Helium 10’s Xray is hands down the best software on the market when conducting product and market research on Amazon.
Here are RevenueGeeks, we’ve thoroughly explored Xray, talked with Helium 10 customer services, and put our stamp of approval on the Xray Chrome extension.
Because we believe in Xray, we are providing you this review so you can see for yourself if Xray is something you want to utilize as well.
What Is the Xray Tool?
Xray is the most comprehensive product analysis tool on the market for Amazon sellers, as it aids sellers in conducting in-depth product research directly on Amazon.
Xray is part of Helium 10’s chrome extension. The extension pulls as much data as possible from the product you’re researching and provides accurate, precise, and necessary information for you to analyze.
Utilizing Xray can help ensure you’re not entering a product into an oversaturated market and that your desired market has an already existing demand.
Pros and Cons
Before diving straight into the review, we want to highlight the main pros and cons of Helium 10’s Xray software.
Take a look below to get a general idea of Xray, and what it can and can’t offer you.
Pros
- Saves you time
- Pulls data from an extensive database
- Free to use with Helium 10’s chrome extension
- Success score provides instant insight into whether you should enter a market or not
- Alibaba tool
Cons
- Limited uses with the Free plan
- Data can be overwhelming when first viewing it
- Product variation data is skewed
How Can Xray Help My Business?
Conducting product research is a time-consuming and daunting process.
It’s all guesswork without software to help you, leading to inaccurate data. So, now you’ve spent significant amounts of time and didn’t even get the results you were looking for.
Frustrating, right?
Well, with Helium 10’s Xray tool, you’ll be able to breeze through product research, along with gathering the most accurate and up-to-date market data available. Here’s how Xray can help your business today:
- Saves time. Xray pulls a large array of data from its immense database almost instantaneously. This way, you don’t have to scour Amazon and crunch numbers on your own. Xray does it all for you.
- Competitive Edge. Spying on competitor reviews may seem like a daunting and impossible task, but with Review Velocity, you can keep track of the health and traffic of your competitor’s products.
- Find suppliers easily. With Helium 10’s partnership with Alibaba, finding suppliers just got easier. You no longer have to pour over pages of supplier profiles, the Alibaba feature does it for you!
All of this seems too good to be true, right? Well, it is very true! In this review, we’ll discuss various tools and features of Xray that can further aid your online business.
But first, let’s talk about costs.
What Helium 10 Pricing Plans Include Xray?
Xray for Amazon is included in every plan, however, on some plans, you will be limited to the number of searches you can conduct.
On the flip side, Xray for Walmart is only included in all paid plans. You won’t be able to utilize Xray for Walmart on the free plan.
See the table below to see the plans and number of searches you’re allowed in each.
Free | Starter | Platinum | Diamond | Elite | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Xray for Amazon | 15 searches | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited |
Xray for Walmart | Not available | 50 searches | 50 searches | Unlimited | Unlimited |
What Are the Main Features of Xray?
There are three main features of Xray that we think are vital to sellers like you.
- Amazon Product Research
- Supplier Finder
- Demand Analyzer
In this section, we will discuss their importance and how to use them to benefit your business.
Amazon Product Research
The entire purpose of Helium 10’s Xray tool is to find the most profitable niche products and markets on Amazon. You can gather a large amount of data that provides an in-depth view of your desired product/market.
Here are some of the important metrics you’ll find in Xray:
- # – The serial number of the listing as it appears on the search results page.
- ASIN – Amazon Standard Identification Number.
- Price – Current price
- Sales – The average sales the product makes in a month.
- Sales Graph – See the sales of the product made each month over a specific time period.
- Revenue – The monthly revenue for each product.
- BSR – Value of the product’s Best Seller Rank (BSR). Shows the average ranking of a product compared to its competitors.
- FBA Fees – Total estimated FBA fees.
- Active Seller # – Number of current active sellers in the market.
- Ratings – Average star rating for the product.
- Review Count – Total number of reviews.
- Review Velocity – Change in the review count in the last 30 days.
- Fulfillment – Who fulfills the orders, such as FMZ, FBA, or MFN.
All of this data is based on monthly results. So you can rest assured that the research you are conducting is up-to-date and relevant.
Supplier Finder
Helium 10 partnered up with Alibaba to provide users with a direct source for suppliers in their desired market. This feature helps sellers streamline their process, all the while saving time and money.
To get started, follow the steps below:
- Initiate an Amazon search.
- Then, when you have the products you want to find a supplier for, open your Helium 10 extension and click on Find Suppliers on Alibaba in the upper right corner of the window.
- This will open the supplier window in Xray. From here you’re able to explore various suppliers, their country of origin, how long they’ve been a supplier, their SGS verification, and their rating.
- From this window, you’ll also be able to apply filters to your supplier search. You can open more advanced filters and really narrow down who you want to work with.
- Once you’ve found your desired supplier, click on their name and a new tab will open, taking you directly to the supplier’s product page.
Now, if you haven’t found a supplier you like, but you want to keep searching, you can click on View More on Alibaba. A new tab will open with a larger list of suppliers in your market.
You can browse, filter results, and contact suppliers from the Alibaba website.
Demand Analyzer
The demand analyzer is a cool feature that delves into the demand for products and keywords on Amazon. You can conduct this research while browsing Alibaba.com.
So, let’s get into how to analyze the demand for your desired product.
- Go to Alibaba.com.
- Type in a search term you want to research.
- Open your Helium 10 extension.
- Select Analyze Product Demand on Amazon.
- A window will open allowing you to search for keywords and see a full analysis of said keyword.
- Type in your desired keyword and click See analysis.
- Here you can see a snapshot of that term’s metrics.
From this screen, if you click on See all metrics, top products, word frequency list, or full keyword list, you’ll be taken to the corresponding Helium 10 tool (i.e. Magnet, Black Box, etc.).
Another way you could search for market demand is by using the Alibaba search bar directly. Although, once you open up your Helium 10 extension, the steps and results page are the same as above.
- Search your desired product or term.
- Open Helium 10 extension.
- Your product/term will already be in the search bar, so click on See analysis to get your results.
The demand analyzer is a great tool to get quick and accurate information on the type of demand your product or market has.
Tips & Tricks
Quick Access
Before we get into more advanced tips and tricks, we’d like to show you how to open Xray without having to go to your extension.
In some instances, there will be a small, blue ribbon that sticks out from the right side of your screen with the word “Xray” on it.
When you click on it, the Xray main screen will appear, just as if you accessed Xray from your extension library.
See? Quick and easy access!
Finding Keywords Related to a Listing
Single Product Keyword Research Using Xray
When researching a single product keyword, you’ll need to open a specific product page instead of using the entire search results page for your keyword
- Once you have your product page up, open the Xray extension.
- Select Xray — Amazon Product Research.
- Check the box next to your desired product to run the analysis.
- Hit Run Keyword Search
You can include up to 10 products when running a keyword search.
Multiple Product Keyword Research Using Xray
Instead of going to a single product page, researching multiple keywords at a time requires you to stay on the results page of your search.
- Type in your search terms into the Amazon search bar.
- Once the results page pulls up, open your Helium 10 extension.
- Select Xray — Amazon Product Research.
- Click on Related Keywords.
These keywords provide insight into your competition, like how much competition and demand the market has. Use this feature when scoping out a general market before you make the decision to launch a product.
Now that you know how to search for specific and broad keywords, you’ll be able to keep up with your competitors and cash in on low competitive search terms.
Data for Listings With Variations
When reviewing your results, you might notice that some products have arrows beside their titles. This indicates that the product has variations.
- To view the different variations of a product, click on the arrow beside the main product.
- You’ll then see a sub-selection of items under the main product. These are your variations.
While it is great to see the different variations of a product, there is a huge downside to it— you can’t see individual metrics for these variations. Everything is set to show the total of all the products, such as sales, BSR, revenue, etc.
This greatly hinders your ability to accurately judge and decide which products you want to compete against. And unfortunately, there is no good method to use to gauge the best variation, which generates the most sales nor the best BSR.
However, we can show you one method to gather information on product variations, though it is time-consuming.
- In the Xray results window, click on the ASIN of the product variation you want to view.
- On the product page, there will be data listed below the listing, including sales data and a revenue calculator.
- Please note: this data is only visible on a desktop or laptop.
- By hovering over the lines on the graph, you’ll be able to view the date, time, and sales data.
- If you want to download any of this data, you can do so by clicking the three dashes off to the side of the graph.
- You can also utilize other features of Helium 10 by using the links listed at the top of the graph. This will display the desired data in the appropriate Helium 10 tool.
- Below the graph is where you will find the revenue calculator, sales estimator, and basic information about the product, such as ASIN, price, competitive FBA offers, and more.
- Use these tools to gather information on the different variations of products in your market.
The data in the revenue column will vary. This is because each variation’s price is multiplied by the total number of estimated sales for all variations.
Filters and Advanced Features
When you conduct a search and open up the Helium 10 extension, you’ll see a few options for filtering data and other research. This is what we will be going through in this section.
Column Adjustments
If you want to remove specific columns from your search results, you can do so!
- On your screen, you’ll see a split screen with a gear icon. Click on this.
- Once you do, a small options box will appear, allowing you to select the columns you do and don’t want to see. Your results will adjust in real-time.
- When you’re finished customizing your columns, just click out of the options box to close it out.
Filters
Filtering your results is the best way for you to gather exactly what you need instead of what you don’t.
- Click on the Filter Results button on Xray’s home page.
- This will open a filter menu with a variety of options.
- This menu allows you to enter the maximum and minimum ranges for ratings, price, sales, and more, along with other tools, such as star tier, fulfillment type, etc.
- Once you’re done, click Apply Filters to have your results adjusted.
Filtering your search results will also change the top-level data on your Xray home page.
Deleting Products
Say you don’t want to see sponsored products (listings with SP besides the title), what you can do is delete the entire product from your search. This way you can focus more on organic searches.
- Check the box by the product you want to delete.
- Click on the trash can above your product list.
If you remove a sponsored product from your list, your average data won’t change. However, if you delete an organic result, the average data across the top (including your success score) will change.
Exporting Results
Once you have all your filters applied and your desired list of products, you can export the results to better analyze outside of Xray. You have three choices when exporting your data:
- As a picture
- As a CSV download
- As an excel report
Taking a Picture
Clicking on the camera icon allows you to take a picture of the current data.
When doing so, Helium 10 blurs any sensitive data. This way you can share your findings with other sellers or employees.
Why does Helium 10 blur the search term and products? Because sometimes you don’t want to share exactly what you’re looking for with other sellers, or the data is irrelevant when having employees analyze the data. It’s all about keeping your competitive edge.
Downloading Data: CSV & Excel
Outside of sharing data with sellers and employees, you can also download the results data and conduct an even deeper analysis of your findings. You’ll have the choice of downloading the data as a CSV or excel file.
Either way, if you decide to download, you’ll have all the relevant data from your search, including the applied filters.
Managing Success Score
There are two types of success scores you can view: Multi-Factor and Two Factor.
Each of these success scores will provide a different value for your search.
The success score only shows on Xray when you run it after searching your keyword, NOT on a product page.
Multi-Factor Success Score
- Once you search for a keyword, allow the page’s data to load.
- Then, open Xray to view your keyword’s product research data.
- In the upper right corner of the Xray window, you’ll see a Success Score box. At the time of this review, the success score is currently in beta and will likely change in the future.
The Multi-Factor success score pulls data from the top ten ranking products in your Amazon search. This score is calculated based on market maturity, average sales revenue, average product price, and a few other variables.
The score tells you whether or not launching a new product in the current market will be a challenge or not. The factors that go into the success score weigh the levels of opportunity that could exist at the time of your search.
However, the multi-factor success score doesn’t determine a seller’s potential success in the market.
To gain more insight into your success score, hover over the box to see more information.
Two Factor Success Score
The Two Factor success score looks at the top ten organically ranked products based on your Amazon search and provides a set of filters. The score is based on the criteria you entered for revenue and reviews when switching scores.
However, unlike the Multi-Factor success score, these filters are limited to customer reviews and monthly sales revenue as they provide a more accurate measure of how successful a product is financial and with customer satisfaction.
You can also gain more insight into the demand and competition of the market’s keywords.
Just click on Related Keywords and a keywords menu will appear detailing search terms, search volume, and the demand and competition of each word.
This is useful information when introducing a new product as you can target specific keywords to help drive traffic to your product pages.
How to Change Success Score Settings
- Open your Helium 10 extension.
- Click on the gear to open your Settings.
- Helium 10 extension’s settings page will open up.
- In the Success score setting section, select the desired success score criteria you want to view.
- For Two Factor success scores, you’ll need to set criteria for the minimum revenue and maximum reviews you want to be evaluated.
- For Multi-Factor success scores, you won’t need to indicate revenue and review criteria.
- After you selected your success score setting and/or updated your revenue and review criteria, click Save.
Review Velocity
One of the main, and best features, of Xray is review velocity. This tool allows you to view the number of reviews both you and your competitor are gaining and losing each month.
Why Is This Tool Important?
Well, reviews provide insight into the health of your product and your competitors.
Reviews are vital to a product’s success on Amazon, so knowing how many reviews, what the reviews say, and how many you gain (or lose) in a month can help you gain a competitive edge.
So, you’ll want to keep an eye on your competitor’s reviews, as there are a few benefits to spying on them:
- Learn from mistakes. If you see repetitive complaints about your competitor’s products, you can analyze what your competitor is doing wrong and ensure you don’t fall into the same hole. This can be pricing, quality of the product, vague descriptions, etc. Take what your competitors are failing at and strengthen your own products.
- Keyword Insights. You can conduct keyword research on your competitor’s products and reviews. When comparing product listings, you can see what keywords your competitors are using and ones you can cash in on as well. This in turn allows you to create a keyword research strategy to keep up with your competitors.
- Pricing structures. By examining the price ranges of your competitors and what consumers are saying about them, you can gauge the perfect price range for you to insert your product. This will aid in attracting more buyers.
All of these benefits can be gained by using Xray or other tools on the Helium 10 chrome extension.
Our Experience Using Xray
Is It Easy to Find a New Product to Sell?
Thanks to Helium 10, it is easy to determine which product to launch and which market to enter.
We’ll give you some tips on how to utilize Xray when scoping out a new market/product.
But, before jumping right in, there are two key questions you’ll need to ask about your desired market or product:
- Is the product in demand?
- How is the competition?
Is the Product in Demand?
To decide this, you’ll want to look at the search volume in Xray, which will be displayed in the upper left corner of the screen.
Remember, this data is on a monthly basis. So you can divide this number by 30 to get a rough estimate of how many searches are being conducted a day.
Rule of thumb: the higher the search volume, the better.
How Is the Competition?
The average reviews will tell you how competitive the current market is. How?
Well, if there is a high number of reviews for products, that means the competition is high and the barrier to entry will be difficult. And vice versa.
If the average reviews are low, say less than 300, then your competition for that market/product is more obtainable.
Another feature to look at is the related keywords section. The Niche Insight section will tell you how competitive the keywords are. The lower your competition, the better.
What Is the Success Score?
Next, you’ll want to look at your success scores, particularly the Two Factor score.
The more of the top ten products that have less than your desired amount of reviews (the image below depicts 75 reviews and under), the more room for opportunity.
Now if there were only, say, two out of the top ten, then that means your competition is high.
Is the Product Seasonal?
Knowing whether a product will be in demand year-round or only during a specific time of year is beneficial. This is when you’ll need to conduct research on if the product is seasonal or not.
To view the search volume of the product over the course of a year, click on the graph beside the Search Volume number.
This graph will show you the search trends of your market by 30-days, 90-days, 1-year, and of all time. The 1-year and all-time graphs are a great indicator of if the product is more seasonal or if it withstands year around.
Alibaba Feature: Does It Work?
Based on our experience with the Alibaba tool, the feature does in fact work!
We enjoyed utilizing the on-demand and instantaneous Alibaba tool. This extension tool creates a streamlined process for sellers when researching demand and suppliers who sell their desired products.
With up-front supplier ratings, locations, and verifications, the process for sellers is made easy with this partnership with Helium 10.
However, one issue we noticed was the low quality of the Alibaba window when accessed through Xray. Although this does not affect how the supplier finder operates, it does affect the user experience.
Besides the quality of the Alibaba window through the extension, the feature works well and helps you make the best choice for your business.
Limitation(s) Of Xray That Can Be Improved Upon
While Xray is the most in-depth product analysis tool available for Amazon sellers, there is one limitation of Xray: product variation.
As we talked about previously, products that have a variation of sizes, colors, styles, etc., tend to not work well with Xray. We can’t see their individual BSR, sales revenue, and other pertinent data.
If Xray can implement a process to allow sellers to view the data of different variations, then sellers can be more picky and precise with the products they want to launch on the market. Currently, it’s all guesswork, and we all know that isn’t ideal.
Maybe in the future Helium 10 will figure out a way to add this feature to Xray, but until then, if you’re wanting to see the different variations of products, just know that there will be additional work for you outside of Xray.
FAQ
Is Data From Helium 10’s Xray Accurate?
Yes, Xray is one of the most accurate product analysis tools for Amazon on the market.
Here are some stats to prove Helium 10’s accuracy:
- Pulls data from over 450 million ASINs
- Provides estimates within 22 units of actual sales or within 10% accuracy
Can Xray Be Used on Other Websites Besides Amazon?
Yes! Xray can be utilized by Walmart sellers, too. Try Xray for Walmart, today!
Why Do Xray and Profitability Calculator Show Different FBA Fees?
The main difference between the Profitability Calculator and Xray FBA fees is how they’re calculated.
- Profitability Calculator. The FBA fees are shown as a separate line item.
- The FBA fees are calculated with referral fees, which can vary based on product categories and the product price.
What Is the Meaning of N/A for Sales in Xray?
In Helium 10’s Xray tool, when you see “N/A” under the sales column, it stands for “Not Available.” This notation indicates that the specific sales data for a product is either not present or inaccessible during that search session. There are three main reasons for an N/A result:
Unsupported Category: While Helium 10 supports numerous categories in the U.S. marketplace, such as Appliances, Arts, Crafts and Sewing, Automotive, and many more, there are some categories like Video Games, Movies & TV, and Kindle that aren’t supported. If a product falls outside these supported categories, Xray will display “N/A.”
Absence of Main Category BSR: A product might lack an Amazon BSR (Best Seller Rank) in the main category. Even if the product belongs to a supported main category, Amazon might offer only a subcategory BSR for that product.
ASIN Criteria Mismatch: Some ASINs might not meet Helium 10’s specific criteria to be included in the Xray research results. This exclusion could arise from factors like unstable data, a highly fluctuating BSR, or other considerations.
Helium 10 aims to provide accurate and relevant data. If Amazon doesn’t release specific data during a search, Xray registers it as “N/A.”
Is Xray Worth It?
Based on our experience with Helium 10’s Xray, we believe that the software is worth the cost, even the free version.
You have access to a profound database of information when using Helium 10, and the accuracy of the data is what sells us. Xray supplies a vast amount of information that aids sellers in a variety of research areas: competition, demand, keywords, suppliers, and more.
The Alibaba Supplier tool is also an added bonus as it makes finding suppliers easy and streamlined, saving you time and money!
Xray has proven to be a vital tool and lives up to its name as the most popular tool on Helium 10. We recommend downloading the extension and utilizing Xray for your day-to-day Amazon business tasks.
If you’re still not sold on the idea of Xray, sign up for Helium 10 today and test it out yourself!
You won’t be disappointed.