You may have seen numerous businesses find their big break on platforms such as Amazon, and thought, I’d like a slice of the pie. However, while it’s an opportunity to be in front of millions of users every day, the landscape is competitive, and reaching your potential can be a challenge. But it’s not impossible!
For any business looking to step into the waters of Amazon and open up a new sales channel, this short guide is for you. Check out some of the top tips and facts about selling on the Amazon.com.
The costs of selling on Amazon
While setting up an account on Amazon isn’t that expensive, there are some other things to think about that could add to the initial investment. Elements such as buying UPC codes for your products, buying stock, creating a logo, and investing in photography for your products is vital to get started.
To determine how much an Amazon account will cost also depends on how you register with them. Selling as a professional incurs a monthly charge of $39.99 plus selling fees.
Optimize your listings
If you have the stock ready to list and photos all prepped, listing your items is the next step. However, before you start, it’s best to do some research. The number of products listed on Amazon is vast, so ensuring you stand out in the crowd is vital to make sales. Use data to determine the best search terms and search volume for different keywords.
Choose the best category for your products and avoid restricted product categories. If your product falls in these, you’ll have to wait for your account to be approved before setting them up.
Product listings should be given clear and accurate information while ensuring you get relevant keywords within the copy. The listing should also resonate with the customer. Don’t just write something for the search results, as the user experience will also be part of the ranking factor.
Utilize the Seller Central tool
All sellers have access to the Seller Central dashboard. This is the go-to resource for all things Amazon and is the place where you’ll be able to see everything about your sales, products, and inventory. It’s important to get to grips with this feature. Here you will find reports and metrics to monitor your performance. Using this data, you can optimize your product listings and track what’s doing well.
Why performance metrics matter for Amazon selling
Amazon states they operate at a high standard, so to continue selling with them, there are specific targets to keep tabs on. Some important metrics to consider include order defect rate, pre-fulfillment cancel rate, and late shipment rate. They each have percentage targets to stay below, and it’s crucial to keep within these; otherwise, it could affect your account. Feedback and reviews also make up part of how you manage your account. Making sure you are familiar with the policies surrounding feedback is essential.
Use platform advertising to boost sales
Amazon has lots of ways to help your business improve sales. A great way to do this is via advertising. The platform offers three different examples of product advertisements, including Sponsored Products, Sponsored Brands, and Amazon Stores. This type of advertising can help you target search results to improve conversion rate and enables your new brand to be seen.
Brands can experiment with positions and terms to gauge what works best, but to avoid costly mistakes, hiring an Amazon consultant is a great idea. They will guide you through the process of optimizing your account and product listings and help advise and run targeted campaigns to drive more sales. This option also enables you to utilize marketing spend effectively rather than spending money without a clear indication of return on investment.
Use Amazon guidelines and checklists
Amazon provides a host of resources to use when starting a new business on the platform. So, use them! While the process may seem straightforward to get started, the finer details are the area that will ensure you get the successful results. Amazon themselves state that the first 90 days are crucial for getting to grips with selling and establishing good practices to achieve success. Once you have created effective selling mechanisms, it is also a good idea to keep monitoring and tweaking your efforts to widen your reach.
Check out the Seller University
As part of Amazon’s seller guidelines and resources, they also have a Seller University on YouTube that demystifies many of the main aspects of selling. There’s everything from the essentials of getting started to fulfillment by Amazon and driving traffic to your listings. There are also resources available in different languages for international sellers.
Think about global expansion
When you’re starting out, setting your selling area on a national level is advisable. This helps you control sales and inventory in the early stages and monitor what’s working for your business. However, when you start to grow and want to take it to the next level, the option for global selling is available. As part of the platform, Amazon Global Selling enables you to use the worldwide network to get your products in front of the larger audience. You can choose to sell your products outside America in locations such as Europe and Asia.
The next steps
The main takeaway from the above information is that: to start selling on Amazon, you need to learn the ropes. To succeed, investing time and effort in using the guidance, the platform gives is vital to optimizing everything fully. You can also hire the expertise of agencies and consultants that can take care of everything for you.
The growth opportunities on Amazon are extensive, and many companies use this channel in isolation. In contrast, others use it alongside brand websites. To get the most out of the experience, it’s essential to use all available resources to gain traction. Once you have established your company and products, this brand awareness can help to increase sales and acquire customer loyalty.