Why I Decided to Sell on Amazon and Took a Break on EF
First of all, I’d like to say that creating and launching an Amazon business was my idea, not my husband’s. He agreed after
seeing the results of two of his co-workers. Honey, if you’re reading this, you know it was me. Ok bye.Of course, everybody wants to make more money, and some are willing to take calculated risks to succeed and see that reflected in their bank accounts. Plus, being in the process of purchasing our first home, we knew we could use the money to pay off our home faster.
I also had a lot going on in my life, so I felt that I had to distance myself from EF for a while but now I am back and I’ve got stronger content in the making. Brace yourself!
Okay, back to Amazon. I like expensive things and living debt-free, so selling on Amazon was (is) perfect for me to make money on the side, plus it works on my schedule. Hey, Gucci bags are not cheap! And I want to own every single one of them.
Disclaimers on Selling on Amazon Before you Continue Reading Rest of the Article
Selling on Amazon isn’t free! Just having a professional seller’s account is about $40 per month. Of course, since Amazon thinks about everything, they do have an option where you can sign up to sell as an individual for free. But you are limited when it comes to the number of items you can sell per month, and if you are serious about this business model, you need to be more serious when it comes to your sales expectations.
Amazon’s fees are scary and extremely difficult to understand! This is why having the right product and prices are crucial to a successful Amazon business. Having the wrong product will cost you a lot of money.
(just having your products stored in an Amazon warehouse has a price)
Again… fees! I have been selling on Amazon for a short while, and I still don’t understand how they calculate their prices. But even the most advanced sellers find it complicated, yet they earn a lot of money. Isn’t that all we care about?
Do you think selling on Amazon will be right for you? I tested it for over a month, AND it paid off. Keep reading!
I Didn’t Even Know Where or How to Begin
There are so many courses out there about selling on Amazon that I got confused and felt flustered because I didn’t know which one to take. I’ll be more specific; I didn’t know which course deserved my time and money as investments. Luckily, two of my husband’s co-workers are current Amazon sellers, and they told us exactly which courses to take:
The Amazon Boot Camp by The Selling Family. This is the first course I, and it is fantastic! If you want to start on Amazon by selling other people’s products (AKA well-known brands), I highly recommend you take this course. Its primary focus is Retail Arbitrage which is buying a lot of random products from stores at a discounted price and selling them for a higher price on Amazon for profit.
Retail Arbitrage is an easy Amazon business model because you don’t have to worry about marketing or advertising since the brands you are listing the products under are already highly searched for. Your profits are almost guaranteed! But the catch is that you must do your research and find discounted products in stores. Luckily, The Amazon Boot Camp facilitates that by teaching you their best tips.
They also have a lesson on products that you need to get to ship your products to Amazon so that they can take care of everything for you.
I didn’t choose this business model because I knew that I could make more money selling my own products, but sometimes I consider it.
Amazing Selling Machine. This course is beyond amazing! Hands down! If you choose to sell your own products, this course will hold your hand every step of the way. This course helped me find my profitable products to brand and market. It taught me how to create Facebook Ads and Amazon Ads that actually convert! It taught me how to take my business to the next level by getting sales even if I don’t promote anything! And most importantly, it taught me how to list my products in a manner that generates organic sales. Of course, it taught me more, but I cannot narrate the entire course in this post.
This course is for Amazon sellers that choose to sell their own products instead of doing Retail Arbitrage, which results in higher profits and more control over your business. Like I mentioned
before, I chose this business model. However, you can feel free to do both if you’d like!My products are fulfilled by Amazon (FBA), which means that I ship my packaged products directly to them, and they take care of shipping, customer service, returns, and all of the headaches.
LLC & Other Legal Stuff
I got an LLC (Limited Liability Company) for my business to separate it from me. This means that if any legal concerns arise, I will be fine on a personal level and only my business will suffer.
There are a lot of benefits for doing this which you can read here. But I love the tax benefits I have!
Since I want to keep selling, I am considering trademarking my company’s name and logo to protect my brand, which also gives my business validation.
How I Found the Perfect Products to Sell
I know what you’re thinking, “I have nothing to sell!” Well, wrong…
Thanks to the courses I mentioned above, I was able to use tools and resources that helped me do market research on Amazon, which is precisely what you need to do to find your profitable product.
I used the plugin Jungle Scout Pro and adjusted the filters according to the categories I was searching in based on search volume, daily sales, and competition scores. Then, after finding the best products, I did more digging outside of Amazon to find a similar product to put my brand on.
I found my products on Alibaba. Although they are based in China, I discovered that shipping time is very fast, especially when you work with the sellers when it comes to your shipping options with them. Also, there are a lot of sellers selling the same products in bulk, so finding the cheapest and the best one is just one click away.
Another software that helped me with my business is Helium 10. Because of Helium, I was able to list my products in a way that allowed me to get organic sales (without having to promote my products) because there are a vast variety of tools within Helium 10 that enable you to do more product research and find the best keywords.
The FBA Calculator Plugin is also crucial. When you go to a product page on Amazon, it tells you how much Amazon takes as fees for those products, so you will always know if your product idea will be profitable before you order anything. Just don’t forget to put how much you are buying the products from!
How I Priced the Products While taking into Consideration Amazon’s Fees
Pricing your products is perhaps the most challenging task. Here’s my theory:
If you want to be fair in your pricing, Amazon will take most of your profits.
If you want to make a lot per item, you won’t make a lot of sales since there are other sellers with competitive prices.
So how do you stay ahead of your competition, make a lot of money and be fair with your pricing?
The answer is so simple it might anger you: using the software and plugins above.
You will see how expensive your competition’s products are, then decide if you want to sell a bit higher or lower. It is smart to have a fixed ideal profit margin in your head, but I believe that all dollars add up, so even if you are only making $5 profit per item after all of the fees, and you sell about 20 per day, that’s $100 that you didn’t have before.
