It’s the last day of July! Hopefully you’ve had an opportunity to enjoy some fun summer activities like going to the beach, camping, or visiting a water park. Now that July is almost over, I want to discuss summer seasonality from the perspective of an Amazon FBA seller, and specifically what we can do if summer isn’t a busy time for us.
Many people know that the 4th quarter of the calendar year (October, November, and December), with Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and the weeks leading up to Christmas, are busy and profitable months for retail. However, new FBA sellers may not know how slow the summer can be. Kids are out of school, families go on vacation, and people are spending time outside. If people are doing all of those things, they aren’t shopping on Amazon.
In my own experience, July is the slowest month of the summer. In 2019, for example, my dollar sales volume in July will be about 10% lower than June, 15% lower than May, and nearly identical to February, a month with 3 fewer days than July! Also, I sell a few products where summer is their best time, and I still see a slowdown!
If you sell summer-oriented products like swimming trunks or pool toys, summer will probably be your best season. For the rest of us, however, summer often means slower sales.
Some sellers, especially new sellers, can be freaked out by this slowdown. There won’t be much time for worry, however, as back to school season starts in August. Notice the same chart above which shows slower July sales also shows a surge in August last year.
Is there anything you can do now to make sure August, and the rest of the year, shows stronger sales than July? Here are some ideas.
Make Your Products Eligible for Deals
One way to boost your sales is to make your products eligible for deals. While this can be a great way to increase your sales, you need to be careful not to offer too much of a discount or you could end up losing money.
You can offer Lightning Deals or time-bound deals. To be able to offer a deal, you must have a Pro selling account with at least five feedback ratings per month, and an overall rating of 3.5 stars or greater. Your products also have to:
- Have a sales history in Amazon stores and have at least a 3-star rating
- Include as many variations as possible
- Not be a restricted product
- Be Prime eligible in all regions
- Be in new condition
- Be compliant with customer product reviews policies. These are Amazon’s Customer product reviews policies
- Be compliant with pricing policies and have a valid reference price. For more info, see Show a reference price on your products and Amazon Policy on Reference Prices
- Be compliant with deal frequency policies. To find out more, go to Create a Deal
For more information on setting up deals, see Amazon’s official Seller Central help page here.
Source More
This one is a no-brainer, especially for retail arbitrage-oriented FBA sellers. The more inventory you find and send into Amazon, the more sales you have, right? So you should continue to focus on sourcing as much as possible. Remember, the winning formula for retail arbitrage is: frequency of sourcing + variety of sources = increased sales. Speaking of variety…
Source Differently
Is there a particular store you’ve never visited looking for items to re-sell? Is there a nearby town or city you’ve never tried sourcing in? This is the time to get out there and take a look! This tip applies year-round, since you should always be on the lookout for new places to find product, but if things are a bit slower this time of year, then what better time to give a new store a try?
Re-price
Some people don’t realize the necessity of re-pricing on Amazon. You can’t just set a price when you list a product and forget about it! You have to re-visit your price for the product regularly to make sure you’re competitive with other sellers.
You can re-price manually or use software like the “Automate Pricing” tool offered by Amazon (shown above). I personally do both manual and automatic re-pricing, depending on the item for sale and my competition on that item. I typically re-price my inventory every week at a minimum, and more often for super-competitive items where I’m trying to maximize my margins on every sale.
Research New Products
If wholesale-sourcing is your thing, summer is the perfect time to look for new wholesale accounts. I start with software such as Jungle Scout to discover products that are already selling well on Amazon. When I find something promising, I contact the manufacturer or distributor of that product to establish an account to buy their products for resale on Amazon.
Relax
Don’t forget to take some time for yourself this summer. Go on a trip, visit with family and friends, read a book, whatever. Take some time now to re-charge, so you’re ready for the busy portion of the year, which is just a few months away.
If you’ve seen a slowdown in July like I have, just be patient. If you keep sourcing and keep your pricing up to date, you’ll see sales increase soon. Remember, Christmas is only 147 days away!