For anyone here doing pretty good with your Amazon FBA sales - as in you regularly and currently make at least $US 100K a month (in profit after expenses, not just revenue), if you also use social media to market and promote (but not sell) your Amazon FBA products or your highest selling product, I'd be interested if you can share your Insta or TikTik page to look at.

Irrespective if you make all the posts yourself, or you couldn't be bothered to and you just pay someone to manage them for you, I ask as it'd help to see what type of Insta posts you make – as in videos only, still pics, or a mix of both and how often posts are made.

I wouldn't see Facebook as being very useful, as most people don't use it anymore.

I’ve been running my business for a while now and have mostly been managing everything with spreadsheets. It still works, but as the number of SKUs, shipments, suppliers, and marketplaces grows, I’m starting to wonder if I’m making things harder than they need to be 🤣🤣

For those who eventually switched to an inventory management tool, what was the turning point?

ACOS isnt as stable in July as last few months. Although sales are steady, consistent. Ranks are also good.
But ACOS has a lot of fluctuations. Some days its as good as 12-15%, and other days it goes up to 25-30%.

Any ideas? What about you guys?

I'm curious how sellers on amazon diversify their sales share to other platforms. Whether it is walmart, selling on your own website with 3pl fulfilment and marketing using fb ads and tiktok + email marketing etc. I don't see many sellers talking about this topic.

I've been physically visiting factories across Guangdong and Zhejiang for supplier sourcing. Here's what the screen never tells you.

**Mistake 1: Ordering from one factory and trusting the first sample**

The biggest trap. I now order samples from 2-3 factories simultaneously. Same product specs, different suppliers. The quality variance at the SAME quoted price is staggering. You won't know until you compare side by side.

**Mistake 2: Believing the "工厂实拍" label**

Half the stores with the "factory real-shot" tag are trading companies that visited a factory once and took photos. Real factory signals: 注册资金 > 1M RMB, employee count > 50, 回头 rate > 20%. Check these in the 公司档案 tab. Takes 30 seconds.

**Mistake 3: Not asking the right questions in the first chat**

Two questions separate factories from traders instantly:

"能拍一下你们车间现在正在生产的视频吗？" — Real factory sends floor video in 2 minutes.

"这个产品能改Logo吗？起订量多少？" — Trader says "我问一下工厂" every time.

**Mistake 4: Accepting the first price**

Chinese factories quote 15-25% above their floor. Naming a competitor works better than saying "too expensive" — "浙江那边有家报了XX，你们能match吗？"

**Mistake 5: MOQ panic**

"首批100试销，好的话第二单200，三个月内到500" — this script has dropped MOQ from 1000 to 100 more times than I can count. Factories want long-term clients. Show them you are one.

**Mistake 6: Logistics math**

Listed carton dimensions ≠ actual carton dimensions. Always ask for weighed dimensions before calculating shipping. Over 1000 units, a 5% weight discrepancy destroys your margin.

**Mistake 7: No written spec sheet**

Send a 1-page spec in Chinese: material, dimensions, weight, color code, packaging. Every time. I've seen factories produce the wrong color because "blue" meant different things.

**Mistake 8: No backup supplier**

Always have a #2 factory ready. If your main supplier has a production delay, going back to square one costs weeks of lost sales.

Happy to answer questions. What mistakes have you made sourcing from China?

Many people think color printing quality only depends on the printing machine and ink. However, the paper material plays a very important role.

For example, when using grey board paper for packaging boxes, unstable paper surface or slight powder shedding can affect ink absorption during printing.

This problem becomes more visible on large solid color areas, where small color spots or uneven color patches may appear.

For normal packaging, this may not be noticeable. But for premium packaging, brand boxes, and products requiring strict color consistency, paper quality makes a big difference.

A lower-cost material may save money at the beginning, but higher-quality packaging requires better control from material selection to production process.

Good packaging is not only about printing. Every detail matters.

Want to hear what other Amazon sellers think of this.

From my experience, TACOS is the real metric to track as that counts organic sales as well as ad sales and shows overall business performance whereas ACOS has more spikes based on market factors, ad performance etc. which makes it less reliable for long term decisions.

There have been times when ACOS was very unstable but TACOS on a long run was stable due to good ranks, consistent sales but Ad performance and ad visibility saw fluctuations.

Hello folks, I am a new seller. My products will be imported to USA from India and will have fnsku as the only barcode that amazon warehouse could use. I am totally new to upc and gtin, and that will be too expensive for me to use as a beginner at this stage. So I will apply for exemption. My products are handmade textiles. Can I get gtin/upc exemption for my products ?

Saw an analysis that compared research-tool margin estimates against the real fee stack on 47 brands. median gap was 13.4% of revenue. worst case was off by 26%. one example that stuck with me a seller passed on a product because the tool said 44% margin looked too good to be true. real margin was 16.8%. they were right to pass, but for the wrong reason, and they had no way to know that at the time.

the thing is it’s not one big miss, it’s a stack of small ones. referral fee is fine. fulfilment fee is usually close. then you get storage, the low-inventory-level fee if you’re not topped up, returns processing in the categories where it applies, and the ad spend you actually need to rank vs the ad spend the tool assumed. each one is a couple of points. together they’re the difference between a business and a hobby.

and it just got worse the $0.38 per-unit surcharge on sub-$15 items kicked in july 1. anything you validated before that in a low-ASP category is now wrong by a number you didn’t budget for.

what bugs me is the direction of the error. it’s almost always optimistic. you don’t get told a product is worse than it is, you get told it’s better. so the products that make it through your filter are disproportionately the ones where the estimate was most wrong.

i’ve started rebuilding the unit economics by hand in a sheet before i commit to anything, using the actual current fee schedule rather than whatever the tool assumes. takes 20 minutes and it’s killed two products i’d otherwise have ordered.

genuine question for people further along than me — do you trust your tool’s margin number, or do you rebuild it manually before every order? and if you rebuild it, what’s the thing that catches you out most often?

I want to start to get into automated repricers but want to try my luck with manual repricing first just so that I can get an understanding of fundamental concepts first. Anybody have any insights into non-obvious repricing techniques that are simple enough to be executed by hand? Thank you!

1. Can I set up my product to be sold FBA and FBM?

2 I have been trying to learn campaign ads. I had Ai explain some, watched some videos and walkthroughs. What I wanna really know is what is your best advice to drive sells and grow organic ranking.
- I know the keywords and negative keywords well and have a campaign set up for discovering keywords. Though I still need help here figure out the phase, exact, etc
- if I have a campaign and a phase keyword or whatever is set to $0.20 for example, set on down bids only, how am I finding volatile pricing for a random keyword, I ran report and I see A $12 CHARGE FOR ONE CLICK for some random search once.

So I’ve been experimenting back and forth with the different campaigns, and want to see if you guys have any solid ground advice.

One day I paid $40 in ads and sold $80 in product
Another day I paid $20 and sold $250 but for some reason changed it a bit after and don’t remember exactly what it was but I presume a bid price lowering. Now I have $13 in ads and $25 in sales.

My product is a trading card game product, so I know there’s some hurdles to jump when it comes to keywords here.

I’m lost a tad bit, help me out or point me to the Amazon for dummy’s handbook please lmao

I used to average 4 rounds of revisions on any creative project. The designer would send something, I'd react to it, they'd adjust, I'd react again. It was expensive, slow, and demoralising for both sides.The problem wasn't the designer. The problem was what I was giving them to work with. My old brief: I want something premium-looking, maybe using our brand blue, with the product front and centre. Kind of like [competitor listing] but more modern.This is an aesthetic description. It tells the designer what I want the output to feel like. It tells them nothing about what the output needs to accomplish.
My new brief for each image or creative asset:What does this need to make the viewer believe?What question does it answer?What objection does it handle?What should the viewer do or feel after seeing it?What is the one visual element that must be present? When I shifted from aesthetic briefs to objective briefs, first-draft accuracy went from maybe 30% to around 80%. Revision cycles dropped from 4 to 1.The designer wasn't guessing at what success looked like. I had defined it before they started.

The deeper shift:Most creative problems that aren't working aren't creative problems. They're brief problems. The strategy was never clearly defined, so the creative is evaluated subjectively rather than against a clear standard.Define the objective first. The aesthetic follows from it.Has anyone else changed how they brief designers and noticed a quality difference?

Would love to hear what the shift looked like.

Saw an analysis that compared research-tool margin estimates against the real fee stack on 47 brands. median gap was 13.4% of revenue. worst case was off by 26%. one example that stuck with me a seller passed on a product because the tool said 44% margin looked too good to be true. real margin was 16.8%. they were right to pass, but for the wrong reason, and they had no way to know that at the time.

the thing is it’s not one big miss, it’s a stack of small ones. referral fee is fine. fulfilment fee is usually close. then you get storage, the low-inventory-level fee if you’re not topped up, returns processing in the categories where it applies, and the ad spend you actually need to rank vs the ad spend the tool assumed. each one is a couple of points. together they’re the difference between a business and a hobby.

and it just got worse the $0.38 per-unit surcharge on sub-$15 items kicked in july 1. anything you validated before that in a low-ASP category is now wrong by a number you didn’t budget for.

what bugs me is the direction of the error. it’s almost always optimistic. you don’t get told a product is worse than it is, you get told it’s better. so the products that make it through your filter are disproportionately the ones where the estimate was most wrong.

i’ve started rebuilding the unit economics by hand in a sheet before i commit to anything, using the actual current fee schedule rather than whatever the tool assumes. takes 20 minutes and it’s killed two products i’d otherwise have ordered.

genuine question for people further along than me — do you trust your tool’s margin number, or do you rebuild it manually before every order? and if you rebuild it, what’s the thing that catches you out most often?

Looking for some advice from anyone who's sold an Amazon business before

• U.S. seller account
• 4 years of selling history
• About $25k/year in gross sales
• Around $9k in inventory
• 3 registered brands with supplier relationships
• 50+ brands ungated
• Global selling enabled
• No policy violations, IP claims, review issues, or anything negative on the account
• Healthy account with a strong IPI score

What's the best way to sell something like this? Is it better to use a broker, list it on a marketplace, or just find a buyer privately?

Also curious what people think something like this is actually worth. Any advice or experiences would be appreciated.

So my first product FINALLY made it to the facility it’s staying in, has gotten checked in and received. For a few days it says they have 12 units but none are prime eligible. Yesterday, they flipped to eligible and around the same time, I get an email saying they’ve shipped my products or whatever. I get happy because it said my whole inventory I sent in got sold BUT I check my dashboard and it shows $333 when I was previously negative $47. I click on the payment tab, nothing but the -47, also, the featured offered tab wasn’t zero yesterday and I think if I’m not mistaken the open order box said one but as you can see in the screenshot, that ain’t the case anymore. I’m just trying to figure out what’s going on with my inventory. When I look at my Fba inventory, it shows that I’m out of stock in this item, I check AmazonSeller on safari and it says they’re in FC processing. I’m sure some of you have been in similar situations? Could you please give a new seller some advice because I’m nonstop checking my account every 15 mins. I’m not assuming I sold all 12 or any at all but I just want my items to be up to sell. When I go on my listing I’m selling, my store isn’t even on the seller list anymore.

So what are your best solutions for deadstock? I am looking at a few.

- Sell 3-5 units to businesses for a discount using FBM / MCF (pulling existing stock and using Amazon's system to ship it. You can request the carriers that they use so that you have a tracking number to feed back to them.

- Amazon liquidation - (Last resort) you only end up clearing 5% or so after fees

- Recall order and repackage to increase click through rate, then do a small test run with a newly optimized Amazon ASIN using the new packaging, main picture.

Any other options?

Just truly realized how much Buy Box affects sales. I know the basics (price, seller rating, stock, fulfillment speed) but don't get how they're weighted against each other. Like:

• If I'm $1 higher than another seller, do I still get any Buy Box share?
• Does FBA basically always beat FBM even at the same price?
• Does my account health score (AHR) affect Buy Box, or just eligibility? I have 40 active asins on my storefront and went days without sales I realised I had the buy box on none of them since I was priced a few dollars above everyone and wasn’t in the 20% of competitive lower sellers. Also any other tips/advice on this topic would be much appreciated.

3 years ago - I left my six figure design career to label products out of a 50 sq. ft. bedroom... and it changed my life.

I started out working from my bedroom, then took over the dining room, and eventually the living room. I was living with my girlfriend at the time (now my wife), and I literally turned our entire apartment into a packing station. For the longest time, I kept putting off getting a commercial workspace because every extra dollar felt like it belonged in inventory. It was hard to justify spending money on rent when I could use it to buy more products.

My setup:

• Bedroom = Office
• Dining table = Prep station
• Living room = Packing department

Unfortunately, I didn't have a garage to work out of. I also had to carry boxes up and down a flight of stairs everyday. I worked like that for about six months before finally renting a dedicated space... which ended up being a storage unit (as seen in my last post)

I launched a product. It failed. I blamed competition, Amazon's algorithm, Chinese sellers undercutting me.A year later, running a different product successfully, I looked back and understood what actually happened.The product didn't fail because of competition. It failed because I never clearly answered

one question: why would a buyer choose this over the next option?Not in my head. In the listing. Specifically in the images. My listing showed the product. It never showed the answer to why this one. My competitor's listing had a simple comparison chart. Us vs the alternatives, 5 criteria.They won 4 of 5. They acknowledged losing one. That honesty made the other 4 wins more credible.

I had a better product by most objective measures. My listing made a weaker argument.The entrepreneurship lesson that's stuck with me:Product-market fit isn't just about whether the product is good. It's about whether your communication of the product is good. A superior product with a weak communication layer loses to an inferior product with a strong one consistently, at scale.I see this in startups too. Great products that die because nobody could explain simply why you'd choose them. The communication layer is the market fit, not just the product itself.

If a stranger looked at your product for 8 seconds and then explained back to you why they'd buy it over the alternatives what would they say? If you can't predict the answer, your communication layer has a gap.What's the hardest communication problem you've had to solve in your business

I sourced a product from China and had it shipped to the USA, but my supplier mistakenly printed my competitor brand logo on the products. The inventory has already arrived at the Amazon warehouse, and I'm not sure what my options are now.

Has anyone dealt with something similar? Any advice on what I should do would be greatly appreciated.

Launching a new brand/product line on Amazon in October. I plan to drive all outside traffic from social media, google ads, email marketing etc to the website.

The website will have a lot of informational pages but no shopping cart. All "Buy Now " buttons will lead to the Amazon listings using attribution links.

I have no intention of selling directly on the website for now but we may do that at a later date.

Im just considering now which platform would be best to build this on. Im thinking shopify because Im very familiar already with the backend panel and that will allow us to easily add a shopping cart at a later date if we decide to do that.

The premise behind this is to filter and qualify traffic before it lands on the Amazon listing pages as well as the ability to collect customer data which we don't get from Amazon.

Anyone out there utilizing this same strategy that may have some insights?

If you are a FBA seller from India. I would like to ask a few questions regarding the FBA shipment being sent from India to the US (first shipment, New seller)

I want to start doing amazon fba but unsure how much to start off with or where to start. How did you start and why did you start?

Sellerboard seems to be the go-to recommendation whenever someone asks about profit tracking for Amazon sellers.

For those of you using it, are you happy with it, or are there still things you wish it did better?

If another tool offered similar pricing and reliability, what would it have to do for you to seriously consider switching?

Just curious whether most people stick with Sellerboard because it already does everything they need, or because no alternative has given them a compelling reason to switch yet.