The hidden (really big) profits in used toys

by JORDAN MALIK

Ed. note: This type of product sourcing can be very profitable, so don't dismiss it until you try it! 

U.S. consumers are living in a "throwaway" economy. This means that we buy lots of 'stuff', use it for a little while, and then replace it with other 'stuff'.

Example: children constantly demand popular toys and games. They get the toy, play with it for a short while, lose interest and then put it away.

Purchasers of those toy (e.g. parents) end up giving them away or selling them for far below their used value. Those toys typically end up at yard sales, garage sales, thrift stores, estate sales, or on Craigslist or eBay.

Fortunately, this is where smart Amazon and eBay sellers like us can make a huge profit.

In fact, this revenue stream is so reliable even this multi-millionaire does it to show you that it works. 

See, used toys and games are generally "out of production" (OOP). Meaning they're no longer manufactured, making them much more difficult to find in stores. Rarely is there a convenient match between owner and consumer in the 'local' market. So buyers turn to eCommerce giants like Amazon or eBay to find a specific toy. These large online platforms create a place where demand meets supply. Thus, a toy that was worth next to nothing in the local market can now fetch anywhere from $15 to $150 (or more) online.

For nearly a decade, I've made a very profitable business out of sourcing and selling these 'forgotten' toys and games on platforms like Amazon and eBay. (Yes, you can sell most used toys on Amazon. When listing the condition you have to select 'collectible', not used.)

Here are just a few reasons why I love sourcing used toys locally (just like this other millionaire entrepreneur, who has a whole team to do it):

1. The market is nearly untapped. Many competing sellers are reluctant to roll up their sleeves (it's too 'dirty' for them).

2. Higher profit margins. Many OOP toys can be found 'new in package' which means a higher margin of profit for you.

3. The toys do not have to be perfect. If your toy is incomplete, there is a market for that too. Pieces or parts of many toys are sold on eBay (and sometimes on Amazon).

4. Out-of-pocket expenses are minimal and inventory is abundant. Used toys can often be purchased for just a fraction of the original cost and can be found just about anywhere.

5. Used toys sourcing can be 'scaled' online. Placing an 'item wanted' add on free sites like Craigslist or Facebook can help bring toys to you. Or use this free site to alert you when a toy (or just toys in general) or listed on Craigslist locally.

6. Help is easy to find. If you want help cleaning, testing or inspecting the toys, you can easily enlist a friend, neighbor or relative to help you.

7. This market will remain largely open. Few homeowners are willing to do the work required to sell these toys online themselves. This means more profit for savvy sellers like us. And every day, families are buying new toys that they end up giving away again, contributing to your endless cycle of available inventory.

So how can you get started sourcing used/new profitable toys? Here are some ideas:

1. Start with your friends. Ask 5 of your friends (local or through social media), if they have unwanted games or toys in  their home. Chances are that you'll end of with boxes of items that they are more than happy to part with. They might even ask  some of their friends to do the same (which results in more inventory for you.)

2. Keep an eye on trends. Once you start selling games or toys, make sure to keep a list of which items sell quickly. Take that listt and figure out how you can 'get more' Another method is to search Amazon for games or toys in 'collectible'  condition that are selling for an unusually high price, and then find the equivalent on eBay.

3.) To find more profitable used toys, search online for "hot toy" lists of previous years. This will help you find toys that were hot during holiday seasons but have likely been forgotten since. Odds are high that homeowners' are looking to get rid of these items.

Now, take your list of these toys and "source more" via:

a) Local thrift stores (Free directory near you: thethriftshopper.com)

b) Local estate sales (free directory near you: estatesales.net) or garage sales (free directory and app: gsalr.com)

c) If Amazon is your primary selling platform, try finding the same toys on eBay. Generally speaking, you can find a higher selling price on Amazon than you can on eBay.

d) If eBay is already your primary platform, look for the item on eBay that is poorly represented (blurry pictures, confusing or missing descriptions) as these items are generally under-priced and can be purchased, received, and flipped back on eBay via your own listing.

e) Search for toys free local classified sites/apps OfferUp.com or Craigslist.org. In addition to checking the 'toys' section on those sites, look  for a 'free' section where homeownes are posting items that are free for pickup.

(For safety purposes, always meet any stranger you contacts in a public location and during daylight hours. Consider bringing a friend with you if you are uncomfortable.)

More tips:

1.) Do your research and ensure that you can make a profit before you buy. For Amazon sellers,  make sure to check the sales rank and prices for any items you wish to sell. On eBay, use the free sellers site to review the 'completed listings' of a toy to find out what it has previously sold for.

2.) For Amazon sales, ensure your the used toy is 100% complete.  For toys that are missing instructions, search online to see if they can be downloaded and printed for the customer.

3.) If you are new to selling online, consider joining a seller Facebook group. You'll be able to get support/ideas from other sellers of used toys and games.

When it comes to sourcing used toys, there is unlimited potential for profit. Follow these simple tips and start crushing it! 

(SOURCE)

- Any used toy sellers out there? How has your Amazon selling experience gone so far?

Private Label Product Research For Amazon FBA Sellers - FBA ALLSTARS

-Great video with so much great info! Tell us how you chose your product to sell on Amazon FBA!

Exactly How I'm Making $2,500 Per Month Selling On Amazon FBA

- Great tips from the master himself, Stefan James! How's your Amazon FBA experience going? We'd love to hear it in the comments!

Amazon FBA-Step by Step for Beginners Guide!

- Now that was SUPER helpful! Who are beginner FBA sellers out there? Leave us a comment! 

The Most Harmful Amazon FBA Sourcing Decision You Could Ever Make

by karon thackston

Did you know that a toy on Amazon ranked 10,000 today could have been ranked 500,000 yesterday? All it takes is one sale. Just one. One sale of that toy on Amazon could change the sales rank drastically overnight.

Would you buy a toy ranked 10,000 on Amazon to resell? Would you buy a book ranked 500,000 to resell?

I know there are lots of other factors at play in how you might answer that question, but my point in asking it is to get you to look at the sales rank. You view a toy ranked 10, 000 much differently than one ranked 500,000, right?

Yet every day many, many Amazon sellers are making their sourcing decisions based on today’s sales ranks and low prices. They find a toy ranked 10,000 and snatch it up, without checking to see that it was possibly ranked 500,000 yesterday. Or maybe it’s a book ranked 100,000 that was ranked 1.5 million yesterday.

There are two main reasons why you shouldn’t base your sourcing decisions on today’s sales rank and pricing data:

1. Amazon changes their prices often.

Amazon is known to change their prices across their website 2.5 million times per day. That’s just Amazon’s prices – that doesn’t include 3rd party seller prices, which are also being changed constantly throughout the day with repricers. Now, Amazon has hundreds of millions of products, and they’re changing those prices 2.5 million times per day, which is mind blowing if you try to think about what that means. The low price on items also change throughout the day when a seller sells out of an item and the low price bumps up to the next seller. If prices are changing constantly on Amazon, why would you make a sourcing decision based solely on this one snapshot in time of the current low price?

2. Amazon updates sales rank often.

Amazon recalculates their sales ranks every hour. That’s 24 times a day that sales ranks change on Amazon! If I’m looking at an item to resell, it’s too much of a gamble to base my buying decision on what the sales rank looks like on this one hour of this one day. The current sales rank is just a snapshot in time of how this item has recently sold. I need to make my decisions based on broader information than this one snapshot.

Whether you are in a store doing retail arbitrage or you are at your desk doing online arbitrage or looking at a wholesale catalog,you need more information than this one snapshot in time. You need more than just the current low price and the current sales rank in order to decide if you want to buy 1 of an item, 10 of an item, or 100 of an item. Your hard-earned inventory money is at stake here! You want to make your decision based on the best information available.

Making this type of decision on how to spend your sourcing money without using historical data from CamelCamelCamel or Keepa is the most harmful sourcing decision many Amazon FBA sellers are making.

I would be willing to go so far as to say that making sourcing decisions without CCC or Keepa is one of the top reasons Amazon FBA sellers quit their businesses. If you’re in this same boat, you might be spending all your sourcing money on inventory without looking at the historical data, the prices tank, the inventory never sells, and you throw your hands up in despair and say, “I quit! I tried Amazon, and it just didn’t work for me.”

Now, there may be other factors at play, but for many resellers (you included) using CCC and Keepa could be a huge game changer. You could find profitable inventory that will sell in a reasonable amount of time and won’t lower quickly in price.

I’m especially disheartened when I hear resellers saying they want to quit Amazon FBA over these types of inventory problems because this problem is so easily fixable. You canlearn to read and interpret CamelCamelCamel and Keepa. The graphs can make sense, and you can use them to make smarter sourcing decisions.

Both Camel and Keepa are free, easy-to-access programs that you can use on your computer or your mobile device, either in a web browser or from your 3rd party scouting app like Scoutify, ScanPower, or Profit Bandit (Amazon Seller app does not have links to CCC and Keepa, however). It only takes an extra 20 to 30 seconds (if even that!) to look at the sales rank and sales price history of an item when you’re sourcing. You can take a quick look at how often this item has sold and how it’s been priced in the past, and you can make an educated prediction about how it will behave in the future.

I want to encourage you today if you’re making sourcing decisions without using historical sales rank and pricing data from CamelCamelCamel and Keepa — there is a better way to buy Amazon FBA inventory! You can make smarter sourcing decisions. Your business will hugely benefit if you take the time to learn how to use these powerful free resources.

(SOURCE)

- Are you a CCC or Keepa user? Tell us how these great programs helped your business out with a comment!

6 Reasons Investors Will Be Buying Amazon 'FBA' Businesses in 2016

By THOMAS SMALE

Fulfillment By Amazon -- or FBA -- is fast becoming a buzzword in the online business space. You don't have to search long and hard to find FBA success stories online. It's a business model whose time has come, and its popularity will almost certainly continue to rise throughout 2016.

What is Fulfillment by Amazon? According to the company's website, FBA customers store their products in Amazon's fulfillment centers, which then pick, pack, ship and provide customer service for these products, as well as help their home companies scale and reach more customers.

In short, FBA gives business owners the chance to focus on product and growth instead of the ongoing grind that "operations" so often entails. Although there is legwork involved in setting up FBA, and some ongoing maintenance, the work involved is relatively simple and straightforward -- especially compared to what's required for so many alternatives.

Need some good reasons why investors are interested in buying FBA businesses? Here are six.

1. Scalability

FBA businesses may very well be among the most scalable of any enterprise. You don't need a large team to run it and, even as you grow, your primary expense is the manufacturing or procuring of inventory to sell. 

Additionally, you don't have to limit yourself to a single product category. You can expand your offerings as you see fit, and hire staff to oversee additional products if things become unmanageable.

Bottom line: You can keep costs low while you continue to search for additional product and profit opportunities. As a business owner, you can stay focused on what matters most.

2. Availability

Business investors are motivated by a variety of different factors, including passion, prestige, pride, security and profit.

Amazon FBA businesses can provide investors with an opportunity like never before to get into a business they're genuinely excited about, in an industry or niche that they already know and like.

At their core, Amazon FBA businesses are all essentially the same. Getting started means finding a popular product category, creating a relationship with a manufacturer that can produce a product of your choosing, inexpensively, and listing it on the world's most recognizable ecommerce platform -- Amazon -- for sale.

Although setup is far less complicated than with many other business models, investors have the option of walking into a turnkey business that's already up and running, in a category that complements their passions and interests. Since many business owners are focused exclusively on a single product, there's no shortage of businesses to invest in.

3. Simplicity of operations

FBA businesses are easy to run and maintain. Consider:

• You don't need to focus on customer acquisition. Amazon has done the hard work of building the world's largest customer base. You don't need to cold-call or have a sales team work around the clock to convert leads.
• You don't need a website. You don't need to know how to code a website, set up an email list or understand the ins and outs of SEO. This frees up costs associated with programmers, domains, hosting, virtual assistants, SEO teams and other online subscription services.
• You don't need to manufacture your own products. In most cases, it's better to build a relationship with third-party manufacturers, to seize the product opportunities you see in front of you. If you know how to sniff out deals in your own locality, you can also turn around and sell products for more on Amazon. Arbitrage opportunities abound.
• Amazon handles shipping and customer service. You won't require a team of customer-support representatives constantly fielding calls to ensure that your customers stay happy.

4. Profitability

As already stated, FBA businesses by their nature offer cost savings. You don't require a website or an extensive customer support team, and you don't have to handle the picking, packing and shipping of products, which is oftentimes a major bottleneck in ecommerce.

If you can keep costs low, you can also increase your profitability. Most FBA businesses sell products in the $10-to-$60 range, the "sweet spot" where the most money can be made. As such, you will need to sell a large volume of products to generate revenue consistently, but this also ensures scalability as you grow.

Additionally, many ecommerce business owners have found that listing their products on Amazon has increased their overall sales. The company offers a lot of exposure.

5. Access to Amazon Prime users

Amazon Prime members have opted to pay for free, two-day shipping on their orders. When you set up an FBA business, you automatically qualify for Amazon Prime shipping and gain access to Prime members, who have clearly shown interest in meeting their product needs online.

Many studies have shown that customers prefer free shipping over product discounts, so this has a major influence on their buying decision.

If your competitors aren't Prime sellers, and you are, whom do you think buyers are going to go with? Right! It will be you.

It costs you nothing to be a Prime seller, so there's no reason not to take advantage of this unique prospect.

6. Fulfillment across multiple channels

Multi-channel selling isn't just an ideal anymore; it is fast becoming the standard by which an ecommerce business is judged. 

Although getting your product seen on Amazon should be your highest priority, selling through other marketplaces could boost sales and expose your product to new buying audiences. The good news is that multi-channel orders can also be fulfilled through FBA.

Multi-channel selling has never been easier, which means business owners can focus on the growth of their enterprise instead of having to come up with new solutions to get their products seen in as many different online retailers as possible.

Final thoughts

Whether you're looking to diversify your business and investment portfolio, or you're looking for a passion project that will also generate consistent profit, FBA businesses are worth your consideration.

As with any business, there are some risks involved. Your manufacturer may not be able to deliver goods on time. Amazon may pull the plug on your product at its discretion. Clearly, building on rented land sometimes comes with a price tag.

But the simplicity of the business model makes it easy to start over or to adjust your strategies when you need to. If you are looking to buy a business, and you have yet to decide on any one model, definitely take a look at what FBA businesses have to offer.

(SOURCE)

How to start selling on Amazon UK and Europe with FBA

by Kiri Masters

As an Amazon Seller, what do you do when you think you’ve “tapped out” of the market on Amazon.com? You could design and release new products, sure. But why not leverage the winning products that you already have in a new market that’s hungry for innovation? Just like in the US, Amazon offers their FBA program in Europe and the UK. That means that you can ship your inventory to an Amazon warehouse in Europe and they will handle order fulfillment for local customers. This means that you can access millions more Amazon customers, and continue to leverage the operational simplicity of the FBA program.

So how does it work? Let’s answer some frequently asked questions from Sellers about Amazon FBA in Europe.

HOW DOES FBA WORK IN EUROPE AND THE UK?

Once your inventory has been imported into Europe and is with Amazon, there are two fulfillment options to choose from - European Fulfillment Network (EFN) or Multi-Country Inventory.

EFN allows sellers registered for FBA in Germany, France, Italy and the UK to store their inventory in one country’s Fulfillment Centre, and still fulfill orders throughout Europe, regardless of the marketplace the item was sold on. Alternately you can arrange to have inventory held and shipped from FC’s in individual countries, known as Multi-Country Inventory.

Once your Amazon Europe Seller account is set up, all your orders will be managed in the one Seller Central account.

DO I NEED TO SEPARATE PRODUCT LISTINGS FOR EACH COUNTRY?

When you register to sell in any of the Amazon European marketplaces, your seller account is automatically enabled to allow you to sell in all other Amazon European marketplaces.

However, this does not automatically create listings in each of the Amazon European marketplaces - you need to set each listing up individually on each marketplace.

WHAT ABOUT THE LANGUAGE OF LISTINGS, PRODUCT PACKAGING, AND CUSTOMER SERVICE INQUIRIES?

• Product listing language: each country’s Amazon marketplace has different rules. But regardless of Amazon’s requirements, you’ll undoubtedly have better results if you translate your listings into the local language.
• Customer Service: Amazon asks that you provide general customer service, including handling customer’s VAT invoice requests, in the language of the marketplace you list your products on.
• Product packaging: Technically, product packaging is only required to be in the language of the country of origin. However for the best customer experience, you should consider having your packaging, instructions, and inserts translated into the local language.

But finally, good news! You can still view Seller Central in the local marketplace language of your choice, as well as in English.

DO I NEED TO IMPORT MY PRODUCTS TO EUROPE?

Yes. Using FBA will require importing your products to another country for storage in an Amazon fulfillment center to sell them to customers in that marketplace.

To import products into the UK or Europe, you’ll be paying import taxes and duties upon arrival. Your shipping carrier may assist with this process. You’ll also need to apply for an an Economic Operator Registration and Identification Number (EORI) in order to import your goods.

Tip: Your company (or your freight forwarder) needs to be listed as importer/consignee and nominate a customs broker. Do not import goods as "Amazon" or to show Amazon as the declarant, importer of record or consignee!

Inventory sent to Amazon’s fulfillment centers needs to be sent under “Delivery Duty Paid Destination” freight terms with all relevant import duties, import VAT and other taxes paid by you. If inventory arrives at Amazon with unpaid taxes or duties, it will be returned at your (predictably exorbitant!) expense.

DO I NEED TO REGISTER FOR, COLLECT AND PAY VAT WHEN SELLING ON AMAZON IN THE EU?

Yes. You must collect and pay VAT if your inventory is sent to and held in the EU. Amazon will require a VAT number from you to complete your account registration.

VAT can be avoided only if items are sold from outside the EU, are genuinely low-value and are imported in small packages already addressed to individual consumers. And in that case, you’ll probably be either paying hefty international shipping fees or having to pass that onto your customers, inevitably resulting in less sales or profits for you. Sometimes the end customer is even sent a bill by the customs authorities for the import duties. Not a good customer experience!

Best to buckle up and invest properly in being compliant in this new potential market. For that, you might want to consult a professional firm that specializes in VAT applications and ongoing reporting on your behalf. 

WHAT IS vAT?

VAT, or Value Added Tax, is a consumption tax which applies to goods and service that are bought and sold for use or consumption in the EU.

As a seller, you collect the applicable VAT (currently the standard rate is 20%) from  the buyer at the point of sale. You’re then required to forward on the VAT payment to the relevant country’s revenue authority on specific dates.

If you’re familiar with Sales Tax in the US, this concept may be familiar.

SO HOW DO I GET STARTED ON FBA EUROPE?

1. Apply for a VAT number. If applying in the UK, go to www.gov.uk and follow the links to apply for a VAT number. You can also apply for a VAT number in other European countries.
2. If you apply for a VAT number in the UK, you should get a VAT registration certificate within 14 working days, though it can take longer.
3. Once you have your VAT number, you can apply for a new Seller Account in your chosen marketplace. This will be a separate account than your North America Seller account. To apply, you’ll need:
   1. A valid credit card
   2. Phone number
   3. Tax information - your EIN (or equivalent if you’re not a US entity), and your VAT number.
   4. Bank account which is in a country and currency supported by Amazon.
4. Enroll in FBA in your chosen marketplace. You may have a payout restrictions placed on your account while Amazon goes through the process of further verifying your business registration information.
5. Start preparing your inventory for import into Europe.  To start importing inventory, need to apply for an EROI number. Consider working with a freight forwarder or customs broker to help with the importing & customs process. Some shipping carriers such as DHL offer this service for a fee.
6. Create a plan for product returns. You’ll need to provide Amazon with a returns address in the country of the fulfillment centre. Without a local returns address your products can’t be returned and may need to be disposed without reimbursement to you. However, just like with FBA in the US, Amazon can repackage and re-sell returned items for you, as a default option. Just be sure to work this into your selling costs and avoid surprises.

So, it can be a long journey to get started on Amazon in Europe, but from many accounts it is well worth it. We’ll cover in more detail Why Selling On Amazon in Europe is Worth the Hassle.

If you have questions about the process, please leave a comment below and we’ll do our best to answer!

SOURCE

 

Amazon FBA: Dream Business Model Entrepreneurs Have Been Waiting For?

by Leonardo Schwartz

E-commerce is actually exploding right now and there is no doubt the upside trend will remain and even accelerate during the next 10-15 years.

Is no secret that being capable of bringing to the market a popular physical product is a sure way to make a fortune. This actually is a proven formula that’s not at all new: it has been put to test time and time again for decades and many billionaires and worldwide known brand names got in fact started this way.
But of course, even if there is no secret to it, being able to produce and sell physical products has been always beyond reach for the average Joe or Jane.

It just called for complicated logistics and some deep pockets just to give it a fair try.

But not anymore.

Nowadays there exist hundreds if not thousands of fulfilment centers all over the US alone ready to take care of the grunt work involved on distributing physical goods for a reasonable price and the sourcing part of the equation has seem itself vastly simplified too thanks to global marketplaces such as Alibaba.com or Tradekey.com

But the real revolution came about when Amazon launched its Amazon FBA program back in 2006.

In a nutshell, Amazon FBA – Fulfillment By Amazon- not only takes care of what any half-decent fulfilment center would, but it add to the offering several advantages, you won’t find anywhere else.

My favorites ones being:

1) Amazon doesn’t charge you in advance for using their warehouses. They keep your inventory for free until you sell it and just then they take a cut on your sales price.

This FBA feature alone helped to mitigate the risk of this business model quite a bit and took away one of the main worries people have in mind when considering to get involved in this profitable game.

2) Amazon takes care of mostly all customer service related tasks, including return handling and refunds. They even provide free shipping for most orders at their cost!

3) They manage all the finance side of the business by charging their customers’ credit cards and sending the seller his earnings every other week.

This may seem to be like a disadvantage at first glance but in fact, when you don’t have your own merchant account –which’s really difficult to get and so most entrepreneurs and start-ups don’t have it- you really can’t get thousands of orders through without getting your paypal account or whatever you’re trying to use to get paid limited or frozen for months, putting you instantly out of the business just at the very moment you had started to see some success!

Amazon solves this issue from the let go.

Not only that: Amazon is said to have more than 250MM customers’ CCs on file. Thus, purchasing a product in Amazon.com is so easy: just click the orange button and you’re done!

And of course, everyone trust Amazon’s brand.

You just can’t beat Amazon when it comes to conversions.. Hundreds of millions of dollars have been invested to perfect this selling machine over the years.

Fortunately for you, as an Amazon FBA Seller you don’t have to compete against Amazon anymore, you now have access to all of these incredible competitive advantages and can use them to promote your own products just as if they were yours.

4) Last but not least, Amazon allows you to put your product in front of millions of people. This is the ultimate advantage for any entrepreneur!

Before Amazon FBA, most people didn’t have access to a distribution chain, and a distribution chain IS the real secret to success in this business.

Amazon, by letting you to list your product for sale in the most trafficked e-commerce site in the world gives you the closest thing to owning your own distribution chain!

And it’s worth it to remember that this “kind of” a distribution chain cost your about 15% of your product sale price and includes all warehousing, package handling and delivering, customer service and finance services FBA provides you as a seller, against 60% or more a traditional distribution chain would usually take just for the distribution!

All in all, Amazon FBA is the real deal and has just open the physical product game up for small guys just like you and me.

One last thing I don’t want to finish this article without mentioning: as someone who got started in the entrepreneurial world as an online marketer, I truly appreciate the advantages of not having a heavy overhead threatening to kill your start-up business at any time.

But there is something I learned a long time ago and that has been the absolute edge for me when considering digital products vs physical products: THE POWER OF AUTOMATION.

Without trying to enter in a subject that would make for a full article –or a full book for that matter- on and of itself let me briefly tell you that with a digital product you can automate many tasks that would require human intervention in the physical product’s business, being distribution and delivery the major ones.

Now, thanks to Amazon FBA you can build a business around selling your own physical products –and remember physical products make up 98% of the market- without having to resign to the automation advantage only digital products used to provide.

Of course, there still are and probably always be human beings behind scenes doing all of this work when it comes to physical products, no software in the world can really take care of this, but for you all of that labor is totally transparent and we’ve reached a point unthinkable just a few short years ago where you can setup and manage a full supply chain getting physical products produced –even overseas- packaged, imported and finally sold and delivered to the customer… without never having to touch a single one of them or even see them in real life!

So unthinkable, an even so true and SO POWERFUL that I have no doubt in my mind that this business model will be largely responsible for the creation of a new generation of millionaires in the world. We’ve seen some of them already.

Would you like to be part of this revolution? What are your thoughts?

SOURCE

The Five Keys to Success

We hope we have given you enough information to help you be successful and win with FBA. As you continue to grow your business, the following five strategies can help you be successful.

 Let the numbers lead the way

• On a regular basis you should Monitor daily business health metrics in Seller Central including your Customer Feedback.
• Use the Amazon Selling Coach dashboard to see all your inventory, fulfillment, product, and pricing opportunities.

 Use high-quality listings and optimize prices

• Optimize your listings to avoid listing errors such as, Missing info, Incorrect info, Matching errors, and Variation errors.
• Keep your listings active. Inactive listings could result in inventory being stranded in our fulfillment centers.
• Price competitively, and keep the potential FBA sales lift in mind when you consider margin.
• Utilize FBA tools, like the FBA Revenue Calculator and Fee Preview to gauge your profitability before you convert products to FBA.

 Manage your inventory

• Keep enough stock on hand to cover demand and set up your Replenishment Alerts to avoid stock-outs.
• Use the Inventory Reconciliation Report to keep an eye on your inventory movements.
• Manage your inventory fees by setting up Automated Long-Term Storage Removals.

 Minimize error rates

• Remember that Prep and Label errors can delay receipt of your inventory. Prep and label your units appropriately and make sure you don’t send any restricted products.
• When it comes to your inbound shipments remember to count twice, ship once to avoid sending the wrong quantities.
• Follow our shipment policies and guidelines to save time and money.

 Optimize, optimize, optimize

• Use Amazon-partnered carriers for your inbound shipments.
• Enable FBA Export to sell to more customers around the world.
• Advertise with Sponsored Products and set up promotions to help drive demand.
• Subscribe to the FBA Newsletter to keep an eye out for new features and important business-related information. We will also communicate through direct e-mail and headline announcements on Seller Central.

SOURCE

10 Tools to Scale Your Amazon FBA Business

By MonetizePros

Everyone hates top tens, but everyone loves making money. That’s why having an Amazon FBA Business is so popular today, it’s all online entrepreneurs are talking about. And it makes sense.

Entrepreneurs invest in themselves. Amazon’s all about upfront investment – time and money. Put in the work and pull relatively passive profit every month. What entrepreneur wouldn’t want that? There’s a problem though.

We Only Have 24 Hours

We all get it. There’s only 24 hours in a day and even entrepreneurs need sleep. So how do you scale? Scaling is the only way to true, mind-boggling profit. I certainly couldn’t run my business on my own. Packing and shipping hundreds of orders a day? No thanks.

Here’s the thing..

Amazon makes it easy. Fulfilled By Amazon, that FBA acronym we all hear, it means Bezos handles the logistics. Ship product to warehouses and then just focus on sales – it’s that easy, almost…

Only Half the Battle

But maintaining is not growing. There’s more to Amazon FBA success long-term. You NEED to rank higher or launch more products, or do both – that’s the ONLY way to grow. And that takes time. Time to search and source products, time to promote and gather reviews. All of this takes time, time a solo-preneur doesn’t have. And there’s a cliche for it.

You Have to Work on Your Business, Not In It

Boring. Yeah, you’ve heard it before. But for Amazon it’s more true than ever. Individuals are commanding massive wealth and cashflows, all without touching the product or worrying about the little details. Automation and software is the key. Here are my tools of the trade.

Top 10 Tools to Amazon FBA Success

I’ve never liked Top 10 lists. I’m process-oriented. So, here’s a step-by-step process for Amazon success. This is how Amazon sellers start faster. Enjoy.

Product Selection

Nothing trumps this. Pick a loser and you’ll have to restart, pick a winner and the game accelerates. It’s that simple.

Here’s how I do it, in order!

1. The Jungle Scout Webapp

Today, I start here – a database of Amazon success. I have to thank Greg Mercer for this one. He’s a personal friend, a two time guest of FBA ALLSTARS and owns Jungle Scout. But believing bias motivates this selection is foolhardy. The webapp provides a custom filter system for searching Amazon products and a huge database of information. You can choose categories, target BSRs (or Best Seller Rankings), sales, reviews, sizes – the options are vast.

Pros:

·         Fast product ideas

·         Easy to search

·         Filter based results

·         Free 7 day trial

Cons:

·         Recurring billing

·         Helps others find my products too

·         Not a complete database

This makes finding profitable products easier – way easier honestly. It’s almost scary. But I start here searching for my brand. After setting filters, everything fits my criteria for successful private label products. I track these in a Google spreadsheet.

Then it’s time for Amazon + Jungle Scout.

2. Jungle Scout

I thought this was stupid INITIALLY. I’ve done a complete 180. Jungle Scout is a Chrome extension which saves you hours. It automatically pulls BSR stats, seller data, review reports and estimated sales and revenues of all the products showing in an Amazon search. I used to manually open and search every listing. This is a must have for serious sellers.

Pros:

·         Save tons of time

·         Export data

·         Analysis markets instantly

Cons:

·         Stats are estimates (real data on sales is impossible)

·         Price

3. CamelCamelCamel

The name sucks, but it’s free. And it’s helpful. CamelCamelCamel picks up where JS left off, it tracks historical data. Specifically sales price and BSR. This helps in determining the legitimacy of sales data. You can tell if products are just launching and spiking sales or consistently performing. It also helps identify trends over time, a big plus for seasonal products.

Pros:

·         Totally free

·         Tracks historic data

Cons:

·         Non-friendly interface

·         No other functionality

Amazon Product Sourcing

After ideas it gets physical. Finding products and getting samples is an unavoidable bottleneck. It’s often intimidating, especially since most suppliers are overseas. So, here’s a free guide to get you started. And it’s easier than you think, sort of.

4. Alibaba

There’s nothing better. Excluding supplements and skin-based beauty products, most items are manufactured in Asia. The majority of these are Made In China. And short of flying there (which I’ve done), Alibaba is your best bet. It’s a matchmaker for suppliers, like Craigslist on steroids with Yellow Pages added in.

And it’s overwhelming at first. You just have to get started.

Here’s a few rules of thumb:

·         Submit buying requests – these allow manufacturers producing what you want to contact you

·         Search product offerings – you can find most things if you are crafty

·         Migrate to email or Skype communication ASAP

·         Do your homework and get samples

·         Always start with Trade Assurance

·         AliExpress is essentially Alibaba for samples

·         Many “suppliers” are just trade companies, middle men for sourcing – they make things easier but slightly more expensive

·         Don’t be stupid

Pros:

·         Basically the only option

·         Connects buyers and suppliers anywhere

·         Trade Assurance protects your investment

·         More legitimate than some sites

Cons:

·         A million and one scams

·         Scary to get started

That’s the basics. The rest you learn as you go. But production takes time. While waiting, work on your listing. It’s time to optimize.

Copywriting and Keyword Research

Sales depend on being found. Even a time machine would flop if no one knew about it. Keywords and optimization are critical to Amazon. You need traffic to get buyers.

5. Google Keyword Planner

Amazon’s bad about data. They don’t like sharing search numbers, or sales. For these you need 3rd party software. Google’s the biggest search engine in the world, Amazon’s the biggest for products. That means search data in Google will be similar to Amazon. You can get an idea what customers are searching for, look at keyword trends and find terms to target for PPC (paid ads).

The easiest way is to copy/paste competitor URLs into the tool. Google then spits out its idea of the page’s keywords. BINGO. Now you know.

Pros:

·         Free

·         Easy to use

·         Tons of data

Cons:

·         Requires an AdWords account

·         Has lots of irrelevant keywords

Review competitor listings and reviews. Here you will find gems of keywords, phrases and customer complaints, all of which can help your listing shine.

MonetizePros Tip!

Google Keyword Planner does the trick but can be difficult to use. We recommend using SEMRush for everything keyword research related. It also has a lot of other features that’ll come handy with your Amazon FBA business. Spy on your competitors, see where they’re spending their PPC budget, what keywords are bringing them the most traffic and much more.

You must measure progress or you’ll be spinning your wheels indefinitely. To do this, sales and profit are king. But rankings are important too. Where you rank determines sales and success. Tracking this is the only way to monitor your efforts. There’s two I like.

6. AMZTracker

I push hard. It’s the reason my business and FBA ALLSTARS has grown so fast. To do that I need data. I need to know which keywords I rank for, what to optimize and the 80/20 of increased sales. AMZTracker allow me to do all this, plus monitor negative reviews and launch products easier (and faster) with their review club. Recently they’ve released a solid competitor to Jungle Scout, Unicorn Smasher, which makes things interesting as well.

Pros:

·         Simple keyword tracking

·         Product launch review club

·         Negative review monitoring

·         Email updates

·         Unicorn Smasher Free tool

Cons:

·         Monthly cost

·         Doesn’t track PPC data

7. Amazooka

Similar to AMZTracker but different in several key ways, Amazooka’s making a splash in the Amazon FBA world. While offering keyword and BSR tracking, negative review monitoring and it’s own review club (although a bit premature on this), there’s a few features I love. You guys will too.

First, Amazooka let’s you export customer phone numbers. That means you can target existing customers on Facebook. That’s big. But there’s also the autoresponder. Amazooka’s working on a feedback follow up sequence to make customer communication and review gathering simple and effective. But that’s not all.

The dashboard is the gamechanger. See all your sales by product, by country (even by state) right on an easy to use interface. Any seller with multiple products knows the poor job Amazon does of displaying this.

Pros:

·         Keyword tracking

·         PPC tracking

·         Negative review monitoring

·         Email updates

·         Customer phone number exports

·         Powerful dashboard

·         Feedback follow up

Cons:

·         Monthly cost

·         Still in its infancy so occasional bugs

Customer Interactions

Emails get excessive. When you sell hundreds of units a day, you cannot email everyone. That hurts. Rankings are partly dependent on reviews (likely feedback as well). But gathering reviews is hard. Have you ever left a review on Amazon? There’s a trick.

Email automation, it’s vital. Like an autoresponder, Feedback Followup software allows entrepreneurs to individually, automatically email every customer. This automates customer service and allows sellers to ask for seller feedback and reviews. That means more organic reviews and sales – it’s a flywheel.

But what’s the talk of feedback and reviews, what’s the difference? Well seller feedback reflects your performance as seller, it also has minimal impact on rankings and conversion rates. Reviews on the other hand are product focused. These directly affect ranks and build customer trust and boost conversion rates. I ask for the feedback prior to reviews, despite their lessened importance as this provides a filter. I’ll only then ask happy customers for reviews which as you’d expect, leads to better reviews. There are two solid softwares, I use the first.

8. Feedback Genius

While Feedback Genius allows Amazon sellers to automate their messages and track negative seller feedback as well – avoiding customer complaints and issues before they begin. But that’s not all.

The biggest differentiator for me in Feedback Genius vs Salesbacker is in the reviews. Feedback Genius filters customer feedback. When a customer leaves a positive feedback, that triggers a custom message asking for a review, hence my safety net filter. And it’s automated, Salesbacker can’t.

Pros:

·         Automates feedback requests

·         Automates review requests

·         Tracks negative seller feedback

·         Automatic safety net

Cons:

·         Analytics software is ineffective

·         Hard to track open and conversion rates of emails

9. Salesbacker

Salesbacker doesn’t have this feature of feedback triggers. It does however have quite a lot Feedback Genius lacks. Chiefly, improved analytics and testing. It’s also got canned emails which help you get setup. And in case you haven’t got a rank tracker, Salesbacker’s got your back on BSR tracking.

Pros:

·         Automates feedback requests

·         Automates review requests

·         Tracks negative seller feedback

·         Tracks BSR

·         Offers enhanced analytics

·         Comes with template campaigns

Cons:

·         Doesn’t enable feedback filtered emails

Product Launches and Reviews

Sales don’t start themselves. You need to do a blast to build up reviews, boost your rank and get sales going. That’s how the algorithm works. Amazon makes money on sales. That means your product needs to sell to make Amazon succeed. Sell and you’re rewarded, stagnate and your rankings drop.

It’s not all about sales though. Reviews help too. Reviews are social proof that strengthen conversion rates. A solid base of reviews with spiked sales and your listing will start itself.

10. Tomoson

Reviewers love products. Sellers love sales, and reviews. Tomoson’s a way to work together – matching sellers offering with promotions with product testers. It has an awful interface and is challenging to use, but it’s free, it’s easy and it will help you find reviewers faster. Plus Tomoson has a free month trial so time it right and you won’t pay a dime. Play with the site before getting started and then scouting reviewers. It’s time to promote your product with coupon codes and speed those sales.

Pros:

·         Plenty of experienced reviewers

·         Free month trial

Cons:

·         Painfully bad interface

Pro tip: use one time use claim codes for your promotions or risk ALL your inventory evaporating overnight. And NEVER use a percentage off. It’s a recipe for disaster. Imagine one person buying your entire stock,90% OFF. That’s a bad day.

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