- Hi, and welcome back to another Amazon selling video.
If you're new to my channel, my name is Nikki Kirk,
and I've been doing retail arbitrage for three and a half
years now, almost four all from my fifth wheel RV,
which is being renovated right now.
I am doing so many things right now.
It's kind of crazy, but one of them is
completely renovating the RV.
So stay tuned to the end, I'll share like a little bit of
how it's going and I will, of course cover all of it
when it is done, but just if you care, it'll be at the end.
So today I just wanted to quickly cover some of the
frequently asked questions that I get just to help you out.
In case you ask the question or have that question.
You guys, there is no dumb question.
When it comes to Amazon, it is a complex,
confusing thing when you're starting out.
So feel free to ask.
I will answer as best I can in a video or
just on your comment. So let me know.
So the questions I'll be covering in today's video is what
scanning app am I using?
How long does it take from the time I send my inventory for
it to sell?
How do I track my inventory and profit?
And then I'm quickly going to recap some prep questions when
you're doing your shipment.
Because I get asked a few things often and I thought I'll
just really quickly tell you.
So what app am I using to scan in stores?
I am using the Amazon seller app. It is in the apps.
It is a free app that comes when you have your Amazon
selling account.
So you do need an account or it's useless because you can't
log in.
So when you're in store, you scan with it,
just like you're taking a photo, you can scan the barcode,
you can scan the front of the item.
However you want it to pop up.
You can type it in even, and then it tells you,
it breaks down all the information.
If you use inventory labs, I think they're Scoutify,
or Scoutify 2 what you can use to scan.
A lot of people do it.
I just don't have inventory labs and I don't use it.
So I don't use that scanning app.
So when you're out scanning something,
I scan this at a Walmart,
you scan the barcode and then it will pop up the listing you
select through.
And you can see here, Amazon is selling it for $29.84
there's FBA offers for $49.95.
And then if you click through on this first one,
this is where you will see the profit breakdown.
So low price in F Amazon fulfilled. So it's FBA.
This is seller fulfilled, Amazon fulfilled.
That's what I do.
And then you can see the fees.
So it's a referral fee.
Amazon charges a percentage of the price.
So obviously if this was 29,
that referral fee would be down because it's a percentage
based off the selling price.
So the referral fee is just a fee for selling on Amazon,
because it's pretty easy.
You don't have to have your own website.
You can just sell on Amazon and they charge you for that.
Then there's the pick and pack.
This is an FBA specific, this is what Amazon is charging for
them to warehouse your stuff, pick the order,
pack it up and send it to the customer.
So this is a fee for FBA, which is worth it.
And so the total fees on this would be $10.97.
And why it's worth it?
Let's just say I got this for $19.99 at Walmart.
I'm pretty much making $19 even after that $10.
So this is just an example.
However, I wouldn't buy it because Amazon is selling it.
If you watch any of my videos, you already know that,
but I personally, don't like to compete with Amazon
and that's why I wouldn't do it.
But if you want to that's if I found this at Walmart.
Another feature here is you'll click through,
and this is where you can get the ASIN and right here.
So you just would copy it if you want to use apps or the web
service of Keepa.
That's what I do in stores, or just use Keepa.
So that's what I do. Copy it.
Also, if you're in my BOLO group,
that's how you get the ASIN to share.
So that is just a really quick little walk down of the
scanning app I use.
Again, that's the Amazon seller app.
It's free with your Amazon selling account.
So the second question was,
how long does it take to sell all the inventory I send in?
I usually get these questions on all my sourcing videos,
and I probably should just add it there,
but I always forget.
So anyways, it takes if I send in.
So I just sent in a rather large shipment and it will
probably all sell, I would say, 70 to 80% of it,
will sell in the two weeks that it hits the warehouse.
Some of it is already selling as soon as it got to the UPS
store and checked in. So it does sell relatively quickly.
And the reason it is,
is because I'm only buying stuff that has low ranks.
Low ranks means it sells well.
I don't buy things that have really high ranks because they
don't sell fast.
And I'm just trying to flip.
I don't have a lot of inventory at any given time.
I have anywhere from like 50 to 150 SKU's,
different products I'm selling.
And that's pretty normal for me. Honestly.
I don't have hundreds and hundreds of SKU's.
So I like my stuff to flip fast.
The other stuff that doesn't sell the other, like 20 to 30%,
that stuff I like to sell within the first two months,
try to get it all sold within a month.
But some things are kind of duds, unfortunately.
After three months, is when Amazon starts to
charge their long-term storage fees.
I have very, very rarely ever had a product sit there
for 90 days because I price things after two months of
sitting there or till I'm like, ugh,
this has been in there forever.
I start to price them to move them.
In general, most of my stuff sells within two weeks.
If you're interested to know what rank guidelines I go off
of and what like is a good, low rank to flip things fast,
I have a free rank guide as well as the FBA prep checklist.
When you sign up for my email, the email link is below.
It's just my newsletter. So I don't send very often,
not even once a week, I don't think,
but if you want the free resource, they are there for you.
All right.
The other question is how do I track my inventory and
profit?
Because a lot of people ask me if I have my worksheets for
sale or whatever,
but I don't actually use that worksheet often.
I use it only when I'm doing a video for you guys.
So no, I don't have it because it's,
I wouldn't recommend it. It is not a good way to do it.
But I do use Inventory Labs,
and you can get it for free for two months.
I love it because it actually forecasts out like what you're
going to do that month. And it's pretty spot on.
So let me just walk you through a real fast,
what it looks like.
So here is the dashboard.
So you can see today, it's been a slow day.
$97 in sales. Yesterday was 292, this month So far 5,391.
Forecast is 8,000.
But honestly it does not have my shipment that I just sent
in earlier this week.
So I anticipate that will be a $10,000 a month or more.
And so that's one of the reasons I like it.
The other reason I like it, is because you can see very
quickly here, your sales.
So this is my sales for this month. So I sold 233 things.
I don't advertise the shipping of what I've sent.
So, like I said, I don't think it's processed through
the shipment that I did last week because I have
$94 on shipping.
Any refunds that Amazon has.
Cost of goods, So this is what I paid at retail for them.
The profit I've showing right now is 1300.
And then you can see here,
my ROI is 71% and my margin is 26.
Since I've been using seller board for a few months,
actually my profit margin is pretty much always around 25%
in December and November. It did go up to 30.
So that was cool.
So then you could see here, if you go to your products,
you can see all your products.
If I clicked this, it would take me to the Amazon page.
This is why I make my SKU's the way I do,
because right here, you see TJM that's TJMAXX.
I got it for 5.40 and my break even on it was 10.98,
my price was 18.
And so I would just put right here, 5.40.
And that is why I make the SKU's the way I do.
But also why I love Sellerboard,
because it's super easy to just input your cost of goods.
I did it on my iPad this morning,
just like quickly entered all the cost of goods.
So it's really easy. And I really recommend it.
Take a test out.
You don't have to put a card or anything in you can just
try it out for two months for free.
Again, the link is below. So, yeah.
Okay. And the last question is questions I've gotten around
prepping shipment.
So everything from how to take a sticker off,
what are the expiration dates? Do you put expiration date?
And then obviously does it need a polybag?
I have a whole video, which I'll link here,
about poly bagging, but I just wanted to really quickly
just go over those things.
So, poly bagging.
(chair squeaking)
All right, poly bagging.
So if you can touch the actual product, so,
this, if it didn't have a clear thing on it,
if this was the actual fabric, I was touching,
put it in a poly bag.
This. Let's pretend that I can touch the stone
P.S.This is going to be in my renovation on my kitchen wall.
But let's pretend I can actually touch the stone.
If I can touch the physical product in any way then yes,
polybag it.
So if there is a toy where part of the toy is out,
like feel how soft or play with the arm,
make the mouth move, put it in a polybag.
So this is kind of a large item. So what do you do?
You can just grab a clear recycled bag.
I got these on Amazon.
All of these supplies are on my Amazon supply list,
which is linked below, but I got them on Amazon.
I just cut off the draw string.
And then you get this suffocation warning and you just stick
it on there.
So you can tape the bag onto the product if it's oversize
and then put a sticker on it.
Because it must have a suffocation warning.
These are the poly bags that I use.
You can see the, the suffocation warning,
or maybe you can't see,
but it's right here in a couple of languages.
I prefer these Spartan Industry ones,
which are in my link because they are not repositionable.
So they stick.
The ULINE ones I was using for literally,
probably two and a half, three years,
they would come off because they're repositionable
and I don't want that. I want them to stick.
Things like this, polybag it!
Because you don't want this to open and just destroy the
rest of your contents in your box.
Just polybag it.
I got my 2020 planner, because this needs a polybag.
You don't want this to get ruined.
I can touch the actual product. You have an item like this.
Exactly. This is just for my own personal use.
But if you were selling it,
I have these clear round stickers,
which I use for beauty items.
And you could literally just stick it on here so that this
little thing doesn't come off of it.
You could also use it on like toys, shoe boxes,
anything that might open, you want to seal it.
If you're going to make bundles, do you want to do the,
this is a set sticker so that Amazon does not take it apart.
Now I have seen this asked a couple times,
if you have a lot of small things,
what I do is I just put them on top of the box on everything
else.
But people ask like, can I polybag them all together?
If you do that,
Amazon's going to send that one thing to the customer.
You really want to prep it literally how the customer
is going to receive it.
It was recently brought up in the BOLO group that someone
bought something from Amazon, clothing,
and it was covered in hair when she received it.
Can you imagine?
Please do not be that seller, do not let hair, pet dander,
anything, get on the stuff that you're selling.
You want everything to be exactly as Amazon customers
are going to get it.
You want them to be impressed.
You don't want any bad feedback.
So if you have a lot of little things,
you could put them in one poly bag,
but really what you need to do is polybag each individual
one, unfortunately.
If you, if you need to make it big enough to put a label
on it, or if it is any way that you can touch it.
So, everything needs to be shipped to Amazon,
how you want Amazon to ship to the customer.
So how do you take a sticker off a Scotty peeler is your
best friend.
You must, must, must get a Scotty peeler.
I also use GooGone.
I just spray it on a piece of paper towel and I wipe it off.
It usually lasts a couple items.
And then you spray a little more.
This is my second bottle in four years.
So it lasts quite a while.
And all you do with the Scotty peeler is use a hairdryer,
first of all, but I didn't bring one out here.
And so you can just use a hairdryer and a Scotty peeler and
slowly peel it off and voila the price tag is off.
So that is it for this video.
If you have any other questions or want me to answer
something that I didn't answer in any of my videos,
or you just have a question, feel free to ask it below.
I will leave you with this renovation video.
It is going, eh, it's going.
We are getting ready to paint it all.
So we took out the flooring.
We're going to put in new flooring, it's new faux
hardwood flooring, but I am super excited.
(country music plays)
I'm mostly excited for my couch.
Which I got from Article it's like the first, like,
adult couch I've ever got.
I've had hand-me-down couches and I've had like Ikea
couches.
So I'm really excited.
I actually tested it out and it's super soft, but yeah.
So I will let you know how it goes and what it looks like,
but it's going to be beautiful.
And I cannot wait to show you.
Thank you guys so much for watching and I'll see you back
here for another Amazon seller video.
(country music plays)