So you want to know the EXACT steps on how to import and sell products on Amazon? Here you go:

[ddzc]

Solid thread OP, a lot can learn from this. Sounds like a very similar experience I had with my last venture. I hope you hit a home run on the next venture.

 

[KLaw]

Awesome thread. I love your line of thinking and the way you hold yourself accountable for EVERYTHING! REP+ transferred. You are gonna kill it no matter what you do.

 

[Cain]

Hey Steven. Great work! I'm currently working on getting my second product on Amazon (first one didn't work out, too much competition for too low profit margin).
Looking forward to seeing your progress with this.

 

[Kim Yong Ho]

Dear Steven
I am so pleased that I could find your thread here, while I am reading your thread, I could feel like seeing a business text movie.
It was very inspiring myself. I am 36years old now, I have been thinking to open my first business like you have done.
I do appreciate for sharing your experience as well.
I wish your best and good luck for prosperous your business!
Kim Yong Ho / Not a native speaker of English either.
PS. How you chose your first item to sell? What was your focus and strategy?

 

[Walter Hay]

From the suppliers I've used they are happy to provide up to 3 items as samples but won't supply more or do orders under 300 items (or $5000). Is that normally the case?

You are dealing with the wrong suppliers, most likely traders, or else you haven't read my book to learn how to negotiate small orders including sample orders.

Can't post it all online, there's pages of it.

Walter

 

[maituikas]

@steven - Just superb reading how punctual and devoted you are with you mission with Amazon. I wish you great success with this and I will follow your story for sure.
Myself, I have tried to approach Amazon Seller Central with slightly different angle. Not to deal with product/service development but instead be in between supplier and end customer. Keep the stock at suppliers physical storage space, advertise their products* and organize the dropshipping of the product to the end customer straight from the suppliers warehouse when the order has been received. Basically the only thing you have to do after successful implementation of automated tasks* and advertisement is mediation of the orders.

Automated tasks*
1.Daily export product data from supplier stock and convert/format it to Amazon readable format of .xlsx file
2. Make the stock file available to Amazon Seller Central

of course all of this is a simplified list of task that needs to be done and in real life the export-import scripting and other stuff takes alot of time (and money if you have to buy programming from someone). Also you need a hosting space where to keep all this data and export-import scripts.

Their products* regular home electronics, car alloy wheels and tyres.

I have to admit that currently my own Amazon project is on hold as I was too greedy and started with 100 000k + products and there were too many errors with the Amazon update process vs the product info .xlsx file. Some examples:

The SKU data provided conflicts with the Amazon catalog. The standard_product_id value(s) provided correspond to the ASIN B01ATM97W0, but some information contradicts with the Amazon catalog. The following are the attribute value(s) that are conflicting: part_number (Merchant: '13127' / Amazon: 'B01ATM97W0'). If your product is this ASIN, then modify your data to reflect the Amazon catalog values. Else, check your value(s) for standard_product_id are correct.

SKU does not match any ASIN and the product data provided is not eligible for ASIN creation.
We have temporarily removed your ability to create new ASINS because an unusually high number of ASINs have been created from your account. However, you can continue to match your products against existing ASINs. Please refer to the ASIN Creation Policy page for more information on how to avoid receiving this error message. If you believe your creation privileges have been removed in error, please contact Seller Support.

ETC

Apparently you have to fix these errors one by one and doing so on stock list consisting huge numbers of items takes too much time. So my lesson so far: Narrow the stock list significantly and start all over again
As I run a webshop in parallel then currently I do not have the time to start with this again in the near future but for sure I will try again

Good luck to you Steven and keep us updated with you progress!

 

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[AG356]

Sorry for the delayed response, I'm busier than ever.

@NanoDrake, @Temujin pretty much said what I would have stated.

@Steven. Great story. I look forward to seeing your progress with your private label project. I expect, at your current rate, you'll be free from the need to have a job by late 2019. I'm rooting for you.

Just to play a little devil's advocate here, isn't Amazon largely in control of your destiny at this point, thus making your business in violation of the law of control? What happens if Amazon changes its policies all of a sudden, like the Youtube adpocalypse?

Before I get flamed, LOL, the answer to my own question might be that timing is important and since Amazon is currently a great sales channel, you SHOULD use it. And as you said in your post, there are other things you can do like hitting up influencers on Instagram (Gary Vee style) for a shout out and build your brand in other ways.

I'm twice your age and admire your strength. Of course, we'd all like to know what your product is, but I suppose you're trying to avoid some folks from competing with you. I'm new here, so I'd like to hear from others about precautions they take on this forum, in terms of protecting ideas, etc.

Yes you're 100% right. I absolutely rely on Amazon and if they decide to change things up I will have to suffer the consequences. I learned that lesson after they deactivated the export option on 90% of my products to Austria/Switzerland for a whole 12 weeks. Usually they take 2 weeks, but even 20 support email wouldn't fix that. Watching my whole launch strategy I had already set up for the Christmas season (new product) and the the spring season being pulverized showed me that I'm nothing but a small dot on Amazons radar. They don't care if one seller more or less sells a certain product and it's understandable when you make nearly 500M revenue a day. But that's the risk you have to take if you want to use a established online marketplace with a huge consumer base like Amazon.

There's a lot to say about the process right now but I'm short on time. I will update the thread for sure addressing everything that happened so far soon.

 

[Longinus]

No, I did the opposite. I raised the price once I dominated the market. I provided a better deal, differentiating myself from my competitors and still able to raise the price. There were people providing even a better deal then me in page 3-5 with a 50% lower price but I do things differently.

I already told you that when I lost ranking and reviews, the revenue naturally dropped as expected. I decided to milk it and sell ownership rights because I wasn't able to get any additional reviews. Took advantage of the situation.

So you had a top notch product which dominated the market with good profit margins, but you lost rankings anyway? Why did you rank lower in the first place? Change of algorithm, really? Or were it the fake reviews that AMZ deleted?

Reason I didn't pursue the product again was simply because I knew with the new changes and algorithm, it would be hard to with that particular product.

Must be a great product that you were selling if you can't keep it up with new changes and algorithms. Please tell me more about how you recognize a good product.

You see that already two-three individuals has responded to my inital comment and they wanted to know a little deeper in terms of the barriers, whether that was money, certifications etc. That opened some of their minds and they'll have it on the back head when doing research.

LOL, "how to find products" is probably the most asked question on this forum. It's the carrot all Amazon gurus use to sell their bullshit FBA courses.

I just hope those people are clever enough not to take advice or share their product idea with a total newcomer who claims to have a shady short term success (if it even happened) who qualifies as mentor.

 

[Kaizen502]

I simply gave some broad and simple advice above which can be further researched so they get an understanding and think differently when they approach products in the future. You see that already two-three individuals has responded to my inital comment and they wanted to know a little deeper in terms of the barriers, whether that was money, certifications etc. That opened some of their minds and they'll have it on the back head when doing research.

I hope you are not offended and call me names too. Your response was vague again. I have done my research and heard the advice of sourcing products with higher barriers of entry before and thought you might could give an example. Anyway, I won't ask more questions.

And there are multiple ways on finding a product, I usually approve/deny those that get to me and ask if it's a good product to sell. (To make it easier for you dumbfuck: Good product in my terms are = good to sell, good demand and enough competition for you to dominate and enter it, and getting a slice of the pie. After the changes, I recommend that good product aligns with good quality.)

I am not sure if it is really necessary to get verbally offensive if someone is asking you challenging questions. That is not just a waste of your time but makes you look bad. I think we should try to help and support each other instead.

 

[B. Cole]

Awesome and inspirational post Steven. Learn, rinse and repeat!

 

[MakeMoreMoves]

Awesome, good stuff!

Is there a reason that you didn't order more than one sample to validate your product before going all in?

 

[MiguelHammond10]

Thanks for the thread it was good read and inspiring.

 

[RemedySC]

Amazing work Steven! Really enjoyed reading your process.

 

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[Najma]

Nice. Its a great read. Amazon is the leading e commerce industry. It was an inspiring post.

 

[Ramzi]

Awesome post. Really motivational!

 

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[sparechange]

Thanks for posting awesome thread!

 

[C-Jay]

Hey OP,
First off, thanks for the thread. Great info and I'm impressed with your story. Should be great things to come.
My question here is a bit of an obscure one. You got the goods delivered to your house, and then (smartly) drove them over the border to ship them to a fulfillment centre.
Are you (or anyone) aware whether it's possible to just have the goods shipped directly to Amazon's warehouse? Or do you physically have to receive them first to put labels on, etc.
I ask because in my case it would be so much more economical to have them shipped right to a fulfillment centre. I could even drive to said fulfillment centre to put on the labels and still save a bunch of dough that way.

 

[eliquid]

not sure how I missed this, but posting so I get updates/subb

 

[Telamon25346]

Rep+

gotta say i love this thread, your journey so far has motivated me. keep it up .

i like what you said about this forum being like a river of "golden nuggets" and it is absolutely true, i learned more from this forum and MJ's Books in the past 4 months than i have about entrepreneurship in the past year.

 

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[NanoDrake]

Hey man, great story! sending some rep!

Just wanted to ask you a questions since I'm a little bit curious:
Isn't going on Amazon with just a private label product a little bit risky? I mean, I'm working on how to create a community and some followers before launching a product, so I know they are buying my brand instead of some unknown "oh I just need this xyz"
I'm taking this approach since there is a lot of "brand factor" in my market and perception is all
keep up! if I'm in Austria again will love to buy you some "Omnipollo"

 

[Dave Daily]

@Steven. Great story. I look forward to seeing your progress with your private label project. I expect, at your current rate, you'll be free from the need to have a job by late 2019. I'm rooting for you.

Just to play a little devil's advocate here, isn't Amazon largely in control of your destiny at this point, thus making your business in violation of the law of control? What happens if Amazon changes its policies all of a sudden, like the Youtube adpocalypse?

Before I get flamed, LOL, the answer to my own question might be that timing is important and since Amazon is currently a great sales channel, you SHOULD use it. And as you said in your post, there are other things you can do like hitting up influencers on Instagram (Gary Vee style) for a shout out and build your brand in other ways.

I'm twice your age and admire your strength. Of course, we'd all like to know what your product is, but I suppose you're trying to avoid some folks from competing with you. I'm new here, so I'd like to hear from others about precautions they take on this forum, in terms of protecting ideas, etc.

 

[Minus9]

Thanks.
How did you find and choose your products ?
What are the most important criterias ?

Curious, what happened after those 5 weeks? How much money are you making now? Is that profit or revenue? How much profit?

It's pretty easy to "make $10k" (revenue) in a short time on Amazon, but that says nothing about your business in the long run, let alone profit.

What you're writing is pretty common information. I'd expect more expertise from a self called mentor.

Thank you @Minus9 for joining the conversation.

Could you elaborate more on #3? What are the criteria for a product with high barriers of entry?

Do you source expensive products, products that are very technical or need certain certificates, oversized products a lot of the beginners are scared of sourcing because of the high inventory costs?

I am also curious about your way of doing product research.

The same thing happened to me, I chose a 'bad' product and used a little more unethical ways on getting my reviews - but after the wave where all reviews got deleted and many were affected including me, my ranking dropped. (As well as random people jumping on my listing and trying to sell.) hence why it's important to differentiate yourself in terms of brand-marking your products which at that time I didn't have the budget to do so.

Out of the revenue, around $5-6k profit in the first 5 weeks. Went for a few months and then decreased. I decided to milk it and sell ownership rights to get into something else while also mentoring others. Bare in mind, while I may not know everything, I can tell a lot of things on Amazon in terms of what is a good and bad product. Now I am saving something that requires a little more and has less competition.

Like you said, either products that seem hard to do, technical, certifications etc. All these are barriers of entry. The more they are, the less people are going to get into the market because it "seems complicated" which rules out a lot of people. Those who get through these barriers and is able to sell usually is able to achieve success.

I am not perfect by any means but I do recommend that you don't use product research tools, they suck. Only use the stats extension to get an average x amount of sales, revenue etc. to understand whether this is a market you should get into.

Some ways you can research is first finding the inital first products, even if they're bad. Look at those who do FBA and are selling successful products, if that product is too competitve for your budget, take a look at their seller profile and see what they're selling. A seller will always want to sell good products. Don't look for trendy products, look for those who are already established and proven to have a constant source of income.

And then use the tool to run the numbers and take a look at those with a little less competition. There's more to it, I am not that good at explaining it in a forum post.

 

[Longinus]

Out of the revenue, around $5-6k profit in the first 5 weeks. Went for a few months and then decreased. I decided to milk it and sell ownership rights to get into something else while also mentoring others. Bare in mind, while I may not know everything, I can tell a lot of things on Amazon in terms of what is a good and bad product. Now I am saving something that requires a little more and has less competition.

Like you said, either products that seem hard to do, technical, certifications etc. All these are barriers of entry. The more they are, the less people are going to get into the market because it "seems complicated" which rules out a lot of people. Those who get through these barriers and is able to sell usually is able to achieve success.

I am not perfect by any means but I do recommend that you don't use product research tools, they suck. Only use the stats extension to get an average x amount of sales, revenue etc. to understand whether this is a market you should get into.

Some ways you can research is first finding the inital first products, even if they're bad. Look at those who do FBA and are selling successful products, if that product is too competitve for your budget, take a look at their seller profile and see what they're selling. A seller will always want to sell good products. Don't look for trendy products, look for those who are already established and proven to have a constant source of income.

And then use the tool to run the numbers and take a look at those with a little less competition. There's more to it, I am not that good at explaining it in a forum post.

So if I understand well, you sold a product for some weeks until your price probably dropped?

You don't have to be a genius to do that, it's what 95% of the sellers are doing:

1/ source and import high selling product on Alibaba, go for the quick buck!
2/ sell for a slightly lower price
3/ PROFITS for a few weeks until your competitors lower their price as well
4/ sell remaining inventory at loss

You're not the Amazon-mentor I would choose.

 

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[Pershing]

Hello Steven,
great thread, long reading but you were good at keeping me reading.

I strongly recommend to not sell on amazon, event if, FOR NOW, people can make good money.

Basically we are teaching amazon what and how to sell, and Bezos clearly said this in his book. They'll one day sell what you currently sell.

I'm from Italy and I import (not from China for now) products to sell to businesses, so big repeated orders.

Let me know if you want to know more. I have a proven strategy that I replicate everytime I spot a good product

 

[iceyblitz]

hey man thanks for the post. Do you still do amazon ?

 

[Deleted52191]

This forum is like a river filled with gold nuggets.

True story, thanks for sharing this post.

 

[secondhanddog]

Awesome, good stuff!

Is there a reason that you didn't order more than one sample to validate your product before going all in?

From the suppliers I've used they are happy to provide up to 3 items as samples but won't supply more or do orders under 300 items (or $5000). Is that normally the case?

 

[DannyD]

Thank you for this amazing look into process

 

[stavedeve]

Thanks for the kind words guys, I appreciate it and hope I could provide some information.



Yes it is possible to ship the goods directly to the Amazon warehouse. However you have to label the boxes beforehand, so you have to submit the labels to your supplier so they label them for you. Same goes for the product labeling, but this can be outsourced to Amazon for .15$ per product (at least on the GER marketplace).

I personally didn't go through this process but I've read about it in blogs and in several threads of @biophase.

I would also suggest to have a close look at the first shipment by yourself. I know there are inspection services but I still prefer to check the quality by myself. Especially if it's a new supplier sending the first bulk order.

Great job man! Very inspirational.

 

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[Musashi]

Thanks for this thread Steven.

Can I ask for what profit margins you are aiming for when sourcing new products? Im based in Germany as well and currently also in the research phase. So far, customs + value tax make it quite hard to find profitable products.