After reading this article, you’ll understand what Amazon Seller Central consultants are, when it makes sense to use a consulting service, and what other options you have to scale your brand on Amazon.
Success Factors for Selling – Amazon Consulting
Selling physical products through the world’s largest marketplace is becoming increasingly important every year. According to Amazon’s SME Report, more than 45,000 companies sold their products via the marketplace. Amazon offers retailers many advantages because, unlike in its own online shop, Amazon itself ensures that millions of customers visit the platform with an intention to buy.
If the FBA program is used, Amazon also takes care of storage and Prime shipping to our customers. This means that one of the most complex areas of an e-commerce company can be outsourced at the highest level—often even at significantly more favorable shipping conditions due to Amazon’s size.
The FBA program gives merchants access to a huge customer base that is actively looking for products. This is a decisive advantage: With the right strategy, strong organic rankings can be built up within a few months, depending on the niche and competition.
In the long run, our experience shows that the ratio of organic traffic to PPC traffic is around 70:30 (of course, there are exceptions in both directions). This means that a large part of the traffic and sales are generated without additional advertising costs. Hence, sellers via Amazon are usually twice as profitable as sellers in their online shop with the right strategies, approaches, and systems.
More than 900 SMEs achieved sales of more than $1 million for the first time in 2021. To sell successfully on Amazon, in addition to good strategic planning, you also need an understanding of the marketplace and the ability to adapt and optimize your processes and systems. Two key factors play a major role here – product and marketing.
Product
An outstanding product is the foundation of every successful e-commerce strategy. On Amazon, it is essential that the product not only meets the needs of the target customers but is also of high quality and competitively priced—it depends, above all, on the product-market fit.
Customer reviews are of particular importance due to the comparability of your products with those of competitors on the platform; they form the basis of a brand’s trust and credibility. Amazon’s A9 algorithm rewards a product that consistently receives positive reviews and higher rankings in search results. The consideration and ongoing review of product quality and relevance should, therefore, take place not only at launch but throughout the entire product life cycle.
The best product won’t do you any good if no one sees it. Marketing on Amazon is a broad field that includes both organic visibility (SEO) and paid advertising (PPC). An effective SEO strategy ensures that product listings are optimized for relevant search terms and rank high in Amazon search results. PPC campaigns, on the other hand, are designed to drive targeted traffic to the listings and thus increase visibility and, ultimately, sales.
Both strategies should work together to achieve the greatest possible success. Amazon PPC, implemented correctly, not only promotes product sales but also improves organic rankings. Therefore, constant alignment and fine-tuning between SEO and PPC strategies are essential.
Amazon advice – When it’s worth it!
From product selection to marketing, the Amazon FBA process involves various steps that must be implemented strongly for success on the platform. The question often arises here as to whether it makes sense to benefit from Amazon advice, i.e., experienced sellers or services, in order to use empirical values to achieve the best possible result for your own products.
In this section, we will go over the core areas of a successful Amazon company and clarify whether it makes sense to use Amazon consulting for the growth and scaling of your own FBA company.
What is Amazon consulting anyway?
An Amazon consultancy or consulting is the process by which Amazon experts help businesses and individuals maximize their presence and success on the Amazon platform.
Given Amazon’s many process steps and dynamics as a marketplace, such consultations can often help overcome challenges and take advantage of growth opportunities. As a rule, the company must carry out the implementation of the developed solutions independently in the case of an Amazon consultation.
An Amazon consultation can be invaluable for both newcomers to the platform and experienced sellers. The right Amazon consultant can help prevent mistakes, save costs, and increase sales by ensuring that best practices are followed and all available resources and tools are made to the best of their ability. Amazon consulting can be divided into five major consulting fields:
1. Strategic consulting
Strategic consulting focuses primarily on growth topics from a bird’ s-eye view. The key points here are the creation of strong systems and the collection of data and market analyses to drive the scaling of one’s own company. This involves strategic decisions such as the launch forecast, merchandise and process management, and the use and usefulness of debt capital.
2. Full-service consulting
The term full-service consulting usually refers to a holistic approach, with the idea of advising Amazon FBA companies on everything from strategic orientation to product development to marketing.
Amazon FBA can be thought of as a machine where gears interlock. The best consulting in marketing won’t do you any good if you have sand in the gears at the front of the process, the product. The great advantage of full-service consulting is precisely this holistic view of the process and the resulting, finely-tuned consulting.
You can often find such advice from successful Amazon FBA merchants who have built and scaled their own companies from scratch and can provide practical experience. It should be taken into account that good full-service consultations can deliver a good, but usually not the best possible result, as the depth of the topic is lacking, especially with specialist topics such as Amazon Marketing.
If you have a toothache, you probably wouldn’t go to a general practitioner either. In the same way, you usually wouldn’t go to a full-service solution for marketing challenges. For the best possible result, you should usually rely on specialists who still know and understand the entire process.
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You can often find such advice from successful Amazon FBA merchants who have built and scaled their own companies from scratch and can provide practical experience. It should be taken into account that good full-service consultations can deliver a good, but usually not the best possible result, as the depth of the topic is lacking, especially with specialist topics such as Amazon Marketing.
If you have a toothache, you probably wouldn’t go to a general practitioner either. In the same way, you usually wouldn’t go to a full-service solution for marketing challenges. For the best possible result, you should usually rely on specialists who still know and understand the entire process.
3. Subject-specific advice
Specialist advice includes experts such as tax consultants, trademark and patent attorneys, contact persons in the field of certificates, and experts who specialise in specific topics such as project development, financing issues, or portfolio management.
All these topics represent an important component and can be seen as a framework that is a prerequisite for success on Amazon. Amazon consulting can be used here to support the strategic orientation.
4. Sourcing Consulting
Product selection, elaboration, and manufacturer identification are elementary steps of an FBA company. At their core, they are the value-adding steps of any e-commerce business. This step should usually be covered in-house, which is why, in many cases, it does not make sense to hand over the entire sourcing area to your own hands.
However, Amazon consulting can be a strong addition to this process area to build up additional skills. Especially in product development, additional perspectives or supportive advice from experts help solve problems. Amazon consulting can also support manufacturer loyalty. Of course, all areas should be understood and ultimately mapped in-house, but in sourcing, a better result can be achieved through additional input.
5. Marketing Consulting
Marketing on Amazon is a broad field that includes both organic visibility (SEO) and paid advertising (PPC). An effective SEO strategy ensures that product listings are optimized for relevant search terms and rank high in Amazon search results. On the other hand, PPC campaigns are designed to drive targeted traffic to the listings and thus increase visibility and sales.
When does Amazon consulting make sense?
The question of when Amazon consulting is worthwhile cannot be answered in a general way, as this decision depends heavily on one’s own skills and resources and also on the complexity of the products themselves. In this section, we will discuss the factors of decision-making so that it becomes clear in which areas Amazon consulting can be used to scale in part and in which process steps in full.
Tax Planning, Legal, Compliance
As a rule, these very technical areas of responsibility should always be carried out together with advice to ensure a secure and strong foundation for selling products on Amazon. Acquiring these skills in-house usually makes little sense due to the complexity of the topics. If you look at the input-to-output ratio of diving into such a topic on your own, the utility factor of such a topic becomes clear quite quickly.
Scaling, sourcing, marketing
Before deciding to use Amazon consulting, entrepreneurs should first take stock of their own company. The focus should be on how strong the knowledge of the individual topics in the Amazon FBA process is in the company and whether there is sufficient capacity for applying the knowledge. The main focus should be on the large areas of scaling, sourcing, and marketing.
Scaling: Amazon consulting can promote the growth of your company, especially when it comes to scaling issues. Questions such as “Should we work with borrowed capital?” “When should we bring which new products to the market?” “How can we build processes to achieve reproducibly strong results?” can improve the growth and sustainability of your company in cooperation with a strong Amazon consultancy.
Sourcing: We have already discussed sourcing in the previous chapters. Counselling can be useful here to achieve a stronger result and build up further skills. However, the implementation of the consulting solutions should be covered in-house, as the process brings strong products to the market and represents the core competence and value-adding step of every e-commerce company.
Marketing: The marketing areas, i.e., Amazon SEO and Amazon PPC, are usually not handed over to a consultancy. Why? In hardly any other area do the two factors KNOW and SKILL, in combination, play a greater role in achieving a strong result.
Knowledge refers to understanding knowledge, whereas skill is practical application—skill delivers results. The best consulting strategy will be useless if you don’t constantly put this knowledge into practice through regular optimizations.
Amazon PPC records an average of four relevant monthly changes, all of which need to be tested and insights gained. Amazon Advertising is a dynamic market that must often be responded to with experience and knowledge. Situations and markets change, sometimes within weeks. If you really want to achieve the best possible result, you need large amounts of data and systems to gain the most accurate insights possible from this data and at the product level.
The Amazon PPC sector, in particular, can be easily outsourced to an agency, as a strong result requires very in-depth specialist knowledge, which must be implemented constantly and individually according to the market situation.
Amazon PPC is based on various strategies, A/B testing, and constant development and optimization of existing campaigns. Successful here is the one who not only has the most data at their disposal, but also the one who manages to draw the most insights from this data and implement them profitably for scaling.
Amazon Consulting vs. Amazon Agency
It is important to understand that entrepreneurial success always depends on two factors: knowledge and implementation. Amazon consulting focuses primarily on the strategic side of selling on Amazon. It provides comprehensive analytics, recommendations, and strategies to improve product rankings, increase sales, and improve visibility in search results.
Consultations are often based on in-depth market analysis and are ideal for sellers who want to understand the market and adjust their strategy accordingly. As a rule, they only impart knowledge without subsequently implementing it themselves.
A little thought experiment makes the difference between an Amazon consultant and an Amazon agency easier: Imagine a carpenter explaining all his tools and movements to you on making a piece of furniture. Can you make a piece of furniture as good as he did? As a rule, no, because practical experience is an elementary component for a successful result. Knowing tools or being able to master them are two different things.
This is exactly where Amazon agencies come into play. They act both in an advisory and operational capacity. This means that they not only provide strategies and recommendations but also intervene directly in their implementation.
The main difference lies in the level of participation and the scope of services. While consulting primarily offers advice and strategies, an agency also takes care of the practical implementation—both options have their value. As explained in the previous section, there are areas where consulting is worthwhile. In contrast, there are other areas in the Amazon FBA process that can be completely outsourced for the best possible outcome.
Ultimately, consulting and agency should be based on a company’s specific needs, subject area, and resources. Both approaches have the potential to significantly increase success on Amazon, as long as they fit the respective business structure and philosophy.
Conclusion – Consulting for Amazon companies
Amazon offers e-commerce merchants many advantages and the potential to profitably offer real physical products to millions of customers. Amazon consultations can help sellers make better decisions about scaling their own brands.
Fundamentally, however, it must be understood that success always arises from knowledge and its application, i.e. implementation. Amazon consulting usually only takes care of the former, whereas the companies must implement this knowledge themselves. With this understanding, it quickly becomes clear that advice is not worthwhile for every area in the FBA process.
For complex topics such as taxes, trademark and patent matters, product compliance, product development or strategic consulting at the company level, useful areas of consulting are useful areas. In contrast, topics such as Amazon PPC should be outsourced either in-house or to an agency. The complexity and individuality of this topic make it difficult for many salespeople to apply the findings of a consultation in daily optimization for the best possible result.
Each seller must decide for himself whether a consultation or agency is worthwhile. Factors such as knowledge, resources, and capacities play a major role here. However, suppose you manage to implement Amazon FBA at a strong level in all areas of the process. In that case, Amazon offers retailers incredible opportunities to sell products profitably to the end customer and to carry their own company and product vision into the world.
FAQ – Frequently Asked Questions: Amazon Advice
What makes an Amazon consultation?
Amazon Consulting helps sellers make better decisions when scaling their own businesses. Consultations usually only impart knowledge that companies then have to implement themselves.
How do I find an Amazon consultation?
There are a variety of Amazon consultations. In the first level, it should be clarified what exactly is being sought. Subsequently, in-depth research is carried out, and it is checked what results in the counseling has actually achieved in the past.
What makes an Amazon expert?
An Amazon expert should have demonstrably achieved strong results in his or her respective area of expertise over a certain period. To do this, the person should implement things operationally, which they can then pass on from real experience in a consultation.
How do you get professional advice for Amazon FBA?
To get professional advice on Amazon FBA, interested parties can contact specialized agencies that offer customized services for Amazon sellers. They can also find freelance consultants who focus on e-commerce and Amazon commerce.
What are the benefits of a specialized consultant for Amazon sellers?
A specialized Amazon consultant offers Amazon sellers the advantage of access to expert knowledge and the ability to develop individual strategies. They help increase visibility in the marketplace and sales while ensuring compliance with Amazon’s policies.
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