Six pitfalls of being an Amazon employee!

The first pitfall: black technology

Due to historical reasons, Amazon was once dominated by black technology. It was to the point where "everyone uses black technology" and "no black technology, no Amazon". However, in recent years, black technology has become increasingly difficult to use, and mainstream Amazon sellers have switched to white hat operations. They focus on products, supply chains, and deep cultivation of brands and channels.

Are there still people playing with black technology now? Of course, there are always people playing with it. But the threshold is getting higher and higher, and the risks are getting bigger and bigger. We business people are not so pedantic. If others are playing with black technology, you don’t do it, and you don’t have to do e-commerce. Back then, everyone was playing with black technology, so you had to play with it too. Now black technology is no longer mainstream, which is actually a good thing.

The second pitfall: follow the seller

It’s good to follow others and easily pick up ready-made products. Other people’s products and sales can become yours in a matter of minutes.

There is only one small disadvantage of following the sale, you can't get the money. It is really fun to follow the sale order, but unfortunately, it is only fun to place the order. When I tried to withdraw the money, I was dumbfounded, and the store was gone.

If you are doing follow-selling now, it is either difficult, extremely difficult, and you have to survive in the cracks. Or you will constantly infringe on the rights and shut down your store. A seller came all the way from Fujian to Shenzhen to find me, wanting to do our stable product selection model. Because it is too tiring to follow-sell. They have a team of nearly 10 people who follow-sell, and they use black technology and fancy operations. But it is tiring. The store is a consumable! The store is still there today, but I don’t know if it will be there tomorrow, and there is no guarantee that the balance can be withdrawn.

The third pitfall: one-click distribution

In the early days of e-commerce, there were few sellers and few products, so sellers had to distribute products in large quantities. But now there are more and more sellers, and sellers are flooded, so there is less and less room for distribution.

I have a theory called: whoever creates value earns profit. I have written an article about this. Interested readers can click here to read it:

If you want to make money, you have to provide value, you have to do things that have thresholds. What value do you provide for this kind of thing of transferring goods from one hand to the other hand with one click? Someone has selected the products for you, found the source of goods for you, and even organized them for you, taken photos for you, and shipped them for you. What do you do? The only thing you do is to put the products on the platform, advertise and promote them? And even this listing is organized by someone for you, you only need to move your fingers and upload it with one click. So what do you do?

I think everyone who is not stupid should understand that your only value should be the value of leeks. People don't want your brain and wisdom, but they just see that you don't have this thing.

The fourth pitfall: best-selling products

What's wrong with best-selling products? If we don't make best-selling products, then what about slow-selling products?

Let’s answer this question first: What is the essence of doing business?

If it is 2015 now, and you are doing cross-border e-commerce, basically you can get orders as long as you put your products on the shelves. Why? Because there were few sellers at that time, and you were scarce if you could put your products on the shelves. But now it is 2024, and you can't get orders even if you put your products on the shelves. Why? Because if you can put your products on the shelves, others can also put their products on the shelves. Now there are too many sellers.

When there are few sellers, it is possible to place orders, but when there are many sellers, it is difficult to place orders. Therefore, the essence of doing business is competition.

Best-selling products have orders, but there are too many sellers who focus on best-selling products, and the competition is too fierce. If you have strength, you don't like small products, and you are not satisfied with small competition, you can make best-selling products. If you are an individual and sell small products, you will die miserably if you make best-selling products.

The fifth pitfall: Secret play

People often look for experts in groups, but in my opinion, in the e-commerce industry, there are no experts but there are many people who pretend to be experts.

If there is a magical and top-secret fighting method in this world, which has magical effects and can make you a god once you use it, then this fighting method should not be a "secret". Because if it works well, people will use it, it will become famous, it will be noticed, it will be cracked by others, and it will no longer be a "secret".

You would say: He made a fortune secretly and kept it a secret. That is unless this method is not effective. If it is effective, you cannot cover it up or hide it.

In the e-commerce industry, there is often a period of time when a loophole is exposed, one person first makes a move, and then a bunch of people follow suit, and then it becomes widespread and useless, and is remedied by the official. This is a normal phenomenon. But if you keep chasing after such loopholes, you will be exhausted, and you may not make money in the process. You will most likely lose both time and money.

The sixth pitfall: the five black categories of counterfeit brands

When men have no money, they start to study unconventional things; when women have no money, they start to reflect on their marriage; those who have no future in e-commerce, when they have no orders, start to study the five black categories.

The risk of doing black five is high, and the overall rate of return is not low. However, there are so many shining success stories. We always hear some stories of getting rich overnight.

Scientists have studied those who sell drugs in gangs. They work hard - they have to be lackeys for the bosses, and the risks are high - their lives are at risk at any time. However, many of them still live in their parents' homes because they have no money to rent a house. In between selling drugs, they have to do odd jobs in supermarkets to supplement their lives.

What makes them spend so much money and effort on this job? This is really like "selling drugs with the heart of selling drugs, but earning the money of selling cabbages".

The answer is: star effect.

People only see those gangster bosses, driving luxury cars, living in luxury houses, hugging beautiful women, and surrounded by followers. People don't notice that the overall success rate of this business is low and the risks are high. It's better to go to work properly.

The same is true for the Black Five. You hear a lot of seemingly successful cases. But you don’t see the “one general’s success is the result of thousands of sacrifices” behind it. The risk is high, the success rate is low, and if you have the time, energy, and money to invest, it is better to make some stable products.