Amazon Vine 101

79% of consumers go to Amazon to check reviews before making a purchase.

A review on Amazon includes a customer’s opinion about a specific product. Given that reviews can generate shopper loyalty, incremental sales, and improved SEO rankings, they are a very important aspect of the Amazon flywheel. 

The Amazon Vine program enables select, trusted Amazon customers to review new and pre-release products to help inform purchase decisions for other shoppers, providing honest and unbiased feedback so shoppers are more educated before a potential sale. 

Amazon invites specific customers to become “Vine Voices” based on their reviewer rank, which indicates how helpful and insightful their reviews are, as judged by other Amazon customers. In return, Amazon gives Vine members free products that have been submitted to the program by participating sellers and brands. Reviews that are Vine-approved have a green stripe on them and may reference a note such as “Top 100 Reviewer.” 

You cannot apply to be a Vine Voice but rather need to be invited by Amazon to participate. Amazon evaluates potential Vine Voices by the helpfulness and thorough quality of their reviews, their interest in the products included in the program, and the number of reviews they have written. According to Amazon, customers who “consistently write helpful reviews and develop a reputation for expertise in specific product categories” are most likely to be invited into the program, with more weight given to recent reviews. 

How to Participate in Amazon Vine

As a seller or brand on Amazon, you want Vine Voices to review your products, as the program’s credibility can help increase product discovery and conversion. To participate, you need to meet the below criteria:

• You must be enrolled in Amazon’s Brand Registry.
• You must have less than 30 reviews on the specific product’s listing. If a product reaches 30 reviews after enrollment, the remaining units that Vine Voices has not yet reviewed will be unavailable to request for review and your enrollment will end.
• The enrolled product must be fulfilled via FBA, in new condition, and not an adult product. It must also have already launched by the time you enroll in Amazon Vine and have adequate inventory.
• The enrolled product must have an image, a description, a title, and any other ASIN-level or offer-level attributes set up.
• The product must not be a bundle or split case pack.

You provide free units of the product that will be reviewed to the Vine Voices so they can analyze the product and post reviews. They can begin requesting units 24 hours after your enrollment is complete. You can enroll five products with Amazon Vine basic, 10 products with Amazon Vine plus, and 10 products with Amazon Vine premium and can select the entire family or a limited subset of variations for each enrolled product.

If you receive a negative review on one of your products enrolled in the program, be sure to respond to it publicly to show that you are committed, attentive, and working hard to resolve the issue, whether it had to do with on-time delivery or an issue with the product itself. 

Be careful not to contact a Vine Voice to discuss their reviews — even if they are negative — as that is against the program’s Terms of Service. Not only will this harm your enrollment in the program, but it can also lead to an investigation of your seller account. 

You can track the Vine reviews for your enrolled products in Seller Central to see the number of units Vine Voices claimed, the number of units still available for request, and the number of reviews that have been submitted by Vine Voices. Product reviews will continue to be an important element to your success, so you should take advantage of programs or tools to help you generate legitimate ones.