If the last few years have taught us anything, it’s how very precious and fragile good health really is. And what that means is that consumers of every age, ethnicity, gender, and social status are looking for new, better, and more affordable ways to cultivate long-lasting wellness. That also means that there has perhaps been no better time than now for clinics, healthcare facilities, and purveyors of medical products and services to consider selling medical supplies on amazon.
However, marketing your facility or your products on Amazon is likely going to require a markedly different approach to promotions than your business is used to. This article examines strategies medical practices and suppliers can use to achieve success selling medical supplies on amazon.
Making Money Selling on Amazon
It doesn’t seem to matter anymore what your industry is — if you’re not selling on Amazon, you’re missing out. In fact, reports show that 89% of Amazon sellers are profitable, and that 37% saw profits increase throughout 2022.
As more of the population become comfortable operating online, many of our needs previously defined by brick-and-mortar or in-person experiences are being revolutionized. Telehealth, for example, is facilitating long-distance connections between doctors and patients across the globe. In the same way, medical service and product providers are seeing success selling medical products on the Amazon marketplace as well.
Restricted Categories on Amazon: Getting the Appropriate Permissions
Amazon is, literally, the largest marketplace in human history. It enables sellers of every stripe to reach a truly global customer base.
Perhaps not surprisingly, though, access to medical products and service providers has traditionally been quite limited and subject to extensive federal and international regulation. That does not mean, however, that medical product providers and practices cannot avail themselves of Amazon’s tremendous market reach.
What it does mean, though, is that if you want to market your medical practice or product on Amazon Stores, you’re probably going to need to jump through some hoops. For instance, if your product or service is regulated by the FDA, as many health-related ones are, then you’re going to fall into a restricted category.
That will require you to meet certain conditions before you’re permitted to market your business, product, clinic, or service on Amazon. In most cases, this will require you to receive FDA approval, adhere to FDA standards, and comply with certain labeling requirements as defined by Amazon.
Which Categories are Restricted on Amazon?
Amazon has specific restrictions on selling in certain categories to ensure quality and compliance. If you’re looking to sell in these areas, it’s important to be aware of the unique requirements for each of the following categories:
- Automotive & Powersports Products
- Collectible Coins
- Artwork and Fine Art Sales
- Holiday Selling Requirements in Toys & Games
- Jewelry
- Products Exclusively Made in Italy
- Music & DVD
- Household Safety and Personal Protection Products
- Offering Services
- Dealing in Sports Memorabilia
- Streaming Media Players
- Selling Videos, DVDs, & Blu-ray Discs
- Watches
- Participating in Amazon’s Subscription Box Program
Using Data-driven Marketing
Once you have received the appropriate permissions and met the relevant requirements for marketing on Amazon, you can turn your attention to defining a platform that works. If you are a local medical practice or a smaller-scale manufacturer of medical products and devices, you aren’t likely to have much experience in marketing to a global audience.
The prospect may, indeed, be daunting, but don’t despair. Marketers today have more and better tools than ever before for understanding and reaching their target audience. The key to reaching your ideal client on Amazon is data.
Data-driven marketing enables you to understand who your target client is, what they want, what they need, and what they require. But these aren’t the only insights to be gleaned through data. Data can also help you define patterns of behavior in your target audience, including identifying the types of online content that pique their interest and generate the most clicks.
Once you’ve defined what kind of content your target audience is looking for regarding medical services, devices, and products, you can craft your Amazon marketing materials accordingly.
Marketing Your Practice Through Online Relationship Building
One of the most important things to bear in mind when you’re learning to leverage the power of Amazon to market your medical practice is that your goal is not to advertise. Your goal is to build relationships.
Marketing your medical practice, product, or service is, fundamentally, about starting an ongoing conversation with your target customer base. The Amazon Store is only one prong of a larger strategy in which you cultivate an engaging and engaged online presence in order to connect with your target audience.
Thus, linking your Amazon Store with your business’s website is an ideal way to take your business relationships from merely transactional to truly transformational. You might use blogs, discussion forums, and even online events to help your target clients learn about your practice, your company, and the products and services you provide.
In the process, you will be building a sense of community in your client base. The more audience members connect with you and with one another, the better able you will be to identify and respond to their evolving health needs.
The connected Amazon Store, then, is the domain where you endeavor to meet those needs. Your Amazon Store becomes the locale where you are able to respond to the conversation you are having with your clients through your product and service innovations featured there.
Selling Medical Supplies on Amazon: The Takeaway
The provision of medical products and services is truly a labor of love and, now more than ever, medical practices and health product companies can serve a global market. Unleashing the tremendous power of Amazon Stores is an ideal way to access this international customer base. However, doing so effectively requires strategy, calling on stakeholders to improve their marketing strategy for a new, more diverse, and far larger target audience. This requires marketers to ensure they have the appropriate permissions and adhere to relevant guidelines for marketing on Amazon.
This also requires marketers to tap into the tremendous power of data to define the target audience, understand their behavior, and align their marketing strategy accordingly. Improving marketing through Amazon Stores means integrating Amazon into a more comprehensive and compelling digital strategy. Cultivating a robust digital presence enables medical practices and product purveyors to engage in an ongoing conversation with the target audience, building client relationships that can last a lifetime.
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