Here is your midweek jetpack of Amazon seller news, updates, and other useful clicks for your e-commerce business…
Amazon Says FTC Lawsuit Will Harm Consumers and Sellers
The Federal Trade Commission officially filed its antitrust suit against Amazon yesterday. The lawsuit accuses Amazon of buying competitors to thwart competition and abusing third-party sellers on its platform.
Today, Amazon sent an email to all selling partners and made a post accusing the FTC of “filing a misguided lawsuit against Amazon that would, if successful, force Amazon to engage in practices that actually harm consumers and the many businesses that sell in our store—such as having to feature higher prices, offer slower or less reliable Prime shipping, and make Prime more expensive and less convenient.
The looming antitrust case may have led Amazon to ditch the planned additional 2% fee for third-party merchants who do not use the company’s fulfillment services.
This is a huge case that is worth following. We will keep you updated in the FTC vs. Amazon ring.
Walmart Now Hosts 100K Active Sellers
Walmart now hosts 100k active sellers on its platform, doubling its size in 18 months. Around 10-20k new sellers are joining each month, and most of them are in the USA.
Image from Marketplace Pulse
There are over 400 million SKUS indexed on Walmart.com, and at least 95% of these products are listed by third-party sellers.
Many sellers are also now leveraging Walmart Fulfillment Services, with a notable 50% uptick in adoption just in Q2 of 2023.
Are you selling on Walmart yet?
Holiday Online Spending Projected to Grow 6.7% this Q4
Things are looking rosy for Q4.
According to Mastercard Spending Pulse, ecommerce spending during the holidays is expected to grow by 6.7% this year.
Ready for more good news?
The National Retail Federation says Halloween spending is expected to reach a record $12.2 billion, exceeding last year’s record of $10.6 billion.
It’s meltables season again…
Amazon US Search Volume Down 2.4% in July 2023
According to a LinkedIn post from the CEO of ZonGuru, recent data shows a 2.4% drop in Amazon’s US search volume YOY in July 2023.
While 2.4% seems a negligible number, its true impact is felt in categories like Clothing, Shoes, and Jewelry (-18%) and Sports and Outdoors (-13%).
Is this a reason for concern heading into Q4? Or is it just a summer slump?
Amazon is in the process of hiring 250k warehouse workers for Q4, up from 150k last year. That’s hinting at a huge Q4.
So…
AI Caramba! This Week in AI + Ecomm
- New Amazon KDP File Submission Limit: with the rise of AI-generated content, Amazon has issued a file submission limit, and will now limit KDP authors to just uploading three titles per day. This is to ensure a positive customer experience and combat the spamming of low-quality, AI-generated books.
- SMBs Leaning Heavily on AI this Holiday Season: Capterra’s 2023 Retail Holiday Preparation Survey reveals that small and mid-sized retailers have AI as a major part of their 2023 holiday strategies. Leading uses for AI include generating marketing content, personalizing customer experience, data analytics, automating tasks, and designing products.
- AI for Small Businesses: Fit Small Business recently released a guide for small businesses that shows several cases of AI in ecommerce along with examples, present benefits, and risks online merchants need to be aware of.
Important Amazon Updates for Yo’ Bad Seller Self
October 26 FBA and MCF Inventory Deadline for Holiday Deal Events
If you want your inventory to be available for Black Friday and Cyber Monday, make sure that your inventory arrives at Amazon fulfillment centers by October 26.
Read the full announcement here.
New “Sales Trend” Feature to Display Number of Sales on Listings
According to an announcement from Amazon, the new “sales trend” listing feature will allow shoppers to see how many customers recently purchased the product on the listing.
You may have seen this feature on various products over the past few months as it was being tested. It will now be added to all eligible products.
There is quite a bit of concern about how this will affect small sellers with lower-volume listings:
Enhanced Automated Handling Time Feature
In a recent announcement, Amazon said that it had enhanced its automated handling time feature to help protect sellers from order surges, and to show more accurate “delivery promises”.
The following improvements have been introduced for automated handling time:
- Same-Day Handling Time – applies a same-day handling to SKUs that you ship on the day you receive an order.
- Override for Order-Handling Capacity – gives you the option to override automated handling time set according to previous order-handling capacity should your operations improve.
- Option to Revert to Previous Handling Time – reverts your SKU-specific handling time to its previous settings should you decide to switch off automated handling time.
Learn more about this new feature here.
This Week in Seller School
Blog Posts
- Holiday Fulfillment Fee Guide by Feedvisor
- Tips for Monitoring Your Total Inventory Value by eComEngine
- Black Friday Marketing Strategy – Amazon FBA Selling Tips for 2023 by Jungle Scout
- A Detailed Amazon Q4 Game Plan to Maximize Sales and Profits Part 1 and Part 2 by My Amazon Guy
YouTube
- Amazon FBA Bundles: The Right and Wrong Way to Bundle on Amazon by Mommy Income
Podcasts
- US Amazon Seller’s Guide to European Expansion by AM/PM Podcast
- How to Get the Most Online from Your Online Arbitrage Subscriptions by Full-Time FBA
Upcoming Seller Events📍
Here are a few upcoming industry events that you might be interested in. Slick that hair back and start mingling, playa!
RISE Amazon Sellers Conference (October 9-11, 2023) – Miami, FL
RISE will bring you the latest insights, trends, and tactics that will help you stay ahead of the Amazon curve.
Seller Velocity Conference (October 11-12, 2023) – New York City, NY
2 days focused on optimizing performance to drive brand growth
Amazon Ads Unboxed (October 24-26, 2023) – New York City, NY
Learn about Amazon’s newest solutions and innovations to help brands connect with their customers, expand their business, and prepare for the future.
Eclimb Summit (November 2, 2023) – Austin, TX
“Bridge the gap between Amazon and Ecomm for D2C.”
AMZ Innovate (November 13-14, 2023) – New York City, NY
Nashville eCommerce Summit (December 12, 2023) – Nashville, TN
“A one-day gathering of local eCommerce experts and decision-makers across retailers, brands, merchants, and solutions providers.
Other Quick Clicks
- Amazon steps up recruitment for peak season
- Amazon to invest up to $4 billion in AI startup Anthropic
- Can the Shopify and Amazon Partnership help propel growth for the ecommerce platform?
Thank you for reading. If you have any questions, comments or violent reactions, let us know below!
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