Amazon is now on track to invest $15 billion to empower Amazon 3rd party sellers.
The money is being used to provide sellers with new tools, services, and infrastructure "to allow sellers to better manage their Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) inventory and, in turn, increase sales."
In 2018, third-party sellers made up "58% of all physical gross merchandise sold in Amazon’s stores... [with] sales far exceeded $2 billion on Prime Day in July this year. These businesses have created an estimated 1.6 million jobs worldwide."
This marks Amazon's recognition and support of small & medium businesses selling in their marketplace. Amazon Vice President of Small Business, Nicholas Denissen, was quoted as saying, "Small and medium-sized businesses are the lifeblood of the economy, and we are committed to empowering them...As part of our dedication to supporting independent retailers, we have thousands of employees around the globe who work hard on their behalf, developing tools and services to help them grow their sales in Amazon’s stores. Ultimately, our success depends on their success."
So how does this actually help you? This money has not only gone into improving the infrastructure for 3rd party sellers, but it is also being used to develop tools and apps to help improve the whole process. Expect more resources to help make better decisions when purchasing inventory and research potential products, make shipping to FBA's more streamlined, make pricing decisions, and provide general seller education for new and seasoned 3rd party sellers.
Types of recently introduced tools and services include:
Fulfillment and inventory tools – The Target Inventory Levels tool launched in the U.S., the U.K., Italy, Spain, France, and Germany to help selling partners obtain better insights into their FBA inventory. Achieving suggested inventory levels increase sales through more 1-Day delivery eligibility and qualifies selling partners for lower storage fees.
Appstore and third-party tools – The Amazon Marketplace Appstore expanded globally into Europe, India, Japan, and Australia. The Amazon Marketplace Appstore helps selling partners to identify trusted third-party applications that complement Amazon’s free tools and help them streamline their business operations. With more than 200 apps available, selling partners can find tools and services across a range of categories including pricing, advertising, and inventory management.
Pricing management tools – Sold by Amazon, a free, opt-in service, help selling partners save time and increase sales by automating prices so they can consistently and effortlessly offer customers great prices. Selling partners have peace of mind that they will never receive less than the established price for a product, even if the product is sold to an Amazon customer for less.
Business reports and analytics tools – The Product Opportunities dashboard can help selling partners find new product opportunities that align with how they want to grow and scale their business. To do so, this tool generates customized reports based on business analytics and data that provide curated guidance for selling partners, like purchasing trends and requests for quantity discounts, which help inform their decisions for how to grow their selection. Selling partners using Amazon Business can use the new Marketplace Business Opportunities Portal reports finding more product listing opportunities for their business.
Seller University– An improved, redesigned Seller University portal helps selling partners find relevant educational content easier. In addition, Amazon launched a feature in Seller Central that gives selling partners personalized guidance about additional selling programs and features that they can experiment with to accelerate their growth. Each recommendation includes rich educational content (including Seller University videos) to help selling partners learn more about the programs.
Find out more about the programs that Amazon is polishing up for 3rd party sellers: Amazon Storefronts, Amazon Handmade, Amazon Launchpad, Amazon Business, Fulfillment by Amazon, Amazon Global Selling, Merch by Amazon, and Amazon Lending, which help your small businesses grow.
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