benchmark your performance.

• Reviewing customer insights is crucial. Use Brand Analytics to identify popular search terms, competitor performance, and buying behaviours that drive better decisions.
• Focus on improving underperforming SKUs. Adjust pricing, marketing efforts, or packaging for products with low sell-through rates to boost performance.
• Analysing sales trends can reveal opportunities. Tools like Amazon Retail Analytics help track performance and plan effectively for seasonal demand.
• Benchmarking your market share offers valuable insights. Leverage Amazon’s data to compare your brand against competitors and uncover growth opportunities.

5. Growth Opportunities

Amazon’s platform offers endless possibilities for growth, but it takes a strategic approach to make the most of them. Explore how optimising your product assortment, expanding internationally, and refining pricing strategies can drive long-term success.

• Optimise your CPG product assortment by collaborating with Amazon. Identify gaps in your portfolio and explore opportunities for exclusive products.
• Consider global expansion as a growth strategy. Work with Amazon’s Vendor Central team to evaluate international opportunities and develop an effective localisation plan.
• Keep your pricing strategy competitive by benchmarking against the market. Balance profitability with customer appeal to stay ahead in a dynamic environment.

6. Operational Efficiency

Smooth operations keep your brand running like clockwork on Amazon. From logistics to returns, this section shows how to streamline processes, reduce chargebacks, and meet Amazon’s high standards.

• Meet OTIF requirements by optimising your logistics processes. Consistently align with Amazon’s stringent delivery standards to avoid penalties and maintain reliability.
• Minimise chargebacks by regularly reviewing chargeback reports. Address root causes promptly to reduce penalties and protect your bottom line.
• Streamline your fulfilment processes by collaborating with your Amazon Vendor Manager. Focus on improving efficiency in demand forecasting and inventory planning.
• Monitor key operational metrics such as defect rates, late shipments, and cancellations. Tracking these helps maintain operational excellence and avoid disruptions.
• Optimise the returns process by proactively addressing quality or packaging issues. Reducing return rates ensures a positive customer experience and protects your reputation.

7. Brand Protection and Compliance

As a 1P seller, protecting your brand is just as important as driving sales. However, this crucial aspect is often overlooked during routine Amazon audits.

If you neglect brand protection, you could be quietly losing both revenue and reputation through unauthorised 3P resellers, suppressed listings, and compliance issues that can be easy to miss without regular review.

• Assess the health of your Amazon Brand Registry setup, making sure your trademarks are correctly enrolled and your access permissions have all the right controls.
• Monitor unauthorised 3P sellers and pricing inconsistencies, as these can erode customers’ trust, and disrupt Amazon’s confidence in your brand.
• Review any suppressed ASINs, restricted claims, or missing attributes to protect brand visibility and stay compliant with Amazon’s constantly-changing policies.

8. Content Governance and Scalability

One-off listing optimisation isn’t enough to sustain strong performance over time. As your catalogue grows and your team expands, content quality might become inconsistent if you don’t use the right ownership and processes.

• Review how your listing updates are managed internally, from creation and approval to final deployment. 
• Assess version control for titles, bullet points, imagery, and A+ content, along with understanding how content changes initiated by Amazon can be monitored and resolved.

By establishing a full, scalable content governance system, you’ll ensure that updates can be rolled out efficiently across multiple ASINs when needed, while keeping seasonal or promotional content accurate, compliant, and on-brand.

9. Retail Readiness and Commercial Terms

Long-term success as a Vendor extends far beyond marketing performance. Profitability, retail fundamentals, CoOp agreements and other commercial terms, can all play a major role in the way Amazon supports and prioritises your brand.

• Review cost prices, accruals and Vendor funding to ensure your investment is delivering healthy, sustainable returns.
• Analyse profitability at SKU level rather than focusing solely on top-line revenue, helping you spot underperforming products that erode margin.
• Assess the effectiveness of your commercial terms and CoOp agreements to understand how they influence Amazon’s level of support.
• If enrolled in Amazon AVS, evaluate whether the support provided justifies the cost and aligns with your wider business objectives.

Amazon Audit FAQs

Achieving success on Vendor Central isn’t easy, but starting with a full, methodical Amazon audit will give you the crucial information you need to prioritise your resources and pursue the most high-impact projects possible.

For more support with your Vendor journey, be sure to check out our other blog posts, or book a free consultation to discover how our full channel management service can help you achieve your goals.

How often should I perform an Amazon audit?

Ideally, you should carry out a full audit at least once or twice a year. However, lighter health checks on areas like listings, advertising performance and account health should be done on a monthly or quarterly basis to stay ahead of issues.

What are the most common mistakes vendors make during an Amazon audit?

Common pitfalls include focusing only on top-line sales, overlooking account health metrics, underestimating the impact of poor content governance, and ignoring brand protection risks such as unauthorised 3P sellers or suppressed ASINs.

Which areas have the biggest impact on performance?

Product listings, advertising efficiency and account health typically deliver the fastest wins. That said, long-term success often depends on less visible areas like operational efficiency, data-driven decision-making, and strong commercial terms.

How does an Amazon audit help improve profitability, not just sales?

By reviewing performance at SKU level, including chargebacks, accruals, CoOp spend and returns, an Amazon audit highlights products or processes that quietly erode margin. This allows you to optimise for sustainable, profitable growth rather than volume alone.

Why is brand protection important for 1P vendors?

Even as a 1P seller, unauthorised 3P activity, pricing inconsistencies and compliance issues can damage customer trust and Amazon’s confidence in your brand. Regular Amazon audits help catch and resolve these issues before they escalate.