Gift biz, unwrapped episode 303 that you don't believe in yourself. Have you ever show up with the attitude that you matter, that your opinion matters and that people have better? Listen, no. One's going to listen to you. Attention. Gifters bakers, crafters, and makers pursuing your dream can be fun. Whether you have an established business or looking to start one. Now you are in the right place. This is gift to biz unwrapped, helping you turn your skill into a flourishing business.
Join us for an episode, packed full of invaluable guidance, resources, and the support you need to grow. Your gift biz. Here is your host gift biz gal Sue moon Heights. Hi, dear. I'm so happy to have you here with me today. As we dive deeper into Amazon handmade, we've talked a lot about the benefits of being on multiple platforms. So you have exposure to different audiences and have sales coming in from various sources. If you're not doing this, you're missing out on opportunities.
And by being on different sites, you strengthen your business overall because you're not dependent on just one, all of this over and above your website, of course, because your website is the single most important online property, because it's the one you own and have complete control over.
As a reminder at any time, you can go to gift biz, unwrapped.com forward slash search, and there enter a word that covers a particular topic you're interested in and all the episodes where we've talked about it will pop up. It brings you directly to the spot in an episode where that topics being discussed, or you can go back and listen to the whole podcast, your choice.
So use this as a resource, really for any business topic that you're researching, kind of like your own gift biz, Google, if you will. So back to Amazon handmade. One thing that's really important to know is that not only does each platform have a different audience, but each platform works differently. Although your ultimate goal is to get sales.
Your strategy with Amazon should be different than say your strategy with Etsy or eBay, even to the point of which products to offer your titles, inventory control, lots of things. This is why when you hear people say at is not working for me or Amazon handmade, doesn't perform as well as I'd say, it's probably because they're trying to duplicate the same product offerings and quote unquote, work the platform in the same way.
In this episode, you'll hear in particular how Amazon handmade and Etsy are so different and what you should do to see results from the power of Amazon handmade. Oh, even though this is with Rachel, we had another guest with us and that her parakeet green you'll hear her chime in once in a while in the background. Now let's cue it up. All things you didn't know and how to have success with Amazon handmade Today, it is my pleasure to introduce you to Rachel Johnson. Greer of think Cascadia.
Rachel is a global business strategist who specializes in helping entrepreneurs increase their internet, product sales, curate their brand image online and avoid catastrophic legal threats. After getting her MBA in international business at Seattle university, she spent nearly a decade at Amazon working in product development. Since then, Rachel has founded companies that reached both multi-six figure and multi seven figure growth.
In under three years as a consultant, she supports clients in everything from international product expansion to, for Exene their sales through online retailers. Rachel has appeared on the today, show CNBC business, insider the wall street journal and Bloomberg. When she's not working with clients, she's scaring her friends at parties with stories about the most problematic online products she's found in their homes. Oh, Rachel, I want to be at one of those parties in here, all about those.
Welcome to the gift biz on to podcast. Thank you for having me here. What do you do? Just like look around people's houses and say like, Oh, let me tell you. It always seems to come up when they figure out what I do or they've heard what I do or they're like, Oh wow. I saw you on TV. And tell me about something over here. It's like a party trick or something like that.
But invariably, there's something that someone's bought that they think is so cool that has some sort of terrible safety implications. If you use it wrong or there's something that I was actually given for my kids where I looked at it and I looked at the bottom of it like that, the labeling. And I was like, I am so sorry. You guys, I will buy you a replacement, but this one is going in the trash. Oh my gosh. Sometimes knowledge can be dangerous. Right? But in this case, knowledge is safety.
I think, I guess we shouldn't go that way. Especially with anything that plugs into the wall or anything for kids, I tend to be very cautious, no burning down the house. No poisoning the kids. Oh my gosh. We're way off our plan already. But I do have to ask you this, since it came up this way, is there anything that we should be looking out for when we're getting anything electrical that we should know about? Yeah, you're definitely It's labeled on the bottom.
A lot of people will think that like CE is something special and something that shows that it's being properly CE is actually a self-certification that a lot of factory just put on there because no one actually checks and it's for Europe. So no one really checks it in the U S at all. So what you want to be looking for is something that says UL on it, like in a circle or something that says ETL on it.
And there's a couple of other ones that are pretty big, like TUV and SGS is about five different labs that certify electric products. And if you look at your electrical product and it doesn't have one of those little circles with the lab information inside of it, that means it's not certified. That means a lab never tested it to make sure it's safe. And that's the kind of stuff that you just either give back or throw away and buy something new. Got it. Oh, that's perfect.
That's wonderful to know. My brother used to work for UL underwriters laboratory. That headquarters is like probably 15 minutes from where I am right here. So yeah, he would tell me some scary, crazy things about that too, but that's not the topic for today. So we're going to go ahead and move on to something a little lighter, I think. And I want to start out Rachel, by asking you my traditional question here and that revolves around a motivational candle.
It gives us since all of the people who are listening are creators gives us a little bit of a different way to learn something about you. So if you were to describe a motivational candle that really speaks to you, what color would it be? And then what would be a quote or some type of mantra that's on the candle. Yeah. I love this question. So the color would be that color of green.
When a tree is just starting to grow new buds in the spring, it's a very bright and really, almost a sense of green. That's like right in your face. I think some people call it chartreuse. I just love that color. Most people do not love that color. It is just really in your face, happy green that's new life. It's spring, it's everything, it's renewal and something to me, it symbolizes a joy. That's the color that I would choose. And one of my very favorite authors is Brittany Brown.
And one of my favorite quotes by her, she has a lot of really great stuff, but one of my favorite quotes is no one belongs here more than you. And it's one of the things that a lot of women especially have imposter syndrome. And I can tell you, you know, who doesn't have imposter syndrome, most men, they just show up and do whatever. And they say whatever and expect it to be good enough. And a lot of women don't.
And one thing I learned working in tech and working at Amazon is if you don't believe in yourself, if you don't show up with the attitude that you matter, that your opinion matters and that people are better, listen, no one's going to listen to you. And so yeah, no one belongs here more than you. I love that because it's also so uplifting and opportunistic, I guess I would say you belong here, show us what you have and you have every right and you deserve to be here.
No imposter syndrome, no questioning yourself. They certainly don't. Why should you, There you go. I agree. Absolutely. So share with us a little bit about your background and how you got into and started working at Amazon. So I actually, it's kind of a sideways away, which always made me kind of giggle a little bit. My undergrad was in history and then my first graduate degree was actually also in history. And the area that I studied was early modern Europe, specifically Austria.
And it just happened to be one of those things where I studied German in school. And so when I wanted to do study abroad in Europe, I chose one of the dramatic countries and the place that I applied to that we ended up getting was Vienna. And I have never been so grateful that the place that we ended up getting was Vienna my college roommate and I, because it's such a wonderful city, it's such a wonderful place.
And so then when we went on to our respective master's degrees, I ended up studying Austria. Instead of the German areas I went into studying. Austria had a lot of time spent there after my degree, teaching English. And so when I came back to Seattle and I was looking for jobs, there was a job posting for a fraud investigator with near native German speaking skill. And I was like, I'm not really near native, but you know what?
I see being able to get a job, actually using my German skills in the U S when everyone told me that a language arts or a degree in history, wasn't going to get me anywhere. That would be really awesome. And so I just applied for it anyway. And then I found out after the language test that I was actually the best one there. So again, don't doubt yourself. You just have to show up and do it. Even if you don't feel like you're ready.
So I got the job and that was, I started at Amazon back in 2007 was just because I spoke German. You know, it's so crazy how people land, where they do. And that's one of the reasons why I always ask it, even though we've done an intro too, because I think that is so crazy, like who would have thought, but you never know where the roads are going to take you from history background and all the way to just what you described. And I think that's really important also for everyone.
Who's listening here to think about to the job that you have right now. Maybe it's a nine to five, has nothing to do with what you're looking at, creating or turning into a business, but what skills or other things are you picking up or connections are you picking up where you already are with, if you're working full time, that can also transfer over because you just never know. It's like, it just appears in front of you.
Right. And I love that statement about how it's a lot of it is luck, but you have to be ready to take that luck when it presents itself. Exactly. I always say you have to stand in Lux path because if you're just behind a door, luck might be walking right outside, but you're not there to see it or to intercept it. So that's amazing. So what were you doing then, right when you first started at Amazon?
Yeah, when I first started, I was actually a fraud investigator and I was an investigator for about four months. Oh, this Is where all those scary stories come up. Right? Well, that was the second department I was in at Amazon. So the first one was actually just fraud. So stolen credit card, stolen bank accounts, fraudulent tickets. Oh, gotcha. That sort of thing. It sounds way cooler than it is being a fraud investigator is a boring job.
You have a couple of minutes to decide if an order is fraudulent or not, and then you either pass or fail it with a note and then people have to provide information to prove it. If they're actually authentic, it's actually a really terrible job because you're just constantly moving and you're having to move so fast. It's like, I'm sure people are aware from reading stuff about Amazon, but they're very numbers driven.
And so everyone had to meet a certain quota per hour and it was a little bit overwhelming. So I was really happy to move after about four months into answering law enforcement inquiries. And those were actually really interesting. Some of them were really boring. Like why did the information on this stolen credit card that was really important, but there were a couple of really interesting ones.
Like when the FBI contacted us about having a schematic to the F 22 listed on the website, that was bad. We were like, we'll take it down right away. Yeah. Seriously. Oh my gosh. Some other kind of interesting things like that. And it's really sad stories too. Like just really terrible stuff. So after a couple of years there, that particular role topped out, everyone has a level at Amazon and jobs have a specific
levels. And so if you want to get promoted, you've got to move around to different departments that can allow you to grow. And so the second department I was at at Amazon was compliance operations. And so we got moved around to different operations departments, but it was an absolutely wonderful job because I got to learn so much.
I really can't even emphasize how amazing it was to be in a position like that at Amazon in 2010 to 2012, the company grew from millions of dollars a year to billions during the time that I was in operations. And it's such a unique experience to be in a company growing that fast and doing that much in such innovative ways. I just feel like I learned so much that if you started at Amazon today, you wouldn't be able to learn what I did in the same department to doing the same thing.
You just wouldn't be able to the kind of jobs that I had were while it was growing. And I got to see and experience so much, and I'm really grateful for that. It was a fantastic job. Amazon also kind of choose you up and spit you out. So there's that. But I felt like I learned so much. It sounds like bouncing around to the different departments in a very planned way gives you this well-rounded understanding too, of the whole business. Yeah, absolutely.
I was really lucky about that because the first job that I had was really in the buying and selling portion of it. So just like how the transactions work, how the website works. Then I was in recalls and product safety, which touched a lot of the operational side of the business. I was responsible for making sure that recalls were locked down in the fulfillment center, that customers were messaged that first didn't go out.
And so I had to know a bunch of stuff about how the website worked, how the business worked in really like super detailed level, like what permits people had to get that sort of thing. And then after doing that job, I went to quality and compliance for private brands. And so worked on private brand launches, developing our own brands. We worked on Amazon basics and about four or five other brands. And now obviously it's like 60 brands.
So building the structure for Amazon, developing its own brands, then I worked at international expansion. And so a whole bunch of different things. They're learning about what an EORI number is in, in Europe. Like there's just so many different things that you learn doing different things. Then the last job that I had at Amazon was managing hardware for the website. And so I learned a ton about how websites are structured and things like managing bots that scan the website. I had no idea.
And so you just learn so much if you're just paying attention and curious, and always wanting to learn more, you know, so I feel like I just had a really well-rounded ability there to learn about e-commerce and what it means to be an e-commerce leader and what it means to kind of be a part of that ecosystem.
That's a perfect segue for us because as I'm hearing everything that you're describing, I'm thinking of all these little angles that we could go into, but I think what would best serve our conversation here is to talk about Amazon for a handmade creator, which is the majority of the people who are listening and hanging out with us right now. And we've talked a lot, Rachel about, you should have a website.
People may have started through something like Facebook shops, things like that, but there are multiple ways that they can attract customers and then sell their products online. But part of that is also Amazon. And I don't think people always think about that as the first solution for them. So let's talk about Amazon and the opportunities that could exist for a handmade product maker. Yeah. So there's two ways that you can do business on
Amazon. If you're selling something that's handmade, the first thing you can do is just have a regular Amazon account and just sell it handmade, which is one way that you can do it depending on your supplier situation. If you think you can grow, if you think that it's distinctive enough to where you can show it that way, the other way that you can do it is through Amazon handmade. And the results are a little bit different. The pages are a little bit different. And so it's more like Etsy.
It's like Etsy with an Amazon. And so you have the opportunity to either be in search like a regular store, or you can be in handmade where people can search for where you're at specific features about what you do. They can learn about you as the handmade creator. I actually personally prefer Amazon handmade now over Etsy because I have a really hard time figuring out the difference between someone who's reselling handmade or an actual handmade seller.
And the handmade program on Amazon requires like pictures of your studio really it's really involved or proof that you're actually a handmade. Yeah, It was going to be one of my questions is what's the difference in why Amazon over any other platform? And obviously the first one, many of us would think of is at se. So that's really, really interesting. So if you are applying for an Amazon handmade account, you have to show or prove that you're the actual maker of the product.
Yeah. You have to be either the designer or the maker or in some way involved in the actual production of the product. And so have a whole application process where you've got to prove what it is. So like if you're the designer, for example, but you have someone else actually putting together your jewelry, for example, like maybe you do all the drawings and select all the stones, but someone else actually does the metalworking. That's okay.
You are the jewelry designer or if you're the one who actually does the metal working, then that's okay. So it's one of those things where you're supposed to be involved in the process because their whole goal is to make this as small business hub. Basically they were trying to make a better Etsy. Okay. What if you design the product, but you send it out to a factory to be made.
So if it's something that's basically factory made or in some way using molds or something where it's not actually individually handcrafted, that it's not supposed to be in hand. Okay, perfect. And how is that different from Etsy? So with Etsy, it's kind of hard to tell what's what, and who's doing certain things. And so for me, I like to know who the creator is. I like to know where it's from and the way that Amazon structured their search function is just easier for me to
follow. Then finding things on Etsy. I feel like I get a lot of kind of individual results. And then the way that the reviews work is different on Amazon, the reviews are per product on Etsy. If you look at people's comments, you see everything. So you've got to kind of dig through to figure out what the comments are for that particular item. Managing listings is a little bit different on Etsy.
And so it's just harder to find things I find on Etsy and figure out what other people have said about it. So the other thing that you can do on Amazon handmade is you can also advertise and so you can get in front of people and you can get movement that way. Okay. That's interesting. And honestly, I wouldn't say that you have to be exclusively on one or the other only, Well, you should be on both for sure. If you're guilty, then you should be on Amazon handmade.
Let's talk logistics of putting together an account. If I right now and buying things in the year that we have just gotten out of, probably everybody has bought something on Amazon over the last year. So we have like a personal account. Let's say, we're going to start with, from the bare bones here. So I'm buying things. I've got my Amazon account. Where would I go from here in terms of setting up either a regular Amazon account or a handmade account? How does that work?
Yeah. So they're actually completely different. So you actually apply to be in handmade. It's a whole separate application process versus the application process as a regular seller, as a regular seller, I usually recommend that people have gotten themselves set up with an LLC. It's not that big of a deal to set one up in most States. It's like a hundred bucks a year to make sure that you remain current. And so it's just better to have your business be a separate entity than you.
So on the Amazon side for selling, then you would sign up with your business entity and they require basic things like the paperwork for that, the tax EIN number, stuff like that on the handmade side. In addition to your business information, they also request things like pictures of your studio or other information about what you're doing. And then it takes a little while for them to review both of those. And then sometimes there'll be a phone call with you.
Occasionally you seem like a postcard, they keep experimenting different things. I'm assuming they're just trying to prevent people who are faking their own a good business from applying to be on Amazon. But that's basically the process is you can be a sole proprietor and Amazon that's getting harder and harder just because there were a lot of fake accounts that were made. I'm sure, you know, Amazon's a huge platform. And they do a lot of takedowns of unauthorized businesses.
Like they, Chinese shell companies where they got shut down and then they create new shell companies. They even were doing this thing where they were hiring people on Craigslist to be the name and face of the company while it was actually backed by the Chinese company and was run by the Chinese company and the person whose name and face was on it and got like 2% of the sales or something. Oh my gosh, there's so many like games that people play on Amazon that they try to like catch.
And so it can seem like it's kind of a stupid amount of paperwork just to get an account, but it's really because people have been cheating. And so they want to make sure that you're a real person with a real business. And that you're really, that person does that then extend into the safety of your account. If they're watching and judging and you have to go through this filter to even get an Amazon handmade account.
But would you say that a handmade account on Amazon is a safer account to have on maybe other platforms I'm saying other platforms in general, not a specific one. We'll jump right back into the conversation, right after a quick word from our sponsor. Yes. It's possible increase your sales without adding a single customer.
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They've had to be really careful about their screening process because they've had so many problems a couple of years ago. You could just sign up with your name and your address. And today you've got an account and regulations, and now you to go through a bunch of hoops, you have to prove your real business. You have to prove who you are. You have to submit your passport or driver's license because they've had so many problems.
So in terms of, as a consumer, I feel much more comfortable buying on Amazon than I used to. I used to be really careful in spring. Everything that I bought the whole knowledge can be a little bit challenging sometimes because then you're like, I know this could be one of these shell companies and I'm buying it. You do have to be careful because buying is so easy now online that you really do want to take that extra
level. I want to back up just for a second, for some of our new listeners who you may just now be thinking of turning something that you create into a business, monetizing your handmade product. A sole proprietor means that you're running business under your social security number. So taxes are paid through your personal taxes, et cetera. There's really no wall between you and your business. And I know a lot of people start out that way.
As I talk about Facebook shops, we even say, you know, as you're testing out, whether you really want to get into business, you can set up a Facebook shop as a sole proprietor using your social security number. But very shortly thereafter, you want to ramp it up and specifically get an LLC, which is limited liability corporation or company.
I forgot what the C is for, but what that does is it separates you from, if anything were ever to happen in you were being sued, they can't touch any of your personal assets. And that's really important. So I really liked the fact Rachel, that you're talking about that. And I think you were mentioning that for even an Amazon seller account.
So you're just saying that's best practice overall, regardless of where you would go, Amazon seller or Amazon handmade, I would never tie my social security number to anything. And when I was seeing people do imports and importing under their social security number, I was like, yeah, I'm going to break out in hives, just like paperwork. Really. People don't understand the risks they're taking.
And it's so much better, especially if you've got any assets that you care about to separate your business from your personal life. Okay. So if somebody has already been selling on Amazon under a regular seller account, they would open up then a separate and new account for Amazon handmade. So would you have to, would you sell the same product in both places? You're not allowed to sell the same product in both places, so you would need to choose which one you wanted to go for?
The thing that is important to know about what gets you success on Amazon is it's all about reviews. It's really critical to get reviews. And so unlike on Etsy where you usually get reviews for the seller, because they're often doing unique individual things, each listing is a new thing. So there's not generally reviews on every single product. It's, it's a reason the seller themselves, and you can see previous items, they sold on Amazon. It's all about the product.
So one of the top selling items that I actually have bought personally on Amazon handmade, and I know that they're on Etsy, but they're on handmade as well. Is there little wrist warmers? I know that every woman who's ever worked in an office can understand this, but Holy crap, it gets cold. And so one of the things that I learned to stay warm at the office was to use restorers. So they basically are really simple. They have a cuff that is on one end, and then it's really simple at the top.
It's just a hole for your thumb and then a whole three or four fingers. And it's just a little bit of cloth that covers over your wrist to where your fingers are free to type, but you're covered all the way up to your knuckles basically. And so then you're going to be less cold And there's even like tops. Now that have the thumb in there where you can loop your I'm actually wearing one right now where you can loop your thumb in.
And then the sleeves like go over your hands a little bit Working at Amazon because I used to sit under event. It's terrible. It was always 65 degrees. So you'd have your like summer getup in the office where you've got your coat and your wrist warmers. So funny, they've just done a fabulous job because they've got four different designs of the same wrist warmers. And they're like Jane Austin.
And so like it's printed with a section from Jane Austin or from, I forget the other ones, the one that I have is for pride and prejudice. And so that's the main thing that they do. And they're just constantly selling these things because they've gotten hundreds of reviews and people just buy them now. And so that makes it to where you, you shouldn't be thinking too much about variety on Amazon. If you want to do variety, like Etsy is the place to be on Amazon.
You should be thinking about what's a product that I think has a market and how can I get reviews on it and advertise on it so that I can gain ring and have people see my product, some of the other ones that do really well. There was one that I saw that did really well. That was a whiskey candle. And so when it burns, it smells like, you know, whiskey, there was one that they had those like spiced rum, couple of other ones, but they did a really good, huge business for Christmas.
And so, you know, when you're thinking about, okay, so how do I use Amazon, Amazon at the peak of traffic, I'm hesitant between 25 and 35 million people on the site in any given day, which is just huge, right? I mean, it's just massive. So how can you get some of those people to click on your products? And then once they click on your product, how can you convince them that this is the right thing for them? And so that's where you want to be like reviews.
And so something that you can remake over and over again is really critical. And then the second piece is something that has an audience. So the ones that I've seen do really well are candles and bath bombs do really well. Basically things that people need that might wear out that are handmade or things that are really unique gifts. Those do really well on Amazon. Okay. And we got into this in some shows a couple of months ago, and it was a little bit new to me.
And I think something that a lot of people really resist. And tell me what you think about this statement, Rachel, with Amazon, it's all starts with search. Someone's looking for those rum flavored candles, for example, then what you title your products needs to be something that can be found through search, right? Yep. So you probably want to call your product, Rama flavored candle It's to be in the title. You have lots of texts in the title.
You have lots of texts you can work with, but don't be too cute. You want to be a little bit cute, but not too cute. Yeah. Because it has to be found. So not tropical. I learned candle sense or something like that because who's ever going to search for that. You're looking for like rum Mohito or my favorite for those ones. They had a line of, I forget the exact way they put it, but it was like the kick-ass line.
And so it was something where it was like, meant to be, you know, that thing where people are like kind of aggressively supportive. And that was what was on the tin of the candle was some sort of like mantra with a swear word in it. Right. There's some research that shows that those, that kind of like drives and adrenaline hit in our brain just because of how we feel about swear words. And so it's like, feel strong about this kid. It was interesting, but they did really well with those ones.
With that particular line, This brings up a really crazy question. Like I said, I've been working with my community a lot on Facebook shops since this is the new thing that's open. There's not a big barrier. It's really nice for someone, in my opinion, who's just starting out, selling their product, just to see if they even like processing orders, actually selling all of that. And I had one client whose store would not be approved because the name of her company and the logo was slightly
suggestive. So it's not totally, but just a little bit sexually suggestive. And she can't set up her business in Facebook shops to save herself. Like they keep rejecting her and rejecting her, even though she shows that's not what my product is. Like, whatever you're thinking it isn't. Is there some type of a layer or do you feel like people would get caught with that over on the Amazon side? No, I don't think so.
In fact, I was just looking it up just to see if there's something similar to that on the Amazon side. And one of the first things that I see is some Lamas humping each other. So, no, I think we're good. Okay. Now, you know, like the second we're done with this interview, I have to email her and say, Hey, let's look at Amazon handmade for your product. Yeah. Scrolling down. I'm just kind of like, Whoa, sexy, just to see what would pop up.
And some of them are actually sexy and some of them are like, Whoa, hi. Hmm. Maybe I didn't want to see that today. So you can definitely sell pretty much. It That's really interesting. I mean, some of them might not be to your point that it just captures the attention, but the product, you know, it's a fun play on a logo or Yeah. And there's some really fun things. So like Amazon does a lot of like handmade cards and
stuff. There's a lot of like suggestive stuff there or handmade clothing that is suggestive. So the biggest takeaway that I've had so far besides the whole electrical thing in the very beginning is that Etsy in terms of reviews is more specific to the seller or the business overall, an Amazon relates way more to the product. Yes, absolutely. Given That's the case.
How do you develop or let me even back it up further, do you try to develop your brand on Amazon or is it all about just selling Your product? So what I usually recommend is putting some inserts in the shipment that you send about the other things that you sell, because your flagship product that you invest your time and money in, and you really do need to figure out what your flagship product should be, and then make sure that's never out of stock. Make sure you always have product available.
Other things that don't sell as much can go out of stock and can be less of a priority, but on Amazon, it's about staying up and staying in stock. If you ever got a stock, you start losing rank like crazy Amazon's algorithm, prioritizes those who have slow action available to buy. And if your selection is not available to buy, you don't get the good numbers.
So once you have a product that you think can be a winner, like the pride and it is wrist warmers, or one of my favorites, lavender and rice, I actually bought this a couple of years ago and then bought another one. When I lost it in the move was a lavender and rice ergo thing in front of my keyboard. And then there was a lot of rice and for the keyboard and then a smaller one in front of the mouse. And so that person's top item.
And so those are the kinds of things where when you have a top item, it better be in stock, no matter what. So Given that you want one item, it's your best seller. It's what you're calling your flagship product, whatever it is, you need to know that you can make them quick. If you're out of stock, you always have stock. And that it's something that people regularly would search for and want to buy. Right? Yep. Okay. So could you just have one product Amazon you could.
Yeah. And so usually the ones who do really well do variations on a similar product. So they'll have different sense of a candle or, or like the restorers are exactly the same design, but different sections or different books, like famous books or the one that I was talking about with the little bag thingy that's in front of your keyboard. She has about six different designs for that one. And so it can be just like one product with a bunch of variations. That's totally fine.
And then the folks who do the candles, I saw their first year, cause I bought her a couple of years ago. And then I've gone back a couple of times for other, I guess, and they've added a couple of new lines. And so that's one of the things. If you can get a really strongly performing product, then you can send inserts that, tell them about the other things that your store sells. And you can turn your customers who are buying your top product that has rank. That's getting people in.
Some of these people are selling 50, a hundred thousand dollars a year of candles. I mean, they're actually making a proper living at it. Then you can launch a different line, like a line of bar soaps or far lotions with a similar sense as your candles. So there's different ways that you can use it, the success of one listing to grow new ones. Right. But you've been really clear on the approach to take when you're starting getting recognized, getting sales.
I mean, this IC is also a great way to start building your business. You don't need a whole slew of products. You have one thing, cause we always talk about, you want to be known by one thing first, Amazon doesn't care if you have one thing or a hundred things. So go with that one thing, sell it, maybe sell a few versions of it.
And then this is your visibility play to get in front of people who then as you grow your brand now know you, and then you're able to market to them a more broad extension of what you have available through the insert that you were just talking about. Right. Rachel, And one of the better things about Amazon is that it's really easy to see your past orders.
And as long as you stay in stock on those, it's really easy to click on that item and go right back to the detail page and see all the information. So I do that sometimes. And I'm like, I thought that thing a couple of years ago, where was it? And so I'll go to the search function in my Amazon account and I'm like, Oh yeah, there it was. And then I click on it and then I can go buy more stuff.
So if you have a great experience for your customer without one product, they're going to remember you, they're going to remember what they got and come back. Okay, perfect. Now we sell our product because we had really good keywords and we were found in search. We sent it out with an insert. So now they can see what other things we have available.
Is there a way for us to communicate us as a business owner to reach out and communicate with them through an Amazon channel, kind of like how we would do with email? Yeah. Unfortunately there isn't a direct way, but what you can do is a cool new thing called Amazon live and Amazon live is Amazon's answer basically to social media. And they've created a whole platform where you can go live on Amazon and talk about stuff.
And I think this is a huge opportunity for influencers and TRIBEr who are just starting out, are selling on Etsy. Because if you have followers on social, they usually require a thousand followers, which isn't terribly hard to get. Then you can apply to be on Amazon live and do demonstrations. So say if you're doing a handmade bath bomb set, then you could do a live and feature your bath bombs along with other top products in bathrooms.
So like the top soap set or the top dishware set or whatever you want to have for a bathroom or for a home, and then your live event will up on those pages. And so it's a really great way to promote your products along with other top products on Amazon. If you have a regular seller account, not a handmaid account, but regular seller account, you can also sign up for Amazon live as a brand and have people follow your brand.
So you can choose either way, you can apply as an influencer or you can apply as a brand. If you apply as a brand, you do need a trademark. So a lot of people don't have that. So I recommend going the influencer route if you're a smaller business and have not as many options in terms of the trademark. But if you do maybe have a social media following, that's a good one to join as an influencer. Meaning handmade, no Influencer program is totally separate from handmade.
So handmade is selling products. And then if you want to promote or pitch products on Amazon, you can sign up as an influencer or as a brand. Got it, got it, got it. Okay. I'm with you on that. Okay. And so let's stick with handmade, cause I think that's really the best place for people who are listening here to be, where would they see more about the live? Or let me just kind of ask you some questions. So I'm thinking about live that I know.
So Facebook, Instagram, all the places where you can go live it's social media. Yes. You can either schedule a time when you're going to go live and invite people to come. Or you can just pull up your phone, click the live button. Obviously you're a little more prepared than that, but you get what I mean? Is that the same type of thing on Amazon? Or is there some structure to scheduling or do you prerecorded or how does that work over there? I've never seen a live on Amazon. At least.
I don't think I have. It's exactly the same. You can either schedule it and it'll show up in the upcoming lives and you can tell people about it on social, where, or you can just go live and the thing that's great about Amazon live and the reason why I say that, it's the way that you connect with your customers through Amazon, that's allowed, there are other ways that are against policy, but people still do. Anyway, this is the way that's fully compliant with policy.
As people can choose to follow you. And then when you go live, there's a push notification that goes to your phone that says whoever is going live, but as the brand or your name. And so then they get the notification on their phone that you're going live and they might want to follow you. And then does that recording stay on Amazon after you're done. Yeah. It's actually in the previously live section for a couple of days. And then if someone's really digging deep, they can see it.
I've seen lives and be watched up to two or three weeks after the live is actually happened. What I've been doing is downloading the lives that we do with the clients, clipping them into chunks because you end up repeating yourself a lot in a line and then putting the best chunks onto the Amazon page itself And then putting them onto your own Amazon page. Yep. Yeah. There's places where you can add. Okay. Got it. All right.
Wonderful. And with the inserts, are you allowed then to offer something else or I'm thinking the best thing to do then since there is no real way to communicate back with your purchasers, I mean, it's more your customer finding you, then you being able to attract your customers directly one-on-one in terms of prior customers, but what about putting an email address or some incentive for them to give you your email address on that insert is that acceptable?
So you're not allowed to direct them off of Amazon. That's the biggest, tricky thing for any sort of insert. And so generally speaking, if you're going to do an insert, you want to make sure they can use any discounts you give or any specialties, that sort of thing you want to make sure they can use it on Amazon too. And so that there's no question of them being directed, like a discount that's only available off of Amazon. That's not going to work.
Right? So that's the kind of thing that you have to think about when you're deciding what to put in there is Amazon doesn't want you taking away their customers. So you can't direct them to your website. It's called diverting, but you can offer them a discount and just make sure it works on your website too. And then if they have to go to your website, then that's your choice. Okay? Let's say I sell scarves. Could you put an insert in that says, come over to my website for a free download.
That shows you seven different ways that you can wear your scarf. And then there's some type of a link there, or they just go to the website. And then when they go to the website, it's through an opt-in. So you collect an email that way is that legal? I recommend people will do. It's kind of in the gray area, but it's defensible. So that's, And you're not selling, you're sharing information to support the product. But yeah, it's a little gray, but I like gray color like that color.
So valuable to get that information from people that a lot of people will just do it anyway. And so I definitely give those recommendations to my clients where it's like some sort of instructional giveaway or some sort of QR code where you can get a sample of free sample bulls of other items say you do skincare or something and they can try different products. If you've got a sample size, then they can give you their information and get a sample.
Like there's various ways that you can try to get people's information. Okay. All based on things that will help heighten the customer experience, you know, something that's going to be valuable to them in return. I never asked for it. I will say that never asked for reviews. If you ask for reviews in any way, connected to a freebie, Amazon will freak out. It is not worth it. How will they know? So they sometimes will get reports from other sellers.
So in case if you have a successful listing, you can come under attack from other sellers. So other sellers will sometimes buy your stuff, take pictures of what you sent with it. And then submit a report to Amazon. Amazon's whole system relies on sellers, snitching on each other, basically because they don't have to do it themselves. And so they have a whole report, a violation section where you can report other sellers, Oh, no self policing. I guess that's the way that goes.
One of those things where, when I first learned about it back in like 2009, I was like, wait, you have a whole form for this because I was in the same department, but I didn't work in that team. And they're like, Oh yeah, well we have way too much to do to go find these problems ourselves. So we just wait for sellers to snitch on each other. Oh my gosh. Well, you know, honestly, I mean, Amazon is so big and you want everybody playing by the
rules. But I think like some of the rules people would violate, not even knowing that they're violating, they're just trying to grow their businesses. So this is really interesting. So don't ask for reviews in exchange for anything, right? So don't bribe for reviews. Exactly. It's either ask for reviews and then nothing, silence, just reviews or freebies and getting their name and all those sorts of things. That's getting their sample size or whatever.
But don't mention reviews, I guess one of the other, you can't give the appearance of incentivizing reviews. Got it. Okay. What are a couple of other things that you see people doing that are either not in accordance with what you should be doing or just not a best practice overall? Yeah, I would say the other one that can come up sometimes is not providing sufficient warnings statements.
And this is something that a lot of people don't really think about on Amazon or really anywhere else when you're a small business. Cause you're like, well, why would they do something stupid like that? But the reason why a lot of your big brand stuff has about four or five different warnings, sometimes a whole booklet of warning. So what the product is because people have done that and people have gotten sued over that. And so you just want to make sure to cover yourself.
And so one of the things that I always recommend that my clients do is they go into a regular store, like a big box store or Walmart or target or something. And they go buy a retail version of that product and then make sure that on your product, no matter how you package it, that you have all of the warnings and required information that the big brands have just to cover yourself.
Even if it's a handmade item, you still just want to make sure that you're covered and that you have warned people and that they can't get mad at you. For certain things. We have a client who used a special kind of ingredient in some of their scrubs. It's like a body scrub type thing to help her to calluses. And if you leave it on for too long, then it can make your skin a little bit red because of what's in it. And he didn't have a warning on it at first.
So we were like, no, no, no warn the heck out of that thing. Seriously, some customers. And it's like, well, yeah, but that's better than having a customer, have something go wrong and then suing you. Like, it's really easy to Sue people here. So one of the things, that's the easiest way to do it, where it doesn't cost a lot.
And it's not going to be something that requires you talking to a lawyer or talking to a lab to figure out if it's safe or not just go into the store and look at what's on a retail package already, or buy something similar and take a look at that a few years back on Etsy, there was a whole slew of these, these baby slings that were sold. And this one is just kind of heartbreaking, but people didn't realize that if they held the baby at the wrong angle, babies can't move their heads.
So if they held the baby at the angle, it would constrict their airway. And in some cases fully restricts the airway and the baby would suffocate and die. Oh my gosh. From people selling slings, it was like a whole thing 10 years ago about trying to be more baby wearing. And people were trying to do more things. These are parents who obviously love and care for their children. And just didn't realize that the low hanging sling around the belly is not the correct way to hold a baby.
You want to have the sling to where the baby is up top, where their head is next to your chest and they're fully vertical so that their head is supported and secure. And there were just no worries on these things. And I know that the people who made them did not intend for anything bad to happen, but you have to be careful of your business. You have to be careful of what you're offering.
And if you're giving someone a product that injures them or hurts their child, or they go to the hospital, a lot of people in this country are not fully insured. And so if they're facing a 10,000 or $15,000 medical bill or heaven forbid more, some people aren't insured and it's hundreds of thousands of dollars. They may choose to go after you and try to get money from you to pay for that circles back to why you want to be an LLC. Yeah, absolutely.
You do not want your house to give you Anything else. Any other mistakes that you've seen people make on Amazon that you think we should know about? I think the only other one for folks who are just starting out is just going to broad all at once. It can be tempting to be like, look at me, I'm a real brand. I've got all this stuff, but you don't know what it's going to work or how it's going to work.
So if you have like 10 or 12 things that you've been toying with, and you're not sure which one might work, just put them up, but don't invest a ton of money in it. Like a small amount of money. See what happens, the ones that get traffic immediately, even if it's only five or 10 people on the page, the other one's only got one or two people. Those are the ones to invest in. And so you can kind of, one of the things that Jeff B likes to say is fail fast and fail often.
And the idea is that you don't keep chasing a losing proposition. You test a lot of things. You figure out which one is most likely to be successful. And then you chase that with single-minded intensity, but you leave other ones like nine out of 10 things are going to fail, right? So you try a bunch of things. This one got 20 people to in on the page in two weeks, that really only got five people they want to 20 people is the one worth pursuing.
Right? And so then you can really see what the direction is that you should go without investing a whole lot. And then what's the whole sunk cost fallacy. I spent a lot of time on it. So therefore it's worth my time. It's not, if it something that is like your favorite thing and you absolutely love it. And it's the best thing for you. And then you see that it sells one or two items a day and you're like, Oh, that's terrible. And your other one sells five or seven items a day.
Then invest in the one that sells five or seven, no matter how you feel about the one that's selling slow. Okay. Absolutely. It's so hard to do though, because you know, as a maker, you have your favorite one. And if it's not the mover, it's like, people just aren't getting it. Maybe it's the wrong audience. This is so beautiful. This is the best, you know, but your audience gets to choose you.
Don't I think it's Gary Vaynerchuk that says that, you know, the market says all they have the final say right. Of what it is. So that's exactly what you're talking about. Another question occurred to me. What about consumable products on Amazon handmade? So if someone makes decorator cookies or something like that, is that acceptable in Amazon handmade food, It is not acceptable on Amazon handmade. So you would have to have a regular Amazon account for
that. And we have had clients who sell on Amazon. The only thing that I would say about that is that you do want to make sure that you are registered with the FDA. If you're going to be making food for consumption, they do have some small maker rules. And then you also have your local requirements, like definitely check your requirements. So sometimes people forget to get permits that they need to have. Sometimes there's County permits. Sometimes their state permits.
If you're going to do consumables, make sure you get everything organized. And it's like those terrible stories of inspectors showing up. And you're dumping bleach on all the brownies that people are. So, but it's really important to make sure that your paperwork is in order if you're doing consumables. For sure. Absolutely. So that would be a seller account, not a handmaid, Right? So handmade skincare and topicals, but not consumable. Okay. Perfect.
Wonderful. So tell us a little bit more about your business, what you're specifically doing and share a little bit more about where people could find you. Yeah. So I help sellers with growing on Amazon for optimization of listings. So like doing search engine optimization, doing photography, just making really beautiful listings that grab people's attention. We also help with strategies to get reviews strategies, to get attention on your product.
And the best place to find us is actually our website. So www.thinkcascadia.com and Cascadia is where we're from. I was born and raised in the Seattle area and the cascade mountains run through British Columbia, Washington, and Oregon. So this part of the world is called Cascadia. And a lot of it, my daughter almost moved to Seattle before March of 2020. And instead, now she's in Denver, which is equally wonderful for us as you move forward.
I mean, obviously with the time that we've just gone through everyone's buying online, people are so much more comfortable or will purchase online just because that's what we've had to do. What do you see for the future of e-commerce? I just think it's going to keep getting better. The thing that was interesting about this here is that it kind of trained a bunch of people who had been resisting going digital by digitally.
And so one of the things I thought was really interesting is the paperless menus restaurants now have trained people to know what a QR code is. So now that I see a QR code, I'm like, Oh, I could go get that freebie that I just got in the mail. Whereas before I was like, I don't anyone understand.
And it's something that people who are more tech involved, like there was some guys that at Amazon who were super into this when I was there years ago and they were, Oh, we're going to have a QR code or everything is going to be really cool. You can see this, you can see that. And like this looks at a QR code. That's weird. And now everyone knows that QR codes are no matter what your age is, because anyone who's been to a restaurant in the last six months has experienced the QR code menu.
Oh, it's just easier for the restaurant to do. And so now customers know what to do when they see a QR code, You know, it's so interesting because QR codes did kind of go out of popularity for a while. They were the big thing. Everyone was excited about them. Then they a little bit, you know, people weren't using them as much anymore. I mean, you'd see them around from time to time, but no big deal. Well now all of a sudden you're absolutely right. They are back full force. For sure.
I, in the summer had been going out to a number of craft shows just to see how these events were taking place with social distancing and temperatures and like all of that. And there's so many less to your point paper menus, but also brochures or anything that would be managed or handled yet. Instead. Now there were QR codes. So people who were going to the booths take your phone, click the QR code, and there you've got all the information.
So I think it is something for us to pay attention to and figure out how we might integrate that into our business. I think it's a really good point. And so you have older people who had never paid attention to any of this. I'm not going to say that I'm older, but I definitely was. I'm the Oregon trail generation, the ones that played Oregon trail in schools when it was like those old computers card catalog at the library. And I tend to shy away from too much technology.
I liked doing things where analog, where I can, and this year has just been, it's all been at all, like, okay, fine. And so even people who have resisted it have just been like fine it's time. Yeah, for sure. And I think it is here to stay. I mean, as we open up again and are able to get back whatever portion of the past lives we had, we'll get back, hopefully most of it. But I think some of the things will stay and definitely more acceptance with online and purchasing online.
And then things like you're talking about QR codes and other things I absolutely loved going on tourist trips to where I would go into a little store and there'd be all these cool artists and things there, and little gift shops and so on.
And I think that one of the things that people are going to start doing is a lot more kind of offline and online connection because it would be really great if you're in a cute little store and you see these beautiful jewelry items, there should be a QR code that shows you how to follow a person for new designs or go to their website and join the mailing list for new designs.
Cause there's plenty of people that I would do that for like jewelry items or beautiful scarves or various handmade things that are uniquely made. And so then you're like, maybe I really want to get that to my mom next Christmas. And so kind of connecting online and offline in that way. I like that. I like that. And you were saying a little while ago, too, how you really enjoy knowing who the artist is.
I'm even seeing a QR code, like your saying, if there's like an artist in market where you're not sitting where your displays are, whether it's consignment or wholesale, however it's to your product Is displayed, but you're not there having a QR code that referenced back to a video of you creating the product or how to use a product demos, anything to grow followers, anything to grow your followers. Absolutely. Well, Rachel, this has been so interesting.
There's so many things about Amazon, even though I feel like I'm on there every single day that I didn't know from a seller perspective and handmade for sure too. So this has been very enlightening, very, very helpful. And I thank you so much for coming on the show and sharing with us today. Thank you so much for having me.
How refreshing is it to think that you don't have to, nor should you load your entire Amazon handmade account with all your items, pick the products that are positioned to perform the best there, adjust their names and descriptions if necessary and give it a go. Now, what do we have coming up next week? I'm going to talk about virtual craft shows. I can see this as an up and coming best practice to integrate into your marketing and sales strategy immediately.
We'll talk about why I say this and what it's all about next Monday as always, thanks so much for spending time with me today. If you'd like to show support for the podcast, please leave a rating and review. That means the world to me and helps our show get seen by more makers. It's a great way to pay it forward and now be safe and well. And I'll see you again next week on the gift biz unwrapped. I want to make sure you're familiar with my free Facebook group called gift is breeze.
It's a place where we all gather and are a community to support each other. Got a really fun post in there. That's my favorite of the week. I have to say where I invite all of you to share what you're doing to show pictures of your product, to show what you're working on for the week to get reactions from other people and just for fun, because we all get to see the wonderful products that everybody in the community is making my favorite posts every single week, without doubt.
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