Sell on Amazon: Go solo or join the ecommerce giant?

Should you sell on Amazon.com? In this episode of The Pe:p Show, Austin Brawner from Brand Growth Experts discusses if your ecommerce business should sell on Amazon or take a chance growing your brand and services away from the ecommerce giant.

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Peep: So who should try to be a solo site and not even have anything on Amazon, I just sell through my own store? And when does it make sense to do both? Austin: If you're gonna sell on both one of the things you should think about is how do you connect both of them? What I mean by that is if somebody buys on Amazon, how do you get the information from Amazon to your back end of your store?
Peep: Hi guys I'm here with Austin Brawner from Brand Growth Experts and we're going to talk about Amazon and ecommerce. So Amazon is eating everybody's lunch or it seems that way. Austin: Sure. Peep: So what does an e-commerce company do in this situation like should they be an Amazon not on Amazon hybrid? Austin: Sure. Really tough question right. Amazon is dominating the ecommerce space and businesses that were a couple of years ago doing really well. Are now in this position where they feel like OK what are we gonna do? We're just going to ride out until Amazon takes our product listing. They are rightfully scared. They don't know what to do. So I guess what I've been talking about with with people who are in this position clients in the position is just making sure that you're not competing with Amazon? Really you don't. There's three things the Amazon dominates. Price you're never going to win if you try to compete with price. They're going to beat you every single time. Convenience. They're going to beat you every single time. Right. If you're going to try to compete with them on that you're going to lose. The third thing is selection those three things you if you're competing on any one of those three things you're going to lose. So the idea is compete on things other than price convenience and selection. Peep: So this service and brand or. Austin: Service brand customization that sort of thing doing things that are unique. I was talking to somebody yesterday about their their store. Austin: They sell product at Amazon. They have like a four million dollar sale store on Amazon and they sell mainly one product and they want to get onto Shopify. And the first question asked is why would why would somebody buy from you? From your Shopify store. And that was a really hard question for them to answer right and they started saying well we got guarantees we've got fast shipping. I was like Well everybody can buy from Amazon for that. Peep: And Amazon's guarantee is way better. Austin: Exactly. Much easier to return on Amazon. So I guess things I've been taught things I've been talking to people about has been. Austin: Really trying to compete on outside of those three pillars and making sure that if you're going to have a store that you are really thinking about your strategy before investing in your store. Peep: So who should just try to be a solo site and not even have any but anything on Amazon? I sell through my own store. And when does it make sense to do both? Austin: Sure. I think that's a that's a good question and one that. You know the big answer is It depends on what your business depends on kind of you are. Where you want to take your business? I think companies that should be just specifically on their own store with no Amazon listing are products and businesses that. Are very easy to? To copy and have other people. Peep: Come into. So let's look she the several that's double edged size sword there. So if you're in a commodity business and you're selling a commodity product and you've been dominant in there and you're on Amazon just continue to do that because if you try to break away and have your own store. Austin: You might just lose out on the Amazon opportunity. If you have look at some of the companies that have been successful on on their own store companies like every lane bonobos a lot of the traditional kind of cooler brands you think of it on their own store because they're focused on having an experience that's different. There have unique products I think I'm wearing the shirt here untucked there. They have their own store and they don't sell. I don't believe they sell on Amazon they might. But if they do it's quite limited listings. A lot of what I've seen a lot of people do is have a store and then sell limited listings on amazon and have the true better experience be on their Shopify store or Magento store. Custom builds for. People who sell on both. So. If you're going to sell on both one of the things you should think about is how do you connect? How do you connect both of them? What I mean by that is if somebody buys an Amazon how to get the information from Amazon to your? Back end of your store. How do you get the customer information? I've seen a couple of companies do this recently where they sell a product on Amazon. And then they have a follow up where you have to actually download an app and use an app. To access the product. And with that type of a product they don't care if you sell it they sell on Amazon or they sell on on their store because they're getting all the customer information anyway. That's a good fit where they can sell on both. And they really don't care where somebody comes in makes a purchase. Peep: If you want more interviews like this subscribe to my channel.

Three things that you’ll never beat Amazon on Price, Convenience, or Selection. Think outside of the box with your strategy. Sometimes it’s better to NOT sell on Amazon.

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About Austin Brawner
Austin Brawner is the CEO at Brand Growth Experts. We help the world’s fastest-growing online brands drive traffic and retain customers by sending smarter, more profitable emails and delivering more effective ads.

He also hosts the highly-acclaimed Ecommerce Influence Podcast, where he shares advanced acquisition and retention strategies for fast-growing online brands.

About The Pe:p Show

The Pe:p Show is a series of short and to the point videos. Topics that I’m covering go way past conversion stuff – it’s about optimizing all the things: your life, health, relationships, work, and business. I will also be interviewing industry peers on various topics like digital marketing, growth hacking, and more.