Main brands were blocked and sellers withdrew from Shenzhen: the continuous blocking of accounts may be due to this investigation

Since May, big sellers have been blocked continuously, allowing people in the cross-border circle to witness the tragic end of sellers under Amazon's iron-blooded policy.

Some of them were devastated and decided to leave Shenzhen, the fertile land of cross-border e-commerce , while others were busy clearing out their stock at low prices. More importantly, sellers in the vortex or on the edge of it began to consider adjusting their strategies and seeking transformation.

The main brands were blocked, and the sellers left Shenzhen in frustration

“I used to often see news about big sellers getting their accounts blocked, but I always felt it was far away from me. Now that my friends have been affected, I realize that this is a real thing,” said a seller with emotion.

Indeed, when Patonson’s account was blocked in May, I believe many sellers were just watching from the sidelines. But now many of them have been caught in the whirlpool.

Previously, there was news that the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) had proposed a target of closing 200,000 Amazon accounts by the end of September. Although the authenticity of this news has yet to be verified, it is an indisputable fact that news of sellers being closed is still spreading.

Once these sellers are blocked, the number is not just a few, but usually dozens or even hundreds of them. The blocked sellers may lay off employees and reduce expenses, or even declare bankruptcy.

A few days ago, an employee said that more than 20 of his company’s small and medium-sized accounts were shut down overnight . In addition, the large accounts had been blocked in the past few months. The company is likely to declare bankruptcy because it can no longer hold on.

As we all know, Shenzhen is a gathering place for cross-border e-commerce sellers and a fertile ground for the development of cross-border e-commerce enterprises. However, under Amazon's continuous heavy blows, sellers have been forced to leave this fertile ground in despair.

Recently, a seller who started his business in Shenzhen in 2018 told his friends that due to Amazon's crackdown, his main brand was blocked. To make matters worse, the European site was also found to be related, so Amazon basically went bankrupt. Now his main task is to appeal to get the money back, pay back the suppliers and logistics companies, and then move the company back home.

The account was blocked or related to the WHICH investigation

I believe sellers have always had this question: How does Amazon achieve such precise strikes?

The editor believes that this may be closely related to " Which? " ( the most well-known large-scale independent consumer rights protection organization in the UK ).

Which ? said it investigated some of the best-selling products on Amazon in May and found that buyers repeatedly claimed they were rewarded for giving positive reviews.

Which ? looked at the top 10 tech products in nine categories, including smartwatches, earphones, dashcams and Bluetooth speakers .

We know that among the brands that were blocked this time, electronic products were the hardest hit. And the results of the Which? survey also showed that among the five categories of products, including smart watches, dashcams, portable Bluetooth speakers, in-ear headphones and surveillance video equipment , nearly a quarter of the products repeatedly showed signs of trying to incentivize .

It is worth noting that in the investigation report, " Which? " highlighted 12 brands that offer rewards to obtain positive reviews or modify negative reviews, and by checking the products within the brand range, pointed out the number of products that have such behavior. Among them, the editor found that brands such as Ap****, which had been reported to have had their accounts hacked, were on the list.

Which ? said that among the 12 brands mentioned above , Vi**** was one of the worst affected brands. "Of the 29 products we investigated, 11 of the brand's reviews showed that consumers said they were incentivized to leave reviews or positive recommendations, some of which included free SD cards."

In addition, " Which? " stated that four out of six of the reviews on Ap **** contained words such as "bribe" or "incentive." For example, several people said they had received gift certificates worth 15 to 30 pounds to write a five-star review. En **** has eight pieces of evidence that it has false reviews and rewarded reviews. One buyer in the review said that "a few weeks" after submitting the original review , the seller contacted them and said that if they changed the review from one star to four stars, they would be refunded or given a gift certificate as compensation.

The big seller collapsed, and the industry's internal competition intensified

As sellers fall one by one, the industry's internal competition is further intensified. In addition to sellers clearing out their inventory at low prices, advertising costs are also rising.

Some sellers said that more and more sellers are being blocked due to false reviews, and many sellers dare not fake orders. In order to get orders, everyone has to increase advertising investment and increase the chances of clicks and orders through advertising exposure.

This is how internal circulation comes.

Sellers reported that the current advertising bid has soared from 0.1 to 3, but even with such an investment, the number of orders has not increased.

Another factor causing infighting in the industry is that blocked sellers are clearing out their inventory at low prices.

“If I were a big seller whose account was blocked, with so much inventory, I would definitely create a small account or buy another account to clear the inventory as soon as possible,” said a seller.

Every piece of inventory is invested with real money, and it is impossible for the seller to give up, so it must be digested in the foreign market in the end.

In recent days, there have been many reports that big sellers whose accounts have been blocked are indeed clearing out their stock at low prices. We know that these sellers have hundreds of millions of overseas stocks, and if they put them up for sale at extremely low prices, it will be the beginning of another wave of disaster for sellers with similar purposes.

Industry shocks force sellers to transform

"This ban incident has reminded us: in the future, we should do less brand authorization and register more brands, and separate the brands and products. Otherwise, if something goes wrong, all brands will be taken down and many accounts will be implicated." said a seller when sharing his feelings about the consecutive bans of his accounts.

In fact, if it weren’t for Amazon’s strong rectification this time, many sellers would still do cross-border e-commerce business in the same way as before, without considering compliance issues and thinking that as long as they can make money, that’s all.

But this time, Amazon directly exposed the fate of non-compliant sellers and their tragic ways to the majority of sellers. This made sellers deeply realize that the original approach no longer worked, and transformation, rectification, and change of marketing strategy were imminent.

"I only now realize that life is the most important thing. Our entire company's business processes need to be rectified and transformed. We are under a lot of pressure now." A big seller in Guangzhou said that not only the platforms, but also the supervision of down payment tools are becoming more and more stringent. The era of getting something for nothing is over.

A management staff of a major seller in Shenzhen also stated that this wave of rectification by Amazon is actually forcing sellers to return to the product itself. Because when the path to fake orders is blocked, sellers will be more dependent on the product. Only by increasing investment in research and development can they win the hearts of buyers in the future and gain a place in the market.

Not only the big sellers, a small seller also said that it is becoming increasingly difficult to do business on Amazon this year . Faced with this situation, he has also adjusted his strategy : from distributing goods in large quantities to fine-tuning them, self-delivery and product testing through advertising, and then shipping to warehouses based on link data performance, thereby reducing inventory pressure and improving capital utilization.

"How to achieve 400 to 1,000 orders per day for a single product without violating regulations is still a big question. Whoever can figure it out in a short period of time will definitely lead the trend," said a seller.

Amazon ban