Want to make a fortune on Amazon? Product selection is key! Many sellers have learned the hard way that failures in product selection can render even the best operations useless. Today, we're going to expose the pitfalls of Amazon product selection, helping you avoid traps and take fewer detours!
Mistake 1: Focusing Only on Sales, Ignoring Viability? A Beginner's Cardinal Sin!
Many people choose products by focusing solely on those with the highest sales! Seeing a "Water Bottle" with hundreds of thousands of dollars in monthly sales, they feel like they've struck gold. They dream of a 30% profit margin and millions of RMB in monthly income – sounds great, right? But the reality is harsh: high sales mean high competition!
Have you considered the following questions:
- Do you have enough capital? For a product selling 10,000 units a month, how much inventory do you need to avoid stockouts? Two to three months of inventory, tens of thousands of products – is your starting capital sufficient?
- How fierce is the competition? How many sales do you need to rank on the first page? How much advertising spend is required? Do you have enough budget?
- What about storage fees? Stockpiling large quantities leads to inventory pile-up, and monthly storage fees can be a significant expense!
New sellers with limited capital and experience are likely to lose everything if they rush into red ocean markets. The right approach is to start with niche markets, choosing products with less competition where you have an advantage. After accumulating experience and capital, you can consider entering more challenging markets.
Mistake 2: Launching New Products with Vine Review Too Soon? Negative Reviews Can Ruin Everything!
Vine Review is an Amazon-approved method to get good reviews by paying to send free products to reviewers in exchange for evaluations. But many people overlook one point: Vine Review can also result in negative reviews!
If your product quality is substandard and reviewers find flaws, giving you a few negative reviews, your new product will be dead on arrival! Therefore, before doing Vine Review, you must have enough confidence in your product quality to ensure you get at least four- or five-star reviews. Otherwise, focus on improving product quality and accumulating organic positive reviews!
Mistake 3: Homogeneous Competition? Price Wars Only Lead to Mutual Destruction!
If the products you choose are nearly identical to your competitors' with no differentiation, your only competitive tool will be price reduction! Price wars ultimately lead to mutual destruction! If you're not a factory with price advantages, you'll only end up killing yourself in the end.
The right approach is to differentiate!
- Improve the product: Check your competitors' negative reviews, identify pain points, and upgrade.
- Add features: Add new features to improve the user experience.
- Bundle accessories: Bundle practical accessories to increase the product's added value.
- Visual differentiation: Highlight your selling points in product images and descriptions to attract customers.
In short, make your product unique and give customers a sense of value for money.
Mistake 4: Incorrect Profit Margin Calculation? All Your Hard Work for Nothing!
Incorrect profit margin calculation is a common mistake. For example, when calculating the profit margin for a leg pillow, you might refer to another similar leg pillow. But the two products may differ significantly in size and weight, leading to deviations in shipping and other expense calculations, ultimately causing the profit margin to be far lower than expected.
For example, assume Product A and Product B are both leg pillows. Product A weighs 3.36 pounds, while Product B weighs 5.38 pounds, a difference of 2 pounds.
| Product | Weight (lbs) |
|---|---|
| Product A | 3.36 |
| Product B | 5.38 |
If you use Product B's weight to calculate Product A's shipping cost, it will lead to higher shipping costs and lower profit margins.
Therefore, when calculating profit margins, be sure to find similar products with dimensions, sizes, and volumetric weights very close to your product as a reference. It is best to measure the length, width, height, and weight yourself after receiving the sample to calculate an accurate profit margin.
Mistake 5: Blindly Trusting Suppliers? Inspection is Key!
Many people find the sample quality satisfactory and directly place a bulk order. But have you considered that the bulk goods the supplier delivers may not be the same as the sample? They may reduce quality to lower costs.
If you don't inspect the bulk goods before shipping them to the Amazon warehouse, and quality issues arise, resulting in many negative reviews, your product will be completely ruined!
Therefore, you must inspect the bulk goods before shipping them! You can inspect them yourself or hire a third-party inspection company. Ensure the quality of the bulk goods meets your requirements to avoid unnecessary losses.
These are some common mistakes in Amazon product selection. I hope you can learn from these examples, avoid these pitfalls, choose products with real potential, and succeed on Amazon!