Listing maintenance: titles, bullets, keywords, and suppressed listings

• Baseline — capture the current value and the intended replacement as a small, explicit change list (SKU, field, old value, new value).
• Submission — record how it went in: the edit page or a flat file, the date, and the processing result.
• Verification — open the live detail page. If the intended change is not there, the item stays open and you investigate.

Use two statuses in whatever tracker you keep: submitted and verified. They answer different questions, and the gap between them is where catalog problems hide.

Titles. Keep them under 200 characters — many categories now enforce less, and around 80 is what shows in full on mobile. No promotional phrases ("free shipping", "best seller", "hot item"), no words in ALL CAPS, no special characters such as ! $ ? _ { } ^ ¬ ¦, and no word repeated more than twice. A dependable structure is Brand + product type + key attribute + size or count + color.

Bullet points. Five, benefit-led, written as sentence fragments. No prices, shipping claims, promotions, or HTML. Amazon's guidance is roughly 150–200 characters each; front-load the benefit so it survives truncation.

Description. Plain text up to 2,000 characters. If you publish A+ Content, it replaces the description visually on the page — keep the description filled anyway; it still matters for indexing and for surfaces that do not render A+.

Restricted claims. Medical or therapeutic language ("cures", "treats", "FDA approved"), environmental claims without certification ("eco-friendly", "biodegradable"), competitor brand names, "guarantee", and "#1" are the usual suppression triggers. Each marketplace maintains its own list — check it for every language you list in.

The generic_keywords field (Search Terms in the edit page) is indexed but never shown. The rules:

• 250 bytes maximum. Multibyte characters count for more than one byte. If you exceed the limit, the entire field is ignored — not truncated.
• Separate words with spaces; commas are unnecessary.
• Do not repeat words already in the title or bullets — they are indexed already.
• No brand names (yours or a competitor's), no ASINs, no subjective claims.
• Spend the bytes on synonyms, alternate spellings, use cases, and regional terms the visible copy does not cover.

The main image must have a pure white background (RGB 255, 255, 255), show only the product (no text, logos, or props), fill at least 85% of the frame, and be at least 1,000 px on the longest side — 1,600 px or more enables zoom. Additional slots can show lifestyle, scale, and detail images. Bulk image changes go through the image upload flat file; product videos are managed under Upload & Manage Videos (brand-registered sellers).

A search-suppressed listing exists but is hidden from search and browse because a required attribute is missing or non-compliant — a missing main image, a title over the limit, a missing bullet, or a category-required attribute left blank. Find them in Manage All Inventory (filter Status → Inactive and look for the suppression reason) and, in more detail, in the Listing Quality Dashboard, which names the exact attribute for each affected SKU. Fix it on the edit page or with a PartialUpdate flat file, then check the status again after processing.

Stranded inventory is the FBA cousin: units sitting in a fulfillment center with no active listing attached. Inventory → Fix Stranded Inventory shows the stranded reason for each SKU; relist or create a removal order.

• Category Listing Report (Reports → Inventory Reports) — every attribute for every SKU, in the flat-file layout. It has to be enabled through Seller Support first; once available it is the base for every audit and bulk edit.
• All Listings Report — a status snapshot of the whole catalog: which SKUs are active, inactive, or incomplete.
• Listing Quality Dashboard — suppressed and at-risk listings with the attribute Amazon wants fixed.