Amazon product research tools. Which ones come to mind first? Most sellers will probably think of Viral Launch and Helium 10. After all, the two have established themselves as leading software solutions in the e-commerce space. Sellers have added these platforms to their arsenal of Amazon tools for a variety of reasons: market research, data precision, keyword optimization, and review management, to name a few.
It’s all the more reason to invest in one of them to help scale your business. The challenge? Deciding which set of tools to use.
We stand behind ours and the value they provide, but we’re all about helping you make the right choice. This article will break down what you need to know about each platform, so you can:
- Make an informed decision
- Settle the Viral Launch vs. Helium 10 debate once and for all
Fasten your digital seat belt. We’re about to dive into some deep seller software discussions.
Viral Launch: A Quick History Lesson
The origins of Viral Launch date back to 2014, when renowned e-commerce innovators Casey Gauss and Jordan Dekker founded the company. Since then, it has enabled the success of over 3,000 seven-figure sellers and earned the trust of over 52,000 brands worldwide for its all-in-one Amazon seller toolbox. Users have access to a wide range of features, such as:
- Data-driven software tools for product discovery, listing optimizations, keyword research, and PPC automation
- Leading market intelligence capabilities that deliver impactful data and insights on product niches, market trends, competitors, profit potential, and more
- A responsive customer service team committed to helping users resolve technical issues and learn how to effectively use each tool
- Chrome extension for Market Intelligence that can be used directly on Amazon for market research
- Expansive library of free e-books, seller courses, tutorials, and other resources to reference
Given all the benefits that have helped numerous Amazon sellers thrive, Viral Launch has rightfully earned its place at the top. But don’t take our word for it. See what some of our customers had to say.
Helium 10: Another Quick History Lesson
You’ve heard the story behind Viral Launch. Now, let’s shift gears to talk about the inception of Helium 10. E-commerce experts Manny Coats and Guillermo Puyol first developed the platform in 2015, with the goal of helping sellers build and scale Amazon FBA businesses. Like Viral Launch, the Helium 10 software comes with its own set of features, including:
- Various keyword research and listing optimization tools for enhancing product listings
- Operational capabilities to manage inventory, refunds, and reimbursements
- Product research and analytics solutions designed to find product opportunities, perform competitor analysis, and track data
- Helium 10 Chrome extension for conducting product research directly on Amazon
- Educational resources to assist you in your journey as an Amazon seller
Looking at both Viral Launch and Helium 10’s offerings, it’s easy to see why the latter is another contender for sellers in search of Amazon FBA tools. In the next section, we’ll explore each of the platforms’ main selling points in more detail.
Viral Launch vs. Helium 10: An In-depth Comparison
As you consider which seller software to choose, it’s important to understand how Viral Launch’s tools stack up against Helium 10’s. We’ve gone ahead and put together a handy comparison chart to help you in the decision-making process.
🏆Competitive Edge: Viral Launch
Helium 10 has features comparable to Viral Launch, but there are certain capabilities that it doesn’t provide or would entail extra costs. On the flip side, Viral Launch takes added expenses and tool limitations out of the equation with its all-inclusive offering.
Product Finding
A great product finder is all the difference between selling a high profit margin item and one that results in a loss. Viral Launch and Helium 10 both offer such tools, so let’s take a closer look at each.
Product Discovery by Viral Launch
The efficient way to find high-demand, low-competition products in untapped markets. With advanced filters and search functions for products, keywords, brands, and categories, this tool allows you to skip the manual research and get promising results backed by data. Here’s a preview of how it works:
And here’s Product Discovery in action. It analyzes millions of items on Amazon, providing you with a myriad of product opportunities to look into. What’s especially great about the tool is that you can save your favorite product ideas.
Black Box by Helium 10
Similar to Viral Launch’s Product Discovery, Black Box enables you to search for product opportunities by products, keywords, and competitors. It also boasts a range of filters to help you hone in on what to sell.
🏆Competitive Edge: Both
Viral Launch and Helium 10 are on equal playing fields when it comes to sourcing product ideas. Both provide excellent tools with advanced filters and functions, allowing you to refine your search results.
Market Research
Investing in a reliable market research tool can go a long way in helping you understand the market you want to sell in. Let’s delve into what Viral Launch and Helium 10 each bring to the table in this area.
Market Intelligence by Viral Launch
Consider this tool your North Star for market research in the Amazon marketplace. You have the most accurate data at your disposal to validate product ideas, evaluate profit potential in niche categories, determine pricing strategies, and more.
The accuracy of information lies within the historical and real-time data. It helps you confidently make informed decisions, whether you’re looking at the competition or researching primary keywords. Everything you need to get the lay of the land is packaged neatly into one tool (and Chrome extension).
Xray and Trendster by Helium 10
Market research with Helium 10 can be broken up into two different tools:
Xray
Deemed one of the most popular tools in the Helium 10 Chrome extension, Xray allows you to examine the BSR, estimated sales, FBA fees, revenue, and review count of direct competitors. Much like Viral Launch’s Market Intelligence extension, it’s a convenient solution for sellers wanting to access sales analytics data and other key metrics within Amazon.
Trendster
Just as the name suggests, this tool provides insights into the seasonal trends of a product. You have the option of looking up trends for a specific ASIN or a keyword.
🏆Competitive Edge: Viral Launch
In this Helium 10 vs. Viral Launch round, Viral Launch takes the cake for market research with Market Intelligence. While both offer valuable insights, Viral Launch goes above and beyond with the amount of quality data baked into its platform and Chrome extension. That includes detailed competitor information, market analysis capabilities, and even a series of tips, alerts, and warnings—something extra that Helium 10 doesn’t have.
There’s also no need to jump between tools when researching. VIral Launch users can do their research all in one easy-to-navigate place. Helium 10 users, on the other hand, not so much.
Keyword Optimization
Keyword tools are a must when it comes to selling on Amazon. What good is a product listing without the right search terms? Viral Launch and Helium 10 have their own versions of these types of tools, which we’ll get into below.
Keyword Tools by Viral Launch
If you want to boost your visibility on Amazon, Viral Launch’s Keyword Research can help. The tool performs a reverse-ASIN lookup to identify and automatically sort relevant, high-performing search terms in competitor listings. In other words, it gives you a glimpse into what keywords customers are actually searching for.
But that’s not all. Keyword Research also includes proprietary metrics to guide your SEO strategy.
- Priority Score: A value that rates a keyword’s importance
- Opportunity Score: A value that rates a search term’s ranking potential
- Relevancy Score: A value that determines how relevant a keyword is
To take things one step further, you can:
- Integrate your keyword research into the Keyword Manager to track, monitor, and analyze search terms
- Incorporate newly found keywords into your product listings by using the Listing Builder
Do all of the above and you’ll have a well-optimized listing in no time.
Keyword Tools by Helium 10
Helium 10 offers the following tools for keyword research:
Magnet
Helium 10’s primary keyword research tool. Simply input a search term to obtain a comprehensive list of keyword recommendations. Like Viral Launch’s Keyword Research, Magnet has its own unique metric to evaluate high-relevance, low-competition keywords—the Magnet IQ Score.
Cerebro
Akin to Viral Launch’s Keyword Research tool, Cerebro does reverse-ASIN lookups to find promising keywords. You won’t have to worry about a lack of results because this tool delivers big time. However, the sheer number of search terms may mean spending more time sifting through what to capitalize on.
🏆Competitive Edge: Viral Launch
The competition remains fierce as both platforms continue to put their best features forward. Nonetheless, Viral Launch takes the crown for its extensive keyword research and ability to automatically display the most relevant keyword opportunities first. This ultimately saves sellers time, eliminating the need to manually filter through thousands of search terms. Along with seamless integration into its other tools, Viral Launch makes optimizing product listings a breeze.
PPC Advertising
No Amazon seller strategy is complete without a solid PPC campaign in place. It’s the bread and butter of driving targeted traffic to listings and generating immediate visibility. So, let’s see what Viral Launch and Helium 10 have in store for the paid side of things.
Kinetic by Viral Launch
This tool enables you to uncover in-depth keyword insights, make bid adjustments for better ROI, and monitor the performance of live campaigns effortlessly.
What really sets Kinetic apart from other PPC tools is the fact that it can automate campaigns. You can do this two different ways using rules for campaigns, keyword targeting, product targeting, and search terms.
- Select a predefined template
We recommend this approach to new sellers and those wanting to become more familiar with PPC campaign automation. For more information, check out this quickstart guide.
- Create new rules
This option gives you the freedom to set your own parameters. That means you could have Kinetic automatically spend more on ads driving traffic or pause underperforming ones. The choice is up to you.
Adtomic by Helium 10
This PPC tool operates in a similar fashion to Kinetic, allowing sellers to automate campaigns, make bids, and access critical data to increase ROI.
However, it comes at an added cost. Adtomic isn’t included in any of Helium 10’s paid plans, so be prepared to shell out an extra $199/month if you want to use it.
🏆Competitive Edge: Viral Launch
Both platforms equip sellers with robust PPC analytic tools. Yet, Helium 10 falls short due to the hefty price tag attached to Adtomic. The additional monthly expense, on top of the cost for a subscription, can be a barrier to existing and potential customers on a budget.
With Viral Launch, there are no extra fees. You can enjoy all the benefits of Kinetic and more when you sign up for the Pro Plus Ads plan.
User Interface
It’s often said that good design is invisible. It should enhance, not detract from the user experience. Such is the case for Viral Launch and Helium 10, whose interfaces uphold this principle. Both platforms impress with their intuitive designs and thoughtful organization of complex information.
🏆Competitive Edge: Both
In the end, user interface comes down to personal choice. We’ll let you decide who emerges victorious in this category.
Viral Launch vs. Helium 10: Pricing & Plans
Getting acquainted with the seller tools out on the market is only half the battle. The other half revolves around determining which ones are cost-effective and right for your business. Keep in mind that this decision isn’t something to be taken lightly. You don’t want to end up with a costly Amazon toolkit that doesn’t yield the results you’re looking for.
To help you find clarity in this conundrum, we’ve broken down Viral Launch and Helium 10’s costs for each plan.
For the Novice Seller
The first step in the Amazon seller journey typically begins with product research. AKA the stage where you’ll want to figure out what to sell.
This makes Viral Launch and Helium 10’s tools especially great for newer sellers as they both supply the basics to help you find new products.
🏆Competitive Edge: Viral Launch
At this tier, Viral Launch charges more than Helium 10. But you really get what you pay for—great product filtering, unlimited searches for keyword data, and access to global data. With Helium 10, you could be on the cusp of a great product idea only to be bound by the limitations put in place.
For the Established Seller
The most popular plans among Viral Launch and Helium 10’s offerings—and for good reason. They’ve got all the benefits from the beginner tier plans, as well as additional features for optimizing, monitoring, and tracking product listings.
🏆Competitive Edge: Viral Launch
The Pro plan from Viral Launch may cost a bit more than Helium 10’s Platinum plan. But again, you’re not confined to as-low usage restrictions or limited access to tools.
For the Elite Seller
This tier is the hallmark of Amazon seller software plans. You get everything offered in the beginner and established tiers, plus the flexibility to perform market research, optimize listings, and more without strict limitations.
🏆Competitive Edge: Viral Launch
Helium 10 opens up the doors to many of its sought-out features with the Diamond plan. Still, they miss the mark on providing paid advertising tools to their customer base. As we previously mentioned, the company charges an extra $199/month for its PPC capabilities. That means you would be paying $428/month vs. $199/month with Viral Launch.
Making the Right Choice for Your Business
These days, there are many tools for Amazon sellers to choose from—Viral Launch and Helium 10 included. Before you settle on a software, assess the pros and cons for each. Determine if they align with your specific needs, budget, and business scale.
This is the time to test the waters. Here’s what you can do:
- Start a 14-day free trial with Viral Launch for complete access to industry-leading tools. If you’re still undecided after the trial period, you can sign up for the Market Intelligence à la carte plan. It’s a low-cost, low-stakes option that showcases what Viral Launch offers on a smaller scale.
- Sign up for Helium 10’s “free trial” plan, a no-cost choice that lets you try out most of the tools. Do note that you’re very limited in what you can do. For instance, sellers can only use Cerebro twice a day.
- Check out Viral Launch and Helium 10’s reviews on TrustPilot to see what other sellers have to say about the platforms. Second opinions are always welcome when you need to weigh your options.
The Final Verdict
And the winner of the great Viral Launch vs. Helium 10 debate is…
up to you!
That’s right. Both platforms offer impactful solutions designed to help sellers attain long-term profitability on Amazon. It’s really a matter of you answering the question, “Is Viral Launch or Helium 10 worth it?” Your response will vary depending on what stage your business is at. Fortunately, a platform like Viral Launch can assist you regardless of whether you’ve just launched or are ready to scale.
In any case, we’ll be here should you want to seek out Helium 10 alternatives or subscribe to a Viral Launch plan. The process is quick and easy, so you can start leveraging the tools that set you up for absolute success.
