What do I do if my Amazon Product Fails? Hint: Don’t Freak Out!

My first Amazon FBA product was a home run. In three weeks, I had recouped the money I had invested in the item, and it was well on its way to becoming the star product of my mini-FBA empire.

Naturally, with my first product a success, I was ready to launch my second. Unfortunately, I had to learn the hard way what happens when an Amazon product fails.

The curse of the watermelon slicer.

Back in the summer of 2016, watermelon slicers were all the rage. Sellers were making over 1,000 sales per month, while charging close to $19.95 for the product. Needless to say, I wanted to ride that gravy train too. So, I quickly contacted a vendor on Alibaba and purchased 2,000 units.

Look out, Amazon! Dave Hamrick’s BEST DANG watermelon slicers were going to blow up the world. Except, of course, they didn’t.

When my watermelon slicers finally hit Amazon, my listing was on page 15. Apparently, every other would-be Amazon FBA seller noticed the trend and rushed to launch their slicer too.

Pay-Per-Click (PPC) costs skyrocketed to $5.00 per click, and the average price for the slicers went from $19.95 down to $12.95 (and some even less). Nothing I did could get me past the third sales page.

The product was dead on arrival.

What do I do if my Amazon product fails?

First, don’t freak out.

Yes, it’s frustrating to watch all your money and hard work go down the drain. However, failed product launches happen. True, it tends to happen less if and when the seller uses proven research methods, but even doing your due diligence doesn’t guarantee success.

So if your product goes belly up once it hits Amazon’s fulfillment centers, there are a few things you can do to “reboot” your product. Just follow these steps, making sure you complete them in order.

#1 – Improve your product listing.

This might be obvious to some of you but, nine times out of 10, if you’re not getting sales, the problem is your product listing. It’s not generating enough excitement.

Maybe the pictures are boring. Perhaps the product description and bullet points don’t sell its benefits. It could be that the title doesn’t use enough relevant keywords. Whatever it is, it’s important to identify the broken piece of your listing and fix it immediately.

You can also look at what your competitors are doing, pinpoint the weaknesses in their listing and product, and improve upon them in your own. Find your own weaknesses, too. Reviews are a good place to start.

Finally, beef up your Amazon PPC campaigns.

New sellers tend to use few keywords for their campaigns, and the ones they do use are usually popular and expensive. However, the more keywords you use the better. And Keyword Scout is the perfect tool to help with that. It can help you find hot, new, long-tail keywords to elevate your product’s visibility.

Even if your sales increase by just one or two 1 or 2 units per day, it’s better than seeing yet another zero.

#2 – Advertise and promote outside of Amazon.

Just because your product’s niche is popular on Amazon doesn’t mean it’s popular outside of that e-commerce platform. Start promoting your product on other websites. That should help you find new customers.

And while this tactic is a little more advanced, and requires a bit more work on your part, it’s not as difficult to pull off as you might think. Here are a few ideas to help you promote your product elsewhere:

• Start an Instagram account devoted to the product and its benefits.
• Use Google or Facebook ads, especially if they’re less expensive than your Amazon PPC costs.
• Write a blog that focuses on subjects related to your product.

#3 – Wholesale your products.

Until you’ve done everything you can to improve your product’s visibility on Amazon, don’t try to off-load your inventory. This is meant to be a last-ditch effort to recoup some of the money you invested into the product.

But, if you’ve tried absolutely everything, and there’s nothing else you can do to get your product flying off of Amazon’s shelves, then it may be time to sell them wholesale to another seller. And the best place to sell your products in bulk is via the world’s largest flea market: eBay.

Keep in mind, though, that if you sell your products on eBay, it might be costly to ship everything to the buyer. Amazon’s low-cost shipping rates are usually reserved for Amazon only. Plus, eBay buyers look for deals, so you may lose a little on the front end too.

Either way, it’s better to recover 80% of your investment, instead of having 100% of it tied up in products that aren’t selling.

In addition to eBay, you can look for buyers in Amazon FBA-friendly Facebook channels, on Craigslist, and any other platforms business owners use to find product deals.

#4 – Liquidate your products on Amazon (as your ABSOLUTE last resort).

If you can’t sell off your inventory – piecemeal or via wholesale – to another Amazon FBA seller, then you can liquidate your products on Amazon. But it’s important to note that Amazon pays out very, very little after they liquidate your products.

In fact, your payout could be as low as 2-3% of your product’s sales price.

So, if you bought a product for $5 per unit to sell for $30, then you could receive a mere $0.90 for each unit Amazon liquidates. To add insult to injury, it can take as long as six months for them to liquidate your products, even in low amounts.

Conclusion

I can’t say this enough. If your Amazon product launch fails, don’t be discouraged. Remember, you’re running a business, and businesses have obstacles.

To help your business move past this particular obstacle, make sure you follow steps one and two to the best of your ability. As a last resort, try selling them wholesale, and avoid liquidating the products through Amazon – if you can.

And never, never, NEVER freak out!

Good luck!