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In the blink of an eye, the second quarter of 2024 is already halfway through. Faced with a series of ongoing operational challenges such as tightening policies, low-price competition, and rising costs, Amazon sellers are still stumbling on their cross-border journey as May approaches.
According to past sales, consumers will buy gifts in the spring from March to May due to the many holidays, and this period is usually regarded by sellers as the peak sales period for Amazon. As for May, a month with important holidays such as Labor Day and Mother's Day, many sellers are looking forward to a promotion feast during this period. But contrary to expectations, this year sellers on the US site seem to be facing the sales challenge of entering the off-season early this month. It has been observed that since May, many Amazon sellers have reported a downward trend in traffic to the US site: "As soon as May began, the number of orders dropped and the traffic disappeared. What happened to the beautiful country?" "Me too. When I woke up today and looked at my performance, it was a huge disappointment. I feel like the conversion rate is very unstable with the new algorithm." One of the sellers even mentioned that its product sales in April had dropped by about 20% compared to March, and in May, the number of orders dropped by 50%. Even the best-selling links seemed to be unsaleable. ▲ The picture comes from the social platform, please delete if it infringes According to the feedback from sellers, the most obvious decline in orders in early May was from May 10 to 12. The main reasons may be the following three: 1. The holiday sales peak has passed According to the American calendar, Mother's Day in 2024 will be May 12. Generally speaking, overseas consumers tend to buy gifts for their mothers during this important holiday, but the peak sales period is usually before the holiday. As consumers are immersed in the festive atmosphere near and on the day of the holiday, a decline in online shopping demand is inevitable. 2. The main force of online shopping is on the march It is reported that since the end of April, large-scale demonstrations have broken out in many parts of the United States, and many of the participants include young Americans who are the main force of online shopping. As of May, most of the protests have not been resolved, which has also had a certain impact on product sales on US e-commerce platforms. 3. When variant illegal scanning is in progress According to industry sources, Amazon launched a new round of sweeps against a large number of stores with illegal variants in the early morning of May 11. Many sellers received notification emails from Amazon, saying that "the ASIN variants created violated Amazon's ASIN creation policy", and their accounts were suspended, making it impossible to conduct normal sales operations. At the same time, some sellers revealed that this round of sweeping accounts may continue until December 30. Amazon did not respond to this news. However, in any case, facing Amazon's recent strict review of variant violations, relevant sellers need to spend more energy on appeals and pay more attention to the compliance of their accounts. In addition, some sellers also mentioned that as May approaches, the fierce competition for traffic between Chinese overseas platforms such as Temu, SHEIN and AliExpress and Amazon in the US market is still continuing. The platforms’ low-priced products are emerging in an endless stream, continuing to divide some of Amazon’s traffic. Overall, affected by multiple factors, in May, a month full of opportunities and challenges, many sellers not only failed to welcome the promotion feast as expected, but even experienced the situation of entering the off-season early and declining sales. But as the saying goes: sellers do not share the same joys and sorrows. According to feedback from the industry, there are also some categories with obvious seasonality in May that were not affected by the above unfavorable factors and ushered in the sales peak as expected.
When it comes to the hot-selling categories in the e-commerce retail sector in the second quarter of each year, gardening and outdoor must be one of them, and 2024 is no exception. In recent social media posts discussing the order volume in May, many sellers said that traffic has increased: "Whether the order volume can grow in May depends mainly on the category. The traffic of gardening products has been very high recently." "My outdoor products saw a huge sales volume in May, a much larger increase than in April. A product that was out of stock in January was re-launched and sales increased again." It was observed that the products sold by sellers with an increase in order volume mostly belong to the garden gardening and sports and outdoor categories. It is understood that in Amazon's US market, both categories have obvious seasonal characteristics. 1. Garden and gardening category According to the latest forecast released by MomentumCommerce, Amazon's US garden and gardening sales are expected to reach US$30.7 billion in 2024, a year-on-year increase of 14.4%. In the second quarter, the gardening category is expected to bring in $11.1 billion in revenue, accounting for about 36% of the full-year forecast revenue. In terms of specific months, due to seasonal factors, the category is expected to have the highest revenue in May, reaching $4 billion. At the same time, Google keyword trends also show that in the past five years, keywords related to gardening products usually reach their search peaks from May to June, such as moss pole, monstera plant support, etc. 2. Sports and Outdoor Category With the improvement of people's health awareness and the rise of outdoor sports craze, the demand for sports outdoor market has reached an unprecedented high in recent years. In 2024, before the arrival of the season suitable for outdoor activities, the sports outdoor category in the US market has also ushered in a golden period of sales. According to the latest sales forecast, Amazon's US sports and outdoor sales are expected to reach US$32.4 billion in 2024, a year-on-year increase of 11.4%, with the sales growth rate reaching the highest point in January and July. In the second quarter, the sports and outdoor category is expected to bring in $8.1 billion in revenue, accounting for about 25% of the full-year forecast revenue. Looking at specific months, sales in this category continued to grow from April to July and are expected to reach a peak of $3.2 billion in July. It is worth mentioning that although the increasingly fierce market competition has not changed, relevant data show that in the seasonal category, Amazon's performance in 2024 will be stronger than in 2023 , and more and more American consumers are turning to Amazon for seasonal shopping. It can be seen from this that for Amazon sellers, if they want to achieve an increase in orders, selling seasonal products during the right time period may be a good breakthrough. You can observe market trends more and understand the sales status of categories in advance so as to seize the opportunity. However, in view of Amazon’s increasingly stringent policy reviews and market challenges in recent times, we would like to remind all sellers that no matter what operational adjustments you make, you must try your best to put compliance first, adhere to the spirit of long-termism, and build your own core competitiveness. What do you think about this? Welcome to discuss in the comment area~
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