Changes “Behind the Scenes” for Selling on Amazon

Every day there are new ideas being explored for the Amazon.com web site, and every day teams of people are working hard to make the site “a place where people can come to find and discover anything they might want to buy online.” As a seller, you are part of the result of these efforts. There are also people working to keep the seller business running while they make incremental changes to support all seller businesses on Amazon.com.

Here are just a few of those incremental changes that have happened recently.

INVENTORY REPORT: This is a tool in Seller Central that has been available to sellers who sell non-media products. There was a glitch causing anything with “zero” inventory to not be included in the report and many of you told us those were actually the products you needed to know about. That has been changed and now the inventory report is a list of all your products with the inventory, even if it is at zero. If this was something on your wish list or something new to you, check it out at the Inventory tab in Seller Central or click on the following link to learn more about Inventory Reports.

DISBURSEMENT INFORMATION: In order to provide more specific information about your payments account, the Payments pages have been changed to display revenue, reserves and what is available for disbursement, rather than a total settlement as in the past. There is new information about the account summary and reserves here in Seller Central or here on Amazon.com

ONE ACCOUNT IS ALL YOU NEED: We’ve simplified registration so that when signing up for the Selling on Amazon program you only need one account to list products – both media and non-media. Media is generally books, music, videos and DVDs and non-media is everything else open for selling on Amazon.com. To get started, or for more information, go to Amazonservices.com to sign up today.

There is still a choice to make, though, because two pricing options are available. “Sell a little” is for those of you who don’t have many products to sell (typically when you expect less than 40 orders a month) and “Sell a lot” is for those who are ready to take the professional seller route (“pro” account), no matter what you have to sell. There are some advanced options for detail page creation and bulk upload with the pro account. Don’t worry, if you choose one today you can switch later! For more information before you choose, check out the tabs on Amazonservices.com to see How it Works, to learn about Getting Prepared, and to read What Customers Say.

Condition Guidelines for Music, Videos and DVDs -- Cover Art and Liner Notes: We are working to reduce confusion about what is allowed or not in listings. Until now, sellers have only been permitted to list Music and Video & DVD products that are missing cover art, liner notes or other original inclusions on the Amazon.com website when granted an exception by category managers. The change made recently allows all sellers listing in the Music and Video & DVD categories to offer these items. In doing so, we hope to meet buyer demand for media content while also setting clear expectations for sellers about the used products they may list on Amazon.com.

For Music CDs and cassettes, and for Video tapes and DVDs, we have revised our condition guidelines to state that products missing cover art, liner notes or other original inclusions may be listed as "Used – Acceptable." These products may not be listed in any other "Used" condition, and they may not be listed in any "Collectible" condition. Check out the Condition Guidelines for more specifics.

Support Updates: Our Seller Support team is always fine tuning and making changes to improve your experience. This is a quick reminder about how to take advantage of that help – you may find something new as well! There are links on most tool pages to “Learn More” that take you to help pages. In the Help pages there is additional information worth browsing and reading as you optimize your business. When you really need help, don’t hesitate to use the links to Seller Support and choose either the email or “click-to-call” option where you input a phone number and the support team calls you back.

Comments

[Aundrea Azzi]

Hi Amazon:
I just want to say that Amazon is the best place on the internet to sell without pressure. Thank you for being for the small business people and making it easy for them. They can actually make some money when they sell their products.
Amazon has relieved the stress that sellers have in the back of their minds when they sell on other sites. That worry- which is, Oh, no! I have to pay fees and my product didn't even have enough time to sell, or... I had to almost give my product away because I was afraid my time was running out and I would have to pay to re-list it again and my fees are so high, I can't even afford to be on this site anymore. Thank you for being different Amazon, whoever is behind Amazon is surely blessed.
Thank You So Much,
Azzi & Young