Selling on Amazon is one of the easiest ways to start an online business. Interestingly, you can get started for free. In this article, you would learn all you need to know about how to sell on amazon for free.
Selling for free on Amazon in Four Simple Steps
If you are looking to get started with selling stuff on Amazon for free, here are four practicable steps to selling on Amazon.
- Find the right product
The first step to selling on Amazon is to find a product to sell. If you already have a store offline and already have products you sell, this step would be easy for you. However, if you are starting out with selling, there are several software tools that can help with decision making.
- Create an Amazon account
Once you have found a product to sell, the next step is to create an Amazon seller account for free. You only need to fill in certain information about yourself, and you’re ready to go.
- Product Listing
After successfully setting up your Amazon account, you can then list your product on Amazon for free. Amazon currently has over 160 million products, so there is a chance that the product you’re looking to sell is already online, and all you have to do is join the list of sellers.
- Choose the delivery process
In the process of listing your products, you would also be required to handle the sales logistics yourself or use the Amazon FBA package. With the Amazon FBA package, Amazon handles the storage and delivery process in the sales process.
Do you need money to sell on Amazon?
Although it is possible to spend money while selling on Amazon, it is also possible to start selling on Amazon without necessarily spending anything or spending much less than you expect.
What should you know about Amazon fees?
When starting out as an Amazon seller, the two main fees to look out for are the Amazon Referral fees and Individual per-item fees.
- Referral Fees
These are the usual Amazon commission on sales made on the platform. The fees are usually about 15% of the sales price of a product.
- Individual per-item Fees
These are the flat fees paid for non-professional sellers on the Amazon platform. The individual per-item fees are $0.99 for every item sold.
Both fees are usually taken out of your income after a sale is made. The implication of this is that you don’t have to worry about making any of these payments upfront.
There are also other fees apart from the two mentioned. However, when starting as a new seller with less than 40 products monthly, you don’t have to worry about these other projects.
Finding a Free Product to Sell on Amazon
When starting as an Amazon seller, it is important to cut costs as much as possible. First way is to use IO Scout product finder https://ioscout.io/product-finder to research a product data and analyze your competitors sales. The second way to save money by finding used items around your home to sell. Some common examples include kitchen items, toys, used books, et. You can also choose to create your products for sale. Amazon Handmade and Merch by Amazon are amazing opportunities for this.
If you choose to sell handmade products, your product costs would only include the cost of the materials used in creating the goods.
How to assess if your product sells on Amazon?
Before listing your product on Amazon, it is important to ensure that the product will sell. Luckily, there are several tools that can guide you in carrying out some form of feasibility studies. Some of the indices that can help include;
- The Product’s Best Sellers Rank (BSR)
Almost all products on Amazon have a unique score called the Best Sellers Rank. This ranking is based on categories. The lower the BSR of a product, the better it sells. So a product with #1 will most likely sell thousands of units monthly. Another product with a BSR of #200,000 might not sell more than a handful of units monthly.
When sourcing and listing your products, it is important to pay attention to the BSR of similar products in the category before going ahead.
- Use a Sales Estimator
There are also several Amazon sales estimator tools that can help you get. With IO Scout https://ioscout.io/sales-estimator you can estimate the average sales of a product per month. Apart from this, the software tool also offers a wide range of fantastic options for Amazon sellers.
You can access several IO Scout tools for free. However, to enjoy the full features of IO Scout, you might have to pay for the premium plan. With IO Scout, you get to enjoy Product research tools that help you find the most profitable products on Amazon. The keyword scout function also helps you get high-performing keywords and even a supplier database in case you are looking for manufacturers that can help create your products.
The software also notifies you in case of changes to your listings and other developments on Amazon.
- Predict how fast your product will sell
Once you have your product’s BSR and you know the estimated amount of sales expected monthly, all you have to do is divide the average number of sales accordingly to get an estimate of your daily sales. IF your product has a daily sales rate of 10 units daily, the chances are that you most likely would sell the first day it is listed.