This sounds like an easy thing to do. It’s
not. Answering customer questions can have a big influence on your sales, but
you have to do it right.
First of all, don’t use a script or a
canned answer. People notice. It makes you look like you can’t be bothered.
Answer each question with a fresh answer. Take the question seriously and
answer it specifically.
Everybody thinks they can write, but
copy-writing is a skill that has to be learned. Good copy-writing can make a
huge difference to your sales, because it makes the difference between getting
your customer excited about your product, and leaving them unimpressed. At the
same time, you’ll want to get your keywords into the page so that search engine
and human readers both get what they need to know.
A lot of copy-writing is not about
beautiful writing but about getting the structural basics right. These are:
You need to get your product from the
supplier to Amazon’s warehouses. Put that way, it sounds easy. But it might
involve quite a few different steps – it’s not as easy as sending a letter to
your mom by USPS.
• ‘Incoterms’ stands for ‘international trade terms’, a bunch of standardised arrangements for shipping. That means you don’t have to negotiate every single little thing, and it also means you know who is responsible for the goods at each stage of the journey. Let’s sum the incoterms up in a list.
• EXW means ‘ex works’. Once the factory has the
goods on the loading dock, their responsibility is at an end – they don’t have
to load the truck, get the goods to the port, arrange for the shipping or
customs. You also take on the risk when it leaves the factory, so you need
insurance.
The first key to getting the most out of
trade shows is to prepare properly. Eighty percent of your returns will come
from doing the right prep.
Don’t just turn up. Pre-register. You’ll
get a confirmation you can print out, which will save you queuing. You’ll also
most likely get access to more information by pre-registering, which will help
your preparation.
Research the exhibitor list. Decide who you
want to see, and try to set up appointments in advance, mentioning your main
interests. That way you are expected, someone will already have prepared
appropriate materials for you, and you’ll get to see a salesperson, not someone
who’s just paid to hand out brochures.
Everyone knows that you really need to rank
on the first page for Amazon search. But fewer people realize just how
important it can be to have your product grab the number one spot on page one.
According to one survey we’ve seen, click
through rates for the top ranked product are more than double those for the
second rated product. The top ranked products get nearly a third of total
clicks. The third, fourth and fifth ranking products get smaller portions, but
the fall isn’t nearly so steep as it is between the two top products. So the
message is; if you come first, you get the lion’s share of click-throughs.
It’s worth fighting as hard as you can to
get to number one. On the other hand, it’s not worth duking it out to go up
from, say, four to three.
Okay, let’s say you want to do “zero
to hero” in just a couple of months. Can it be done?
When your productivity suffers, your
business suffers. A lot of the time, you’re probably spending your effort on
things that don’t need it. So here are a few tips for improving your profitability.
1. First of all, have a disposable e-mail address. Sometimes, just contacting a supplier means you’ll be getting all kinds of special offers and newsletters from them for ever after, even if you don’t end up doing business with them. Use a disposable address for first contacts and then you can always junk it; keep your real email for real suppliers and customers (and Amazon, of course).
2. Remember a picture is worth a thousand words. Skitch from Evernote is a great tool that lets you create images and, even better, easily provide input on images – for instance drawing an arrow to show the crucial aspects of a product or ringing the letter that’s wrong in the product name. Particularly if you’re dealing with suppliers for whom English isn’t a first language, this is a great way to get your point across. It’s also a fantastic tool for brainstorming with team members.
So often, a product is just ticking along
quite nicely on Amazon when it could be a real barnstormer. Or it’s not doing
anything much, when it could be selling steadily. The difference is in the
detail – so tweaking your sales listing and advertising could do the trick and
help it achieve its potential.
First of all, look at your listing title.
You have up to 250 characters there, so if all you’re saying is “tea
towel”, you’ve given up prime real estate with nothing to show for it.
Have a think about what tea towel buyers want – they want to know what color,
is it cotton, will it fit their interior design style? So take up some of those
250 characters and let them know, it’s blue and white striped, 100% cotton,
French cottage or farmhouse style – zap! You’re selling!
The same way, “lucky horseshoe
charm” doesn’t convey nearly as much information as “SweetiePie brand
lucky horseshoe charm for bracelet – hallmarked sterling silver jewelry”
which gives your brand, what the charm is intended for, and the fact that it’s
real sterling silver (or “925” – that is, 92.5% pure silver).
Many FBA sellers get started with a single
product. They spend a lot of time researching suppliers, get a shortlist, get
samples and T&Cs, choose their supplier, and get the product shipped. And
then for their next product they go through the whole process all over again.
That can be really time-consuming. Imagine
if you spent hours going through your shopping list and deciding which
supermarket to visit for each item. You’d never get anything else done! So you
need a long-term purchasing strategy.
First of all, unless you’re a very
fast-moving business trying to grab trends quick and exploit them fast, it
makes sense to build long-term relationships with your supplier. That’s the
same whether you’re buying through Alibaba, from a Chinese manufacturer
directly, or in the US or elsewhere.
Your Amazon Storefront is a micro-site
within Amazon which showcases all your products and has information about your
brand. It’s really useful if you have a particular niche such as stationery and
art supplies, pet products, or cookware, or a target customer such as DIY
enthusiasts or lovers of the outdoors.
It gives you a place to do a bit of
storytelling about your brand and its values, to assert your credentials and to
get potential buyers interested.
While your product pages have to obey
strict rules, such as photos against a white background, you have much more
control over the look and feel of your Storefront. With 2.4 million sellers on
Amazon, this is your chance to stand out!
We usually focus on success stories. But
it’s fair enough to say that a lot of FBA businesses do just about okay, and
some are really quite epic failures.
We’re not going to be negative. We’re actually
being quite positive here, because the really big failures usually stem from
one of a relatively small number of problems – and when you know what the
mistakes are, you’re much less likely to make them!
Let’s take the two most dangerous mistakes first.
(This is our version of learning how to put the brakes on before we let you out
on the highway.) They are the dangerous mistakes because they can lose you a
whole lot of money. Other mistakes will usually just stop you achieving a
profit or a worthwhile profit (working for a year to establish a business
turning over $100 a month is pretty sad).
First, spending on PPC advertising without
setting some targets and some limits. If the problem lies elsewhere, no amount
of advertising is going to get you sales – but it will cost you money. Setting
a limit is easy to do, so do it!
If you own a brand on Amazon FBA, you can
bundle your products to create an all-in-one package. That’s an advantage that
unbranded sellers don’t have, and it can help you sell more product at better
margins.
First, think of your customers. What are
the experiences that are likely to lead them to want a package? For instance,
“I just got a new puppy, what do I need?”
If you’re in this space, a chew toy,
harness and leash, litter tray, food bowl, water bowl, collar with name-tag,
and puppy bed all packaged together could make a great package for first time
dog owners.
“My granddaughter’s moving into her
own apartment…what can I get her?” If you have kitchen products for
instance, a gift pack bundling things she’ll find useful with some appealing
items – spatula, measuring cups, pans, a recipe book and some spice packets –
could sell well.
Fads can make you a fortune fast. Two kids
who were among the first to sell fidget spinners in 2016 made $350,000 in just
six months.
But the problem with fads is that they can
die very quickly. First, the big guys notice the market, create their own
products, and use their immense economies of scale to bring the price down.
Fidget spinners started at $25 and ended up selling for $5 each by mid 2017.
And eventually, a fad has nowhere to go. I
saw a market trader trying to sell some a while back – three for a buck! (I
wonder what he paid for them?)
It’s true – more and more people are buying
groceries on Amazon. Partly because of Covid-related concerns about visiting
big stores, or because of local lock downs, partly for convenience –
particularly for people who are working at home, and partly for choice. A year ago, about a third of US customers had
bought groceries on Amazon – now it’s well over 40%.
Some specialty foods are particularly
difficult to get if you don’t have much choice where you shop – for instance
for those living in small country towns. Gluten free, Kosher, and Vegan
specialties aren’t always available while many consumers want to know they’re
eating Fair Trade or Organic food. These could all be good niches.
But selling groceries on Amazon is a bit
tougher than selling dog chews or pencil sharpeners. Amazon needs to know
you’re not going to poison anyone, and it also needs to know you’re a reliable
distributor. So first of all, check whether you’re automatically approved (if
you have a good track record, that could happen), or get approved by providing
a purchase invoice from a manufacturer or wholesaler for at least ten units as
well as live photos of the product and packaging.
Amazon Seller Central provides far more
data than most sellers ever use. It will tell you about your stranded
inventory, it gives you advertising reports, sales totals, page traffic, FBA fulfillment
reports. There’s a whole lot there, but you need to cut through the plethora of
data to get to the essentials.
Essential 1. This is your conversion rate,
shown as ‘unit session percentage’. A conversion rate of 5-10% is good; that’s
better than most websites, as people tend to go to Amazon when they are ready
to buy, not just looking for general information. If you have a conversion rate
lower than 5% then you have an issue.
That could mean your listings page isn’t
good enough. Do you use A+ content? If you qualify for it, you should
definitely use it. Do you have great images and a good video?
It might mean you have bad reviews. You’ll
need to do something about that. Or it could mean your price is too high –
check comparative listings.
Packaging design is partly about branding –
and we’ll get on to that later. But there are also a few things that need to be
on your packaging, and without which, you won’t be able to sell – or worse,
you’ll be doing so illegally. Don’t worry, it’s not too difficult to comply
with the regulations, as long as you carry out the following steps.
1. One of the most important things that
needs to go on your packaging is your FNSKU – the stock number that Amazon issues
you when you create your listing. You could ask your supplier to put it on with
a sticker, or actually print it on the packaging (for instance if you’re using
a cardboard box).
You can also get Amazon to do it – but that
costs money. It’s much better to get it done by your supplier. (You’ll need to
generate a pdf file from Seller Central, where it says ‘Print item labels’.)
There are a good number of ways that you
can kickstart a new product. That’s good, because Amazon is a very, very big
marketplace and it’s not easy to get your product noticed.
For instance, you could use a ‘deals’ site
to promote your product. Use Seller Central to create your coupon codes, and
give those away via the site. For real impact, try half price, or even 70% or
90% off, just to get the ball rolling. Remember, this isn’t a loss making
product, it’s a marketing investment.
The idea is to get people who would be
“kind of” interested in your product at the regular price to say
“hey, at this price it’s a no-brainer”. You’ll be able to rack up
some sales quickly that way. However, ensure you set a maximum order level to
prevent people being naughty and buying your product to resell at a profit!
Managing your inventory better can save you
a lot of money.
If you want to know how well you’re
managing, first stop is to go look up your IPI score on Amazon. This will give
you a broad view of how well you are managing. If it’s not too good, then there
are a number of actions you can take to improve your inventory turnover and
reduce your storage charges.
First off, identify any items in long term
storage – that is, over 365 days. It’s a pretty simple calculation to compare
this with your sales figures to see how long it will take to sell off all this
stock. If it looks like it’s going to take a while, then you need to take
action now.
You could, for instance, run a promotion or
reduce the price. It’s pretty simple to calculate your break-even price for
selling the stock against paying another month’s storage charges. (Of course,
that assumes you do sell the stock.) If your product is just slow selling but
ticking along, this is the right thing to do.
Keywords have a demand curve, like any
other good. If you imagine it starting right at the top left side of the chart,
there is a huge number of searches for a single overall keyword. As you get
more and more specific, the number of searches falls off – but so does the
amount of competition for that specific keyword (or, if you’re advertising, the
amount you’ll pay for it).
Let’s take an example: “dress”. There will be millions of searches for “dress”. What’s the chance you’ll be at the top? Zero. You can’t afford it.
“Black dress”. Not quite so many searches, but still a lot. And this is a keyword where big sellers are going to dominate, and the keyword’s really expensive if you want to advertise.
“Little black dress”. Fewer
searches, more specific.
“Little black dress Azzedine
Alaia.” Then “Little black dress Azzedine Alaia size 12.” Now
you’ve got a very specific keyword. Anyone who wants Chanel, Givenchy, Saint
Laurent… you’ve excluded them. And you’ve excluded the customers who want
another size.
If you think of Amazon as a kind of store, or a big depot, you’re wrong. What is its business model, really? It’s the same as Google – a massive search engine.
Unlike Google, it’s a search engine that
results in a transaction rather than just a click-through. But it’s a search
engine, and once you understand that, you understand that it works on keywords
as well as on other algorithms.
Keywords need to be relevant. And you need
to get that relevant data into the customer’s head ASAP.
Yes, you can have a great long title on
Amazon that includes all kinds of information about your product. But you need
to put the most important information up there first. For instance, brand. If
I’m looking for a Samsung phone, I need to see the brand up front. If I’m
looking for a cat carrier and the word ‘cat’ doesn’t appear right at the
beginning, I’m not going to read on.
Amazon hijackers can be very sneaky. You
might not even realize you’ve been hijacked, if your sales aren’t much
affected. But someone has copied your product, and they’re selling it with your
brand on it, and taking away your business.
Now there are sometimes viable reasons for
a second seller. You may have an authorized reseller, or someone may have
bought your product with a coupon and is reselling it. But other times, you’ve
been hijacked – someone noticed you were doing well, and they’ve decided to
skim the cream off your success.
You might only notice when suddenly you
start getting one-star reviews. What’s going on? People who think they’re your
customers are getting low-quality product from the hijacker, and blaming it on
you.
So let’s see how you can reduce the risk of
being hijacked, and stop it continuing if it’s already happened.
#1 Being in the Amazon Brand Registry
program should help; it will give you more control over your listings. While it
won’t stop hijackers, the program will put dedicated protection at your
service. (But you do need to have a trademark first, which can take 18 months,
so this isn’t a short term solution.)