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    Question Does anyone sell on Amazon via FBA (Fulfillment by Amazon) ?

    I stumbled across this the other day and have been mulling it over. Seems like an easy way to make a quick buck if you choose the right products to sell. Does anyone have experience with this?

    Link for info

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    Quote Originally Posted by tcon View Post
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    I stumbled across this the other day and have been mulling it over. Seems like an easy way to make a quick buck if you choose the right products to sell. Does anyone have experience with this?

    Link for info
    FBA storage fees add up. So do their sale/transaction fees.

    At the end of the day, you can make bank, but you're competing against a lot of people. "Easy way to make a quick buck" is exactly why you're more likely to lose than gain. It's a business mate, and you're competing against people that take it super seriously.

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    You’ve missed the boat on it tbh. They take a 20+% cut for their fulfillment plus other storage fees. Most of the things that people were flipping the Chinese suppliers on Alibaba started selling directly or amazon started offering it as their own product line.

    If you do want to do it you need to go the private label route. Find products and have them brand and label it as the brand you create and do your own marketing and driving site to the brand.

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    Quote Originally Posted by pheoxs View Post
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    You’ve missed the boat on it tbh. They take a 20+% cut for their fulfillment plus other storage fees. Most of the things that people were flipping the Chinese suppliers on Alibaba started selling directly or amazon started offering it as their own product line.

    If you do want to do it you need to go the private label route. Find products and have them brand and label it as the brand you create and do your own marketing and driving site to the brand.
    This. China completely destroyed the cheap merchandise gimmicks. You need to private label now.

    I have a local friend that does very well with FBA. It's not easy. He's private label, and spends a ton of time building his brand and creating valuable content for his niche. It's a full time job.
    I can eat more hot wings than you.

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    https://www.junglescout.com/

    Heard this is the best thing to invest into if you want to sell on amazon...
    Originally posted by beemerm3
    so if we only seen 5 % of the oceans why not drain them or somethin lol or can u even transfer water from one ocean to another??? think of all the stuff u'd find treasures n eerything.

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    Quote Originally Posted by pheoxs View Post
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    You’ve missed the boat on it tbh. They take a 20+% cut for their fulfillment plus other storage fees. Most of the things that people were flipping the Chinese suppliers on Alibaba started selling directly or amazon started offering it as their own product line.

    If you do want to do it you need to go the private label route. Find products and have them brand and label it as the brand you create and do your own marketing and driving site to the brand.
    Fair point. Me and the GF have a few ideas for some stuff we made for around the house that would be potentially marketable. Will probably go that route.

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    Setting up an online store and product fulfillment is way too easy now. It can probably all be done in <2 hours. There's no barrier to entry from that aspect, so it's all about your products (common vs unique vs trendy) and branding. Be prepared to dedicate alot of time in building up social media contents and spend alot of money marketing (e.g Facebook and Insta ads).

    I have a friend who has a e-commerce business. He has the store for over a year now and spends ~$2K a month in online advertising. Also very active online creating contents and interacting with followers. His online store account has over 5000 followers on Insta and 1600 on facebook. Steady sales and decent return on his advertising investments. But last month he went on vacation and decided to turn his online advertising off for a week, and his sales literately dropped to $0 overnight. Despite building his website and brand for over a year with all those followers.. there was zero organic growth.
    Last edited by RX_EVOLV; 05-21-2018 at 09:02 AM.

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    If there's zero continued sales from those "organic" channels, would you say they are a waste of time for a new entrant?
    Quote Originally Posted by killramos View Post
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    You realize you are talking to the guy who made his own furniture out of salad bowls right?

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    I have read that returns are a major issue/annoyance for people selling on Amazon. People are dumb and will return for no reason, or if they don't read the instructions they might leave a 1-star review and return as defective. Amazon then pays the return shipping, and I am not sure what portion of that gets put back on the supplier if it was originally fulfilled by amazon. I am also not sure what happens to the supplier if Amazon's AtoZ Guarantee is applied, but the customer wins every time in those cases and I'm guessing Amazon is happy to pass along any costs incurred.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Mitsu3000gt View Post
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    People are dumb and will return for no reason, or if they don't read the instructions they might leave a 1-star review and return as defective.
    Or if they're really stupid, they'll leave a 1-star review even though they like the product but shipping was slow, which has nothing to do with the product at all.

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    Quote Originally Posted by D'z Nutz View Post
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    Or if they're really stupid, they'll leave a 1-star review even though they like the product but shipping was slow, which has nothing to do with the product at all.
    Not necessarily true. The moment a shipment label is created, the tracking number is updated. It is the stores fault if they create a label on Monday and it doesn't arrive at the shipper until Wednesday. And that happens A LOT.

    I'd suggest using shopify and creating your own webfront and dealing with shipping yourself if interested. As noted, to what end though? You really need something that is different or only available through you. The best and worst parts of online retail is that the costs are minimal to startup, but they are minimal for everyone.

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    Quote Originally Posted by D'z Nutz View Post
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    Or if they're really stupid, they'll leave a 1-star review even though they like the product but shipping was slow, which has nothing to do with the product at all.
    Yes, this as well. Reading Amazon reviews is like reading Trip Advisor reviews for all inclusive resorts - the stars actually mean very little, you need to read the body of the reviews ("Weather was bad - would give zero stars if I could"). If there are enough reviews, they trend towards the truth, but you need to be careful if it is not widely reviewed on either .ca or .com, where there are usually 10x the reviews.

    I think the over the top "customer is always right" attitude Amazon has combined with the average overly entitled shopper would be too annoying to bother being a seller on there. As a customer though it's great the odd time you have a legit issue.

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    Quote Originally Posted by HiTempguy1 View Post
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    Not necessarily true. The moment a shipment label is created, the tracking number is updated. It is the stores fault if they create a label on Monday and it doesn't arrive at the shipper until Wednesday. And that happens A LOT.
    But that has nothing to do with the product. That's the service. When I'm doing research on an item I'm interested in buying, I'm looking for information on things like does it fit, does it last long, does it address my needs, etc.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Mitsu3000gt View Post
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    Yes, this as well. Reading Amazon reviews is like reading Trip Advisor reviews for all inclusive resorts - the stars actually mean very little, you need to read the body of the reviews ("Weather was bad - would give zero stars if I could"). If there are enough reviews, they trend towards the truth, but you need to be careful if it is not widely reviewed on either .ca or .com, where there are usually 10x the reviews.
    The Q&A part of Amazon drives me nuts:

    Q: Does this fit a Honda?
    A: I don't know. I drive a Toyota.

    Q: Does this work when X?
    A: I've never tried it.

    Q: I'm 5'10" and weigh 180lbs. Will a medium fit me?
    A: I'm 6'5" and weigh 500lbs. XXXL was too small.

    Q: Will this work if I X?
    A1: Yes
    A2: No
    A3: I don't know

    So much useless information!

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    Quote Originally Posted by ExtraSlow View Post
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    If there's zero continued sales from those "organic" channels, would you say they are a waste of time for a new entrant?
    I think this depends on what you are selling. If you are selling me-too products (e.g. drop shipping stuff off Aliexpress) then I think don't expect any organic growth. Not necessary a waste of time for new entrant, but definitly a 'takes money to make money' kind of play, and be prepare to spend decent money in facebook ads before your pixels is good enough.

    If you are selling something unique, or local, then probably a different story.

    Shopify is also definitly the way to go (in addition to Amazon), not just because it's such an easy platform to use (been using it for > 5 years), but because the countless number of Apps you can plug into it.

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    Quote Originally Posted by RX_EVOLV View Post
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    Shopify is also definitly the way to go (in addition to Amazon), not just because it's such an easy platform to use (been using it for > 5 years), but because the countless number of Apps you can plug into it.
    If you're using that many apps, it's likely better to use woocommerce and have a custom store. Shopify is great for simple sites however, i just don't like how centralized it is. I build woocommerce sites for a living so I could be biased.

    As for the returns, I'm part owner of an e-commerce company that isn't running off Amazon. Same deal. People will ask for refunds and returns for silly reasons. Scuff on the box. Arrived 2 days later than USPS said. "Sorry inryped the wrong address, please reship". Chargebacks are even worse, since they're virtually impossible to beat.
    I can eat more hot wings than you.

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    Quote Originally Posted by D'z Nutz View Post
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    The Q&A part of Amazon drives me nuts:

    Q: Does this fit a Honda?
    A: I don't know. I drive a Toyota.

    Q: Does this work when X?
    A: I've never tried it.

    Q: I'm 5'10" and weigh 180lbs. Will a medium fit me?
    A: I'm 6'5" and weigh 500lbs. XXXL was too small.

    Q: Will this work if I X?
    A1: Yes
    A2: No
    A3: I don't know

    So much useless information!
    That’s because if a question goes unanswered then amazon emails previous buyers of the product asking if they can answer the question and some people seem to have to respond to everything. It’s pretty silly system

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    Quote Originally Posted by D'z Nutz View Post
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    But that has nothing to do with the product. That's the service. When I'm doing research on an item I'm interested in buying, I'm looking for information on things like does it fit, does it last long, does it address my needs, etc.
    If you are the exclusive retailer for a product, the service is inherently part of the product. Apple doesn't just sell iPhones, they sell an experience in the purchasing of an iPhone. Genesis doesn't deliver cars out of the goodness of their hearts.

    It doesn't matter how great a product is if the retailer has it in stock and doesn't ship it for 2 weeks after purchase. It completely negates how great the product is if it isn't in your hands. That's the way it works, so I have no qualms with people using the rating system as such.

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    Quote Originally Posted by D'z Nutz View Post
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    The Q&A part of Amazon drives me nuts:

    Q: Does this fit a Honda?
    A: I don't know. I drive a Toyota.

    Q: Does this work when X?
    A: I've never tried it.

    Q: I'm 5'10" and weigh 180lbs. Will a medium fit me?
    A: I'm 6'5" and weigh 500lbs. XXXL was too small.

    Q: Will this work if I X?
    A1: Yes
    A2: No
    A3: I don't know

    So much useless information!
    Haha yeah, what Amazon does is email buyers with other people's questions if the question isn't answered fast enough, and when you get the email it is written in a way that makes it sound like it's a private conversation with one person asking another for help. Then Amazon publishes the answers without vetting them, so it's 100% useless unless it's a manufacturer response.

    Part of the blame is on the responder giving completely useless information though - it is often exactly as you describe. The other thing I see all the time is people asking questions that are clearly in the product description. Or they ask a question on the product that Google can answer in 5 seconds, but they waste their time asking Amazon. It's just a bad system that needs to be vetted by a human but isn't. I've never used it to ask, but I have answered people's questions when I can give a good answer.

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    Quote Originally Posted by RX_EVOLV View Post
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    Setting up an online store and product fulfillment is way too easy now. It can probably all be done in <2 hours. There's no barrier to entry from that aspect, so it's all about your products (common vs unique vs trendy) and branding. Be prepared to dedicate alot of time in building up social media contents and spend alot of money marketing (e.g Facebook and Insta ads).

    I have a friend who has a e-commerce business. He has the store for over a year now and spends ~$2K a month in online advertising. Also very active online creating contents and interacting with followers. His online store account has over 5000 followers on Insta and 1600 on facebook. Steady sales and decent return on his advertising investments. But last month he went on vacation and decided to turn his online advertising off for a week, and his sales literately dropped to $0 overnight. Despite building his website and brand for over a year with all those followers.. there was zero organic growth.
    I have a friend in exactly the same boat except he hasnt turned off his advertising, he said in order to make sales he does FB ads and he always has to run them or he wont get any sales. He also spends alot on learning about e-commerce. Last year he spent 40k on going to courses and conferences and shit like that.

    Also Amazon Canada is a shit market and you have to price things way up to expect to make any profit due to the shipping. My friend does his stuff all on amazon.com and that comes with further legal headaches, although I think you would have to do the legal stuff in canada too.
    Last edited by nzwasp; 05-22-2018 at 12:36 PM.

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