How to sell to amazon

How to sell internationally with Amazon Global Selling

Already selling on Amazon.com?

4 steps to succeed at selling globally

Decide where and what to sell

GLOBAL SELLING

Decide where and what to sell

Tips for entering a new marketplace

How we can help

Where you can sell with Amazon

When you prepare to enter a new Amazon marketplace, one early consideration you’ll have is whether your business can operate in the local language. Proficiency in the local marketplace language is necessary for providing customer support for a particular marketplace (a requirement for selling in an Amazon marketplace) unless you use Fulfillment by Amazon. Local language proficiency is also helpful for conducting country-specific research and understanding how to best position your products. You might need to modify your products or reposition your marketing, copy, or packaging to better meet the needs of your new customers.

However, many sellers do successfully sell in Amazon marketplaces where they don’t have proficiency in the local language. Amazon provides some services and tools to help ease the challenges posed by language barriers:

Seller Central Language Switcher
The good news is that you don’t have to master French, German, Italian, Spanish, or Japanese to sell across Europe and in Japan. With Seller Central Language Switcher, you can manage your operations in all of these Amazon marketplaces in English, enabling you to quickly get up to speed on your international business by providing you a familiar interface you can quickly learn to use.

Amazon European Marketplaces account
In Europe, we have simplified managing your business across all of Amazon’s online stores. The Amazon European stores account enables you to create and manage product offers in any and all of our online stores in Germany, the United Kingdom, France, Italy, Spain, and the Netherlands. You control what you sell where, and you manage your business from a single seller account interface.

When you sign up to sell in one Amazon European marketplace, for example on Amazon.co.uk, your seller account is automatically enabled to sell in all other Amazon European marketplaces—Amazon.de, Amazon.fr, Amazon.it, and Amazon.es. Reach millions of international customers and let Amazon help you grow your international online business. All your orders will be managed in a single place, making trading in Italy feel just like trading in the United Kingdom.
Customer support in the local language
When you sell in an Amazon marketplace, you are required to provide customer support in the local language of the marketplace. For instance, if you are selling on Amazon.jp or Amazon.es, you’re required to provide customer support in Japanese or Spanish, respectively. You can choose to do it on your own or have Amazon do it when you join FBA.

Be aware of local taxes and regulations when selling in Amazon’s various marketplaces and enlisting third-party resources (see details about Europe and Japan). We recommend that you consult your tax and regulatory advisors before making decisions about how you will sell in other marketplaces.

Every country has legal and industry requirements concerning sales of products to consumers. In your home marketplace, there may be laws that pertain to intellectual property rights, product safety, environmental, and other applicable requirements. The same is true for all marketplaces. Do your research and understand your responsibilities. Some things to consider are tax and customs, intellectual property rights, parallel importation, export controls, marking and labels, environment, health, and safety, and product compliance.

Crafting a marketplace strategy

Deciding where and what to sell in another country’s marketplace can be similar to making these determinations for your home marketplace. However, there are some added considerations when selling internationally.

One way to evaluate an international marketplace entry strategy is to use the «four P’s» marketing framework: Product, Price, Placement, and Promotions. Let’s review each through the lens of selling internationally on Amazon.

When you select an Amazon marketplace in which to sell, you’ll need to understand whether your product is appropriate for your target country. First and foremost, make sure that you comply with all laws in each country. In addition, product standards differ across countries. For example, mobile devices operating on 110–220 V that use two-prong electrical chargers may not be appropriate for European marketplaces but could be appropriate for Japan. Similarly, feather beds you successfully sell in the U.K. would probably not sell well in the United States because the standard mattress sizes are different in each country.

When selling internationally through Amazon for the first time, a natural approach is to think about your bestselling products in your home marketplace. From your previous experience and from data in sales reports, what sells well? It’s also important to ask yourself why you think these particular products do well. Will these same reasons hold true for the marketplace you are entering, or are there other fundamentals driving customer demand in the new marketplace, such as culture, climate, and demographics, including average age and income? Also think about how differences in marketplaces can benefit you. For instance, do you have seasonal inventory that you don’t know what to do with after the season has passed in one marketplace? You can extend your selling season by selling abroad where the product may find a new audience.

Tip: List broadly across multiple products rather than deeply in one or two products. Why? A broader selection of products means higher customer search exposure to your listings overall. This breadth can help you quickly gauge which products can be successful in a particular marketplace.

You can start slow while still maintaining breadth of selection even if you’re not ready to commit a lot of your inventory to another Amazon marketplace. If your sales spike, you can adjust your price or remove listings to mitigate stock-out risk, just like in your home Amazon marketplace. For an even smaller commitment, you can start by fulfilling orders yourself rather than sending inventory to another country. Remember selling in another marketplace doesn’t mean you lose control over your listings.

In deciding which products to sell in an Amazon marketplace, you of course have another key source of information available to you—observations of the marketplace itself. This sort of marketplace research should be very familiar to you from activities you likely conduct when selling in your primary Amazon marketplace. For this research, local language proficiency is extremely helpful. If you are trying to research a marketplace in a language unfamiliar to you, you may be able get some basic language interpretation from free online translator tools, but beware of relying too heavily on such tools.

In your target marketplace, review the Best Sellers, New Arrivals, and Featured Brand selections for your product categories. Read customer reviews to understand your competition’s strengths and weaknesses.

During this product research phase, you may find it helpful to broaden your search to ecommerce marketplaces beyond Amazon. Use a search engine to find relevant ecommerce sites by country. Trade publications and online seller communities in each country can also provide a rich source of information as you prepare to list products in their locales.

Selling online with Amazon: Frequently Asked Questions

Selling in Amazon’s stores

Some products may not be listed as a matter of compliance with legal or regulatory restrictions (for example, prescription drugs) or Amazon policy (for example, crime scene photos). For detailed information, visit Seller Central Help to learn more about restrictions, and how to request approval for new products in certain categories.

If you plan to ship orders with Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA), be sure to review the list of FBA product restrictions.

What product you can and cannot sell on Amazon

There are many opportunities for new sellers in Amazon’s store. What you can sell depends on the product, the category, and the brand. Some categories are open to all sellers while others require a Professional seller account. Certain products require approval to sell and other categories include products that cannot be sold by third-party sellers.

What products should you start with? What niches are most profitable? For ideas, check out this list of 38 online business ideas. You’ll hear from sellers who started in Amazon’s store and grew to reach global audiences.

Brand case study: Hippeas

Learn details about how to publish eBooks and paperbacks for free and get them on Kindle stores worldwide within 24-48 hours.

Once you create a selling account, submit an application to join Amazon Handmade. If you are approved, you will have the ability to create a store and list products through the Professional selling plan. You will also be able to create your own custom URL, so customers can find your brand easily. For each sale, Handmade will deduct a 15% referral fee.

Join artisans from over 80 countries who are selling their craft in Amazon’s store.

Staying small, intimate, and local on Amazon

Amazon Prime

The cost of selling in Amazon Prime depends on your selling plan, product category, fulfillment strategy, and other variables. The Amazon Prime badge is available to sellers who use Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) to handle logistics or with Seller Fulfilled Prime (SFP), a program that allows you to deliver directly to domestic Prime customers using your own logistics.

Interested in Fulfillment by Amazon?

The first step is to set up an Amazon seller account. The Amazon Prime badge is available to sellers who use Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) to handle logistics or with Seller Fulfilled Prime (SFP), a program that allows you to deliver directly to domestic Prime customers using your own logistics.

Products are then eligible for Amazon Prime FREE Two-Day Shipping, FREE Shipping, and more. Qualified listings display the Prime logo, helping make your products more attractive to Prime members worldwide.

Consider making your offers more attractive to millions of Amazon Prime members worldwide by using FBA. Compare options to decide which fulfillment method is right for your business.

Which is right for me? Fulfillment by Amazon or Fulfillment by Merchant?

Fulfillment

FBA stands for Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA). With FBA, you send products to Amazon’s fulfillment centers, and we pick, pack, ship, and provide customer service for those products.

Specialty FBA programs like FBA Small and Light, FBA Subscribe & Save, the FBA Dangerous Goods program, Multi-Channel Fulfillment, and FBA Export help you stay competitive and pay only for the services you use. The options are flexible, so you can find a combo to serve your business.

FBA can help you scale your business and reach more customers.

Which is right for me? Fulfillment by Amazon or Fulfillment by Merchant?

An Amazon FBA business is a seller that uses Fulfillment by Amazon to handle logistics. Store products in Amazon’s Fulfillment Centers and we will pick, pack, ship, and provide customer service for each product.

Need help deciding which fulfillment option is right for your business? Check out our Ecommerce Fulfillment Guide.

Advertising in Amazon’s store

You can improve product visibility and boost brand awareness through cost-per-click ads, audio and video ads, custom ads, sponsored ads, and more.

To advertise in Amazon’s store, create a seller account and then build your campaign. Amazon ads are designed for everyone, meaning you don’t need advertising experience to launch a campaign.

You can create and launch an advertising campaign in as little as five minutes with ad solutions for every budget. In some cases, a Professional selling account may be required.

Improve product visibility and boost brand awareness through pay-per-click ads, audio and video ads, custom ads, sponsored ads, and more.

Learn more about brand building plus key tips on how to get started with Amazon Advertising and self-service solutions.

Amazon Storefronts

Getting started with Amazon Stores

Amazon Private Label

Amazon Accelerator enables manufacturers to launch brands and innovative products exclusively in Amazon’s store, providing a path to become an Amazon Private Brand or Private Label supplier. Suppliers can create and trademark their own Amazon-exclusive brand which will remain exclusive to Amazon.

The benefits include an opportunity to test new products and get quick feedback, potential entry into Amazon Private Brands, brand protection, marketing services, onboarding support, insights on trends, and analytics tools. Learn more about Amazon Accelerator benefits and policies.

From specialty foods and fashion items to baby care and nutrition, see featured categories for examples of Amazon’s private and select exclusive brands.

9 tips to sell online successfully and how to start on Amazon

How to sell online

Thinking of getting into selling online or looking for ways to boost online sales?

There are plenty of options for selling online. Some sales channels can help you sell used items and gear, while others will consign or sell on your behalf. Selling online with Amazon is ideal if you want to sell new products, build a business, and reach a vast pool of customers.

In this article, we’ll offer general tips on how to sell online successfully, plus more in-depth guidance on how you can reach the 300 million customers who shop Amazon stores worldwide.

Did you know?

On average, U.S. small- and medium-sized businesses sell 6,500 products per minute.

9 tips for selling online successfully

Figure out what you want to sell

What products will sell best online? What niches could be most profitable for you? To determine what online business ideas are right for you, explore your interests and zero in on your strengths.

For inspiration, consult this list of business ideas. You’ll hear from over 40 entrepreneurs who’ve found success across different niches.

Choose the right sales channel

What are you trying to sell? Who are you trying to reach? Whether it’s collectible art or vintage purple leather pants, consider the amount of products you’re selling. This, in turn, will influence what type of sales channel will work best for you.

If you’re cleaning out your house, then a website where you can list multiple items in one go might be your best bet. If you’re building a business, you’ll want access to analytics, customer reviews, and a large number of customers.

Check listing and selling fees

The cost to sell online will vary with different sales channels. Be sure to pay close attention to fees and other charges as you decide on options for your business.

Some stores will charge a small fee to list products, while others offer free listings. Here’s a quick breakdown of the different fees you’ll come across:

Decide how you will handle shipping

Consider how much it will cost to ship an item and how far you are willing to ship it. Some sellers are happy to ship products internationally and will benefit from stores like Amazon with a worldwide customer base. Other sellers prefer to deal locally and only allow orders to be picked up or dropped off within a small radius.

Some stores may have a shipping and processing time expectation if you are going to ship items, while others will ship products for you. This can eat into your profit but may also save you time and hassle.

How shipping works on Amazon

Amazon Prime shipping

Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA)

Seller fulfillment

Ways to ship with Amazon

Take good photos

Where possible, add a video of the product to help customers visualize the product. Great photos and videos are some of the best ways you can increase sales and reduce returns.

Most stores have specifications available for product photography, including Amazon.

Be descriptive

Be honest about the product’s condition and include proper keywords to help products show up in search results for customers looking for similar items.

On Amazon, you can list a snippet at the top of the product listing page, and add more info below. Use all the available spaces to maximize the product’s chances of selling.

Research the right selling price

Package items with care

Focus on delighting customers

The golden rule of selling online? Take a customer-centric approach.

Start with the customer and work backward. What types of customers are you trying to attract? Are you looking to cater specialty items to a community of enthusiasts? Or do you want to attract a variety of customers and have the widest reach possible?

Pay close attention to customer reviews

Customer reviews can help you—or hurt you. Reviewers are candid, and many buyers read reviews before deciding to purchase: According to RetailWire, research shows customers trust online reviews as much or nearly as much as recommendations from family and friends. Don’t ignore reviews; instead, be sure to monitor, analyze, and respond to them.

Look at answering questions as an opportunity to build rapport with a potential buyer. While it’s OK to take a few hours or a day to respond, don’t let requests sit unanswered in your inbox for weeks. Also, be sure to familiarize yourself with the right way and wrong way to get product reviews and avoid policy violations.

Reward repeat customers

Do you get orders from the same customers month after month? Help them feel appreciated with a simple note by offering a small discount or adding a bonus gift to their order. This will encourage them to keep coming back.

Check out this ecommerce business guide for more guidelines on how to start and grow your venture.

How To Sell on Amazon in 2020: Setup, Fees, & Strategy

Today, Amazon is rapidly maturing all aspects of its business, including content, inventory, search advertising, display, targeting, video, and reporting. It can be overwhelming if you’re just starting out on the platform.

We’re here to break it down. Keep reading for a step-by-step list covering how to sell on Amazon.

Table of Contents

How to Set Up Your Amazon Seller Account

Selling on Amazon as a Vendor vs. Third Party (3P) Seller

Amazon Selling Fees

Amazon FBA vs. FBM

Amazon Operations

Amazon Product Listing Optimization

Amazon Creative (EBC, A+, Stores)

Amazon Advertising

Amazon Attribution & Metrics

Amazon Brand Registry

Selling Internationally on Amazon

Conclusion: Is Selling on Amazon Worth It?

1. How to Set Up Your Amazon Seller Account

Step 1. Decide Between the Professional or Individual Seller Plan

When choosing an Amazon Selling Plan, consider the products you want to list. Both Individual and Professional Sellers can list products in more than 20 categories. Another 10 categories are available only to Professional Sellers who apply for permission and meet requirements. Here are the major differences between the Professional Amazon Seller plan vs. the Individual Seller Plan:

Step 2. Create Your Amazon Seller Account

For this next step, you will need:

Visit the “Sell on Amazon” page and scroll to the very bottom to begin your registration process.

Tips for setting up your Amazon Seller Central account login:

Step 3. Follow Amazon Prompts

Once you’ve decided on a login, Amazon will prompt you to fill out several additional steps, including:

Once you complete these steps you will be officially welcomed to use your Seller Central dashboard which includes a variety of tabs for managing inventory, pricing, orders, advertising, reports, and performance. Don’t forget to list your products and fill out the “About Seller” to let the Marketplace know about your business. You can also include your company logo, FAQs and your privacy policy listed there.

Selling on Amazon as a Vendor vs. Third-Party (3P) Seller

Let’s get familiar with the two different types of seller accounts available:

We’ll go through these options in detail next – and which option is better for you.

What is Amazon Vendor Central?

Amazon Vendor Central is an invite-only program for manufacturers and distributors. Amazon Vendor Central grants Amazon ownership of your inventory, which they will then market and sell to shoppers on Amazon.com.

How it works: Merchants or manufacturers sell their inventory to Amazon at wholesale rates. Once they have sent the items to Amazon, the seller’s work is done. Amazon pays for the inventory directly to the seller and maintains ownership of the products. Amazon sells those products on the Marketplace (as Amazon) – choosing their own price and shipping options.

Benefits of using Amazon Vendor Central

With the Vendor option, you’re selling to Amazon, and not on Amazon. This option virtually eliminates direct seller work including marketing, advertising, and even pricing.

Other benefits of Selling to Amazon include:

What is Amazon Seller Central?

Amazon Seller Central is the interface Third Party sellers use to get list and sell products directly to Amazon’s customers.

You’ll list, price, and market your products yourself, and you’ll use the Seller Central dashboard to organize and monitor inventory, pricing, advertising, reports, and more.

How it Works: Brands use Seller Central to list their products on the Amazon Marketplace and sell items as a third party seller. Keep in mind, sellers are responsible for listings, advertising, and everything that comes with selling on an online marketplace.

Selling through Amazon Central is generally more work than selling through Amazon Vendor Central, but it also comes with greater levels of control around shipping, prices, and fulfillment – not to mention the potential for higher margins.

Today, more than half of total sales on Amazon come from 3P sellers using Seller Central. In the fourth quarter of 2019, 53% of paid units were sold by third-party sellers.

Benefits of using Amazon Seller Central

Selling on Amazon vs. Selling to Amazon

Which program you choose to use to sell on Amazon depends on your store, fulfillment abilities, ROI goals, and many other variables.

Vendors who sell to Amazon avoid some headache with logistics, but are limited with their scope and ability to market products. Selling on Amazon is an option that is more suited to sellers who would sell to Amazon but want to take advantage of more exposure and other benefits of the Amazon Marketplace.

The biggest difference between Amazon sellers and vendors is who’s actually selling the product.

Here’s a breakdown of other considerations when you’re selecting between Vendor Central and Seller Central.

Amazon Vendor Central vs. Seller Central: Summing It Up

Access

Pricing

Marketing

Sales

Logistics

Messaging

Analytics

Fees

Though technically you can’t outright choose to become an Amazon Vendor, it’s important to study up on these pros and cons in the event you’re offered an invite to the platform.

Both Vendor Central and Seller Central come with very unique advantages, so the right one for you will depend on your resources as a merchant, the level of control you want and the fees you’re willing to pay.

How Much Does Amazon Charge to Sell

Overall Cost for Selling on Amazon

The cost to sell on Amazon depends on which selling plan you choose.

Referral fees and variable closing fees are subtracted from the overall sale (including selling price, shipping and other charges such as gift wrap).

Amazon seller fees for a professional seller include:

Amazon seller fees for an individual seller include:

Other fees, such as shipping and gift wrap, are paid for by the customer. Here’s an example of those Amazon selling fees in action:

What is an Amazon Referral Fee?

The Amazon Marketplace Referral Fee is essentially a percentage of your total item price (and gift wrap charges if applicable) that Amazon collects based on its CPA model.

What is an Amazon Variable Closing Fee?

The Amazon Marketplace variable closing fees are fixed for media products and vary for non-media products. These fees pertain to the shipping details of your sold product.

Amazon Seller Fees for a Sold Book [Example]:

Don’t let these fees scare you.

Amazon is a major source of traffic for online retailers and is competitive with other marketplace rates. Being aware of and understanding the Amazon selling fee structure is the first step on your way to managing a Marketplace campaign effectively.

(Psst – Use our Amazon Seller Fee calculator to determine just how much you’ll pay to sell on Amazon.)

Amazon Shipping and Fulfillment Options

Before we talk about shipping and fulfillment options, let’s briefly discuss UPC codes. In short: If you don’t have UPC codes, get them.

There is only one legitimate producer of UPC codes that exists globally: GS1.

GS1 (Global Standard 1) is a non-profit organization that has set the global standard for supply chain barcoding.

There are more than 100 GS1 organizations around the world – GS1 US is the organization that serves US businesses. GS1 issues unique prefixes to brand owners so that they can create their own unique barcodes containing the prefix number given to them by GS1.

Amazon FBA vs. FBM: What Should You Choose?

One of the first decisions you need to make is whether to let Amazon handle fulfillment of your products or to handle your order fulfillment in house (or by a service).

Essentially, you have three official options for fulfilling Amazon orders:

You can use FBA for some products and FBM for others but let’s break these down to understand each better.

What is Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA)?

Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) is a program where Amazon stores, packs, ships, and handles customer service for the products you sell on Amazon. FBA gives you the ability to sell products on Amazon Prime.

FBA is a fulfillment option that sellers can choose for any or all of their products. Sellers vary on the number of products they choose to fulfill (if any) using FBA, depending on their margins, product category, and related seller variables.

Fulfillment by Amazon is a good option for merchants who are looking to increase shipping time and reduce time and money allotted to fulfillment.

FBA Pros and Cons

Less Business Operations: FBA eliminates fulfillment shipping efforts for sellers. Instead of handling warehouse management & packaging (handling shipping, picking) and those associated fees, retailers can pass off those task to Amazon

Amazon Prime: Amazon Prime customers purchase more, and more frequently than traditional Amazon shoppers.

Customer Service & Returns: Amazon handles customer service and returns with FBA orders, which is a perk for sellers who aren’t customer service specialists.

Shipping Speed: For online shoppers, FBA means quicker shipping rates, Amazon Prime eligible shipping, as well as 24/7 Customer Service and delivery tracking through Amazon. FBA products are shipped from Amazon, so they process faster and ship faster than products sent directly from the retailer. Amazon emphasizes customer service, so shoppers can rely on helpful assistance.

Buy Box Share: FBA impacts key factors in Buy Box share variables including shipping and seller rating. FBA is a good way to boost your chances of getting a share of the Buy Box for products where shipping or other Buy Box eligibility requirements might be hard to achieve. We’ll talk more about the Buy Box later.

Amazon Branding: FBA is fulfilled by Amazon. Amazon has worked hard to curate a brand around customer service and ease of online shopping. FBA aligns your store with that branding and lends that reputation to your store.

Now for the biggest con (for most sellers) to FBA: the cost.

Amazon FBA Cost

Amazon seller fees result in a charge of a percent of total sale profits. In addition to those fees, FBA charges fees based on:

For some sellers, FBA seems like an expensive option, but keep in mind FBA encompasses fees for all of fulfillment- costs including warehousing and shipping. Use Amazon’s Revenue Calculator to scope out whether your products will be profitable using FBA.

Amazon Fulfillment impacts your margin for individual products, which arguably limits profitability. However, with the increase of total sale volume and exposure, FBA is likely a good investment for your online store. For example, you may make less money overall on a particular product such as a water bottle, but you are likely to sell more waterbottles overall for a larger holistic profit.

Remember you’re not forced to use the FBA option for all of your products, so take the time to calculate which products are profitable to fulfill with FBA. FBA may not be an option for your store depending on the competition surrounding your products, what products you sell, where your business is located, your margins, and other related variables.

What is Amazon Fulfillment by Merchant (FBM)?

Amazon Fulfilled by Merchant (FBM) makes you responsible for picking, packing, and shipping the products you sell on the Amazon Marketplace. FBM does not give you the option to list products as “Prime”.

FBM Pros and Cons

While you’ll avoid some of the fees that come with FBA, you’ll be required to abide by all of Amazon seller rules (i.e. replying to customer support issues within 24 hours, provide tracking info, and ship within your stated time frame). Not easy, but doable if you already have the right infrastructure in place to handle all of the above.

Unfortunately, With FBM you will not have access to selling via Amazon Prime (unless you’re selling with Seller Fulfilled Prime – see below), which in turn will lead to less sales than a comparable FBA offering.

(Psst – If you’re going the FBM route for any of your products, you’ll need our checklist for shipping successfully with FBM.)

What is Seller Fulfilled Prime (SFP)?

The Seller Fulfilled Prime (SFP) option is a hybrid Amazon fulfillment option that gives you the ability to store, pack, and ship your own products while allowing your products to be listed as “Prime”.

Basically, Seller Fulfilled Prime is the best of both worlds if you have a solid fulfillment strategy. You would manage your products and listings the same way you would with FBM but you’ll get access to Prime customers.

However, you do need to qualify for SFP. And it’s not easy.

You’ll need to go through a trial period that involves a minimum of 300 orders. During the trial period, you’ll need to satisfy all of Amazon’s requirements.

This includes a cancellation rate of less than 1%, an on-time shipment rating of at least 99%, and use Buy Shipping Services for a minimum of 95% of the orders.

Tackle Your Amazon Operations

Amazon operations management may not be the sexiest part of running a business, but it is vital to driving the profitability of your business and advertising campaigns.

Demand forecasting, purchase order and inventory management, chargeback prevention, and more are all critical to your success as a first-party Vendor on the Marketplace.

Why Does Inventory Management Matter on Amazon?

You can be doing all of the right things on Amazon to get people to your listings, but if you aren’t in stock, you’ll lose 100% of your potential sales.

Effective inventory management is more important than ever, especially if you’re an Amazon seller. In the past year, Amazon has introduced monthly long term storage fees for slow-moving inventory, increased FBA fees, and launched the new Inventory Performance Index (IPI) metric.

There have also been improvements to the basic inventory management features available in Seller Central. What these changes have in common is a mission to help Amazon merchants manage their inventory more effectively.

Are you struggling with managing your inventory properly? Do you keep running out early or having trouble fulfilling orders properly?
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Here are the best Amazon inventory management tools that can help

How Your Operations Impact the Buy Box

If you sell on Amazon and want to increase sales online, winning the Buy Box is pivotal. Retailers featured on Amazon’s Buy Box for product pages sell more products.

Set Up and Optimize Your Product Listings on Amazon

Any qualified seller can list their products on the marketplace.

What most sellers don’t know is how to make a winning Amazon SEO strategy by cracking the Amazon A9 algorithm.

Let’s get into the basics.

Your product listings on Amazon will be composed of all of these elements:

Product Title

Amazon product titles must meet the following qualifications for character length (make sure you check your category-specific upload template for confirmation):

General characters: 80-250
Right rail ads: 30-33
Mobile: 55-63

What to include in Amazon product titles:

What not to include in product titles:

Amazon Bullet Points Guidelines

The Amazon product detail page bullet points aka “Key Product Features” section is located under the “Descriptions” tab. Product features are the second most important factor in surfacing your products. Amazon shoppers rely pretty heavily on bullet points to gather product information. The more descriptive the bullet points for your product pages, the more you will sell on Amazon.

What to include in bullet points:

What not to include in bullet points:

Amazon Product Descriptions (HTML, Images, and More)

Product descriptions are typically a few paragraphs long, and they may require some light HTML. If you’re selling products in a category that Amazon regulates, make sure you read all requirements before your listing gets taken down for using the wrong terms.

Every product detail page should also describe the major product features, such as size, style, and what the product can be used for. Amazon encourages sellers to include accurate dimensions, care instructions, and warranty information and use correct grammar, punctuation, and complete sentences.

Amazon Product Description Guidelines

What not to include in product descriptions:

How to Add Product Images to Amazon Product Descriptions

According to Amazon, advertisers should choose images that are clear, easy to understand, information-rich, and attractively presented. Images must accurately represent the product and show only the product that’s for sale, with minimal or no propping.

Amazon Product Image Guidelines

What to include in your product image:

What not to include in product images:

Invest in Amazon Creative

You might think that companies selling on Amazon have no control over their own branding. After all, it’s Amazon’s webspace–you’re just a tenant, and so your brand looks like whatever Amazon wants you to look like. But really, nothing could be further from the truth.

Your brand identity can come through on Amazon with just as much power and uniqueness as anywhere else on the web. Amazon understands the power of a compelling brand story, and gives merchants the tools and space they need to tell those stories–you just have to know how to do it properly.

You have the options to select from three Amazon creative options to help create brand equity on Amazon:

A+ Content

Amazon A+ content is available for first-party (1P) vendors on Amazon and features high-quality images, video, and more. In short, A+ content better conveys the value of the product through the use of multimedia.

Below is an example of A+ content detail page:

How to Set Up A+ Content on Amazon

1. Log into Vendor Central and hover over the “Merchandising” Menu then select “A+ Detail Pages”

2. Next, select your A+ detail page package:

Pro Tip: The fees for each package can vary depending on the time of year. The cart price will depend on the type of module a vendor selects. We recommend working with an Amazon agency that understands A+ Content creation and guidelines.

Enhanced Brand Content (EBC)

Enhanced Brand Content allows Brand Registered Sellers to showcase the unique value proposition of their products through enhanced images and text placements. Adding EBC to your product detail pages may result in higher conversion rates, increased traffic, and increased sales when used effectively.

Here’s an example of EBC:

How to Set Up Enhanced Brand Content

“Modular Templates” for Enhanced Brand Content look very similar to templates in A+ Content with a number of added benefits for sellers.

You can create EBC content using one of five pre-built templates or by selecting the customer template and using individual modules to create the style you desire (shown in image A below).

The EBC modules are:

Amazon Stores

“Amazon Stores” is a free self-service product that allows brand owners to design and create multi-page stores to showcase their brands, products and value proposition on Amazon.

How to Set Up Amazon Stores

A question we get pretty often from Sellers is: “Why should I hire an Amazon agency to create my Amazon Store?”

When you work with a reputable agency, you’ll have access to a dedicated project manager as well as an in-house design team to collaborate and share ideas with. It can be difficult to know where to start and how to navigate Amazon Stores on your own.

How to Give Your Amazon Creative a Boost

Amazon branding is crucial for building your brand equity, building a connection with shoppers, and establishing trust. The good news is that there are more tools than ever at your disposal to build your branding on Amazon.

Here are a few ways to start the process of optimizing your creative on Amazon:

More resources on Amazon Creative:

Now let’s get into the game-changer: Amazon advertising.

Start Advertising on Amazon

Once upon a time, a solid organic strategy was enough for sellers to find success on Amazon, but the tides have turned. Enter: Amazon Ads.

Amazon ads break down into roughly two categories:

Amazon Sponsored Ads

The PPC side of Amazon advertising includes Sponsored Display, Sponsored Products, and Sponsored Brands ads. You can click into each of the links below to get access to full blog posts about each.

Sponsored Display Ads

Sponsored Display is a “self-service advertising solution that helps you grow your business by reaching relevant audiences both on and off Amazon.” In other words, Sponsored Display allows Amazon sellers to retarget Amazon shoppers.

Amazon Sponsored Display is available to professional sellers enrolled in the Amazon Brand Registry, vendors, and agencies with clients who sell on Amazon. Your products must fall under Amazon’s eligible categories to advertise.

Sponsored Products

Amazon Sponsored Products are pay-per-click ads based on keywords (and product targeting) that drive traffic to a desired product detail page within the Amazon platform.

These search ads are Amazon’s flagship ad format and are a key investment for brands across all categories for driving awareness and conversions on Amazon’s marketplace.

Sponsored Brands Ads

Sponsored Brands Ads (formerly Headline Search Ads) are one of Amazon’s flagship ad products that allow advertisers to feature brand creative and messaging to engage people at the beginning of their shopping journey.

Amazon has expanded the functionality of Sponsored Brands to include new targeting options, placements, as well as dynamic optimizations for ASINs that are displayed within the ad itself.

Amazon’s Demand Side Platform (DSP)

This category includes Amazon Managed Service and Enterprise Self Service Display Ads.

Amazon DSP — also known as the Amazon’s Demand-Side Platform — gives you the ability to programmatically buy video and ad placements.

Programmatic ads use data to determine which digital advertising spaces you’ll buy and how much you’ll pay for them.

Advertisers are increasing investment in the Amazon DSP, which allows brands to use Amazon targeting capabilities in showing ads not only on Amazon owned-and-operated web properties but also those that it does not control.

Measure Success with Amazon Attribution

Amazon Attribution is a measurement solution that gives Amazon sellers access to sales impact analyses across media channels off Amazon including search, display, social, video channels and email.

Amazon Attribution allows advertisers and brands to uncover the insights needed to optimize their media campaigns and grow product sales.

How to Sign Up for Amazon Attribution

To gain access to Amazon Attribution, you must work directly with an Amazon agency that has access to the beta program. You must also fit the following requirements:

Amazon Attribution allows reporting of both orders and revenue for traffic originating off of Amazon. It can measure traffic brought directly to Amazon, as well as traffic to a site, which later converts on Amazon.

Amazon Attribution can measure traffic from nearly any source (including impressions for rich media and Paid Social channels such as Facebook / Instagram). Through the creation of orders and line items, brands can create unique tracking templates, and performance can be measured to any desired level of granularity.

Enroll in the Amazon Brand Registry

What is the Amazon Brand Registry?

The Amazon Brand Registry gives brand owners access to proprietary text, image search, predictive automation, and reporting tools designed to protect their registered trademarks and create an accurate and trusted experience for customers.

The Amazon Brand Registry also allows brands to search for content using images, keywords, or a list of ASINs in bulk and report suspected violations through a simple, guided workflow.

Let’s talk about why this is important for sellers.

While selling on Amazon, you may experience counterfeit issues or situations where your product content is changed by a third party seller.

The Amazon Brand Registry provides a necessary set of tools (including the new Transparency by Amazon service and Project Zero program) that may help sellers avoid these issues.

Here’s how Amazon’s Brand Registry works, how to enroll, and other brand protection programs that you can use to prevent third-party sellers from counterfeiting your products on the marketplace.

How to Apply for the Amazon Brand Registry

To be a member of the Amazon Brand Registry you must:

More resources on the Amazon Brand Registry:

Explore an International Amazon Strategy

In the beginning stages, most Amazon sellers will experience a combination of both excitement and fear when it comes to selling products internationally.

Common concerns like credit-card fraud and shipping delays may seem overwhelming at first, but with the right guidance, sellers can avoid common mistakes and simplify their global expansion process.

The decision to go global is often driven by a combination of many factors, some financial and others marketing, merchandising or operations related. It can be lucrative for some sellers, and not for others – research carefully.

More resources on selling on Amazon internationally:

Is Selling on Amazon Worth It?

At this point, you might be wondering if it’s worth it to sell products on Amazon.

The good news is with the right products, sophisticated marketing tactics, tools, and seller support – brands selling on Amazon can absolutely be successful. Although the competition for almost every category on the marketplace is fierce, there are still plenty of opportunities for brands to thrive.

To be a successful Amazon seller, you should:

And most importantly, be prepared for whatever Amazon throws your way. Changes can (and do) happen every single day. Looking for a partner to help you navigate these challenges? Read more about what it takes to find the right Amazon agency

How to sell on Amazon – The Ultimate guide

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570,000 sellers) have at least one review a month on their listing. Realistically, it is only those sellers that you need to concern yourself with.

However, it’s profit margins that pay the bills and not revenue. About 75% of Amazon sellers are using Amazon FBA – which is the main reason why this is an Amazon FBA guide – and their profit margins average somewhere between 20-30%. For one-fifth of FBA-dominant sellers, this number goes as high as 32-50%.

By now you’ve probably grasped the sheer magnitude of the Amazon marketplace. There is definitely enough money in it for everyone that is willing to work for it so, with that in mind, let’s explore the Amazon FBA model in detail, with all of its pros and cons.

How to Setup an Amazon Seller Account

One of the most important things you’ll need to do when you decide to begin selling on Amazon, is to choose your professional seller account. Unlike opening your own eCommerce store, selling through Amazon allows you to choose from different kinds of seller options. The first option is the Individual Seller account, and the second is the professional seller Amazon account.

As you might expect, the professional option for your Amazon business comes with access to more functionality. Like similar buy box strategies, an Amazon seller account charges a unit fee for each item sold. On the other hand, a professional seller account charges a monthly subscription fee. If you’re looking to sell items across a range of product categories and you’re not sure exactly how much you’re going to sell in any month, then a professional account makes more sense.

You can sell products from as many product pages as you like with the Amazon business account, and the price of your package doesn’t go up.

Having an Amazon account from the “professional” package is a lot like having your own eCommerce system, with your own UPC and shipping options. The business selling plan also comes with access to things like Amazon prime, and reporting features to track your Amazon selling.

To establish either plan, you’ll need to go to the Amazon Central environment for Sellers

Setting Up Your Amazon Selling Plan

The good news is that setting up an individual or professional seller account doesn’t take much time or effort. You’ll be done within about 10 minutes. However, it’s important to be prepared and have your EIN at hand, or your social security number.

Amazon will ask you various questions about things like shipping service, and the kind of Amazon charges you’re going to be issuing. You’ll also need to provide answers to questions about your tax situation, to ensure that everything will be set up legally for your new online business.

After you’ve answered all of the questions, and you’ve completed the survey provided by Amazon, then you’ll have finished setting up your account, and you’ll be able to begin selling products. Remember, while you’re setting up, it’s worth checking out Amazon’s fulfillment options to make sure that you have the right shipping service in place.

Order Fulfilment with Amazon

Amazon gives you the option to either use their FBA products, or handle the act of shipping products with your professional account on your own. Although both options can work well depending on the kind of business that you run, it’s worth noting that the FBA program is likely to get you better product reviews and happier customers overall.

The biggest benefit of fulfilling your orders on your own is that new sellers can benefit from low postage prices using the approved carriers available from Amazon. When a customer gets a new item from you, you’ll be able to deliver whatever they ordered by printing a postage label from your Amazon account. You can also choose to use your preferred postage label and carrier.

The self-fulfillment option used to be the only way to start selling on Amazon in the past. However, now that Amazon offers an alternative fulfillment choice, it’s a much more compelling alternative to having your own website. For instance, With Amazon Fulfillment, all you really need to do to start running a great business is to highlight your product features in a product description, choose a product title, add some pictures and start attracting customers.

This takes a lot of the hassle out of running typical online retail stores. Benefits include:

Remember, to add FBA services into your seller account, you’ll need to register first.

The Amazon FBA Process Explained

Amazon FBA literally means Amazon Fulfilled-by-Amazon. From the perspective of an Amazon FBA third-party seller, this e-commerce business model is simple: first, you send your products in an Amazon warehouse a.k.a fulfillment center, then your products get sorted and inventoried by Amazon workers – only to be picked from their place on the shelves when a customer makes an order, packed into a box and shipped to the customer’s doorstep. The whole process is automated and taken care of by Amazon; all you have to do is ship the product to them, create a listing, keep the product in stock and take care of the marketing and promotion side of things.

At this point you must be thinking “just ship the product to Amazon and let them take over from there” sounds too good to be true; if it were that easy, everyone would be doing it. And you’re right! Here’s the catch: in order to reap the benefits that the Amazon FBA service has in store for you as a third-party seller, you first need to find or create a product that sells. This is the hardest part about Amazon FBA. This is where your entrepreneurial spirit and resilience really need to shine through and set you apart from your competition.

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Before we get into all of that, we first need to analyze (a) why you should sell your product on Amazon in the first place, and (b) what are the good and bad sides of building an Amazon FBA business. Yes, you read that right – a business. Amazon FBA is not a side hustle, it’s a business. If you want to make some real money anyway.

The pros

The Cons

Comparing the Dropshipping vs the FBA E-commerce model

Ultimately, creating a successful FBA or Dropshipping business depends solely on the extent of your skills and dedication. Both models have their own strengths and weaknesses and choosing one model over the other will entirely be based on your own unique circumstances and preferences. Taking this into account, we think that it’s only fair that we showcase the main advantages and disadvantages of the Amazon FBA model compared to the Dropshipping model so that you can make an informed decision.

The three main advantages of Amazon FBA over Dropshipping are:

Amazon FBA product research demands much less money, time, and effort than the research required in choosing the right Dropshipping product. On Amazon, you’re dealing with one giant market with all of the information and stats you could possibly need all huddled up in one place. The money required for Amazon product research boils down to the costs of your monthly/annual product research tool subscription plan. Dropshipping, on the other hand, is very different. The product research process is more complicated and stochastic, and you’ll have to master several different product research methods and tools and ultimately spend time testing different products before you strike gold. With tools like Jungle Scout or Helium10, you can pretty much know what to expect from your product even before you launch it on Amazon.

The third advantage of Amazon FBA over Dropshipping is its bigger scaling potential. Sure, you can find a home run product and scale your Shopify store to 6 or 7 figures but the profit margins are just smaller and you’ll plateau sooner. With Amazon FBA, on the other hand, the scaling potential is almost limitless. The ROI is greater and if you keep reinvesting the compounding effect can snowball out of control really fast.

You’ve probably heard the saying “don’t put all of your eggs in one basket,” right? Well, this brings us to FBA’s biggest disadvantage over Dropshipping. With Amazon, not only are you putting all of your eggs in one basket but, to make things even worse, you’re putting them in someone else’s basket.

Amazon has all the control and it’s not uncommon for them to take up to six months to fix hijacked listings, leaving you helpless and destroying your business in the process. Protecting yourself from competitors that are using blackhat tactics to screw you over, or even protecting yourself from Amazon’s mistakes is almost impossible as things currently stand.

What’s more, no one is born with the knowledge required to run an online business. It’s only natural that, sometimes, you will be the one making mistakes. You might unknowingly sell a restricted or a trademarked product or do something even more naive (e.g. forget that your billing credit card has expired) and when you’re dealing with Amazon – this alone can be a reason to get your seller account suspended permanently.

With Dropshipping, on the other hand, you’re in full control of your store. Sure, you need to follow some ground rules set by Shopify/BigCommerce or the payment processor you’re using but, besides that, you’re free to do pretty much anything you want.

Last but not least, the Amazon FBA business model is a bit more pricey to kickstart when compared to Dropshipping. With the Dropshipping model you don’t hold any inventory and therefore you don’t pay any storage fees; the only up-front costs are the Shopify theme plus the Shopify apps monthly payments and your marketing costs which depend entirely upon your needs and goals.

With Amazon FBA it’s different – the up-front risk is greater, but so is the scaling potential.

Let’s dig right in.

How much money do I need to start an Amazon FBA Private Label business?

It’s important to take the time to really think about all the costs of setting up your Amazon account, from running a successful social media presence, to dealing with referral fee costs, the price to ship products, and more.

Because this is the first time we introduce the private label (PL) concept, it’s only fair that we first explain what PL means. In short, private label products are those manufactured by one company for sale under another company’s brand. From an Amazon FBA perspective, running a PL business means that you’ll be closely working with manufacturing factories (most likely Chinese) in order to create a “unique” product with your brand logo stamped on it. There are other methods of making a profit on Amazon such as retail/online arbitrage or wholesale, but in this guide we mainly focus on the Amazon FBA private label model.

Without further ado, let’s break down the start-up costs of starting an Amazon FBA PL business and give you some basic strategic insight:

Mandatory costs:

$1500 should be enough for 100 to 1000 units of whatever you choose to sell. This includes developing, manufacturing, shipping and PPC (Pay Per Click).

Pro tip

Optional but advised costs:

Total cost ranges between a minimum of

$1500 and advised total of

This is a relatively small amount of money to start a business. However, as previously stated, Amazon FBA is very cash flow demanding and we recommended that you start with 2.5x the money of the total cost of the product since you’ll need a big buffer in case your first product succeeds and sells out in the first month or so.

Going out of stock with your first product is a big no-no because when you’re out of stock your product ranking will drastically decrease or even disappear, and digging yourself out of that hole will cost you a ton of money in PPC. And even then, nothing is guaranteed. Always plan your inventory accordingly.

Starting an Amazon FBA private label

Now that you’re familiar with the Amazon FBA process, we can get to the most important part of the guide – and presumably the main reason why you’re here – starting your own FBA private label business.

The five zero-to-hero steps you need to go through can be broken down into two meta-sections:

a) Steps you need to take before your product reaches an Amazon fulfillment center:

b) Steps you take to successfully launch your product after it arrives at an Amazon fulfillment center:

The way you scale an Amazon FBA private label business is simple: go through the same process and add more products. Rinse and repeat.

Product research

Product research is the first and the MOST important step in the process. It is the foundation of your operation and it can make or break your business. Searching for the ideal product to sell on Amazon may be a tedious process, but you have no choice – you must do it, and you must do it right.

Product research is a numbers game. Get over it. There’s simply no room for emotions and preferences. The market doesn’t care about your likes and dislikes. Sure, you should always aim to do business in a niche that interests and excites you, it will give you a competitive advantage as it makes your work more pleasurable, but also keep in mind that boring businesses make billionaires. You want to launch a product that isn’t too competitive but there’s a high demand on the market for it.

So how do you find a high demand – low competition product?

You analyze the market and understand what the numbers are saying. You can start your product research analysis manually, but scrolling through Amazon mindlessly and without any indicators will get you nowhere. This is why we recommend using a product research tools such as the ones offered by Jungle Scout, Helium 10, Viral Launch, Unicorn Smasher or others. All of these product research tools have different algorithms and ways to get to the numbers they’re showing, plus their accuracy is more or less the same. Of course, these product research tools have no way of knowing the real numbers only Amazon has, but if you utilize them properly, they’ll get you much further than your own heuristic way of coming up with the information — and in a lot less time. The fact that most of (if not the entire) Amazon seller industry relies on them is a case in point.

The mental model

Let’s assume, for simplicity’s sake, that you want to make

$1000 in profit a month selling your branded product on Amazon. This is your goal. Your placeholder. Once you got this, you begin the hunt for a profitable product by tailoring the research to your goals. Let’s break it down even further.

Next, you want a product that is easy to manufacture (you can basically eyeball this and use common sense) and has low competition. What’s low competition? It’s relative but, in principle, you want to see a couple of sellers on the first page with less than 50-100 reviews, sellers with 3 to 4-star rating coupled with bad reviews, bad photos or unoptimized listings. You can compete with that.

Avoid niches dominated by one seller with more than 1000 reviews and a 4+ rating, or niches where Amazon itself is selling their products. You can’t compete with that.

Pro tip:

Start by getting the exact measurements and weight of the product (with packaging) and then calculate the total shipping costs to get the product from your supplier to the Amazon fulfillment center. Once you got this, use the Amazon FBA calculator to calculate all of the FBA fees. Next, you need to add up all of your upfront costs (samples, graphic design, photography, inspection costs and any additional costs,) your fixed costs (the cost of the product and the total shipping costs) and Amazon FBA costs (estimated PPC/other marketing costs and FBA fees), and divide this number by the number of units you ordered to get your total cost of product.

To get your profit margin, simply subtract the total cost of product from the retail price of the product.

Total cost of product = (upfront costs + fixed costs + amazon fba and other marketing costs) / number of units ordered

Profit = Retail price – Total cost of product

If you’re personally satisfied with the expected profit margin — congratulations! You’ve found your niche!

Now you want to start thinking about your competitors. How can you diversify your product, how can you improve upon it and make it superior to your competitor’s products? Start going through the bad reviews on your competitor’s listing and analyze them. Find the pattern – there’s always a pattern – and see if you can figure out ways to mitigate the problems the customers are unhappy about without incurring additional production costs.

Sourcing your product

Now that you’ve narrowed your research to a single product, the next step is to source your product by finding a good supplier.

The most common place people go to search for suppliers is Alibaba.

Alibaba is a website that connects suppliers to individuals or businesses and, as it stands, your safest bet when searching for a reliable supplier because a lot of the sellers there are already set up to service Amazon FBA businesses.

You should also always check and compare your potential suppliers to suppliers on 1688.com or Global Sources. The former website is in Chinese language only, so you’ll need to use Google Translate and struggle a bit with your searches, but it’s worth it because 1688.com is catered more towards the Chinese buyers, which means you’ll see the real uninflated prices. When you find a few potential suppliers on Alibaba, make sure you cross-check their rates with the same or similar products on 1688.com. It’s very likely that the prices there are significantly lower (because the business-savvy suppliers on Alibaba are trying to milk foreigners out of their money), and you can leverage this information further down the road when you negotiate with your chosen supplier.

When you search for a supplier on Alibaba always tick the gold supplier box and ignore the suppliers with shady ratings. When you find a potential supplier that meets your standard, mark him as “favorite” and continue with your search until you have 10-15 potential suppliers in your favorite bar (top right corner next to the search bar.) From here, you can email them all at once.

How to email suppliers?

There are many email templates on the Internet giving you examples of how to establish the first contact with your potential suppliers. Skim through them and follow Bruce Lee’s famous advice: “Absorb what is useful. Reject what is useless. Add what is essentially your own.”

Even though the contents and style of the emails are largely arbitrary, there are a couple of core principles you should adhere to:

Sticking to these simple rules should be enough to cover all the bases and keep you out of trouble. Once you get some replies from the suppliers you contacted, you can start probing and evaluating their replies, pick your 1-3 favorites and try and negotiate the best terms you can.

Supplier evaluation

First impressions are very important in business. You’re judging your potential supplier from the first email interaction. Are they fluent in English? Did they give you a generic copy-paste response or did they care enough to answer you personally? Are you able to keep a prompt conversation or does it take them days to email you back? Communication is your first filter, and the suppliers that don’t pass the test should be immediately disqualified.

Once you’ve received and inspected your samples, perhaps followed up with any additional questions, go ahead and tell your chosen supplier that you’ll be making your first order. If you’re ever going to negotiate on the price of the product and the payment method, this is when you do it. Just make sure you’ve done your research, and be professional and realistic with your expectations. If you’ve established enough trust with the supplier you can arrange to pay 30% or 50% upfront and the remaining 50-70% after the inspection and before shipping. As far as the payment process goes, insist that everything is done through Alibaba (read our Alibaba guide) and their trade assurance program – it minimizes risk by guaranteeing money back in the event of a supplier failing to meet the terms of the order contract.

After you’ve successfully sourced your first product it’s time to create a product listing and arrange the freight to an Amazon fulfillment center.

Create an optimized product listing

The actual step-by-step process of creating a new product listing in your Amazon Seller Central is fairly intuitive and there are thousands of guides (including the one in the Seller University) that teach you how to do it. Merely creating a product listing, however, isn’t what you’re here for. You’re here to learn how to rank your product on the first page in Amazon by optimizing your listing.

What does on-page optimization mean? It means that once your product is live, Amazon’s A10 algorithm will scour through your listing and analyze the content in order to determine what you’re selling. Then it will categorize your on-page content, mix it with other ranking signals and place (rank) your product in a certain position based on what the consumers are searching for.

Before we take a deep dive into the on-page product optimization, there’s one more thing you need to know: when it comes to ranking, sales are above everything else. Sales, velocity, reviews and price – in that order – are the key factors that will determine your fate on the market and the position you hold amongst your competitors. You can have the best on-page optimization possible, but if you’re not selling, you’re not going anywhere. Needless to say, if you’re selling like a madman, Amazon will rank you on the first page even if your on-page optimization is terrible. All that Amazon cares about is making money, and they do that by taking fees and a percentage of your sales. In other words, if you make money they make money — and the A10 algorithm is designed to ensure exactly that.

That being said, you can do your best but ultimately, you can’t control how much you sell. The market does that. All you can do is focus on the things you have control of, and this is where your listing optimization comes to fruition.

Amazon product listing can be broken down to these six simple steps:

Once you create your product listing and you get accustomed to navigating through Seller Central it’s time to arrange the shipping!

Shipping your product

Shipping can be a little intimidating for beginner Amazon FBA sellers. You can easily find yourself in a situation where you don’t understand the alien terms the supplier is throwing around, or you don’t understand the shipping process, the customs, the fees or the labeling of the inventory. At the end of the day, shipping can be really simple once you get the gist of it, and this whole chapter can probably be summed up in two or three sentences. However, we’re still going to go through all the terms and shipping methods one-by-one, so that you know exactly what you’re doing and you don’t look clueless in front of your supplier.

Generally speaking, you’re faced with two options from the very beginning: you can either arrange the shipping by yourself, or you can let your supplier do it for you. In most cases, it is best that you leave the shipping arrangements to your supplier because it’s very likely they’ve already established a business relationship with a carrier which makes the process a whole lot easier for you. You ask for the quote, pay them the money and wait for the product to arrive at the Amazon fulfillment center. A lot of the times this option will not only be the easiest, but also the least expensive one. The biggest problem with this approach, however, is that whenever you have any issues with customs or anything like that you’ll have to communicate with the carrier through your supplier, meaning you won’t have as much control over the operation.

If you’re a hands-on kind of person you can contact a carrier or freight forwarder and arrange the shipping by yourself. It’s a bit more work but it always pays off to have more freedom. You can contact as many carriers as you want and pick and choose the best offer, haggle the charges down and, most importantly, when your business kicks off and you start frequently ordering large shipments you’ll have an established relationship with your carrier and they’ll essentially become a trusted business associate.

If you choose to go this route, read the following breakdown of the most essential information required to get you started:

As production comes to an end, you’ll need to create a shipment in the Seller Central. This gives you the physical address of the fulfillment center where you’ll ship your products. In your Seller Central account to Inventory > Manage Inventory and then click the drop-down menu of the product you are ordering (the one we thought you how to list in section 3) and choose Send/Replenish Inventory. You’ll be asked whether you want to create a new shipping plan or add to an existing one.

Because this is your first shipment choose “Create new shipment” and then in the “Ship from” field put your supplier’s address if you’re using the supplier to ship your product, or your freight forwarder’s address if you’re using a freight forwarder. Once you go through all of the steps (select how many units you will be sending, skip the Amazon prep, verify the info, use small parcel delivery, print the shipping labels) Amazon will give you the address of the exact fulfillment center. Send this address to your supplier or freight forwarder and you’re done.

Pro tip:

Inspection

Inspections are always a good idea when working with Chinese suppliers (especially for the first time) because there are countless things that can go wrong; the supplier may have poor manufacturing quality control and sell you faulty products, or he may give you wrong weight and size measurements causing you unforeseen issues with Amazon. Everything needs to be right before the product gets on that plane – the logo, the packaging, the labels, the product itself, everything! You can’t afford to mess this up. Amazon customers have very high expectations and they won’t be hesitant to leave you a bad review and ruin your rating. This is among the worst things that can happen because reviews are king on Amazon. If you get any bad reviews during the first one or two weeks of your launch, your sales will plummet. And if your sales drop and you lose momentum, your product ranking will sink as a consequence and you might never recover.

Communication is key when you’re dealing with a third party inspection company. When you hire them, make sure you create a long enumerated list of requirements and really get your money’s worth. The list should include stuff like:

Once you get the green light from the inspection company you can wire the rest of the money, and your product is ready to ship!

So, let’s get to it!

Launching and Marketing Your Product – Getting Your First Sales and Reviews

Sales velocity is king. You found a winning product, found your supplier, you arranged the shipping and created the listing — now all you need to do is launch your product in the right way.

What does that mean? It means that you need to get sales and positive reviews as soon as possible after the launch. This will get you “noticed” by the A10 algorithm and Amazon will rank your products higher, which will result in even more sales. The goal here is to get you on the first page of Amazon (for the targeted keyword) where most of the sales happen.

The lesson here is that you can’t really expect your product to sell organically when you first launch it, or heck, even before you get it on the first page. You need to go out of your way to place the product in front of the right customers. You need proper marketing. You need to spend money to earn money.

The first thing you’ll want to do is get your friends and family to buy the product. Be warned – this is against Amazon TOS and if you don’t do this correctly Amazon will detect and ban you straight away. This method of gaining traction early on is a bit controversial in the Amazon FBA world; some consider it a “blackhat” tactic but, are you hurting anyone really? You’re not. Plus your competition is already doing this, so it’s not like you have a choice.

The easiest way to get yourself banned doing this is to simply send a link of your product to your friends and family and tell them to purchase it. Direct buys on newly listed products are highly suspicious and will instantly raise red flags with Amazon. To circumvent this, you want to send a screenshot of your listing to your friends and family and tell them to search for the product on Amazon themselves; meaning, instead of searching for your brand’s name directly, they should type the appropriate keywords in the search box and scroll through Amazon until they find your product. This will make it seem as if the buys were organic and you’ll stay in the clear.

Next thing you want to do is to set up giveaway promotions where you give 50-80% discounts for your product. Offering steep discounts means you’re likely going to lose money on these sales at the beginning, but it almost guarantees that you’re going to get a lot of sales because of the competitive prices and rank your product faster.

You need to understand that when you first start selling on Amazon your primary objective will be to rank your product, not make profits. The return on your investment will come when you place your product on the first page of the relevant keyword. The time it takes you to do this depends on many factors: your choice of product, quality of your listing, ad spend, price, competition and so on. It may take you two weeks or it may take you three months — but that doesn’t really matter if you go into this prepared and with the right mindset.

Amazon Sponsored Ads

Going into this, you need to understand that you need to butter both sides of the bread at the same time. You don’t wait for your friends an family to buy your products or hope that your giveaway campaign gets you enough sales to rank your product – you attack this thing at all fronts at the same time. You optimize your listing, do giveaways, and pay Amazon to show your listing above all the rest simultaneously.

Amazon Sponsored Ads, also known as PPC (pay per click) is an essential marketing tool for your FBA business. When you start selling on Amazon your product will be buried somewhere on page 20 of the search results which makes it really hard for your potential customers to find you. Sponsored ads, however, give you the opportunity to pay your way through to the top of the search results and, perhaps even more important, after running an automated PPC campaign Amazon lets you download a report that shows you all of the keywords (and their relevance) that led customers to your product listing. After you get this report you can take the best performing keywords and use them to create your own manual PPC campaign in order to optimize for better ACoS (advertising cost of sale.) Bringing down your advertising costs will significantly improve your profit margins later on.

Automated PPC Campaign

Open your Seller Central account, go to Advertising > Campaign Manager and then scroll down to create a campaign.

Next, you want to give your campaign a name, set a daily budget and choose “Automatic targeting”:

Next, you’ll be required to set your default bid. This is where you choose the maximum amount of money you’re willing to spend for one click on your ad.

When you’re launching a new product on the market you want to bid a bit more conservative and keep a close eye on the performance of your ad; if you’re not getting enough impressions or views after a few days of running the campaign it means that your bid was too low and you need to bid higher.

After you run the automated campaign for about a week you’ll have enough data to start a manual campaign. The process is simple: after you chose “manual targeting” click on “Enter keywords” > copy the first 50-100 best-performing keywords from the campaign report, and paste them in the empty field. Finally, click “add keywords” and you’re done!

Keep Optimizing PPC

Running an efficient PPC campaign is not a set-it-and-forget-it type of situation. Staying on top of the game means that you’ll need to keep tweaking your keywords, bids, listing, product photos, and bullet points in order to stay ahead of the curve and dominate your competition.

Managing PPC campaigns is an art form in its own right; countless videos, books, articles, and blog posts have been written on this subject alone and to try and cover all of this information in one guide is unfeasible. We can, however, give you just enough information to build you a solid foundation, a data directory and a research tour guide of sorts that you can later use as a starting point for your own learning endeavors.

If you’re not sure where to start and how to learn the basics of PPC optimization, try the RPSB method:

In order to do this, first you need to know your keywords:

Know What you’re Optimizing For

Set your goals straight. What are you optimizing for really? Are you optimizing for low ACoS and bigger profits on an already established product on the market, or are you putting all of your efforts in ranking or brand recognition? If you’re doing the latter, having a higher ACoS (typically above 40%) isn’t necessarily a bad thing. If you’re intentionally raising your ACoS and you’re doing it with a specific goal in mind (ranking your product) then the first thing you need to do is calculate your break-even ACoS.

Break-even ACoS basically tells you at what ACoS you make zero profit and zero loss. Here’s how you calculate it:

Break-even ACoS = Ad cost ($13) / Sale price ($25) = 52%

This means that at 52% ACoS you’re not making any money, but you’re not losing any money either. Your break-even ACoS is possibly the single most important measurement for your Amazon FBA business. If you don’t know your break-even ACoS before you start your PPC campaign, you’re essentially a blind man in a dark room looking for a black cat which isn’t there. Don’t be that guy.

Rinse and Repeat

You’ve finally made it to the end. We’ve covered everything from finding a product all the way down to launching it! In order to scale your business, just rinse and repeat the same steps to launch more products. This will not only increase your profits but will also diversify your business; when one product isn’t doing very well, you’ll have others to pick up the slack and keep your business profitable.

Obviously, there’s more to selling on Amazon than a lot of people think. You can’t just add a phone number to your account and enter some basic product information like you might when selling products on eBay. There are various Amazon fees to think about, as well as different strategies that you’ll need to consider if you want to become one of the company’s best sellers.

Selling on Amazon isn’t easy. There are many more advanced strategies on how to sell on Amazon but this guide is already long enough as it is and we didn’t want to overwhelm you with information. This “how to sell on Amazon” guide is not intended to give you everything you need to begin, but rather, to give you structure and a clear-cut overview of everything you need to know in order to start this journey by yourself.

Every section of this guide could be 100 pages long and we’d still hardly cover everything. Every seller has a unique philosophy and strategy on how to make a buck selling on Amazon and the only thing that matters is to find a way to make this work for you.

Amazon can give you the freedom to work from home and on your own terms, but it can also give you the chills that go along with the responsibility of running your own business.

Finally, one more advice before we end this: If you don’t have the disposable income, don’t buy any courses teaching you how to sell on Amazon FBA. We’re not saying that there aren’t great courses out there, all we’re saying is — if you have the time and you’re willing to put in the effort, you can learn how to sell on Amazon for free. Our guide is more than enough to get you started, and there are many more guides, articles, youtube videos, podcasts, e-books and free courses to get you to where you want and need to be.