Are you getting started in the Amazon Marketplace or thinking about launching your own online business? We spoke with Ecom Dave to discuss how to kickstart an Amazon business in 2021 and how to avoid common mistakes that get in the way.
Over the past 18 months or so, the Amazon marketplace has made plenty of waves. Whether it’s been about record-setting numbers, expansion into new countries, or competitors such as Shopify or Walmart looking to duplicate its success, there’s plenty of buzz on the topic. Here are some tips to getting started on amazon.
To anyone who likes making money (and who doesn’t?), this may seem like your signal to get in on the action. There’s plenty of opportunity on Amazon and the industry is still growing rapidly.
But before jumping in headfirst, there are plenty of considerations to make.
As with most things that go through massively evolving growth, things change quickly. As recently as 5 or 10 years ago, just starting an Amazon business may have been enough to fast track your success.
With a more mature marketplace, new sellers must enter more strategically than in the past.
That’s why we spoke with Ecom Dave, a superstar seller and seller mentor in the Amazon community. He takes us through his journey as a seller, how Amazon has evolved over the years, and how sellers can build their business the right way.
Tune in to the whole conversation for a free-flowing conversation packed with plenty of helpful Amazon Marketplace tidbits!
HIGHLIGHTS
Get to know Ecom Dave and his experience with e-commerce. (0:00)
If you aren’t familiar with Ecom Dave, take a second to learn his fascinating journey from bartending and failing at his first attempt at selling on Amazon to launch a successful online business and becoming one of the biggest names in the Amazon seller community.
What mistakes are the new wave of Amazon sellers making? (9:31)
When learning a new skill, knowing what not to do can be as critical as knowing what to do. Steering clear of common missteps can make the difference between a dud and a stud, with thousands of dollars at stake. Dave walks us through his process and thinking while assisting new sellers and where many are going wrong.
How getting started on amazon impacted Dave’s lifestyle? (13:25)
Let’s be real. Most of us don’t work because we love the work. We work to afford the best lifestyle we want.
One of the main allures of selling on Amazon is the ability to be your own boss, build your business, and live the life you’ve always wanted. That’s certainly the case for Dave, who walks us through his daily routine compared to before he began selling on Amazon.
Dave walks us through what aspects he believes have personally contributed to his Amazon business? (22:10)
A seller’s mentality at approaching their business plays a tremendous factor in the outcome of the business. When running your own business, your business’s success or failure and overall imprint becomes inescapably related to person running it.
The Amazon seller community is quite diverse in terms of mentality and approach, so while there certainly is no “one-size-fits-all” mentality, each person’s strengths or weaknesses can make an impact on their business. Getting started on amazon can have a large impact. Dave explains how his personality and experiences played a role in his ultimate success.
Before we say goodbye, Dave offers some final advice for Amazon sellers who are kicking off their FBA careers. (27:00)
If we were to dive into all the aspects that go into selling, the Follow The Data podcast would be longer than an episode of the Joe Rogan show. So before the conclusion of this conversation, we asked Dave what other tips or topics he’d like to cover that hadn’t been covered already.
A huge thanks to Dave for taking the time to share his valuable expertise. For more tips and tricks to starting and succeeding on Amazon, check out his website! You can also connect with Dave on Instagram, LinkedIn, and Facebook.
As always, drop your email below to receive the latest Amazon seller news and updates!
Are YOU missing out on thousands of dollars because of hidden Amazon inventory and fulfillment fees?
Happy new year! On this installment of Follow The Data, host Cam Yoder chats with Joseph Abitol, founder of Seller Locker on how you can start 2021 on the right foot by saving your business from hidden yet costly Amazon FBA fees!
While most FBA sellers just accept Amazon-related fees as the cost of business and focus solely on driving sales, Joseph Abitol explains this is a mistake that could be costing your business a hefty amount of cash.
Well, a penny saved is a penny earned. But how exactly do you earn this money?
Cam and Joseph dive headfirst into how to identify the areas where you might be losing money. Additionally, Joseph provides a quick three-step process to remedy those losses!
HIGHLIGHTS
Need proof of SellerLocker’s methods? Joseph shares his screen and showcases how one seller recovered over $400,000 in fees! (6:04)
In this space, unfortunately it’s common that “gurus” will use inflated or false numbers to showcase their alleged expertise. But this isn’t that. If there were any doubt about sketchy math, Joseph provides the proof that others won’t show.
The three-step process Joseph recommends that all sellers can do, with or without SellerLocker (8:36)
SellerLocker originated as a tool for the elite sellers on Amazon, but has developed methods that every seller can use to be reimbursed for lost money. Depending on the size of your business, this is an explosive, groundbreaking method to help improve your bottom line.
When you sell on Amazon, it’s easy to trust the system in place. But given the massive amounts of lost money, should sellers be skeptical? (11:30)
Cam asks the hard-hitting question. If this money has been missing, how can sellers trust the system in place? It’s less devious than you think, and Joseph breaks down why the reimbursed money and how Amazon already reimburses sellers for some of these fees you may not be aware of.
In step one, Joseph shows you how to open a claim. And too many sellers stop there. Following up on your claim is the only way to get your money back, and SellerLocker has methods to automate this process so you can save money automatically.
Always keep your receipts! This isn’t just a helpful tip for shoppers, it’s also one for Amazon sellers. When reporting these issues, Amazon asks for proof through documentation, just as a store will ask for a receipt to issue a return. SellerLocker showcases what documents you’ll need, and how to create a system to organize your documents.
Closing advice from Joseph on getting into ecommerce in 2021 (30:24)
Is 2021 too late to get into the ecommerce game? Nope! Even Joseph’s dad is looking to get into the selling space to take advantage of the massive amounts of money sellers are making. With the right tools and strategy, you could be one of them.
A special thanks to Joseph for hopping on the pod and sharing these invaluable insights! SellerLocker is a great software tool that automates this money-saving process for you that we highly recommend checking out!
Want money-saving hacks, advanced seller strategies, and the latest updates sent straight to your inbox? Drop your email in the box below to stay a step ahead of the competition!
There has been a lot going on with Amazon lately, so join us for a recap of the latest news. Casey discusses Amazon fee changes, Amazon search volume updates, and sponsored ad placement. You won’t believe the data point that influences search volume change!
The Amazon game has changed and will continue to change in the new year. The standard on Amazon has increased significantly, so how are you staying competitive? In this episode, Casey Gauss discusses emerging tactics for success in 2019. Product research, review generation, and micro-niches, oh my!
Join Amazon Seller Coach, Cameron, as he discusses the effects of video on Amazon listings with special guest Kyle Goguen of Pawstruck, an experienced Amazon seller. Kyle shares insights gained from testing out video on his own products, and together they speculate about the future of video on Amazon.
After implementing new videos, over the course of two months, Pawstruck experienced 53% increase in revenue, 34% increase in conversions, 32% more transactions, and 15% higher average order values. Read more about the brand’s success with video here.
If you haven’t already, look into Amazon Brand Registry and register your brand for access to exclusive features as Amazon continues to roll them out.
To get a stellar video done for your listing, check out Video Review Labs and tell them that Viral Launch sent you for a special rate.
Podcast Transcript
CAMERON YODER:
Hey, guys, what’s up? We have Kyle with us today. Kyle has been a seller on Amazon for a little while. Kyle, can you just say hello and intro yourself a little bit?
KYLE GOGUEN:
Hey, everyone. Yeah, Kyle from Pawstruck.com. I’ve been selling on Amazon – I think it’s been two-and-a-half, three years now, and prior to that launched the company in 2014. We sell on our own website, obviously Amazon, eBay and a few other channels. But as of late we’ve been focusing a lot on Amazon.
CAMERON YODER:
Okay. So I actually – I always love asking people, sellers this when we bring them on and when I’m talking to them, but from your perspective how much has Amazon changed? How much has the Amazon game changed since when you first started?
KYLE GOGUEN:
Yeah, so you figure it’s only been a couple years, but things have changed drastically since I started. I would say in the beginning I didn’t really know what I was doing on Amazon, to say the least. And then it’s like as soon as you learn new strategies on how to launch products and promote products, it all seems to change, which I think is a good and bad thing. It definitely pays off for people who stay on top of the latest trends and strategies. Kind of sets yourself apart from the competition. So I like it, and overall I think we set ourselves up well for growth here in 2018 and in the future.
CAMERON YODER:
Yeah, that’s really good. And that actually kind of leads into something that we’re talking about today. So our topic today is all about video and video on Amazon. And this is something that’s – video on Amazon is something that’s super interesting that not too many people are talking about right now. It did get some buzz a little back when the beta was first announced and when people first found out about it, that Amazon was bringing video to sellers on Seller Central. But we’re focusing on video today, and Kyle has been a user of video on Amazon. He’s been – and correct me if I’m wrong, but you were part of the beta. I’m not actually quite sure how soon you were able to get in with video. How long have you had video on Amazon?
KYLE GOGUEN:
I don’t remember the exact date, but it’s got to be – I would say over a year, at least. I was in the Amazon Exclusives program, and that’s how I initially got access to it through some contacts I made through that program. And since then I’ve actually left Exclusives, but I still have access to some of the tools, which include video.
CAMERON YODER:
Gotcha. But so baseline you’ve really had some decent time to see how to work with video on Amazon, see what it’s done for you, right?
KYLE GOGUEN:
Yeah, definitely.
CAMERON YODER:
Okay. So first question, first question for you, for all of our viewers; how – just generally speaking, how has video affected your listings?
KYLE GOGUEN:
Sure. So I guess the first thing I want to go through is all the places that we currently are using video, just to explain that for the listeners, and then I’ll let them know what I think it’s done for our sales and listings. So the first place we have it on a listing would be in the thumbnails. You’ll see it kind of right next to the photos. I’m sure everyone’s seen that before. It’s got a play button, and when you click on it it will play a video just in place of where the main image is. That’s one place. The second place we have it is about halfway down the page. You’ll see video under a related video short section. So we also use that. And the third place we upload video is on our Amazon storefront, which is fairly new, and we’ve got kind of a whole, almost like our own website within Amazon built out. And on each of those pages we’ve used video to show off our products in use. So on – I guess when you’re asking how has it affected our listing, it’s a tough question to answer.
CAMERON YODER:
I know, I know, I know.
KYLE GOGUEN:
Yeah, like most things on Amazon, they don’t give you a whole lot of data, which is too bad. You wish you had access to it, but it makes sense that they wouldn’t want to share it with the sellers.
CAMERON YODER:
Right.
KYLE GOGUEN:
So I can’t tell you how many people have viewed videos, how long they watch our videos or anything like that. And unfortunately when I did upload the videos, you know, we were making a lot of changes to our listings, so I wasn’t even really able to say like A/B test, you know, conversion rate before a video or post videos because we changed so much it really wouldn’t be a fair way of measuring success. So I basically just have to give you my gut feeling.
CAMERON YODER:
Yeah, yeah.
KYLE GOGUEN:
And my gut tells me that it’s definitely helped. Our conversion rates based on my research and talking to other sellers are equal if not much higher than other sellers or people in my industry. So I definitely think it can’t hurt you. It can only help you if you do it the right way.
CAMERON YODER:
So these three locations for videos – so you said in the thumbnails and kind of halfway down the listings and then on your Amazon storefront. Is there one – are all of these videos in each of these places the same, or have you created unique content for each of them?
KYLE GOGUEN:
So for us we had our videos done kind of all in bulk, so product videos, for example, they would shoot just one single product video, and we would upload the same video in all the places. So we didn’t customize it necessarily, but you absolutely could, depending on your needs. You can – it’s not like they’re all connected together, I guess. You upload them separately, so they can have different versions if you felt like one was better.
CAMERON YODER:
Okay, so you basically have the ability to customize putting a unique video at the top in the thumbnails, for example, or like a unique video halfway down?
KYLE GOGUEN:
Yeah, absolutely. And my gut also tells me that the video at the top I would assume gets a lot more views than the one halfway down the page. It kind of gets lost in all the other product recommendations and reviews and everything down there. But since we have the ability to do it, we upload it there, too, and so more people can see the video.
CAMERON YODER:
Sure. And that seems consistent with the, I mean just photos in general and thumbnail photos and EBC all in kind of the same way. With your videos that you’ve implemented have you found any customers giving feedback, or have you gotten any direct feedback from customers that have bought your products or looked at your videos?
KYLE GOGUEN:
Yeah, all the time. So we definitely try to interact with our customers as much as possible. We send out automatic emails after every purchase and every delivery and shipment. We definitely get a lot of responses that reference our videos.
CAMERON YODER:
Interesting.
KYLE GOGUEN:
So we sell dog products, and so our videos show, you know, dogs chewing our products or using it. So a lot of times we’ll get comments about how adorable or cute the videos were, or how helpful they were, or maybe just a follow-up question, something that we didn’t clarify in the video. They’ll mention that they watched the video and they had a question about X, Y, and Z. We also see it in our reviews. A lot of times people will reference the videos on the listings for whatever reason. So we definitely know people are watching them. We don’t know how many.
CAMERON YODER:
Do you think – right, unfortunately. Do you think there’s a little bit of a wow factor when it comes to videos on listings because it’s still – honestly it’s beginning to get standardized kind of, but it’s still pretty new? Do you think people still have that wow factor when they watch videos?
KYLE GOGUEN:
Yeah, I would think so. I would think it’s definitely a way to set yourself apart from your competitors and other listings if you have video and it’s well done and they don’t. That’s a great way to set yourself apart, especially if you have a really high priced product, or something really technical, or one like ours that requires a high level of trust to purchase. I think video can be a way of kind of earning that trust or really showing people why they should trust you to spend that kind of money on a product because sometimes photos don’t do a product justice.
CAMERON YODER:
Right.
KYLE GOGUEN:
Or people don’t want to take the time to read a description to understand how it works or what it does. So our products are pretty simple. We don’t do any how-to videos, but I could definitely see where a how-to video would be helpful for a technical product in setting yourself apart.
CAMERON YODER:
That’s good. So technically speaking, I mean again you’ve had experience in setting up videos with your listings. Is it easy to do? Is it just easy to upload like an MP4 into Amazon and just like oh, there it is straight into my listing, or is it kind of complicated?
KYLE GOGUEN:
It is pretty basic. Assuming that you have a normal video file and that your video is compliant with Amazon’s requirements – so definitely look into that. Like I’m sure you can’t – you know I couldn’t run videos saying like go shop on Pawstruck.com. You know, so you have to make sure your video actually complies with Amazon’s terms of services for videos. But assuming you do all the right things there it is just a matter of hitting the upload button and entering, you know, a title and so on. So it’s pretty basic.
CAMERON YODER:
Interesting. Well, that’s good to know. So as a whole – again, just generally speaking video is a little bit newer, and it was in beta. Again, it was in a beta program that you had to get accepted into, and it kind of got rolled out to people that were brand registered. And now it’s beginning to have more of a mass adoption with sellers that are brand registered. Do you think that video specifically is something that sellers should be putting their time and energy into right now?
KYLE GOGUEN:
Yeah, absolutely, especially if you have an off-Amazon presence in any way. If you’re running any sort of off-Amazon advertising campaigns, whether it’s Facebook, Instagram, something like that, or you have your own website, it definitely makes sense because the money you invest in video is obviously going to help you on Amazon, but you can also repurpose a lot of those videos. So something I haven’t really mentioned yet, but from our videos we have dogs using our products, and we are able to take high res screenshots or screen captures from various frames. So we’re able to get photos of the dogs using the product. And we use those photos as our secondary images on the product. So it’s kind of serving as both a video and a way to generate really good, high-quality photos.
CAMERON YODER:
Interesting.
KYLE GOGUEN:
And we’ve also had the company that we use to produce the videos make shorter versions that are used for advertisements. So you can repurpose the videos in a different way, maybe to optimize for Facebook ads, for example, or Instagram. So you can get a lot of use out of them, and that helps a little bit with that upfront cost that I’m sure you’ll have to pay.
CAMERON YODER:
Gotcha. So you talked a little bit about focusing off of Amazon. Have you found really good – I mean you’re able to – people generally are able to track attrition, I guess, or if people convert better outside of Amazon just because you can track, I don’t know, consumers a little bit better on something like Instagram or Facebook. Have you found really good conversions from using these videos on something like Facebook, or YouTube or Instagram?
KYLE GOGUEN:
So we use those videos on our ads, and they’ve been pretty successful, but I wouldn’t really be able to compare them to anything else we’ve done previously because these are the only videos we’ve had. But one thing I can do – maybe we can put it in the show notes or [somewhere 0:20:09.1] because I don’t know off the top of my head, but on our website we definitely saw a huge conversion boost once we added our videos to our product pages. So I can look that information up, and maybe we can throw that in the show notes what exactly happened because that we were able to A/B test, which was really great. And we have all the information, obviously, how many people are viewing it and all of that.
CAMERON YODER:
Gotcha. Okay, and so we talked briefly about this, but I think it’s something that people should know. It was – we mentioned it just a little before, but I want to reiterate that this video thing was available only to people in beta, like an invite basically. But now seemingly it is starting to get rolled out to everyone that is a part of the brand registry program. And so just for everyone that’s looking to get into video, it would be a good idea if you aren’t brand registered yet to just get brand registered. And brand registry involves a lot more outside of video. It involves a lot of different things. And potentially being brand registered just kind of opens the door for being able to be invited to things quicker or earlier than other people that aren’t brand registered. Seemingly Amazon takes preference to people that are brand registered. And I’m not sure if you could touch into that a little bit. Have you seen – in your time being brand registered have you seen early rollouts or just other things, including video, that have benefited you?
KYLE GOGUEN:
Yeah, so I was part of the beta rollout of brand registry 2.0 so I was able to get in there pretty early and talk to some of the people on Amazon’s brand registry team and give them feedback as they built out the program and everything, and it’s definitely an emphasis of Amazon moving forward. For brand owners they want people to be brand registered, and they’re going to continue to build out features that are specific to those in that program. So like you already mentioned, any seller that has the ability to be brand registered who is not brand registered at this point in time, I absolutely recommend getting registered even if you don’t plan on doing video soon or ever. It doesn’t really matter. There’s just so much that the program offers, and there’s going to be some feature at some point in time that you’re going to want that you won’t be able to get unless you’re in the program. And I have a lot of colleagues and friends who are Amazon sellers who some of which are unable to get brand registered, and it definitely hurts. And they have a lot more issues with counterfeiters and people who are hijacking their listings, and they can’t really do a lot from a protection standpoint. And a lot of those people were in the original brand registry program and just because of some changes aren’t able to get in 2.0 at this point in time, and they really wish they could.
CAMERON YODER:
Yeah, so taking a look at – talking a little bit about brand registry, or taking that even further, what do you think Amazon is going to do next for listings in general? And we’re talking about video, which was a pretty big deal, honestly, to add to your repertoire of things available on your listing. What do you think Amazon is going to do next?
KYLE GOGUEN:
Sure. So when talking about product listings in particular, I think the next thing they’re going to do is build in some sort of augmented reality option for listings, probably on mobile I would assume. And the reason I kind of bring that up is because every time I talk to, you know, family members or friends about shopping on Amazon the one thing they always bring up as a negative – basically the only thing they can bring up as a negative is that they wish sometimes they could go to the store because they want to touch and feel the product. And a lot of times it has to do with apparel specifically, which makes sense, and Amazon is doing a lot of things to combat that with their fast shipping and return policies and even video, right? So being able to see the product kind of in use really helps the customer understand what they’re buying. So I think if you’re able to work in some sort of augmented reality into a listing that could take it even a step further. So, for example, if you wanted to buy some T-shirt, you’re unsure how it looks. It looks on a model. It’s like well you don’t really know how it’s going to fit on you. Or it’s on a white background that’s really hard to tell, but with augmented reality they have the possibility of, you know, you basically turning the camera on yourself kind of like a selfie and the T-shirt or clothing being put onto your body to see what it’s actually going to look like when you receive it. So my guess is they’re going to do creative stuff like that. I think that’s coming to e-commerce in general. People are going to keep innovating, basically removing that barrier or that one hiccup that makes some people want to shop in-store versus online.
CAMERON YODER:
Sure. That makes sense to me. I mean there was an article put out not too long ago about how Amazon owns, I think it was about seven clothing brands on Amazon specifically and how Amazon is moving further or deeper into the fashion market. We also have that fashion camera. It’s a camera that helps you pick out clothes, basically. So seemingly I would totally agree with you. I think that’s an argument that people have for classic retail stores, right, is that you can go and you can touch and feel everything. And so for them to implement technology like that would be huge for the space. I could definitely see that happening. What does the inclusion of video tell you about what Amazon is moving towards with their overall website experience and aesthetic? You touched on this a little bit with the idea of that VR AR idea. But do you think that is going to carry through to their website as a whole?
KYLE GOGUEN:
Yeah, I think so. I think video is just kind of an indication that they want to really show customers what they’re buying before they’re buying it. And like I said before, like photo can only take you – photos can only take you so far. So I think they’re – I’m sure they’re going to add video all over the place, or some of these new technologies, even maybe into somehow in, you know, search results or somewhere else maybe. I think it’s something that they’re definitely focused on doing. You see like if you go through your Facebook feed these days it’s almost – to me, at least, it’s like 95% video is what people are sharing. So I think Amazon understands that. I mean I think that’s part of why they rolled out the related video shorts portion to listings. They’re trying to compete with YouTube influencers and product reviewers. They want that ecosystem on their own website. So I think they’re going to continue to encourage video and other types of content. I mean they’ve already done it with enhanced brand content. I think they’re going to allow brand owners to really build out their brand on Amazon.
So with the storefront and video content, enhanced brand content, really nice photos, and I even think on listings they’ll – right now you only see really big brands, but you see the brand name. Instead of it being text you see a logo there for some of the really big brands. My guess is that they’re going to roll that out to people who are brand registered, that that might be something they’re going to have for everyone because it seems to me that Amazon wants people to build out their brand on Amazon, and that’s something they can set them apart from Walmart, Jet, other places like that is all the sellers are taking the time to build out a brand presence on Amazon. They’re probably not doing that on other platforms. So they can kind of really separate themselves there.
CAMERON YODER:
Well, one final thing for you. And Kyle, I want to thank you so much for taking time out of your day just to be here and talking to us about video and what’s next potentially for Amazon when it comes to creatives and everything in between. For our listeners, what piece of advice, what one thing do you think that our listeners should focus on? We’re getting close to the new year right now, so what do you think that sellers should focus on at the beginning of next quarter, and what are you going to focus on at the beginning of the new year?
KYLE GOGUEN:
Okay, so the first one, first piece of advice I’d have is kind of a trick that I’ve been using that I forgot to mention earlier, so I’ll take this opportunity to mention it. So with video what we’ve also done is in our follow-up email sequences that go to customers, we let them know that they can click a link to go watch videos to learn more about the product that they purchased, and where we’re sending them is to a page on our Amazon storefront. So that is within terms of service since we’re sending them within Amazon’s own website. So it’s just a great way to get people to see your own videos if they haven’t already. It also gives the opportunity to cross-sell some other products within that video or maybe on the same page. And I think a really great use, which we don’t do because we don’t need to, but like I said with a technical product if you have a how-to video and you have it on your storefront and you send people there, you’re going to prevent all kinds of negative reviews, or returns or questions. You can send them there and explain exactly how a product should be used. That’s just going to be a great customer experience and help kind of your whole product overall. So I recommend doing that if you’ve got video already and aren’t doing that right now.
CAMERON YODER:
That’s good.
KYLE GOGUEN:
And for I guess your second question was what we as a company are focusing on the beginning of next year. So the main thing we’re going to be doing is just really ramping up product development. So we’re going to be trying to launch between two and four new products every month and really kind of set up a system where we are constantly finding, launching and kind of adding products to our catalog in a very consistent way and successful way because right now we’ve kind of done it piecemeal as things come up. So I really want to get more focused on that and set up the systems that will allow us to kind of scale that process.
CAMERON YODER:
Sure. Well, hey, that’s good to hear, and that’s good advice. Kyle, you’ve been awesome. You’re in such a good spot, and you’ve had such great opportunity really to know video, number one, but get a lot of good and early experience with a lot of these things that honestly not a lot of sellers have had experience with. So thank you so much for sharing your own experiences with us and for giving your advice. It’s been awesome.
KYLE GOGUEN:
Yeah, of course. I’m happy to do it. Thanks for having me.
Merry Christmas listeners! We’ve got a present for you: 7 tips for your FBA business courtesy of our CEO, Casey Gauss. As you set your business goals for 2018, these tips will help you focus on what will take your business to the next level. Looking to sell for the first time? Even better. Listen closely for advice about what pitfalls to avoid and what will set you apart from other Amazon Sellers.
Check out this brief overview or this longer walkthrough of Product Discovery to learn more about how Product Discovery leverages data to help you find the most profitable Amazon products to source.
Reinvesting your Q4 profits is the best way to get the most out of your extra earnings. Think about what seasonal products you might be able to turn around in time for upcoming Q1 holidays.
Looking for more reliable information from the Viral Launch? Check out our Dispelling Myths Series. Viral Launch takes on 4 common myths in the Amazon FBA community.
Want to be on the show? Have your own story of entrepreneurial success? We’re working on an episode that features our listeners! Leave us a voicemail at (317) 721-6590 with stories or questions about your Amazon business.
Podcast Transcript
CAMERON YODER:
Merry Christmas, everyone, and happy New Year. It’s the holiday season and the end of Q4 2017. As we head into 2018 we want to help you focus on what’s going to make your business as profitable and successful as possible.
CASEY GAUSS:
Today I’m giving out seven tips to grow your FBA business to help you get in the success mindset heading into the New Year. I am Casey Gauss.
CAMERON YODER:
And I’m Cameron Yoder, your hosts for Follow the Data: Your Journey to Amazon FBA Success. In this show we leverage the data we’ve accumulated at Viral Launch from over 28,000 product launches and our experience working with 6500 brands to help you understand the big picture when it comes to Amazon and, more importantly, the best practices for success as an Amazon seller. Let’s dive in.
CASEY GAUSS:
Cool, guys. So we’ll start kind of in the source, launch, dominate order. Tip number one coming to you through the kind of source perspective, tip number one is pay attention to the sales-to-review ratio when entering a market. Really what this means, you know, we call this the ROI ratio, but really what sales-to-review ratio is, it’s just a very simple calculation, estimated monthly sales divided by total review quantity, and really this is a calculation that does two things for you. One, it is showing you kind of what the reward is versus the amount of work you have to put in. So if I want the reward of selling 1000 units of this widget per month, then the amount of work I have to put in is to get to, you know, X number of reviews. So let’s say 100 reviews, right? So if I only need to get 100 reviews to sell 1000 units, that’s a sales review ratio of 10. And that sounds like a pretty awesome scenario considering or assuming that all the other metrics are good, so price point, margin and so forth. But you know that’s far better than having to get 10,000 reviews to sell 1000 units, right? So the sales-to-review ratio, just a really simple quick calculation to, you know, as this kind of litmus test for should I consider this market or not.
CAMERON YODER:
I’m still amazed at how many people don’t take this into consideration when entering new markets. And it’s a really simple concept. Like it doesn’t have to be that complicated. Really it makes sense if you’re looking at a market and you see a bunch of sales and a ton of reviews, then of course you’re going to have to, in order to compete well, have to get that review count up to match what the market’s at. But if you’re in a market with a low number of reviews and high sales, obviously that’s opportune for you to enter and do well.
CASEY GAUSS:
Yeah. Thanks, Cam. So tip number two, go wide, not deep. So a lot of people are always looking for that home run product that is going to, you know, make them wealthy overnight. We have a guy named Brock Johnson coming onto the podcast. In six months he sold like $6 million worth of one product. That’s a unicorn. It’s very tough to find unicorns if you’ve never seen one. So anyways, you know, it’s so much more practical to be able to go really wide and not very deep. So what that looks like is, you know, if I were jumping into selling on Amazon this is the strategy that I would take because this is what I see kind of a lot of people having success with. Anyways, what this looks like is going after products where maybe the maximum sales potential for that market is $10,000 or $15,000, $20,000, some fairly low amount. I guess it’s all relative because for a lot of people $10,000 a month is insane. But essentially what you’re looking to do is enter markets where competition is not very high and you know, there’s lessons in it for the big players with the big budgets who are going to, you know, maybe use black hat tactics against you or whatever to come into the market and try to hurt you and your business.
I see this all the time with supplements and cell phone cases and beauty products. You know, what happens is people end up – competitors will buy your products. They’ll say that they’re getting the products – you’re selling it new, but it’s coming used, you know, the seal was broken, or they up-vote your bad reviews, or they leave a bunch of bad reviews, or they leave a bunch of unverified five-star reviews to make it look like you are going and soliciting these reviews. There’s so many things that competitors will do, and it’s just such a headache to fight in these markets, especially if the markets are mature. It takes a lot of time, a lot of money to reach maximum sales potential versus going in these, you know, markets that are not very deep where you’re making, you know, $10,000 a month top line.
The nice thing about it is you don’t really have to worry about competitors if you find the right markets. It’s extremely easy to enter. You don’t have to spend that much time, that many resources, like achieving success with these products. It’s so easy to do that. And so I would much rather sell 10 products that do $10,000 a month than one product that’s doing 100 K a month, and the reason being, again, competition, ease of entry. A lot of the time going for these, you know, smaller products, it takes 30 days to reach maximum sales potential, or maybe 60 days to reach maximum sales potential and boom, you’re off to the next product. And you can just continue to iterate from there versus going after these $100,000 a month markets generally assuming that there is some degree of maturity around it. It’s going to take you quite a long time.
So I see plenty of people just going – you know, the biggest account that I know of these people that are going, you know, in these wide markets, or going wide versus deep is $30 million a year just in Amazon US. So these guys have a killer business, and they’re just going after all the, you know, low-hanging fruit opportunities. And I would highly suggest anyone jump into there that can or is looking to start sourcing in a different strategy or whatever. I think this is probably the fastest, simplest, you know, lowest headache opportunity to growing your business quickly.
CAMERON YODER:
I would even say – I would add to that a couple years back I think this looked a little bit different just because the market, the Amazon market as a whole, was pretty different where competition with the deeper markets was a little bit less than it is now. Not to say that going deep was better than going wide, but even now since competition is so fierce, especially in those deep markets, going wide is going to let you really look into those markets that people haven’t discovered yet and/or are definitely not as competitive as the deep ones.
CASEY GAUSS:
Yeah, completely agree. Awesome. So we will move on to the launch phase of your FBA journey. Tip number one, you know, I would still – we’ve been trying to, you know, kind of preach this so sorry if you’ve already heard this, but so many people still have not, and I think it is just a very, very simple hack to potentially dramatically increasing your sales. And what that is is you need to include both plural and singular forms of your words in your listings title. So in Amazon’s style guides or guidelines they say you don’t need to include both singular and plural forms. And they say that Amazon, you know, they already account for this in their algorithm, but it’s absolutely untrue. You know, just one quick anecdote. Someone is running a launch for grill gloves. I believe they had gloves in their title, but they were running a launch for a grill glove, and for a grill glove though, the key word that they’re targeting, they hit page 2 like top of page 2 for the launch and they were, you know, kind of disappointed that they didn’t hit page 1. But if you went and looked for the plural form, grill gloves, they were like in the top 10 on page 1 even though they weren’t targeting that word just because it was in the title. And so basically that just goes – and we see this all the time. So this just goes to show that, you know, Amazon does treat singular and plural forms of words differently. I mean if you want to go prove it or test it out for yourself literally search grill glove. Search grill gloves. There’s going to be different search results or in different orders. If there’s not, go try other words, fish oil, fish oils. Just go try a few singular and plural forms of the same word and you’ll see different order of words, different results, and the title has a lot to do with this. So it’s a very quick fix. But like, you know, seriously, the difference in ranking or the amount of keyword power that you’re driving to one word could be the difference of thousands of dollars, tens of thousands of dollars in revenue every month.
CAMERON YODER:
That’s an easy action step, too.
CASEY GAUSS:
So easy.
CAMERON YODER:
To simply go over, go over listing and see if you have both plural and singular forms of your main keywords.
CASEY GAUSS:
Yep, and then the second part to that tip is just don’t repeat words. So you know, let’s say this grill glove seller, they have grill glove then grill gloves and barbecue grill gloves in their title. You don’t need to repeat all those words. It should be in phrase order. So ideally as much as possible, right, so it would be something like, you know, grill gloves, best glove for grilling, or you know something like that. That was just off the top of my head, so probably wasn’t the best. But anyways, you kind of get the gist there. But anyways yeah, you have to have – even if it doesn’t make 100% sense, you know, let’s say you’re selling one glove. You should still have “gloves” in your title because people are searching gloves. Or let’s take a grill brush for example. People are inevitably searching grill brushes, right? Even though you’re only selling one brush you have to have the plural form because people are searching brushes, and by having that in your title when sales are driven through your listing you’re driving that much more power to the ranking for that plural form.
CAMERON YODER:
And by not you’re missing out on all that opportunity.
CASEY GAUSS:
Right. And competitors are. And then second tip for the launch phase is just being aggressive. We just see so many people kind of, you know, tiptoeing to success or waiting kind of for the success to come to them, and it’s just less and less likely every day as competition continues to increase. You really have to go after that success, and I mean really looking at opportunity costs. If you are taking six months to get a product up and, you know, hitting maximum sales potential you’re missing out on so much opportunity. If you did that and if you were more aggressive, hit maximum sales potential in three months you would have twice as much time to go after that second opportunity. And so now you have, you know, let’s say you repeat that with a second product, and so then within six months you have two products at maximum sales potential versus the one. So by going slow, yes it is probably more cost-effective or more cost-efficient, right? So you don’t spend as much money going and achieving that success, but by spending that money and being aggressive you have the opportunity to make that much more money.
CAMERON YODER:
We’re getting into the New Year now, and we’re going to touch more on New Year tactics later. But really this aggressiveness, this tip to be aggressive is a great one to hold onto moving into 2018, even to now, and understand it’s getting close to the end of 2017 and everyone’s going to be spending time with their family and the holidays and whatnot. But planning ahead for 2018, to actually sit down and plan how you’re going to be aggressive is honestly a great strategy, just to even plan it out and see what it looks like for you specifically. Again, reevaluating your goals and setting new goals to just flat out be aggressive among other things. But Casey, let’s move on to dominate. What have you got?
CASEY GAUSS:
Yeah, so three tips under dominate. First one, just reinvest your Q4 profits. I mean hopefully Q4 has been, you know, an amazing experience for you. Hopefully you broke some records and are just super, you know, proud of yourself and excited for what you’ve been able to accomplish. But you know, at least for my personality and if you, again, really look at the opportunity that still exists in the market, I think you really owe it to yourself and, you know, all the people that you are planning on helping with what you’re achieving here with your Amazon FBA business to just go super hard and reinvest those profits. You know, delay getting that Lamborghini or going on, you know, these month-long vacations. You still have so much opportunity. The last thing you want to do when you look back five years from now, 10 years from now is say dang, you know, that was a gold rush and I went to the Bahamas for a month while everybody else is panning for gold and hitting all these opportunities and, you know, I missed out. So anyways, reinvest your Q4 profits. The amount of success that we are seeing on Amazon is just insane, even to this day, and I just really want to encourage you to continue to take part in it. Delay the, you know, instant gratification, the short-term gratification for the long-term goals. So yeah, just reinvest your Q4 profits. Kind of a little reminder there.
Tip number two is go international. So we are planning on having some guys on the podcast that I met recently, and these guys did – in their first year of Amazon they did $10 million.
CAMERON YODER:
They’re killing it.
CASEY GAUSS:
And some other fun facts for you is one of them, still in school full time, and they are both 20 years old. And the other fun fact for you is that they have never sold anything in Amazon US, only international. There is so much opportunity internationally. You know, these guys, you know, they’ll share their story and everything, but there is just so much opportunity internationally. The competition is a fraction of what it is in Amazon US, and I really think that you need to take your resources, you know, hire someone, bring someone on your team to be general manager of internationalization or marketplace director. I don’t know, somebody to go manage your international business.
But there is so much opportunity, and you really want to get in on the ground floor. I mean a lot of the like really successful folks in Amazon US that I know are all people that jumped in in 2014 or maybe 2015, and they went super hard when Amazon was so much easier. And now that Amazon has, you know, really dramatically increased competition and there’s so many additional sellers here, a lot more money going into driving success, it’s so much more difficult. But if you go look in the international markets, in the majority of these markets it’s Amazon 2014 still. And so you need to get in on the ground floor when, you know, Amazon is still – you need to ride that wave of success. So you know you’re on the ground floor. Revenue or revenue potential is just going to continue to increase internationally, but so will competition. And if you’re in, you know, on the ground floor you already will be ranking. You’ll already have the review quantity, and you can just ride that wave up.
CAMERON YODER:
It’s going to be – granted, it’s going to be a little bit different. I don’t think you should go into international markets expecting the same exact process as the United States, but these guys that we’re going to bring on later are examples that, guys, there are no excuses. At 20 years old they are killing it. They’re making bank, and they haven’t sold a single thing in the United States. So if that’s not proof as to what can be possible in international markets, then I don’t know what is. But that, I think that should be part of your long-term strategy, planning, right, to sit down and if international is something you’re interested in, find out more about it, do your research, and then dive in. All right, Casey, what’s tip number three?
CASEY GAUSS:
Tip number three, so basically just never go out of inventory. We see so many people make this mistake, and you know, sometimes it’s inevitable. Sometimes your projections are way off, which is a good thing hopefully. But anyways, there can just be a lot of, you know, downside to going out of inventory. So essentially, you know, just make sure that you are planning accordingly. You know, look at something like market intelligence where you’re able to see kind of the market trends and understand to what degree sales are increasing, decreasing and, you know, how long the increase or decrease will sustain just so you have a really accurate, you know, indication of what to expect or how the market will perform over the, you know, coming X number of months that you need to plan inventory for. And then secondly, like so it may be too late, or it’s probably pretty close to too late if it’s not already.
CAMERON YODER:
Honestly, actually yeah, by the time this podcast is out it’s probably going to be too late depending on the production time for your product.
CASEY GAUSS:
Yeah, I mean so the Chinese New Year is coming up, and I think it’s like early February to early March. Factories are closed down for a month, and before and after that, you know, it’s like, it’s just crazy production because they’re trying to fit everything in before and after for all the people that missed out. And so hopefully you’ve already ordered your inventory in preparation for Chinese New Year, especially if you’re wanting to launch new products. If not, like that can delay your time to getting that product up and running, you know, so far. But yeah.
CAMERON YODER:
This – it’s Friday, December 22nd, and I do know that a lot of manufacturers are taking orders this week in order to get products to you before the Chinese New Year. But with this area specifically, talking about inventory, guys, I honestly think it’s much better to play safe than sorry with this. And so it’s better to overcompensate for inventory here. And sure, you’re going to spend maybe a little bit more money, and you need to figure out how much money you have to play around with ordering inventory and different strategies with that. But it’s better to order a little bit more inventory than it is to run out of inventory and have to wait maybe a week to two weeks before you get your next shipment in. So plan ahead. Plan accordingly. Play it a little safe on this one.
CASEY GAUSS:
I think that’s pretty much all for me.
CAMERON YODER:
Yeah, well okay. That’s all for this week. Thank you guys so much for joining us here on Follow the Data. For more FBA tips and reliable information that will help take your Amazon business to the next level, subscribe to the podcast and check out the Viral Launch blog at viral-launch.com.
CASEY GAUSS:
Guys, we’re all Amazon sellers. We know the most difficult part of your Amazon business is getting reviews.
CAMERON YODER:
So hard.
CASEY GAUSS:
So hard. Please help us get reviews. If we could we would go review your product, but we don’t want to get you shut down. But by you reviewing this podcast we will not get shut down, so we would love your help on this. I mean really at the end of the day if you know anything about me or the company, like we just love honest feedback. So whether it’s in a review or whatever, any feedback just so we know how are we doing, what do you guys want to hear, you know, maybe our approach isn’t the best. Maybe you want us to use voice changers because you don’t like our voice, I don’t know. Anyways, we just love feedback. So yeah, thank you so much.
CAMERON YODER:
We’re also doing – we’re currently doing weekly webinars where we’re going through, walking through product discovery and different strategies that you can use to take advantage of the tools. So if you haven’t seen those yet keep an eye out for those. We do it every – typically every Thursday. But again, we just wanted to say thank you so much for listening. Happy holidays. We hope everyone has a great New Year. And don’t forget if you want to be featured on the show, or if you have an Amazon-related question or an idea for an episode you can leave us a voicemail. Our number is 317-721-6590. Until next time, remember the data is out there.
Amazon Europe is as big as Amazon US. Could going international be the next great move for your FBA business? Join Viral Launch CEO Casey Gauss and co-host Cameron Yoder as they talk with Lucy Marshall from World First about incredible opportunity that is Amazon international and how to make the most out of overseas earnings.
Want to be on the show? We’re working on an episode that features our listeners! Leave us a voicemail at (317) 721-6590 with stories or questions about your Amazon business.
Podcast Transcript
CAMERON YODER:
Hey, everybody. Cameron here with Viral Launch. We’re here in Austin, Texas, recording a special episode. Today we are going to talk about internationalization, and it’s internationalization involved with a company called World First. And we’re going to get into a lot of different things today involved with internationalization. But for now I guess I’ll just pass the mic around the table for some introductions.
CASEY GAUSS:
Hey, guys. Casey here. Yeah, hopefully we can bring you guys some decent value as you look to expand internationally. Or maybe you’re an international seller looking to sell in the US. Or maybe you already are. We just want to help make sure that you are being as efficient as possible, making sure you have as much capital as possible to drive success behind your business.
LUCY MARSHALL:
And hi, I’m Lucy Marshall over at World First. I work on our e-commerce team here working with sellers directly to help them take advantage of new marketplaces and have worked previously for private label brands, so kind of understanding from both the brand perspective and the payments international end of that, how to make your brand successful overseas.
CAMERON YODER:
So like Casey touched on a little bit before, we’re trying to provide value for you, whether you’re expanding into international markets, or you’re thinking about expanding into international markets, or just even with your consideration in expanding your private label business in general. We’re going to talk a lot today about kind of everything having to do with those ideas. Part of that will be really having Lucy here explain what World First is and how sellers can prepare for something like expanding into international markets when it comes to what World First provides. So let’s get started.
Lucy, can you explain, just to everyone, give a basic overview of what World First is, like just simple as that?
LUCY MARSHALL:
Absolutely. So what we are is an international payment solution, and we work with corporations and e-commerce sellers to help them send and receive money globally.
We were founded in the UK back in 2004, and really our founder was working at Citibank and kind of saw an opportunity in the market for small- to medium-sized businesses to get better rates for their FX transfers. And that’s kind of blossomed the idea of World First and really being able to give those businesses better access to better rates than some of the larger banking platforms were. Our e-commerce solution really started coming into play in 2007 and coming truly to support the US market in 2014.
Now as we stand about to roll into 2018 we’ve worked with over 40,000 e-commerce sellers with offices worldwide. Whether you’re selling, you know, in China, Japan, Australia, UK, EU, US, Canada, we’ve got someone there to support you and really make sure your business is a success in that market.
CAMERON YODER:
So let’s say a – because you don’t only deal with private label sellers and Amazon, right? Like it’s businesses involved with international transactions, in general?
LUCY MARSHALL:
Absolutely, absolutely. I mean outside of Amazon itself, we’re compatible with 72 marketplaces globally, so it’s not strictly Amazon. Additionally, if you’re a company with an entity in the US and EU we’re able to send those funds back and forth. If you have suppliers overseas you need to make payments to, we can facilitate those payments as well. So it’s not strictly online businesses, but truly any business that needs to make payments or receive payments globally in different currencies.
CAMERON YODER:
So if a private label seller on Amazon comes to you and says – well, is just interested in what you do, what would you tell them, like specifically for them?
LUCY MARSHALL:
So for them what I would say is we’re an international payment solution that will allow for you to set up receiving accounts worldwide. The benefit of being a private label business is you’ve worked to build this brand. Let’s say you want to take that brand to the UK without actually having to make an entity in the UK. We’re able to set up a receiving solution for you so that that way you can receive pounds or receive the local currency and send it back to your US account at about half the cost of what a marketplace would charge. So we’re automatically adding about 2% to your bottom line without any opening fees, monthly fees or closing fees, and it allows for you to move your money from those global markets worldwide.
CAMERON YODER:
So we talked – now that we, I think everyone kind of has a pretty general understanding of what World First is and, or where you guys came from, let’s touch on just internationalization in general, right. So can you tell us from your perspective and World First’s perspective, what are the advantages to selling internationally?
LUCY MARSHALL:
There are so many. I am like the world’s biggest advocate for selling outside of the US right now because I think there are so many fantastic opportunities even just looking at different selling opportunities. Like you’ve got Boxing Day in the UK, and that’s not something we have access to in the States. There is Singles Day in China. If you start selling in the new Australian market that launched you have seasonality, so if you have a summer product in the US and you want to sell that in Australia during the winter you have that opportunity to sell that worldwide. And so for me those are all those advantages, and especially taking advantage of newer markets, it’s less competition. It’s more opportunity. And then even with exchange rates, if you’re selling in the UK it’s often a higher price point, and so you’re getting more return as you’re converting those funds back and those sales back from the UK.
CASEY GAUSS:
Yeah, and building off of what Lucy is talking about, you know collectively – I think we’ve said this before – but collectively the Amazon EU is just as large as Amazon US. And like Lucy said, so much easier to drive success in these markets because competition is so much lower. Obviously there are some hurdles there, and World First is helping you kind of step over some of those. But there is so much opportunity international. We’re super bullish on internationalization and, you know, making sure you’re selling everywhere as much as possible. Amazon is really pushing Amazon EU markets, and so like, you know, Amazon EU is like getting into Amazon US two years ago, maybe three years ago, where competition is just a fraction of what it is now, and you get to essentially ride that wave of success as Amazon continues to grow their dominance in these markets. And so you know, we actually, here in Austin, at Capitalism Conference with Ryan Moran, we actually just met these two guys. After apparently eight months of taking Amazon successfully these guys just reached the $10 million mark.
CAMERON YODER:
They’re killing it.
CASEY GAUSS:
Which is absolutely insane, while going to college – one of them is going to college. And they don’t sell in the US. They’re only selling an international Amazon markets because there is so much opportunity. You know, one of the guys was saying just by the fact that they have a Spanish speaker write their listings for Amazon Spain they’ll get ranking because their keyword structure is so much better. Their listings are so much better written because they have – one of them is a native Spanish speaker. He’s from Venezuela. And he’s just able to write really great listings, and that allows them to rank. So competition is just like, you know, a shadow of what it is in the US, but the opportunity collectively is the same.
CAMERON YODER:
And they have a slight advantage over people in the US having grown up in Europe and kind of understanding the European market. That being said, that – I think their story really shows that’s a very tangible thing to tell you guys that hey, the European market, or the worldwide market is very much alive. Obviously that’s a lot of good opportunity that is there, and they’re not even selling in the US market.
CASEY GAUSS:
Those guys are super smart guys. Like they were going to Dartmouth, and then now he’s going to Cambridge studying mathematics and finance. So they are very smart guys.
CAMERON YODER:
It’s not like you can just pull a trigger and it just like magically happens.
CASEY GAUSS:
But there’s huge opportunity, for sure.
CAMERON YODER:
Okay, so let’s talk a little bit about the UK market specifically. So if someone – let’s say you have a seller in the US who wants to sell in the UK as maybe like their first step internationally. From your perspective and from what you’ve seen, what would be like a good kind of tangible first step leading to that?
LUCY MARSHALL:
So obviously I think first step looking into any market is looking how your product is going to perform in that market and making sure that you’re actually going to be able to make sales from that. No one wants to throw spaghetti against a wall and put their product in Amazon FBA and be like fingers crossed, hope this works. So again, I think that’s such a fantastic thing that Viral Launch can help you with and looking at what your product can do in that market. Next steps from there are a little bit more admin. Like do you have your VAT numbers, which is value-added tax? And Amazon has really been cracking down on that in the past year. I think the stat was they lost out on $1.28 billion in VAT fraud from Amazon sellers specifically not necessarily paying it. And so the UK government has been really upset with Amazon, which means Amazon is like yo, you’ve got to get your VAT numbers in because we will shut down your account. So getting those set up, making sure you have those implications in place ready to pay those taxes. Our service specifically can help you make those payments so that way you’re making a pound-to-pound payment and not having to bring those pounds back to dollars and then send the VAT payment in pounds again.
Next steps from there, shipping, and then translating your labels and your listings if you are private label and selling on those markets. Luckily UK is English-speaking, so not a ton of leg work there. A little bit of localization to make sure – let’s say if you’re selling pants, they become trousers on that marketplace, making sure things are finessed a bit to that space.
CASEY GAUSS:
I really think – well, there’s one area that I see a lot of people focus on when it comes to money, and that’s tax. Like a lot of people, when they think about expanding internationally they think oh, all I need to do, all I need to do is have my taxes, my tax system set up and set in place. They don’t often think about having like a bank set up –
LUCY MARSHALL:
Right.
CASEY GAUSS:
– right? Or this money transfer system set up in place. Do people need to have, need to have or should have like a bank set up in like the UK, or is that something that –?
LUCY MARSHALL:
You don’t necessarily need to have the banking account in the UK, and this is truly where our service comes into play, right? Like if you’re opening a physical bank account you have to pay fees, you have to have a business over there. You have to have a physical entity and then be paying taxes to that country and paying taxes on your business there. If you’re opening an account with us the beauty is we’re able to collect those funds in one of our virtual accounts. You have the banking and routing number and everything that goes along with that. And if you’re choosing to just use a marketplace to manage your FX transfer, they’re typically transferring that at a much higher rate, and they’re doing it biweekly, so that’s not giving you any control or transparency as to how or when to move your funds. If you’re using a platform like ours we can collect the funds, and then you have access to a platform much like your online banking platforms where you can facilitate a trade. You can watch the rates, be aware of what rate exactly you’re moving your funds at, and then we’re usually coming close to cutting those rates in half, so saving up to 2% on your bottom line. So if you are selling, say, 10,000 pounds a month, that’s saving you $200 on your transfers coming back. So that’s not a small fee by any stretch. And again, as you continue to grow your sales that becomes a much bigger chunk of your sales that you should be getting back because you’ve put in all this hard work to get to new markets. Make sure you’re taking the most home from those markets.
CAMERON YODER:
Is there a simple way to explain like, okay, let’s say we have a seller in the US again who sells in the UK. What does a simple process look like to get that money back into the United States? Like can you break that down a little bit?
LUCY MARSHALL:
Yeah, the flow of funds you mean?
CAMERON YODER:
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
LUCY MARSHALL:
Yeah, so what – right now if you were a US seller selling into the UK you would be putting your US bank account into that space. You would put our routing account numbers in there, and that’s in the name of your business. So Amazon now deposits funds into that account, and then we move that back when you’re ready. It’s either an automatic transfer, or you can transfer that online when you’re ready to. If you are a rate watcher and want to see, hey, I saw this go up to, you know, 1.3 today. I’d like to do it at that rate. So there’s really no difference in terms of timing or flow of funds. It’s just Amazon deposits to us, and then we move that back to your US account.
CAMERON YODER:
Okay. What do you see as like maybe the number one or maybe even top couple mistakes that people are making when it comes to like, I don’t know, money transfer and/or sales internationally?
LUCY MARSHALL:
It’s a complete lack of awareness. I think really one of our biggest hurdles as we’re talking to new sellers is they’re not aware that this FX transfer is occurring, and they’re not aware of what rate that that’s happening at. So to me if you’re not watching your bottom line as a seller, like that’s a problem. You need to be making sure that you are getting the most of your sales home. So we’re able to kind of calculate that, and you can look at, say, a daily rate of when Amazon’s transferring your funds and then you know, dividing that by the amount you’re getting back. And usually you can figure out what that daily rate is and through a percent change calculation see, oh, that’s roughly maybe like 4% of my bottom line. And that’s not necessarily super competitive. And also you have no control over it, so that stinks, too. Like you should be in charge of your own money and how and when that’s being moved back.
CAMERON YODER:
Talking about like money saved, right, because this – so this whole process, the goal is to really help sellers save money through a process that maybe they’re not even aware of.
LUCY MARSHALL:
Right.
CAMERON YODER:
How – do you know how much a typical seller will save after like becoming aware of something like this and getting involved with these transactions?
LUCY MARSHALL:
Yeah, and typically that depends on size of the seller, how much you’re moving back. But I would say on average, again, if you’re at that 10,000 pound mark we’re saving about $200 on every transfer. So that’s kind of our best rule of thumb. Obviously if you’re selling like 10 million pounds or something in that range yearly that’s a much, much bigger number. So that does vary depending on the size of the seller and how much you’re bringing home.
CASEY GAUSS:
Yeah, and so how long does it take to set up this whole World First process?
LUCY MARSHALL:
It’s super easy. It’s really only four documents that we need to get you set up. As long as those come in we can have your account set up in a matter of hours, and then the accounts are able to allocate immediately. We have RMs, relationship managers, in-house that can walk you through where and how to put this in on Amazon so everything is done correctly, it’s Amazon-compliant, and then they will walk you through your first trade as well. So it’s really helpful to actually have a voice on the phone and someone to actually talk to rather than, you know, screaming at a computer. I feel like we all do that enough in our day-to-day lives that don’t have to do it on the banking end of things as well.
CASEY GAUSS:
Yeah, so I mean just to break it down, I know everybody’s always so crunched for time. I mean apparently, you know, this is something that you can do in a matter of hours, let’s say, at the most, and you will save hundreds to thousands of dollars a month, which just really adds up over the course of a year, especially when you’re talking about being able to purchase more inventory, get a little bit cheaper rates on your inventory, so you save more money there. And you can – it really just compounds. And so as long as it’s quick, 2% really adds up, especially when you start getting into volume and you add that up over time.
CAMERON YODER:
Right. This is something that not many people know about, especially when it comes to international stuff. I think one thing that is kind of at fault with US sellers is just awareness with all the systems in place, like in VATs. And the story of the guys that we talked about before, the thing about them is that they, again, grew up in that area. And so they definitely have – they’re smart guys, number one, but number two, they do have a pretty good understanding of the space and the area that they’re in, which is Europe. And that definitely has an advantage. And so being aware of something like this, as well as being able to save money to put towards your other resources, like something like this is something that not a lot of people are aware of that we want to provide value to you by making you aware of or having you be aware of it. So Lucy, talking specifically about World First, what unique perspective does World First offer sellers on Amazon?
LUCY MARSHALL:
It’s really the perspective of smartly managing your finance. I mean we are – we really focus on that payments end of it and making sure we’re creating a solution where not only if you’re selling on the UK, but if you’re selling on China, if you’re selling on Japan, if you’re figuring out how to take advantage of that new Australian market, we want to put the pieces in place for you to be able to manage those different aspects of your business and be smart about it financially. In addition to that we do have a very vast partner network. So if you do need help figuring that out we’re kind of a jack of all trades, masters of none outside of that payment space. So we’re really able to figure out where to connect you there, and I just think there’s so much opportunity outside of the domestic US market to go take advantage of that and then really make sure you’re savvy with both your receiving payments from Amazon, but also paying for, and suppliers paying for, and employees, and making sure you have a frictionless way to move your money globally.
CAMERON YODER:
So if, let’s say some of our listeners are even just a little curious about what you’re talking about. What resources would you have for them to even just point them in a specific direction or to get in touch?
LUCY MARSHALL:
Yeah, and there are a couple of different ways. You can just go sign up online. I mean I will give you all my email to post after this. Please reach out directly. I’m more than happy to field calls or answer questions about something. Really our biggest resource are our people. Everyone’s highly educated, not only in the world of FX, but in e-commerce, as well. So I would put ourselves forward as our best resource to do that in addition to, you know, the content we’re putting out on our blog, as well.
CAMERON YODER:
Yeah, gotcha.
LUCY MARSHALL:
Recently we’ve been working not only with sellers that have already expanded to the international markets, but really looking at how we can support those that want to take advantage of it as well. And so we’ve really relied on partners in the field of VAT, shipping, logistics and translation to help kind of those admin pieces of like where do I start to figure out to get my product overseas and get my listings set up and make sure you’re government-compliant with everything that’s happening in the UK and EU as well. So truly I feel like you all are the best first stop for our clients because you’re able to figure out where in the market does someone’s product fit, and will that be successful? And then we can kind of help through the nuts and bolts in terms of figuring out VAT, shipping and the payments piece of it as how you figure out how to manage your global payments.
CAMERON YODER:
Got it.
Thank you guys so much for tuning in. Again, if you have any questions feel free to shoot us an email. We’ll provide all of the content from this podcast in the description.
The holiday season begins in October for Amazon sellers, but it’s not all fun and gifts. Being aware of fee changes, having crucial deadlines circled on your calendar, and optimizing your listing to move sales is just part of the diligent work it takes to beat out the competition and increase profits during the biggest shopping event of the year. Listen in as Casey and Cameron detail how to prepare for success in Amazon Q4.
Oct. 1 – Reduced Fulfillment and Increased Storage fees
Fulfillment Fees will be reduced and will now be consistent with Fulfillment Fees in November and December. With the reduction in Fulfillment Fees, if you reduce the storage space you use in October, you have the opportunity to pay lower total FBA fees in October.
The monthly inventory storage fee for October will be increased for standard-size and oversize items to be consistent with the monthly inventory storage fees for November and December.
Mid-October – FBA Cutoff for new FBA Seller Accounts
This one is for those who have not sent a product into FBA through their seller account. On October 10, 2016, Amazon denied new FBA sellers in anticipation for full warehouses. This year, watch for the same cutoff in mid-October. As confirmed by an Amazon rep, this restriction is account-based, not ASINbased. So if you’re planning to start selling later this fall, send in a few products to FBA now to ensure your eligibility for the 2017 holiday season
Nov. 7 – FBA Inventory Deadline for Black Friday and Cyber Monday
This one is crucial. Make sure you plan to have your Black Friday and Cyber Monday inventory arrive at Amazon before early November (or even well before then, just to be safe).
Nov. 24 – Black Friday
The day after Thanksgiving, regarded as the first day of the traditional shopping season will set the holiday shopping in motion. From now until Christmas, FBA sellers must be on top of their game to capitalize on the immense sales potential.
Nov. 27 – Cyber Monday
comScore reported Amazon ranked #1 among online retailers in Cyber Monday traffic for 2016, and this year will likely follow suit. Gear up for massive sales on November 27th.
Dec. 1 – FBA Inventory Deadline for Sending in Inventory to be Delivered by Christmas
The peak worldwide shipping day during the 2016 holiday season was December 19th. Just because Black Friday and Cyber Monday are over doesn’t mean you should pump the breaks. Make sure your Christmas inventory is in Amazon’s warehouses by the December 1, if not earlier.
Want to be on the show? Leave us a voicemail at (317) 721-6590
Podcast Transcript
Casey Gauss:
In just three months during 2016 Amazon generated almost a third of its yearly revenue, and with growth projections pointing skyward, we’re expecting an even bigger holiday season for Amazon this year.
Cameron Yoder:
Q4 is almost here, and if you’re not already preparing, it’s time to start. Competition is fierce around this time of year, and only those who meet the season head-on will truly benefit from the extraordinary amount of traffic Amazon is likely to see. I’m Cameron Yoder.
Casey Gauss:
And I’m Casey Gauss, your host for Follow the Data: Your Journey to Amazon FBA Success. In this show we’ll leverage the data we’ve accumulated at Viral Launch from over 20,000 product launches and our experience working with 5500 brands to help you understand the big picture when it comes to Amazon and, most importantly, the best practices for success as an Amazon seller.
Cameron Yoder:
We’re taking a break right now from our four-part series on dispelling myths to help you start preparing for the most important sales quarter of the year, yes, Q4. In this episode we’ll run through all of the must-know dates and all the vital prep that will set you up for success for this holiday season.
Casey Gauss:
By the time the episode is over hopefully you’ll have your work cut out for you and a proven prep strategy that will help you take advantage of the crazy Amazon Q4 sales coming your way.
Cameron Yoder:
Q4 2016 on Amazon was an event like the US economy has never seen. In the course of three months Amazon delivered enough men’s jeans – men’s jeans – to fill an Olympic -sized swimming pool. That’s crazy. Customers purchased enough 4K TVs to reach the peak of Mount Everest more than nine times, and 2.5 million watches were purchased. That is a watch sale every 1.5 seconds.
Casey Gauss:
I heard they had to actually go to an Olympic pool to measure the jeans there.
Cameron Yoder:
Yeah, I think you’re right actually.
Casey Gauss:
It’s pretty interesting.
Cameron Yoder:
You know, out of all those TVs I still don’t have a 4K TV.
Casey Gauss:
Missing out man.
Cameron Yoder:
I know.
Casey Gauss:
Viral Launch needs to pay you more.
Cameron Yoder:
Ah, geez.
Casey Gauss:
So Q4 was huge in 2016, and it’s going to be even bigger this year. If you want to claim your share of Q4 sales you need to make sure your business is set up to succeed. Let’s get started.
Cameron Yoder:
Yep. So we’re talking about important dates right now. I would encourage you, if you’re in a spot to be able to write them down or type them out, then follow through with us. But if not, then you can just go back and listen to the podcast and get those dates.
Casey Gauss:
We’ll also have some show notes.
Cameron Yoder:
Yeah, oh yeah, right. Well, I guess that helps, too. So the first date we’re going to talk about is October 1st. Now this is coming up. It’s soon. October 1st is the date where fulfillment fees will reduce and inventory and storage fees will increase.
Casey Gauss:
Amazon does not want to be a warehouse, but they do want to ship your goods when sales are happening, and they want to make sure that they are the warehouse to do that. So definitely make sure that you mark this down. Make sure that you have inventory moving, and ideally, if possible, don’t use Amazon as a storage facility.
Cameron Yoder:
This is – we’ll go through some of this later, but really having your inventory planned and numbers planned kind of goes into account here. Now these numbers, the reductions in fulfillment fees and increase in inventory and storage fees, will go into effect in October, but they’ll last through November and December, so again, throughout that holiday season.
Casey Gauss:
In mid-October last year in 2016 we saw a cut off for new FBA seller accounts.
Cameron Yoder:
Now this was actually kind of crazy for new sellers because Amazon did not announce it beforehand.
Casey Gauss:
Yeah, so if you had $500,000 of inventory that you purchased because you thought you were going to get rich in Amazon Q4 but you hadn’t created your seller account and sent inventory in, like you were just completely screwed. So Cam has got the trick for you.
Cameron Yoder:
I’ve got the trick. Here’s a trick that should work. Again, we’re not claiming that it’s going to work indefinitely for every single person. However, however, we have seen this work for others. So if you are a new FBA seller and you have not sent in inventory yet, here is something you can do to ensure, or hopefully ensure, that you will be able to send in inventory if you plan on getting your inventory in after mid-October, which you should get it in as soon as you can. But if you haven’t created an order yet you should go to the store. You should buy something, and you should send it in to Amazon FBA. Basically you should do what’s called retail arbitrage. So you’re going to go to the store, you’re going to buy something, and you’re going to flip it basically and sell it on Amazon. You’re going create a separate shipping order. If you need instructions on how to do that just Google Amazon retail arbitrage or how to ship retail arbitrage stuff into Amazon, and it will take you through it. But basically by doing this you are creating a shipping order for Amazon which will basically get that one, that one or that first shipping order out of the way, and Amazon will then allow you to create another shipping order once your inventory gets in or is on its way.
Casey Gauss:
Next date is November 7th. This is the inventory deadline for Black Friday and Cyber Monday, and this does not mean send your last shipment on November 6th at midnight. It takes time to get your stuff checked into FBA, and during the holiday season Amazon is definitely ramping up staff to make sure that they can process all the inventory and all the orders. But sometimes there’s major delays, and you know we’ve definitely had friends that their inventory gets stuck in customs, or it gets stuck in FBA going through the check-in process. So the earlier you can get your inventory in in preparation for Black Friday/Cyber Monday, the better, and the more likely it is that you are able to guarantee that you’ll have the inventory you want to sell.
Cameron Yoder:
So if you want to make some crazy good sales for Black Friday and Cyber Monday, have your inventory in before November 7th. Again, in Amazon. Now as for Black Friday and Cyber Monday, Black Friday is on the 24th of November, and Cyber Monday is on the 27th. So again, November 7th, 24th, 27th. Cyber Monday was – this is just a little fact — but Amazon reportedly ranked number one among online retailers for Cyber Monday traffic in 2016. We’re assuming it’s the same thing for 2017.
Casey Gauss:
Yep, and then final date just to be aware of, December 1st is the deadline to send inventory in to be delivered by Christmas. Again, please expect delays. Do not expect things to go quickly. Make sure that you have your inventory in as quick as possible. Another interesting little fact is the peak worldwide shipping day in 2016 was December 19th.
Cameron Yoder:
Geez. I want to reiterate the deadlines. Again, mid-October is at — unconfirmed, again unconfirmed cut off for new FBA sellers. November 7th is the deadline to have your stuff in for Black Friday and Cyber Monday. December 1st is that Christmas inventory deadline.
Casey Gauss:
So next we want to talk about optimizing your listings in preparation for Q4. You know, really at the end of the day this should go without saying, but we kind of want to dive in a little bit. You need to have your ducks in a row for Q4 because this is the biggest shopping season – not single-day; that’s Prime Day assumedly – this is the biggest shopping season of your career. Like it’s not worth cutting the corners or, you know, being lazy and just expecting the money to roll in. Will some money role in? For sure. But if you could be making tens of thousands of dollars more by taking an extra day or two extra days, it’s totally worth it.
Cameron Yoder:
And all this stuff, I mean this advice for optimizing the quality of your product, should be taken into account every single day for the rest of the year.
Casey Gauss:
For sure.
Cameron Yoder:
But it’s going to matter probably the most around this time of the year.
Casey Gauss:
Yeah, everything is just amplified. Cam, let’s talk about photography.
Cameron Yoder:
Yeah, let’s talk about it. Let’s talk about photos, yo. With photography, honestly, the most important thing is to have high-quality, a high-quality professional hero image that stands out to accentuate all product features. It tells a story, or your photos in general tell a story, and establish and build an emotional connection with whoever is seeing it. What do people see when they search for products? Your photo. They see your photos. They see your listing. So having something that’s really well done in that realm, in the realm of photography, is going to be important. I think, from what I’ve seen after talking with a lot of sellers, people get lost in their own photography. And personally I think they need to – I think sellers need to get the opinion of other people that they trust to tell them what they think about their photos. It could be going to like five people and asking them, hey, what do you think of these photos? Are they good, or are they not?
Casey Gauss:
And don’t even tell them that they’re your photos. And you become emotionally attached to your product and whatever materials are surrounding it. And so you are obviously biased that your photos are good, or your photos are better than the competition, and you would just not believe the photos that we have seen where sellers, you know, asking us to optimize their listing or help them increase sales. And you know we just see the images, and it’s absolutely insane that these guys think they’re great. You know it’s hard for us. We want to be nice –
Cameron Yoder:
Of course, of course.
Casey Gauss:
– and say hey, you know, we think you should maybe consider getting or improving your images. And then, you know, they’re like oh no, I’ve had professionals do that.
Cameron Yoder:
They’re good. They’re good to go.
Casey Gauss:
And it’s like it’s just absolutely laughable. And so you know, you’re probably not a creative. You’re probably not the best judge to say whether or not your photos are as optimized as possible. Definitely using split testing to get some data around, you know, what is the best image, what is the best main image, what is the best photo set, what is the best order of my photo set? These are all things that we’re constantly split testing because we want to understand what makes the best photo sets possible. How can we improve sales as best as possible? Definitely, like Cam was saying, having a high-quality main image is important. If you’re having someone shoot photos, have them shoot three or four different potential hero images so that you can identify this one is driving the most clicks; this one is driving the most sessions. Typically it’s not the main image. The main image is just driving clicks. Definitely invest in some high-quality lifestyle shots so customers can really build an emotional connection to your product so you can really tell that story. See much better conversion rates when we have high-quality lifestyle photos. You just cannot supplement those with some Photoshopped who knows what.
Cameron Yoder:
Let’s move on. Let’s move on to listing. Casey, what you got?
Casey Gauss:
You cannot have temporary language, or you’re not supposed to have temporary language in your listings. I have a friend; they’re doing like 150 K a day, and they had their entire account suspended because they had the term “holiday sale” in the title of one of their listings, just one of their listings. Their entire 150 K-a-day operation was suspended for a little over a week, which is pretty insane. So please do not use holiday type language. Some of your competitors will get away with it. Some of your competitors will not. So if that’s a gamble you want to play, I mean –
Cameron Yoder:
It’s not worth it, in my opinion.
Casey Gauss:
Yeah, I mean yeah, that’s completely your call. Definitely make sure that, again, everything is as optimized as possible. Make sure that your language is tailored to the holiday shopper, but again, don’t use that temporary language like sale, holiday, unless holiday is very descriptive of what the product is. Backend keywords, really backend search terms just don’t matter very much. I mean, at the end of the day you only need to include a word one time in your listing. Keywords in your title are much more heavily ranked than anywhere else in the listing. So if you should be worrying about anything, it’s your title. You should be keyword stuffing as much as possible, as much as possible while still giving like a cohesive title so you can maximize the number of keywords and the total views possible for your listing.
Cameron Yoder:
There is a confirmed limit on – basically byte limits for the backend keywords. In the United States it’s 250, but again, that’s 250 without – or characters without spaces for indexing from the backend, 500 in Japan, 200 in India.
Casey Gauss:
Yeah, and, you know, at the end of the day, again, you should not be repeating those backend search terms. So everybody’s like all up in the air about backend search terms, and in reality that’s only 250 characters. There’s so many – I don’t remember of the top of my head anymore – but you have, you know, 100 characters in the title, 100 characters in the five bullet points on your listing and then 2000 characters in your description. So why are you so, you know, worked up over this portion of your listing that’s not even 10% of your listing’s content? Anyways, basically use backend search terms. Don’t repeat any words that you’ve repeated or already put in the front end of the listing. Just don’t worry about them.
Cameron Yoder:
Hey, thank you so much for joining us for part one of our Q4 episode. Feel free to join Casey and I for part two where we’ll talk about the role of enhanced brand content in optimizing your listing, as well as inventory planning and the best way to perfectly time a product promotion to make it big this Q4. I promise you won’t want to miss it.
Viral Launch CEO, Casey Gauss, and Amazon Seller Coach Cameron Yoder bring data-driven insights to the Seller community in their weekly discussions.
On the show you’ll get the latest Amazon selling strategies and best practices based on the company’s experience launching over 22,000 products and working with over 5,500 brands. Casey and Cam will bring you up to speed on the latest Amazon news, share stories of success and failure, explore the difficulties of entrepreneurship, and discuss the way Amazon is changing retail.
At the center of the show is the Viral Launch commitment to offering reliable information to today’s entrepreneurs.
