Help with Amazon Selling

[CustomLED]

Hi

I currently sell the majority of my products on eBay, however i would like to expand and the only way i can see to do this is to try another selling channel. I set up a Amazon selling account about this time last year, however i couldn't figure out how to use it. I'm normally very technically minded, but amazon wanted EAN numbers and part numbers, which my products do not have.

Not long after this i had some health issues and was lucky to keep my business open with help from family. So now i would like to have another go, but really dont know where to start. Is there anyone that could point me in the right direction, or come to my premises and show me how to do it (for a fee of course)

Thanks in advance,

Tom

 

[alanc]

Amazon's inventory system does depend on every product having a unique barcode (EAN or UPC). If your products don't have these you can buy blocks of bar codes and use those.

The Amazon system isn't too difficult to use but you have to be a Pro-Seller (£25/month) in order to add products to your inventory.

 

[LPB 123]

The Amazon system isn't too difficult to use but you have to be a Pro-Seller (£25/month) in order to add products to your inventory.

Hi Alan,

You don't have to be a pro seller to add products to your inventory. You can add products from the free individual account.

You are right that you need your own EAN codes though.

 

[Cathey]

Hi Tom,

As Alan has said you will need your own EAN if you are making and selling brand new products that are not already in the Amazon catalogue. If the items are in the Amazon catalogue and are being sold by someone else the products will already have an ASIN number which you will be able to use.

With regard to the product number question, I'm assuming you are referring to Amazon SKUs here. The way Amazon SKUs work is that they are an essential field on a product, but, if you elect not to give your new product a bespoke SKU created by you, Amazon will simply create one and apply it to your product for you.

This has its downsides as you lose the opportunity to actually assign a SKU that is meaningful for your business but it does get you started more quickly.

Another way of getting your products quickly listed from Ebay over to Amazon would be to use a multichannel selling tool that has product listing capability. Generally they will allow you to pull down the orders and listings from an existing channel and then use these products to quickly create listings on another channel. Once you're all set up with your listings running multichannel tools also have the added benefit of enabling you to manage all your orders from all your channels in one place. There are several UK based ones out there, including ours, Expandly.

You have very interesting products in your ebay store! Good luck with your expansion plans.

 

[brianlee1982]

Well, u can apply for EAN/UPC exemption. If you bought it from manufacturer and they do not have the intention to register EAN/UPC for the next 2 years, then u need to have written letter/document from them. then apply through Amazon.

Next is product category listing. Some required permission to list. Make sure get these through as well.

I learn this during Tie Grandmaster set up in Amazon UK. Hope that helps you. Get help from Amazon support team. they are great and fast in resolving the case.

 

[19ninety]

Some of my limited experience with Scamazon so far.
Do your pricing research before going through the time of listing productsan Amazon, maybe they don't like me for some reason but my standard seller account Amazon fees are roughly 21% of each sale!!!!! That's a hell of a chunk of money.
Make sure none of your suppliers are selling on Amazon, I've found many of my products listed there by my suppliers using Pro acounts, so they can sell with free P&P and at a low price with lower fees... I can only just match their prices with a standard account and with a awful margin after fees, etc. This is happening often with EU suppliers using Amazon fulfilment in the UK
.
To add to the insult, as a new seller, if someone else is already selling the product, then you won't be on the main product page, Amazon will hide you away on the "Also available from these sellers" page. You may find you are the only person selling a product, after researching the prices and margins you go through the long process of listing your product, then another bigger estabilshed seller starts selling the same product ASIN and just like that you've lost your sales as the established seller will get the lime light on the product page.

 

[Iain Hill]

Hi,

I appreciate that I am replying a bit late to this thread but GS1 should be able to help you with regard to barcode numbers etc and to give advice, this link should be able to help you.

https://www.gs1uk.org/get-a-barcode/for-selling-on-amazon

No, I dont work for them!

I believe that they are a non profit organisation (although dont quote me on that!).

With regards to selling on Amazon it is so important to get in the buy box to get the sales and the best way to do this is to use Fulfilment by Amazon (FBA) however depending on your product you may not be able to do this. I am from a fulfilment house but i would suggest that you use Amazon services for this just to get the sales for this specific sales channel.

I would echo the points from above and just make sure that you work your costings etc. to the last penny as if its not worthwhile dont do it!

Good luck and all the best.

Iain

 

[SteveBurns]

Selling on Amazon isn’t too difficult. The interface is relatively much easier as opposed to other platforms. Since you’re starting again on track, here are few things you should do to ensure things are smooth and efficient-

• Write down your long-term plans and goals.
• Decide if just want to focus on eBay or get started even with Amazon.
• Set a pro-seller account on Amazon.
• Buy bar codes and use them on your products to fix your mentioned problem.
• Sign up third-party to e-commerce solution for higher efficiency and convenience.
• Avoid going for freelancers; hire agency to help you on the technical front. Multi-channel
• E-commerce solutions like ChannelSale also offer managed services these days. The professionals handle your listing, inventory, optimization and more for a small fee.

Hope this helps. Feel free to hit back

 

[Pish_Pash]

Then prepare to be rammed.

After 5 years building a solid (good!) business they suspended my selling privileges a couple of weeks ago ...in the blink of an eye (& after getting over £100k in commission from me in the past year)...not so much as a phone call - nope....no humans were involved - their bots kicked me off & once you're kicked off all normal routes of communication (phone calls to other humans) are cancelled - they only way to contact them is by email - expect a lengthy wait while some underpaid overseas worker gets around to seeing if he can be bothered to listen to (or even understand) your plight. (& for me it would have been a significant impact - i.e. move house to a cheaper area, kids move schools ...sheer upheaval)

Thankfully, I've now got my selling privileges back, but frankly, when selling via Amazon you are dancing with the devil on your back.

 

[Mr D]

Last time I was suspended I rang them on a number found on google and sorted out the issue. Supplied the documents and was selling next day.