New Account Features for Product Ads Sellers!

We released two new features to help you manage your Amazon Product Ads more efficiently. The first, and the most requested feature, is FTP support for Product Ads uploads. This feature allows you to use FTP to send your Product Ads data files. With FTP you can schedule uploads so that your ads are always up to date.

To get your FTP login information go to the Products tab and click the “Use FTP” link just below the tabs.

(You will need to log into your Seller Central account to view all links.)

Read more about FTP and how to use it for your ads here.

Our second new feature is a Notifications Preferences page. This feature allows you to specify an email address for each different type of email notification we may send you. Business critical notifications like credit card failures require an email address and you can direct this information to the right person in your company. Likewise, for feed processing summaries you can specify a different email address ensuring the right person receives this important information.

To set up your notifications go to the Account Info page under the Settings tab. Click through to the Notification Preferences page and specify where you’d like Amazon to send each type of notice.

Click the following link to read more about the different notifications available: Types of notifications
 

Click here to learn more about Product Ads or sign up for an account.

Register here to attend our free webinar, Product Ads Launches FTP and Notification Settings on Wednesday, February 25, 2009 from 10:00 AM - 10:30 AM PST.

Michelle

What to Expect When Selling on Amazon – Putting it All Together

In these posts we've discussed the basics of Selling on Amazon, including how Amazon.com works, listing options, product data, images, shipping settings, accessory relationships and how to navigate the classification guidelines. The question many ask is "How do I put this all together for top performance and how do my options impact Buy Box eligibility?"

The decisions you make for each step of Selling on Amazon impact your performance standing, and your performance standing impacts your Buy Box eligibility. Yes, there are complex and proprietary algorithm systems that constantly monitor that performance for all sellers, and adjust for real-time results. No, there aren’t any formulas we can give you about earning the Buy Box, and there are no options for buying your way to the top (an often asked question).

However, you can take steps to increase the chances of winning the Buy Box. It’s all about performance.

Understand the playing field: Signing up for Selling on Amazon means signing up to present your products and offers to the Amazon.com buying population. Learn about Amazon.com, what makes it a unique and special retail experience, and how to present information in the best format to meet Amazon.com guidelines. Also learn what not to do by reading your agreement and referencing Selling on Amazon Policies. No shortcuts, tricks or gimmicks will work; the time tested best practices of great products at the best prices with excellent customer service are the keys to success.

Start right: Establish your account properly with complete information and settings, learn how to manage your product input and order output, classify your products correctly, and always think about what the buyer needs to know to make an informed and safe buying decision. Make sure you put your products in the right category and that you are listing your offer against the right product so the buyer is getting what they expect – and avoid refunds, claims and negative feedback. In many categories, how long you have been selling at high performance is a qualifying factor for the Buy Box – so you want to start right.

Evaluate your business practices: Price smartly, be wise in setting your shipping fees, make sure you have product readily available to meet shipping promises, and ship the right product on time. Avoid practices that cause negative feedback, claims and chargebacks, but when they happen, realize they are part of doing business and handle each in a professional manner. Need to get a sales track history? Consider offering a sale price or promotion on a product. The Internet is just another selling channel and, like all others, you need to grab the buyers’ attention.

Provide excellent customer service: If you are shipping the right product on time, you’ll reduce your chance of having to make refunds. That means having the products you’ve listed in stock, checking for orders at least daily, and shipping within the established timelines outlined in Seller Central. Having a track record of selling and shipping to the buyers’ expectations is a step toward winning the Buy Box. Another step is avoiding customer service problems. The online world is 24x7x365 and Amazon.com buyers are worldwide. Handle all issues and inquiries as if each buyer is your most important customer, and remember that they are buying in the Amazon.com environment where the customer always comes first. Review the Selling on Amazon Customer Communication Guidelines and always be courteous in your communications with buyers.

Deal with issues proactively: Refunds happen, but when they happen because you cannot ship the product that’s a problem. Things go wrong with orders, but when you do not handle the problem quickly and professionally, the chance for getting negative feedback arises. Getting A-to-z Claims means the buyers’ expectations have not been met, so avoid that by being in control of your listings at all times. All of the negatives are avoidable by ensuring proper listings, quantity of inventory to fulfill orders, and great customer service.

Putting it all together: Selling on Amazon is a low-cost, low investment, incremental sales channel that provides the opportunity to sell to millions of customers. Anyone can do it, but to be successful requires the effort to learn the processes and manage the activities.

The chart below outlines the factors taken into account when selecting the winner of the Buy Box.

• No single factor influences the outcome, so the best practice is to aim for peak peformance in each area.
• Being eligible to win the Buy Box does not guarantee you will win the Buy Box as various factors determine who wins.
• Being eligible and/or winning the buy box in one category does not apply across categories. Each has a different set of criteria.
• These factors and measures may be revised or updated at any time and Amazon.com does not guarantee that any seller will win the Buy Box

Note: the information here applies to sellers in the Selling on Amazon.com program and for more information about your performance metrics go to your Customer Metrics report in Seller Central.

Factor	What we evaluate	What we are looking for
Price	What do you charge for the product?	Low total price, including product price and shipping cost.
	How much do you charge for shipping?
Availability	How many do you have in stock?	Quick and consistent fulfillment.
	How quickly will you ship the product?
Volume	Do you sell many of these products?	Have a compelling offer and sell consistently.
Refunds	How often must you issue a refund due to merchant error?	Low refund rate due to merchant error.
Customer Feedback	How do your customers rate your service?	Low negative feedback ratings.
A-to-z Guarantee Claims	How often do you get returns on your orders?	Low number of A-to-z Guarantee claims.

Now that we've put the basics in perspective, we'll move on to the refinements. Coming soon: matching to existing products, promotions, gift services and everything you need to know about managing orders.

Cathi C.

CLARIFICATION: In context of this post, the reference to avoiding all of the negatives is related to those issues discussed that are within the selling company's control -- listing the right products in the right place, having the inventory available to fulfill, and the level of customer service provided to the buyer.

Marketplace, you, me and Captain Obvious!!

With all the information we have seen here (The Seller Support Blog), now the question is how to filter it to your own needs.  Thus far, we have focused on all merchants selling on Amazon.com. But now let’s turn our attention to our Marketplace sellers. First, many ask what is the difference between Marketplace sellers and non-Marketplace sellers, and the answer is something that could (and likely should) be talked about at length. However, in an effort to save space, we will keep it simple with one major difference:

Marketplace sellers sell BMVD (Books, Music, Video & DVD) and non-Marketplace sellers do not

 

There are many, many other differences; we will table that conversation for later in the future when we compare selling platforms for Amazon.com. 

From the ground up, to start selling you really want to follow the outlined steps

List your items
Get orders
Ship
Get paid

Or at http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=1161232

This is not an exhaustive list, and if it were it would be entirely too long to be useful. However, before you even get here you need to know:

How selling really works
Shipping easy as 1, 2, 3
Profit Margins
Customer Service Standards
How to get paid

How selling really works

Selling on Amazon.com in nearly any platform can be summed up in a single phrase: “You tell us about an item, and then you tell us what you want to sell that item for.” The detail page, the place that the buyer sees, is really owned by Amazon.com and can have hundreds of sellers listed on it. This leaves the choice in the hands of the buyers as to whom they will buy from. When viewing all buying choices, sellers are listed in order of price including shipping. Shipping cost to the buyers is pre-set for all Marketplace sellers, and especially for BMVD. 

Why, Pourquoi, Warum,  Por qué, Kāpēc, De ce?

~Consistency. For you the seller this is an inconvenience, but for the buyer, they know we are setting the price for this and they are getting a fair deal.~

Shipping easy as 1, 2, 3

1.    Know your shipping cost
2.    Know your shipping time frames
3.    Know the cost of those time frames

No one part is more important than the other, and I struggled to pick an order that made sense. The shipping cost is simply the packing materials, time and trouble. If all you have is 10,000 mass market paperbacks then picking out, and picking up, the packing materials would be really easy. Unfortunately, not all of us are that lucky. Normally, our house or basement has stacks of empty boxes waiting to fulfill their potential, along with stacks of shipping sleeves and padded envelopes just waiting. Here is the homework part: search, and research to find the best packing material for your items.

~Remember: You own it, until the buyer opens it~

Your shipping time frames are a little easier and with a little homework, you will be able to create a list or cheat-sheet, to know these times by heart. There really are only 2 shipping speeds for media items you ship in the US, Standard and Expedited. These are easier to remember as Normal and Fast.

Normal shipping should get from your door, to the buyers in about 14 days.

~yes, it says up to 21 in some cases, but would you wait this long for a book?~

Fast shipping should get from your door to the buyers in about 6 days.

If you know media mail will get from your door to theirs in this amount of time, use it. If it won’t or odds are good that it won’t, don’t. Buyers don’t want to hear that it may take extra time, and all it does is make a bad situation worse to tell them that it might be lost in the mail. The cost of shipping for an internet order is part of the cost of doing business, you need to know this cost, and have it well in mind when you price your items.

~since the shipping credit is fixed for all books, you will want to add the extra expense of shipping onto the price ahead of time~

 Profit Margins

We partially touched on this already, and by now you should realize that there are a lot of little things that add into the sale of a single item.

Bubble wrap ………………………………………………….....................…$59.99
Padded envelopes ………………………………….....................….$22.95
Scale and internet postage …………......................$32.65
Printer.............................................…$78.99
Your orders getting where they need
to be when they need to be there…................…Priceless

The best sellers on Amazon.com, and in the retail world, pick a pricing structure and stay there. There are a lot of buyers out there, and if you are constantly trying to be the lowest price, you are catering to the most volatile buying group around. They will go to where the price is cheapest, and historically, will not be repeat buyers. Your pricing structure is one facet of your business; give it only the importance it deserves. Some sellers will price things at ½ retail price to start with, and this is not a bad place to start. Each item has a market, and each market has what is considered a fair price.

~before you ask us about pricing strategies, remember the people in Amazon Services have a Market, selling on Amazon.com. We have not done the homework for your items and will not be able to tabulate the cost of doing business.~


Customer Service Standards

Customers return to shop where they were treated fairly. Time and time again companies have proven that service with a smile is just as important as the product being received. I could go into length here, but I would suggest reading “Customer Service by Captain Obvious”

This lays it out there for you to see, with the exception of returns. As a seller, you will accept returns. This is not up for debate or just a suggestion, it is a fact. This does not need to be the bane of your existence, or something to cause you to have sleepless nights. Buyers are human, and they, like us, make mistakes. The return policy that you must meet is here:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?ie=UTF8&nodeId=1161246#return


How to get paid

All right, we got the shipping materials, the item has been received, the buyer is totally happy and the only thing left is to get paid……..Did you give us a checking account?.....when will it be there?.........how much is it?.........are there more fees?

~Breathe~
~In and out~
~Slowly~

This is the typical, and like the above homework suggests, easily controlled and conquered. When you set up your account just go through every section of the “Seller Account Information” and make sure they are all filled in. We collect money from the buyer, and for the first 14 days we let those funds accumulate. At the end of this time we subtract our fees and shuffle the rest off to you. These then appear in your checking account in 3-5 days. This is your first Disbursement.  Disbursements will occur automatically every 14 days after this.

What happens if you don’t add your checking account right away?
Better do it, if you do it too late (within 24 hours of the end of your first scheduled Disbursement) it can delay getting your funds for another 14 days. I suggest entering it in when you first set up your account, or before you list your first item. There is nothing more frustrating than having to wait nearly a month to get paid.

James M.

Getting Paid – Amazon Marketplace Sellers

If you’re a new Amazon Marketplace seller, we’ve recently launched a video tutorial on configuring your account to Get Paid. Check it out!

Watch the video:

How do I add new products?

How do I list a product that is not already on Amazon.com? If you are absolutely sure it does not exist, then the answer to this depends on how you signed up to sell on Amazon.com so we’ll point you in two directions. However, check twice or three times to be sure it doesn’t exist before creating a new product because the best buyer experience is to find that one product on one page (see our post on The Basics for more about detail pages).

1. For sellers who registered as individual sellers using the Sell Your Stuff or Sell Yours Here option, you will only be allowed to sell products that are already on Amazon.com. However, this platform does offer an option to upgrade to a Pro Merchant Subscription and upload product data to create new product detail pages on Amazon.com. To learn more about this go to the Pro Merchant Subscription FAQ in the Seller Support help on Amazon.com and then read the Create a Product Detail Page FAQ.
   
   
2. The series of posts about Selling on Amazon.com refer to that specific program and includes a recent post on Listing Options. If you have registered through that program, then any of those options provide the opportunity to create a new product when it does not already exist. Again, be doubly or triply sure that you’ve determined the product is not there. Duplicates are not a good experience for the customer and can negatively impact your sales in the long run. Of course, if you are using the UPC then you’ll easily find the match through all tools. For more information about Seller Central uploads and creating products start by reviewing one of these: (You will need to log-in to your account to view these help topics)
   
   a. Using Inventory Feeds
   b. Using the Add a Product feature
   c. Using Amazon’s Seller Desktop tool

In all cases, the basics are the same. Confirm that the item you want to sell doesn't already have a page on Amazon.com. Then identify the listing option that works for you and follow that format to input information about the type of product you are selling and tell us about it. Generally, you will have the opportunity to provide title, product identifier (ISBN, UPC or EAN), descriptions, special attributes, and search terms that Amazon will use to place the item in appropriate categories. Once you have created a product detail page, you can list your offer, setting the price and inventory, and indicating the condition of your item.

Some amount of information will be required for all product pages, but which information is needed varies by category. See the post on Data Definitions for more information about product data.

Remember, there is a lot of great information in your Help pages and many of these topics have tutorials to provide visual information for your self-training needs.

Cathi C

Why Become a Pro Merchant?

Thinking about upgrading to a Pro Merchant subscription on Amazon?

If you're an Amazon Marketplace Seller you might want to consider upgrading to a Pro Merchant subscription.

Here are just a few of the benefits you receive by upgrading:

• Discounted selling
• Access to the Inventory Loader tool
• Ability to create your own product detail pages
• Add an unlimited number of listings that won't expire

You're probably wondering if this is right for you?

Well, watch as our fictional hero, Mike Seller, evaluates the features of a Pro Merchant subscription and walks through the process of deciding if he should upgrade his account.

Proceed to video  

If you still have more questions about whether or not you should upgrade to a Pro Merchant subscription, please visit the Pro Merchant FAQ page.

Happy Selling!

Jay

What to Expect When Selling on Amazon.com – The Drill Down: Shipping

 

There are many facets of shipping to be considered for Selling on Amazon.com. These include: meeting the promise date, quality packaging, shipping the right item in excellent condition, and how much to charge for shipping. Why are these important?  Each of these impacts the buyer experience and that, in turn, impacts your bottom line. Successfully managing your shipping policies, rates and procedures is a key factor in your overall success on Amazon.com.

When the item is late, the packaging fails, or the product is damaged, that will often lead to negative feedback, refunds and/or A-to-z Claims, all of which negatively impact your order defect rating and your bottom line. To learn more about this, watch Understanding Customer Metrics.Other potential impacts to success occur when your shipping rates are too high and scare away the buyer, or you set them too low and lose money. These are important factors to consider in planning your business on Amazon.com.

Let’s take a look at the decisions you need to make in determining your best practices for managing shipping options on Amazon.com. In this post we’re going to talk about shipping settings and rates and assume that you know how to pack your product. If you want more information on packaging, please review the October 30 post titled Shipping Tips Can Save You Chips.

Why choose one shipping option over another? There are three basic parts to setting up shipping rates: choosing how the shipping cost will be calculated, deciding where to ship or not, and what service levels will be offered for each shipping region. Some sellers become confused by the default settings they find in Seller Central and never change those to suit their company needs. The default option and pricing in Seller Central is only a placeholder, and you have a variety of options to customize those settings for your business. You need to make a choice as to how you will charge for shipping and what rates will apply to provide the optimal customer service, and please be aware you can change these at any time (plan ahead, the change takes 4 hours to display in the system).

For the Selling on Amazon program there are three methods for setting up your shipping: charging per item and per order, charging by weight and per order, or scaling the charges by revenue band (called banded shipping). When choosing a method, remember that you are setting up your Amazon Seller Central account with processes and policies as they relate to doing business with Amazon.com customers. Think about your business on Amazon holistically and establish the best process for this channel, as well as one that works with your existing systems.

Per Item and Weight-based Shipping are both managed in the same area of the shipping settings tool. If you offer item/weight-based shipping, you set a flat per-shipment charge and either a per-pound charge or a single per-item charge for handling. Only choose the weight-based option if you know the shipping weight of all your individual products – and don’t forget to enter that data in your product upload or the system will multiply the charge times zero. The flat per-shipment charge is for you if your business can charge a single price to ship any item. Keep in mind the additive factor when setting the per order charge as it will be added to the weight or per item charge and the total needs to be something that isn’t going to scare off your buyer while covering your costs. In other words, do a bit of planning.

Banded Shipping is another option within the shipping settings tool. If you offer banded shipping, you create revenue bands, such as $0 to $25, $25.01 to $50, $50 and up. Each revenue band has its own shipping rates: $X if the value is $0-25, $Y if $25.01-$50, etc. Choose this method when you can set logical shipping weights for those bands and still keep the customer happy and make money. This is especially useful where you do not know the weight of your products, understanding that heavier products will cost more and take more money to ship.

What are the shipping promises on Amazon.com? What does that term mean – shipping promise? When you set up a shipping option you are agreeing to a Service Level Agreement (SLA) that is a promise that the order will arrive within the number of days as established by Amazon. Check your shipping options chart or Seller Central help topics to view the various SLAs, or promises, for each region and level of shipping.

Once you’ve reviewed those, take the time to figure out what that means within your business practices. Don’t do business by default. Instead, plan and prepare for best results for you and the buyer. Questions you might consider: Will you need to make some adjustments to your policies for Amazon sales? Are there considerations to manage with drop shippers? What are the lead times you need to meet these promises?