Amazon is increasingly being utilised, tactically and strategically by established brands, as a low-risk way to diversify their route to market. Capitalising on Amazon’s established global consumer base can offer agile methods to:
- Quickly penetrate new overseas markets
- Add online diversity to existing bricks and mortar offerings with minimal capital investment
- Improve profitability by stretching margins of low-moving SKUs
There are various ways to work in partnership with Amazon. Holding stock in one of the Amazon warehouses and have Amazon themselves pick, pack and ship orders on behalf of brands through Fulfilment by Amazon (FBA) is typically used tactically as the method of choice to get products into a new market at speed. A simple yet powerful way to get products into the hands of Amazon customers with minimal investment. Order preparation and bulk delivery from an existing inventory is often the only requirement and investment required to get Amazon FBA off the ground.
Amazon FBM is a strategic option to sell to customers, with the brand maintaining full responsibility for shipping. FBM allows brands to list their products on Amazon and promote to a global audience whilst retaining the responsibility to store stock and ship orders. Otherwise known as the ‘endless aisle’, this approach boats the opportunity to promote and sell entire SKU portfolios, including those not selected to be included in bricks and mortar stock profiles, granting the opportunity to increase the margin of slow-moving SKUs.
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Amazon FBA
Amazon FBA is a popular choice for businesses, with 66% of the top 10,000 sellers on Amazon using the FBA program. The fulfilmentcrowd platform fully integrates with Amazon FBA automatically consuming orders, instructing an expert team to prepare the shipment, producing compliant documentation, and pre-advising delivery, allowing operations to be streamlined into one solution that unifies every aspect of the supply chain. Preparation, packing, and shipment of Amazon FBA orders to the Amazon network can be conducted by fulfilmentcrowd within the UK, EU, and US.
What are the benefits of Amazon FBA?
Prime Eligibility
Sellers using Amazon FBA can send items with the Amazon Prime feature. This allows the opportunity to seamlessly reach your customers as quickly as possible, with the backing of a globally trusted program, instantly increasing sales. This is a huge advantage as customers are most likely to select an item with a faster delivery option.
Automation and Integration
When you integrate with fulfilmentcrowd, we can prep and ship bulk orders directly to Amazon, where they will take care of storage, order processing, and shipping. Amazon will also provide customer assistance and deal with returns, giving you peace of mind and allowing you time to focus on growing your business. Every order is managed and assessed by our expert team before leaving our fulfilment centres. Both Amazon FBA and FBM is often used as a strategic combination, fulfilmentcrowd can support both programmes in unison, fulfilling orders and processing shipments from any of our 14 global fulfilment centres.
The Buy Box
Selling items through Amazon FBA gives sellers the opportunity to appear in the buy box, a function within the Amazon app that allows customers to directly add items to their shopping carts. With 83% of Amazon sales coming through the Buy Box, it is a feature that can instantly increase profit. This feature appears on the product detail page when a customer selects items to put in their cart. Amazon selects and shows products from a high-performance seller offering the most competitive price and the fastest delivery.
FBM
fulfilmentcrowd can integrate seamlessly with Amazon, taking care of the process from orders placed to the picking, packing, and shipping of your stock across the UK, EU, and USA. Automatically ship from multiple sales channels and marketplaces, including Amazon using FBM, from the one stock inventory and streamline everything from stock preparation to sales reporting. Once you’re connected, we’ll do the thinking, so you don’t have to. We’ll give you updates on stock and access to parcel tracking, allowing you to track every step of the process, including returns.
What are the advantages of Amazon FBM?
More control
When using Amazon FBM, there is more control over the entire process of shipping, packaging, and fulfillment. Maintain inventory management, control pricing, and choose preferred shipping and handling policies. FBM allows brands to customise the experience for the end customer and have more control over the overall process.
Multi-channel Approach
Amazon FBM gives the option to carry out a multi-channel approach. By integrating your Amazon FBM store to fulfilmentcrowd, you can service multiple channels, for example, orders from a Shopify store, Amazon, and wholesale deliveries all from one platform. Our app allows users to track inventory and be notified as soon as the stock needs replacing.
Packaging
Another important aspect of FBM is the option to use branded packaging when shipping out orders to customers, which adds to the customer experience. In contrast to this, the Amazon FBA method will only allow users to ship products in standardised Amazon parcels. The use of branded packaging adds a personal touch for customers, contributing to repeat purchases and increased customer lifetime value, and gives the option to use environmentally friendly materials or incorporate bespoke marketing materials such as flyers and inserts. Integrating Amazon FBM with fulfilmentcrowd allows you to select custom packaging, ensuring your customers receive their orders to the highest standard.
