Podcast Episode 208 – Should You Consider Selling on Amazon Internationally?

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Episode 208 Transcript:

[INTRODUCTION]

[0:00:01.8] ANNOUNCER: Welcome to The Full-Time FBA Show. In each episode, it’s our goal to help you turn part-time hours into a full-time income, selling almost anything on Amazon. Now, your hosts of the show, Stephen and Rebecca Smotherman.

[WELCOME]

[0:00:21] STEPHEN: Welcome into episode number 208 of The Full-Time FBA Show. Today, we’re going to ask this question, should you consider selling on Amazon internationally? To talk about this with me is my co-host, my wife, my business partner, my everything, Rebecca Smotherman. How are you doing, Rebecca?

[0:00:38] REBECCA: Dang it. I don’t know how to follow up with the everything part, but I’m here. I will try to be something.

[0:00:44] STEPHEN: Yeah. Yeah, we know some people are rolling their eyes. Some people are saying, “Aww.” Other people are like, “Get to the podcast content.” we’ll do that right now with The Full-Time FBA Show.

[EPISODE]

[0:00:57] REBECCA: I would say, that most Amazon sellers who listen to The Full-Time FBA Show Podcast are US-based sellers, who are selling on amazon.com. Amazon is not just a US platform. It’s a global platform with opportunities to sell worldwide. As of this recording, in the fall of 2023, there is an Amazon marketplace in 20 different locations worldwide. There’s Amazon in the US, Canada, Mexico, Brazil, the UK, France, Germany, Italy, Spain. There’s also Poland, Netherlands, Sweden, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Turkey, India, China, Japan, and Australia. Shout out to anybody listening from those places.

Even more marketplaces will be launched soon, or have recently launched, like Egypt, South Africa, Nigeria, Belgium, Colombia, and Chile. With so many marketplaces out there, it’s no wonder that Amazon wants sellers like you and me to consider selling in more marketplaces than just the one you’re currently selling in. But is that a good idea for sellers who are wanting to expand their profits?

As always, there’s no one-size-fits-all answer to this question. Let’s break down a few key things to think about if you’re curious about expanding to another Amazon marketplace in another country.

[0:02:17] STEPHEN: Tip number one is this, master selling on Amazon in your home country first. While the idea of expanding to another Amazon marketplace sounds good, more potential customers, more potential profits, before you expand to a new country, be sure you’re very comfortable selling in the country that you currently call home. Different countries have different product demands, different best sellers, different seasonal items, different holidays, etc. It’s going to be a lot to learn. Starting with just your home country will help you get more comfortable with selling in that country much faster than trying to sell in a different country.

Now, we know our podcast numbers. We know that because of our podcast data, that most of our listeners are located in the United States. They’re selling in the United States, but we also are aware that there’s many of you are from around the world, who are selling in non-US Amazon marketplaces. For our international listeners, focus on your home country first before expanding to Amazon. No matter where you call home, once you get to the point of selling in that marketplace, almost on autopilot where it’s so comfortable and so easy for you, then you might be ready to consider expanding to another Amazon marketplace.

[0:03:30] REBECCA: Our second tip, if you’re thinking about selling on Amazon internationally, is that if you feel like your Amazon business is ready to expand, then consider expanding to a country, or marketplace that is most similar to the one you’re currently selling in. We understand that all countries are unique and there’s no country that is a carbon copy of another, but there are some countries that are similar. Maybe they share the same language, they’re on the same continent, they have the same seasons, the same anything that helps you already have a head start on learning how to sell in that Amazon marketplace. It just might make expanding to this similar marketplace a little easier for you.

[0:04:07] STEPHEN: Tip number three, if you’re curious about if you should expand internationally on Amazon, is that again, if you feel like Amazon business is ready to add another marketplace, then consider expanding to maybe one of the top four selling marketplaces. These are the 2022 numbers, but the top four countries and global sales via Amazon are the US, Germany, the United Kingdom and Japan. Here are some numbers to get you to understand. The US is the biggest and accounts for about 69% of global sales on Amazon. Next is Germany, the second most with about 6.5% of global sales. The third is the UK with 6% of global sales and rounding out the top four is Japan with about 5% of global sales.

The other 16-plus countries that have an Amazon marketplace combine to make up the remaining 14%. These top four; US, Germany, UK and Japan, those are the ones that have the most opportunity, the most number of buyers, the most people spending money. Those are the four countries, that’s where almost 86% of all the Amazon buyers are, well, buying. If you consider expanding, this is a great opportunity for you to expand to.

[0:05:18] REBECCA: Tip number four is this, pick a marketplace country that has access to price and sales rank history, if you’re thinking about expanding beyond amazon.com. The only tool that I know that has multiple Amazon marketplaces that give you access to the sales rank and pricing history is Keepa. No matter where we sell, we would not consider selling there without having that Keepa data to help us make the best buying and pricing decisions. You can access Keepa by going to fulltimefba.com/keepa. Currently, Keepa tracks the pricing and sales rank history and so much more information for 11 Amazon marketplace countries, including the US, Canada, Mexico, Brazil, the UK, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Japan and India. They also give out the data in seven languages and they have eight different currencies available for you to look at. If you want to expand to selling in other marketplaces, be sure that there’s access to Keepa there.

[0:06:17] STEPHEN: Absolutely. The bottom line is this, and this goes back to our first tip. Before you expand to other countries, other marketplaces, master selling on Amazon in your home country first. This will probably take you maybe two or three years or so, before you’re comfortable enough with expanding to other Amazon marketplaces across the world. Since you’ll have two years of going through all the ups and downs, the selling seasons, all the experiences that you might have with selling during that time period, that way you’ll get more comfortable. Once you have that comfort level, consider selling on other Amazon international marketplaces.

[0:06:53] REBECCA: If you’re listening today and you aren’t at that place where you don’t feel comfortable enough to expand to another marketplace because you’re not comfortable with where you’re selling right now, first thing we want to say is don’t worry about that. You have time. There are a lot of years ahead to expand, and Amazon is not going to be slowing down on expanding into other marketplaces anytime soon. Get the experience you need and just keep at it. Time and experience is what it takes to get comfortable with selling in your Amazon marketplace.

If you’re not comfortable with the pace of growth that you have right now and you want help getting more comfortable and experienced as an Amazon seller, or if you’re wanting help getting into Q4, we’re in Q4 now with the time that this episode is dropping, we want to invite you to a free workshop that we have coming up real soon. We want you to have your best Q4 and also, a pretty amazing Q1, 2 and 3 as well next year. Be sure that you check out this workshop we have coming up. It’s going to start on October 23rd and it’s our Amazon Q4 income accelerator workshop. We’re going to show you how to realistically make a full-time income selling on Amazon during all four quarters of the year. We’re going to be focusing on getting off to a great start in this Q4.

The sign-up link for this workshop is fulltimefba.com/workshop. Be sure that you’re signed up. You don’t want to miss out on that Amazon Q4 income accelerator workshop. Fulltimefba.com/workshop.

[0:08:25] STEPHEN: Yeah. If you’re a seller on Amazon, or you’re thinking of starting and you really want to start to build up your Amazon profits with the goal of making that full-time income, then you’ve got to come to this workshop. It’s live. It’s going to be recorded, also, if you need to replay. Starting October 23rd, every day we’re going to share with you the five-part framework that we and some of our coaching clients have used to finally make a full-time income selling on Amazon. In this free workshop, we’re going to show you unlimited sources of inventory and how to find those, how to have consistent profits, how to make the best inventory sourcing decisions, like what to buy, what to pass, what to maybe look at later.

There’s always going to be something in profitable end stock with what we teach you in this workshop. We’re going to show you our full-time income success path and how you can realistically snowball your Amazon profits into a full-time income.

[0:09:12] REBECCA: If this sounds like something you’d want to learn and live out in your life and your business, then join us for the Amazon income accelerator workshop. Sign up now to get content that only those who sign up for the workshop are going to get. There’s so much more that you’re going to learn in this workshop, but those are the highlights that Stephen just shared. Again, that link to the five-day online workshop is fulltimefba.com/workshop. Again, it’s free. You have nothing to lose in signing up and we just can’t wait to share this content with you to help you grow your Amazon business to a full-time income. It’s what we really love doing here at The Full-Time FBA Show.

[END OF EPISODE]

[0:09:50] REBECCA: Thank you so much for joining us for this episode of The Full-Time FBA Show. As always, any links that we mentioned, as well as the show notes and transcript for this episode can be found at fulltimefba.com/208, because this is episode number 208.

[0:10:05] STEPHEN: Next week on the show, we’re going to talk about how to master your Amazon FBA reselling skills. This is going to be a great episode for those who are new, or even experienced. We all can improve our skills, so let’s talk about that next week on The Full-Time FBA Show.

[OUTRO]

[0:10:21] ANNOUNCER: That is all for this episode of The Full-Time FBA Show. So, head over to fulltimefba.com/podcast, where you will find the show notes and links from this episode. While you’re there, subscribe to our newsletter where you’ll get several free downloads of our popular and helpful Amazon FBA resources. Now, take action on what you have learned today, so you can find success at turning part-time hours into a full-time income with Amazon FBA.

[END]