Answers to the Top 15 Questions When Promoting Your Amazon FBA Listing

Promoting Amazon FBA listing enables the sellers to use the marketplace’s top-class fulfillment resources. With the likes of Amazon advertising, acclaimed customer support, and trusted delivery options allow the sellers to grow their business domestically and internationally. However, when using Amazon FBA, the sellers might get confused or can have certain questions regarding the listings. Here are the top questions the sellers may ask when promoting Amazon FBA listing:

1. What are the benefits of promoting Amazon FBA listing?

Once your items are listed on Amazon FBA, your products will be entitled to the following features on Amazon.com

• Grow your business using Amazon advertising and its proven Amazon FBA technology.
• Satisfy customers with Amazon’s world-class customer care service to cater your orders.
• Amazon FBA can help you to scale your operations transparently without making any new investments in headcount and warehouse space.

1. How do I upload my listings on Amazon.com?

Amazon FBA offers three specific channels for uploading your listings to contain the scale of your business. It includes the process of creating the product catalog by specifying the product description and other obligatory elements to present it online for purchase by consumers. As a retailer, you can use the pre-set templates by Amazon to create the listings.

Add a product– Seller Central is Amazon’s web interface for the sellers that help them to add new items or select the existing items in the Amazon.com catalog. If you have a small number of items that you want ‘fulfilled by Amazon’ tag on it, you can list them one by one. Once you have listed all the items, you can simply convert it to Amazon FBA.

Flat file feeds– In case if you want to list items in bulk, then you can list them using Amazon’s web tool to upload a flat file. Amazon offers the sellers an Excel Spreadsheet template that they can use to build a file. This method will help you to directly list your items on Amazon FBA.

API Integration– If you have a large number of development resources available and large numbers of items to be listed, then you can integrate your own inventory management software or your website with Amazon’s inventory catalog. This method will help you to directly list your items on Amazon FBA.

1. What are the item categories in which I can use Amazon FBA?

Amazon allows you to sell items in the following categories:

• Beauty products (including personal care appliances)
• Baby products (including toys)
• Consumer Electronics (smartphones, tablets, computers, cameras, and more)
• Digital accessories (including PC accessories, electronics accessories, and mobile accessories)
• Home Essentials
• Jewelry (including watches)
• Kitchen essentials
• Personal care
• And more

1. Do I need to register Amazon as an additional place of business?

Once Amazon accepts you to its Amazon FBA program, you will be required to register its fulfillment center as your additional place of business with the tax authorities. Note that if you are selling any taxable products under the Amazon FBA program, then you will be required to register under the sales tax law adding Amazon’s fulfillment center as your additional place of business. For inclusion of additional place of business, certain documents will be requested by the tax authorities for the amendment such as:

• NOC from the warehouse service provider
• Ownership deed along with property tax receipt

1. What are the Amazon FBA Charges?

Amazon will charge for the following services when promoting Amazon FBA listing:

• Amazon will charge for the storage of your products in the Amazon fulfillment centers. Here your products will be stored until it is shipped
• Amazon will charge a fee if your products are getting an increased exposure to Amazon.com. It means that if customers are regularly reviewing your products, then you will have to pay for the Amazon advertising services
• Amazon will charge a fee for picking and packing your products when a customer places an order
• Amazon will also charge for the shipping of your products to the customers
• Amazon supports return policy and customer service and hence, it will charge for returns and customer service for products sold on Amazon.com

1. Is there any other way to help kick start my listing?

Yes, there are several ways in which you can kick-start your listings. When you are promoting Amazon FBA listing, in order to increase your Amazon sales, you will have to focus on certain things like:

• Get reviews: Customer reviews do matter when purchasing a product online. Amazon stresses a great significance on seller performance when ranking your items at the top.
• Discounts: Amazon will not allow you to sell your products at 100% discount, but if you will cut down the price a little bit, the consumers might show some interest in your products. For example, you can offer your customers a one-off 99% discount code in exchange for a review. It will straight away improve your Amazon search engine ranking.
• Along with your seller rating and price, Amazon also reviews the keywords in your item’s title to rank listings. Amazon only allows 500 characters to be used in the product title. So you will have to use as many keywords possible under the criteria to ensure that your product is visible on Amazon.com
• Amazon advertising or Amazon sponsored products will help your products to be displayed underneath the search results

1. I set up a sale but now my product is showing as an ‘add-on’ item. How do I fix this?

As a seller, you don’t have complete control over whether your products are declared add-ons by Amazon. Amazon only puts low priced items into the add-on category. It means that if your products are low priced, it cannot be purchased alone. But can be purchased along with other items in the same category. Amazon would be in loss if your low priced item is sold and shipped to the customer. As per Amazon’s policy, you can raise the selling price of your products any time. However, there is no set threshold under which your items will be displayed as an add-on.

1. Should I run PPC on a permanent basis?

You can switch off the Amazon Sponsored Products (PPC) once you think that your listings are at a point where it can make regular organic sales. However, if you want to run PPC that really helps you make profits; then you should do it on the basis of the following variables:

• Which keyword grouping gets the most response?
• Which sponsored ad gets the most response?
• Which primary message gets the most response? And is it experience, variety, or price?

Hence, it makes sense to leave the PPC up and running for a particular time period.

1. Do I need custom packaging for selling my products on Amazon FBA?

No, when you are promoting Amazon FBA listing, you will not require a custom package to sell your items. The least feasible package is a polybag as it entirely wraps your items at the lowest cost. In case if you are just testing your items to see if there is a market, you can consider a polybag. However, getting your products delivered in custom packaging serves as a way to distinguish yourself from other sellers and it helps you develop your brand. But you should know that the outer packaging will be of Amazon branding. But you can use custom packaging to share more information about the product and tell your brand’s story.

1. What are Universal Product Codes? How do these codes work with Amazon?

UPC or Universal Product Code is a machine legible code having a 12-digit number. Every item has its distinct UPC code. It enables you to process the orders and track inventory at a faster rate. Every Amazon FBA listing has a distinctive UPC allocated to it. It helps Amazon to convert the Universal Product Code into an in-house stock keeping unit (SKU) system known as Amazon Standard Identification Number (ASIN). As a seller, you will be required to assign a unique UPC to all the products you sell. When you create a listing, it will ask you to enter the UPC. And while printing the barcodes for sending the items into Amazon FBA, your exclusive ASIN code will help identify your item from other sellers.

1. How do I manage sales tax agreement for my Amazon FBA enterprise?

When it comes to sales tax, it can be a very daunting task to tackle. In order to handle sales tax agreement for your Amazon FBA enterprise, you should consider the following steps:

• Determine your sales tax connection
• Enroll for your sales tax permits in the states you are active
• Now, in the states where you have enrolled for sales tax permits, collect the sales tax from the buyers
• Determine how much you are obliged to pay in those states
• File for sales tax return

1. Why can’t I chart some of the shipping options for my items?

Amazon certainly does not want to take risk of a delayed order delivery. A delay in delivering the ordered products means that it directly affects the company’s reputation. It doesn’t matter even if it is your fault as a seller. So, at the initial phase of your seller account, Amazon might not give you the access to chart quick delivery options like two days, next day, or same day to your products. In order to earn that access, you will have to establish a history of reliable shipping with slower shipping speeds. Once you accumulated a history where all your products were delivered on time, Amazon might give you the access to quick shipping options.

1. What should I do when I am vacationing or unavailable to fulfill particular orders?

As a seller, you can temporarily remove all the open listings from Amazon FBA in the event of going on a vacation, taking a holiday, or any other reason. Amazon offers the sellers with the Listing Status feature where they can deactivate their self-fulfilled listings without worrying about their FBA listings. The Amazon FBA listings will be looked after by the company itself.

NOTE: before you change the Listing Status, Amazon wants you to ensure that there are no pending orders remaining because the previously placed orders will not get canceled on their own. So, you will have to manage it manually either by fulfilling the order or by canceling the order.

1. How should I activate or deactivate the Listing Status mode in case of an emergency?

When you are taking a sudden time off or are going on a vacation or taking a holiday, you can set your listings to ‘Inactive’ through the following steps.

• Open your seller account and go to Listing Status
• Now select the status as Inactive
• Press Submit button to save the changes made
• Within an hour or two, Amazon will remove your self-fulfilled listings from the live product listing on Amazon
• When you get back to work after a vacation, you can set your listings again to ‘Active’ through the following steps.
• Open your seller account and go to Listing Status
• Now tick the status as Active
• Press Submit button to save the changes made
• Within an hour or two, Amazon will activate your self-fulfilled listings in the live product listing on Amazon

Note: Amazon offers this feature to certain sellers only such as if you are prime seller promoting Amazon FBA listing. So, if you don’t see the ‘Edit’ button next to Listing Status, then it means that you are not authorized by Amazon FBA to use this feature.

1. How can I manage my supply in Amazon’s fulfillment centers?

As a seller, you can analyze your stock supply levels online via your seller account. In case if you need to send supplementary units to the inventory, you will have to notify Amazon about it that you will be sending further product unit shipments to its fulfillment centers.

Building a business is not a simple ‘walk in the park’ and to get the idea of how your business will perform in this gigantic and competitive marketplace environment, you will want to get the clear picture of what selling on Amazon necessitates. These 15 questions will almost cover all your queries regarding promoting Amazon FBA listing.

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