How Do I Use the Alibaba Demand Analyzer?

How do you analyze the demand for products or keywords on Amazon while searching on Alibaba, one of the primary wholesale databases in the world? You use the Helium 10 Chrome Extension. 

The Chrome Extension works on the Alibaba site in similar ways to how it works on Amazon. This article explores a couple of approaches to starting your product research on Alibaba using the Helium 10 Chrome Extension Demand Analyzer.

If sellers are searching for products on Alibaba with a specific keyword, consumers are probably searching for products on Amazon using the same keyword.

I. Setting Up the Helium 10 Chrome Extension on Alibaba

To use the Chrome Extension on Alibaba, you need to have the Helium 10 Chrome Extension installed, and be logged into your Helium 10 account. If you have already activated the extension and have a Helium 10 Account, skip up ahead to Part II: Using the Helium 10 Chrome Extension on Alibaba (Step 5).

1. Open Alibaba.com using the Chrome browser (the Chrome Extension only works on the Chrome browser.)

2. If you don’t have a Helium 10 account yet--it’s free--you’ll need to sign up, as well as download the Chrome Extension. You can add it by going to Google’s Chrome Web Store and adding the Helium 10 Chrome Extension.

If you already have the extension installed, and you click on the Helium 10 Extension icon in the extensions bar, you’ll get a message to enable the Helium 10 Chrome Extension for Alibaba.

3. When you click Enable, you’ll get a message from Helium 10 asking you to allow it to work on the Alibaba site. Click Allow.

If you are not logged into your Helium 10 account, you’ll be prompted to do so. Click on the Log into My Account button. If you don’t yet have a Helium 10 account, click the Sign up for Free button.

4. If you already have a Helium 10 account, you’ll be redirected to the Helium 10 Login window. Log in.

If you don’t have an account, you’ll be directed to the Sign Up window and walked through the process of creating your personal account. 

Now, when you return to the Alibaba site, you’ll be able to use the Helium 10 Chrome Extension. 

II. Using the Helium 10 Chrome Extension on Alibaba

5. Type in a search term or phrase on Alibaba and let the results page load. 

6. Click on the Helium 10 Chrome Extension icon to open the tool. Make sure the Enable/disable toggle is set to blue showing it is active. Click on Launch Alibaba Demand Analyzer.

The Alibaba Demand Analyzer window will open showing important Amazon metrics for that keyword, like the monthly Search Volume, Total Revenue,  and Top matching keywords, among other metrics.

7. If you want to know the history of the keyword’s search volume, click on the historical graph next to Search Volume to open and view the graph of historical searches. 

This sample graph shows that “coffin shelf” here was searched for most often in the fall, and less so in the spring and summer.

8. In the Top Products area of the window, you can advance your research in two ways. Clicking on the See all top products will activate and open the Niche tab inside Black Box for deeper research.

You can narrow the number of products in the results by using more of the filter options in Black Box as well. In this sample search from the Demand Analyzer, we begin with almost a hundred products. Once we narrow down the list using the extensive Black Box filters, we can review specific product data.

9. Dig down into the revised search results for the products you want to take a closer look at specific products. For example, you can check the price history for a product by clicking on the chart icon next to the current price.

To learn more about the power of Black Box, check out our other Pro Training videos and articles. 

10. If you hover over and click on one of the product images, the extension opens the product’s Amazon page. There you can assess the quality of the product images, bullet points and description.

11. The Demand Analyzer also displays the top matching keywords that contain the original searched terms “coffin shelf.” In the Word Frequency section, you can see how often every word appears in the keyword list. Important information on Search Volume, Search Volume history, and the number of Competing Products are displayed, or take a single click to open.

12. If you click on See full keyword list, or See full word frequency list, the extension opens the Helium 10 keyword research tool, Magnet. The tool launches, defaulting to a Match Type of Smart Complete. Having this filter activated means that the research will focus on only keywords that include the original keyword as part of the phrase. 

Note, in this example search, that Helium 10 has identified 12 Smart Complete keywords, but thousands of related keywords. To learn how to use the Magnet tool in more detail, check out the Pro Training videos and tutorials.

So how do you use the Chrome Extension Demand Analyzer to find unique product ideas? Let’s walk through the process by going back to your initial search results page on Alibaba. 

13. Return to the Alibaba search results page for the search you did earlier, or enter in another keyword for a new search. 

14. Let the results page load. If you look at a specific product manufacturer’s details, you can immediately see the country they are located in, how long they’ve been on Alibaba, and their satisfaction rate. If you click on their company link, their website will open. 

15. From here, you can research what other products they manufacture and sell wholesale. For example, when you click on the products tab, you can see that this manufacturer also sells wooden jewelry boxes. 

16. Scan through the products. When you look through this manufacturer’s jewelry box options, you might come across something interesting, like “engagement ring box.”

17. If you then return to the Alibaba website, you can search “engagement ring box.” There, you’ll find an assortment of products linked to the keyword.

18. On the Alibaba results page for “engagement ring box,” activate the Helium 10 Chrome Extension and click on the Demand Analyzer button. 

The extension displays the critical Amazon research metrics for the keyword “engagement ring box,” showing more than 5,000 searches over the past 30 days, along with the total and average product revenues, and the average price. You might see keywords you never considered searching before.

19. In the Top Products section, you can see a product similar to the one seen on the manufacturer’s page.

20. If you click on one of the top products, it takes you to its Amazon product page, There you can review the title, bullets and description. 

21. From the Amazon product page, you can run Xray from the Chrome Extension to see the data for this specific product. 

22. Xray will display important information like the estimated sales revenue.

This new Chrome Extension feature, Demand Analyzer, helps you integrate your product and keyword research between the Alibaba and the Amazon sites. The feature saves you time by helping you quickly search out and locate keywords and products you may not have considered selling without using this tool.