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Recently I have seen a lot of online courses about how to become an Amazon seller. They promise a huge monetary gain but it looks very strange to me.

Can someone gain a lot of money only by selling stuff on Amazon or is this just a way to sell an online course?

blahdiblah
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Ion Stirba
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    Some Amazon sellers have found it more profitable to sell courses about selling stuff on Amazon than actually selling stuff on Amazon. Anyone who is promising huge profits is lying unless you have a unique well-positioned product. The dropshipping space is oversaturated and has very thin margins when properly accounting for risks. – amon Feb 04 '21 at 14:32
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    Rule of thumb. Whenever someone tries to offer you a way to get rich quick, then that way either requires a lot of work, a lot of special skills, is a risky gamble or does not work at all. – Philipp Feb 04 '21 at 15:55
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    This reminds me of the Get Rich Quick With Real Estate courses from 12-50 years ago. (Did they all dry up after 2008?) Then there were the Get Rich Quick On Ebay courses, and now Get Rich Quick With Amazon. – RonJohn Feb 04 '21 at 16:55
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    anecdotally I knew a couple who did Amazon Selling as part of their income, the gist of their experience was that it was a lot of work, and didn't end up quite being enough to pay their bills, but it did give them the flexibility to move into contracting positions for jobs they enjoyed – Bitsplease Feb 04 '21 at 17:02
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    @amon Once one has established a well-deserved reputation, selling digital courses based on that reputation (compared to selling physical products or even YouTube episodes) is going to be like printing money, meaning that even by taking the most optimistic view of the course author, selling courses is likely to be more profitable than the business covered by the course. And that makes sense: why else would a successful business owner teach their competitors? – jpaugh Feb 04 '21 at 17:32
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    If you're selling someone else's products then it's a Ponzi, err Pyramid, err money laundering, err Multi-Level-Marketing scheme as the you kids would call it and odds are that the course is free. If it's a course showing you how to become a marketplace seller and this is something you're interested in then it might be worth a look. – MonkeyZeus Feb 04 '21 at 17:36
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    @MonkeyZeus Selling someone else's products is just the definition of retail. It doesn't have to be MLM. A drop-shipping retailer via Amazon marketplace isn't MLM. It might be a pain that's not worth the razor-thin margins for an individual, but that doesn't inherently make it MLM or a pyramid scheme. Now, if the person selling the course is trying to get you to retail their products and recruit others to do so, then it's probably an MLM pyramid scheme... – reirab Feb 04 '21 at 20:47
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    @reirab Yes, I meant to say "If the course is pitching their own products to you then it's a Ponzi, etc..." – MonkeyZeus Feb 04 '21 at 20:50
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    do you have stuff to sell? If so, do you think that amazon is the best platform to sell that stuff? – njzk2 Feb 04 '21 at 21:52
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    It's far more profitable to start a YouTube channel and post regular reviews of Amazon products that are popular. When your YouTube channel get lots of views, you sign up for Amazon's affiliate program and you then get a commission for every sale via your affiliate links. While the earnings per sale are very low, the investment made is also very low. Your channel can grow and become extremely popular and then you can earn a decent income passively. You'll also earn via AdSense after your channel has 1000 subscribers and a minimum number of views. – Count Iblis Feb 05 '21 at 07:14
  • What stuff are you planning to sell on Amazon? "Amazon seller" is not a job. – user253751 Feb 05 '21 at 15:14
  • Isn't it? Nowadays "influencer " is apparently a profession :-/ – Mawg says reinstate Monica Feb 05 '21 at 19:12
  • https://www.reddit.com/r/AmItheAsshole/comments/ld7sog/aita_for_telling_my_wife_her_business_has_failed/ – Mawg says reinstate Monica Feb 05 '21 at 19:13
  • @Phillipp - but what about all the Trump University courses that people...oh, wait... – Bob Jarvis - Слава Україні Feb 05 '21 at 22:30

3 Answers3

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You have to pick the right products and find a niche nobody else sees.

It's worth a course, because kitting out as an Amazon seller is technically complex. You need to set up a seller account and create listings (not really any harder than eBay). But then, you'll want to seriously consider shipping your items into the Amazon Fulfillment warehouses so your items ship with Prime. That's complicated - do you ship to one warehouse or many? Do you commingle your stock with other sellers, so your buyer gets the nearest item, or do you barcode YOUR specific items so the buyer gets only your stock? How do you analyze whether it's worth paying to keep slow moving items in the warehouse? How do you get them back (or do you, even)? All that to say, it's complicated.

Examples of niches that are swamped:

  • Buying cheap crud off Alibaba in 1000 quantity and selling it in singles. Frankly the people doing this are mostly large Chinese operations, and you could never compete with them.
  • Buying stuff at Trader Joes by the crate and selling it in 1-6 quantity. Everybody does that and margins are razor thin.

So it really depends on what product area you're good at, and whether you can offer something special that people will want.

Harper - Reinstate Monica
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    Also, if a product takes off, Amazon usually has a replica made under their AmazonBasics brand. – Simon Richter Feb 04 '21 at 17:29
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    @Simon Richter: Or they would just buy the item from the manufacturer and sell it themselves. Or the manufacturer would sell direct on Amazon... – jamesqf Feb 04 '21 at 19:52
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    @jamesqf: Some resellers have managed to carve out a niche where they undercut manufacturers on their own products by buying lower-priced imports at volume. This mostly cannot be done purely via online purchase (because when it's that easy, either everyone does it or the manufacturer blocks it). This requires a ton of work, since the inventory where this is feasible is constantly shifting. It's typically only possible on high margin items (e.g., make-up). Interesting Example. – Brian Feb 04 '21 at 20:38
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    @Brian "buying imports at volume" which are counterfeits. And then this happens to the OEM. Best you can hope for is employees at the OE factory dumpster-diving factory rejects. More likely you'll find a factory who says they are the OEM but are making counterfeits. – Harper - Reinstate Monica Feb 04 '21 at 20:46
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    @jamesqf manufacturers (esp. of technical products) often like to leave some airspace below their direct-mail pricing so there's room for a dealer network to exist and have a role. Dealer networks are some of your best advocates and also offload a lot of support tasks (not least, by being an "idiot filter" so factory support only sees questions worth escalating). – Harper - Reinstate Monica Feb 04 '21 at 21:01
  • @Brian: But that "interesting example" really isn't a good example. It's only possible because the textbook publisher chose to sell its products for different (probably much different) prices in different countries. Then you could have cases where a manufacturer just isn't interested in doing retail sales, but as a reseller you have all the work of breaking up those thousand-piece lots into individual packages, plus the risk that the manufacturer will change their mind... As you say, a ton of work, a need for luck, and a large ongoing risk. – jamesqf Feb 04 '21 at 21:45
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    As I mentioned the specific place were it is possible is when there are sharp price discrepancies due to market segmentation. Textbooks are not the only place this happens. For example, this happens when a manufacturer doesn't care enough about a product to distribute it properly. Where this typically happens is when a manufacturer's main business is X, accessory Y is necessary for X, and the manufacturer has decided not to try to make a profit on Y. You can make a (poor) living by capitalizing on such opportunities. – Brian Feb 04 '21 at 21:55
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    China is unique because it has an economy that rivals that of the US but is still getting some very nice shipping discounts (not exactly sure how that works). China can ship stuff to the US cheaper than a US company can. – Nelson Feb 05 '21 at 00:10
  • @RonJohn Isle of Wight? ;) – SiHa Feb 05 '21 at 08:46
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    @SiHa "Introducing our Wisdom". Okay, I'm out. – Clockwork Feb 05 '21 at 11:01
  • @Nelson and even then, a huge fraction of Chinese goods ship out of Amazon warehouses, whether you buy it on Amazon or offsite, it may arrive via Fulfillment By Amazon. And somehow stuff gets from China to the Amazon warehouses without ever getting looked at by FTC, CPSC etc. – Harper - Reinstate Monica Feb 06 '21 at 01:46
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You probably have things backwards. You start by having products you want to sell, and then if you think Amazon may be the right way to sell it, then you try to find out how Amazon works, and that's where courses may be useful (or not).

There's no magic "I become an Amazon seller and I suddenly make money" formula. You need to find products to sell. You need to find people to buy them from. You need to buy them (i.e. pay them). You need to have the stuff shipped to Amazon. If it comes from abroad, you need to handle taxes and duties and be sure they comply with local regulations. You have to create your seller account. You have to create listings for all products, with pictures, description, all sorts of details. You need to select prices, and possibly adjust them constantly. You have to handle support requests. You probably need to do some advertising (either on Amazon or elsewhere) to bring customers in. And of course you have all sort of tax-related stuff on top of that, including probably setting up a company and a bit of accounting.

It's just a business like any other. A combination of a good idea, good execution, and hard work could make you rich. Or could swallow all your money if you're not prepared or try to sell the wrong product, or sell it at the wrong price or forgot about many of the small details that can make or break a business.

Amazon just simplifies a lot of things for you: it lets you relatively easily be present on one of the biggest stores in the world (if not the biggest), they will handle payments, they can handle shipping out to customers faster than you could ever do it yourself. But you'll be just one of millions of sellers, selling a few of the millions of products on the store.

jcaron
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  • It's not as backwards as you think. I work for a company that develop tools for online sellers and the majority of our users enter into business the way the OP describes - they want to sell online so they open an Ebay/Amazon account and then they look for products. The large majority of online sellers don't even care what they sell – slebetman Feb 05 '21 at 06:43
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    @slebetman I think what jcaron means is that, people who do things that way are actually thinking backwards. As in, Amazon is a tool among many others for people who want to sell online. But people see it as "becoming an Amazon seller" (it's not the tool anymore, it became the job itself). It doesn't change the end result, but on a personal point of view, this answer allowed me to think from the bottom up. – Clockwork Feb 05 '21 at 10:56
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    Like any other business, you won't become rich by doing exactly what everyone else is doing! – user253751 Feb 05 '21 at 15:16
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    @slebetman And are those actually successful? Your company is probably paying affiliate commissions to the sellers of those online courses and e-books :-) – jcaron Feb 05 '21 at 15:35
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The other earlier answers are correct about having a business selling stuff on Amazon.

But also consider this:

The true value of such a course is if (and only if, IMO!) it offers detailed instructions on how to obey the rules of the Amazon markeplace. Amazon enforces all of its rules whether you know them or not - ignorance is not an excuse! - and there is very little ability for a seller on their marketplace to appeal, even less chance for it to be a successful appeal. Then, if you're kicked off or suspended temporarily for breaking their rules and you try again even with a different name, or account you'll get kicked off permanently with no appeal.

If you already know what you want to source and sell, and if you've already worked out the economics and want to give it a go, then the Amazon marketplace can be profitable for you. Then, if the course teaches the Amazon-given rules so you use it correctly, the course might be valuable.

(My claims about rules, Amazon's enforcement of them, and the penalties - possibly permanent - for breaking them, can be easily confirmed by anyone browsing the Amazon seller forums. (You may have to create a seller account just to look at the official Amazon seller forums - I forget - but there are plenty of unofficial ones around too for you to look at. Actually, it would be a good idea to find some of these and browse them for awhile just to get an idea of what you're getting into.)

davidbak
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