Читать книгу The Amazon Jungle - Rick Cesari - Страница 15

As formidable a competitor as Amazon is, with a greater number of products online than there are people in the United States, don’t let their dominance discourage you from listing your products on their platform. Here’s why. Of the 2.7 million U.S. Amazon Sellers, fewer than 7% are producing $100,000 or more in annual sales; which means 93% are treading water.

Instead of thrashing around with the bottom millions, hold your own against the Top Sellers by using strategies like ours to get to (and stay) on top. For nearly two decades, I have invested tens of thousands of hours picking and developing products to sell on Amazon. I have also created cool brands, all while negotiating an online platform that aims to eat me for lunch. The fierceness of this experience forced me to develop a battle-tested plan that has kept me in the game.

When I look back on the distance my brothers and I traveled on Amazon since we launched our first products in 2003, it honestly feels like we orbited the sun—with the scorch marks to prove it! Countless algorithm changes, platform updates, policy tweaks, and Buy Box refinements created a mess of headaches (and heartaches) over the years, while also teaching us to be responsive and poised for change. Hackers, counterfeiters, tricksters, and Amazon itself soured us at times, but they also hardened us to the realities of this savage landscape. As we navigated this unique ecosystem, we learned that the best way to survive was by following a motto I learned as a Marine: Improvise, Adapt, Overcome.

Graduating from the Amazon School of Hard Knocks, like boot camp, gave me the raw experience and fortitude necessary to succeed on the retail platform. It also forced me to work smart and create a process that is repeatable and dependable—even on a platform that is unpredictable and often contrary. Amazon is not for everybody. I get asked all the time about what it takes to become a Top Seller, and as much as I like to quantify stuff, defining the characteristics of the hundreds of Top Sellers I’ve met over the years is really tough. That said, I’m always on the lookout for patterns, and it’s hard to ignore some of the most recognizable traits of the people I’ve come to admire, both for their achievements and for the ways in which they’ve persevered on Amazon.