Are you wondering if you can try out selling with Amazon FBA as an individual seller, without having to pay the monthly fee for the professional selling account? As an experienced and successful Amazon FBA seller, I’ll be answering that question in this post.
Here’s a quick takeaway, then we’ll get into the details…
Technically, you can use Amazon FBA as an individual seller. However, it’s not the best choice if you sell more than 40 items per month, or if you need access to advanced features. Nevertheless, individual seller accounts can be a great way to get started selling on Amazon.
That’s the brief answer, which likely has you asking more questions, so let’s dive into the details.
First, let’s outline the main differences between individual seller accounts and professional seller accounts on Amazon.
Main Differences Between Individual and Professional Selling Accounts
Here is a table from Amazon comparing the two types of plans:
As you can see, the individual selling plan is quite limited in comparison to the professional selling plan, but one detail stands out the most:
Individual selling accounts incur a flat fee of $0.99 per item you sell, and the professional account doesn’t.
If you decide to pay for the professional seller account on Amazon, then you pay a monthly subscription flat fee of $39.99, and no per-item fee.
So the key point to understand is if you sell more than 40 items in a month, it makes more sense to use the professional plan.
More Professional Seller Account Features
Besides the per item fee or subscription fee, here are the most important things a professional seller account has access to that an individual account does not:
- Selling in restricted categories
- Using data feeds to upload product listings or modify existing listings in bulk
- Featured offer, or “Buy Box” eligibility
- Using an API (application programmer interface) to integrate 3rd-party software tools
- Access to Amazon’s advertising tools
- Sales tax support
Selling in Restricted Categories
By signing up for the professional plan, you will be able to sell in all categories, even the ones not available to people using an individual seller account, such as Automotive or Watches. The professional account also lets you apply to sell brands that are restricted, like Hasbro or Mattel.
Using Data Feeds to Manage Listings in Bulk
In addition, there’s a lot of extra functionality that comes with using a professional seller account, like being able to manage your product listings by uploading spreadsheets (data feeds). If you plan on selling lots of products on Amazon, not having access to this is a major downside to the individual seller account.
Buy Box Eligibility
One of the key features that is available for Amazon FBA sellers, and not to individual sellers, is being the “Featured Offer’ on a product page, which is also known as having the “Buy Box”. The Buy Box is a feature Amazon customers are familiar with, and some customers don’t even know there is an option to search for other sellers who sell the same item.
Fewer checkout steps are crucial for online marketplaces, so Buy Box eligibility is a big deal.
Integrating 3rd Party Tools
A professional account also lets you create and manage additional users on your seller account, as well as allowing integration with 3rd party software tools such as Jungle Scout or Helium 10. You can’t do either of these things with an individual account.
Amazon’s Advertising Tools
Having a professional seller’s account also enables you to make your products more competitive by creating ad campaigns, promotions, discounts, coupons, and participating in events such as Amazon lightning deals or Prime Day.
As an individual seller, you’re not able to take advantage of any of those marketing tools.
Sales Tax Support
It’s also important to recognize the tax support that Amazon provides if you’re using the professional account. Selling on Amazon means selling in all fifty states, so having Amazon automatically handle sales tax collection and remittance makes a lot more sense than you doing it manually yourself.
The Big Picture: Which Account to Choose?
In the end, it’s all about your long-term selling intentions with Amazon. If you’re looking to sell a lot of products using Amazon FBA, then choose the professional seller account. The $39.99 monthly fee of the professional account is more than made up for by avoiding the 99 cent per-item fee incurred when selling with the individual seller account. A professional seller account also comes with the majority of the selling functionality you would expect from an online marketplace.
Does Using an Individual Seller Account Ever Make Sense?
There is one scenario that perfectly takes advantage of the individual seller account, and that’s the college student who wants to sell their used books online. They typically have a small number of books, maybe no more than a dozen at the end of a semester, and the books are usually high-value, so it makes sense to recover as much of the cost of the books as possible.
Used books can’t be advertised, and they can never win the buy box, so the advanced features of the professional account don’t add any value in this situation.
Books are also a great way to experiment with selling on Amazon, and it’s how I started selling on Amazon, so I can personally recommend starting with books.
Just make sure that if you’re successful selling books, and want to grow your Amazon business, you move on to more lucrative products to sell as soon as possible.
To Finish Up…Can You Use Amazon FBA as an Individual Seller?
Regardless of which approach you want to take, when asking the question, “Can I use Amazon FBA as an individual seller?”, the answer is yes, but you’ll be restricted in what you can do with an individual seller account versus the professional seller account. Choosing the account that is the right fit for your situation is up to you.
If you’re ready to start your own selling journey with Amazon FBA, go to Amazon’s official page to sign up for either the individual or professional plan, and start selling!
Want to know what you need to get started selling on Amazon? Check out the list of tools I use here.