I have been working at Amazon for two and a half years. It is not easy to survive.
|
My first job at Amazon was at a startup. I watched three or four days of Amazon training videos when I went out for the interview, and then I went out for the interview without knowing what was going on. I actually got the job. They said they would hire two people, but I ended up doing it all by myself. I stayed in this company for half a year, but I only worked on Amazon for three or four months. The reason I left was because my boss contracted the Amazon e-commerce department to an agent, and he probably didn't see any hope for me. When I took over the store, I was processing about 13 orders a day, and the monthly sales of the store was about 7,000 to 8,000 dollars. Later I tracked this store but it didn't take off, what a pity (this company has excellent resources, the pictures and visuals are taken by professionals, and there are artists to retouch them later. In addition, the brand has purchased the eight-year authorization from the British Tom Cat. In terms of operational personnel, an investment manager was arranged to connect with me and arrange for me to go to the official training at the Shanghai Amazon headquarters. When I went for the training, it was the first official training held by Amazon, so the instructor was more serious and the training partners were also very enthusiastic (I am still in touch with several of the people I met, and their performance is very good). This kind of training is very useful for novices, but not for the big guys. I am a newbie so it is very useful. This training is free, free, free). After I quit my job, I started working on my own for a while. Before I started, I felt that I was awesome and capable of doing anything. But in the end, I found that my funding was a big problem, not to mention the supply chain. The products I bought from 1X88 had quality issues, and I ended up failing. I calculated that I lost 60,000 to 70,000 yuan. This was my tuition for entering Amazon. The second job is also my current job, in a traditional small foreign trade company. The boss knows e-commerce, and can be said to be an e-commerce tycoon and an investment expert. He has a generous personality and also invests in e-commerce abroad. The domestic e-commerce he invested in is very large. During the interview, I had a great chat with the boss for two hours. At the end of the chat, he told me that he knew your last company (the company address and company name are xxxxxx), and he also asked me to invest there, but I didn't invest because I didn't think the project was good. Suddenly, I felt that Xiamen was so small, and we could meet each other like this, and then I joined this company. The company's main business is B2B bags, so Amazon also makes bags, and mainly makes mommy bags. Why do we make mommy bags? This is related to the boss, because in 2016, too many Amazon B2B customers came to the company to customize mommy bags. The boss saw that they were so popular, so he asked us to sell them ourselves, so we sold mommy bags. Maybe the timing of my entry was wrong. When I took over, the mommy bag category should be saturated. I was in a loss-making state for half a year after taking over. Losses were fine, but sales were not up. However, I discussed with the boss about developing products and making them myself. The boss neither refused nor agreed, and remained silent. I was so helpless. Without performance, the boss's wife began to doubt my ability. She talked to me alone about whether I should switch to a B2B salesperson. She arranged for me to follow shoe orders. I went to Wenling twice, and the boss also asked me to operate the backend of Alibaba International Station. I know very well that as a salesperson, performance is face. If there is no performance, it is a slap in your own face. If there is no performance, you are... If this situation continues, I don't think I will stay in this company for long. Until April last year, the company's new policy came down, project contracting. Project period: May 2019 ~ April 2020, project goal: 200,000 RMB converted into 200,000 US dollars in sales (of which 10,000 RMB is my investment, I have xxx shares), the project can maintain a break-even. (In fact, any company that converts 200,000 RMB into 200,000 US dollars will lose money, but my current company has been losing money from the beginning to the end because of this Amazon project, so the boss wants to stimulate me to make such a decision). One of the important rules is that the boss is in charge of the financial statements, and other product development, order brushing, etc. shall not interfere. In fact, the company is a financial investment in me. (The boss actually just fooled me casually. Now the inventory is only 400,000 or 500,000 in circulation, and it is now profitable, so he will not care about me. Even if I lose money, it will not be much, so the boss is not worried. If the inventory is two or three million at the beginning of 2020, I guess our boss should not sleep well every night. You should understand the rules of the workplace, haha) My first move was to sell all the bags at a discount, and then launch my own products. I personally don't think much of bags. First, they are too expensive. Second, the production cycle is too long. Third, Amazon's delivery fee is too high. Fourth, the competition is too fierce. Fifth, the turnover of funds for bags is too slow. I calculated it myself. If you invest one dollar in bags, it will take at least three months to get it back. So if bags make goods for you five times a year (that is, send goods to Amazon warehouses five times), it is already very impressive, so the turnover of funds is too slow. What is your inventory turnover rate generally? (That is, how much money is invested in a year to achieve how much sales) Last month, I pretended to go out for an interview and felt the market. In fact, everyone is vague. Some companies say that the investment is one-third of the sales (if you don't want to refute, just let him brag. Amazon's return is only about 40%~50%, and you invest 1/3 of the sales, haha). The boss said that the ideal state of domestic e-commerce is that the annual sales should reach 20 times the average occupied funds. I calculated that it is difficult to achieve. At present, my production is so small that it is barely 15 times (clothing). If the production is larger, the multiple will be lower. However, this is also related to the product. The product with a long production cycle is estimated to have a lower multiple. This performance target was completed in December 2019. Now looking back at this target, it feels too simple, really too simple. At the beginning, I should have taken more funds, made more sales, and taken more commissions... Haha. There are still four months left, so I think I'll just forget it and set a new target for 2020. 2019 was also a tough year. I was the only one in the company's Amazon. I did it all by myself from beginning to end, from registering the store to shipping, finding a freight forwarder, finding a supply chain, and the store operation plan. The boss provided funds and told me where the source factory of your product was and where I could find it, and then I went there to find it myself. When I have time, I talk to him about domestic e-commerce, Amazon, and how to build our Amazon framework (many Amazon sellers in China are small companies and individual sellers, and many of them are crossing the river by feeling the stones, and we are also crossing the river by feeling the stones). He occasionally takes me to the e-commerce company he invested in to let me see the world. The domestic e-commerce thinking has been subtly instilled in me. My boss set a sales target of 700,000 USD for me in 2020, but I actually set a target of 1,000,000 USD for myself. At the end of 2019, my boss planned to invest one or two million more next year and hire one or two more people to expand the business (I am the only one working on it now), but my boss’s wife opposed it, mainly because she was afraid that I would lose all the money and would not feel bad. Well, I still have to show my sales performance, otherwise everything is in vain. The beginning of 2020 was full of twists and turns. Due to the impact of the epidemic, we had planned to ship a batch of goods by sea when we came to work on the first day of the new year. However, we couldn't go to work due to the epidemic, and the factory couldn't start work. The products also began to be out of stock one after another. Finally, the factory started to work and there was a spot of goods to replenish them by air (usually by sea). We wanted to continue to ship by air to replenish the goods, but the factory said that there was no stock and it would take a long time to produce. We had no choice but to wait. When there was stock, the air freight rate rose again, so we could only ship by sea. Damn, it was really unlucky. The goods arrived in the United States by sea, and the Fed signed for it. I don't know what the Fed is doing. The goods are all in the warehouse without delivery, and it has been delayed for a long time. 2020, the Year of the Rat, has started unfavorably. So far, I have only made more than 160,000 US dollars. The performance rose last month, but it fell again because of the shortage of goods. However, now the goods that have been continuously received have begun to be warehoused, and the number of orders has slowly recovered since today. I have been under a lot of pressure in the past two or three months because I was too confident in my products and bought too much goods. The total value of goods from the sky, the sea, Amazon warehouses, and factories is 400,000 to 500,000. The pressure is quite high. The most important thing is that half of them are new products. I am still a little worried. The goal is to break 100,000 US dollars in monthly sales by mid-August, otherwise there will be no fun. Come on! ! ! ! ! |
>>: Four years of Amazon operation--sharing experience of real-person evaluation
Recommend
Shipping plans must be shipped within 30 days? Amazon sellers are collectively furious
A recent policy update in Amazon's backend ha...
US inflation has increased for the 20th month! US online prices hit a new high in January!
It is learned that according to the latest online ...
What is Fancy? Fancy Review
Fancy mainly sells creative products in various ni...
Second-hand clothing platform ThredUp tests peer-to-peer resale marketplace feature
It is learned that recently, according to foreign ...
Attention! Amazon blocks some delivery windows in December!
Amazon warehouse overflows are an increasingly se...
What is FindNiche? FindNiche Review
FindNiche is a powerful niche analysis tool and a ...
What is Xuan Feiyang? Xuan Feiyang Review
Shenzhen Xuanfeiyang Network Technology Co., Ltd. ...
Amazon's daily sales of over 1,000 orders operation skills
Amazon main picture video location, you can also ...
Uncover the secrets of Amazon keyword ranking methods to help you optimize product search rankings
On Amazon, keyword ranking has a great impact on t...
Amazon uses dark technology to crack down on Black Friday sales, and Black Friday flash sales are widely cancelled
The Qatar World Cup is in full swing. Following Ar...
Amazon's flash sale rules have been adjusted. How should sellers respond?
Amazon's limited-time promotions have always b...
What is Frontier Car Group (FCG)? Frontier Car Group (FCG) Review
Frontier Car Group (FCG) is a Berlin-based startup...
Good news for Chinese cross-border e-commerce sellers! Malaysia's 15 billion aid plan
With RM15 billion in relief measures, the vaccinat...
FDA cancels the production franchise of disinfectant hand sanitizer! Production will be stopped from December 31st!
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announ...
Is Amazon a thing of the past? In fact, its golden age has just begun
What is the preferred platform for cross-border e-...