Amazon seller returns to work after 4 years of working alone: ​​I am not up to the task

A well-known entrepreneur once said that once you have a taste of being your own boss, it is difficult to go back to working for someone else.

Indeed, compared with an annual income of millions or even tens of millions, a job working from 9 to 6 with a monthly salary of a few thousand yuan is obviously not attractive at all. This is also the reason why many entrepreneurs start a series of businesses.

However, faced with cruel reality, ordinary people may sometimes have no chance to choose at all.

From a rookie in the workplace to an entrepreneur with an annual income of one million

In 2016, Xiaonan, who had just graduated from college, came into contact with cross-border e-commerce for the first time and successfully entered the industry as an Amazon operations assistant. After working diligently for 4 years, Xiaonan was promoted from an assistant to a formal operator, and then from an ordinary operator to a team leader.

During her working period, Xiaonan's store had good performance and launched many new hot-selling products, which won her high praise from her boss. However, despite the good performance, Xiaonan's salary did not increase significantly.

At the beginning, Xiaonan didn’t really mind the salary issue. After all, she had been in the company with a learning attitude since she started working. However, as she worked in the company for more and more years, Xiaonan’s attitude gradually changed.

After some consideration, Xiaonan decided to talk to her boss about her salary, but her boss' words poured cold water on her. Although he recognized Xiaonan's work, he thought her position was not indispensable and that it was good enough for her to get such a high salary now.

After negotiating with her boss to no avail, Xiaonan decided to quit and start her own business. 2019 was Xiaonan's first year working on her own, when the entire industry was still on the fast track of rapid development.

Relying on the experience accumulated previously and industry dividends, Xiaonan achieved 100 orders a day in his first year of working on his own. During his peak period, he achieved 400 to 500 orders a day, with annual profits exceeding one million.

Taking advantage of this rapid growth momentum, Xiaonan also formed his own small team, and his career seemed to be slowly getting on track.

But the good times did not last long. Starting from 2022, the overall market conditions of the cross-border e-commerce industry began to decline. In addition, with plans to have a baby, Xiaonan decided to retreat behind the scenes and hand over the existing accounts and teams to her relatives.

According to Xiaonan, she chose to step back because she wanted to focus on preparing for pregnancy, and her relatives also said that they had experience in running Amazon stores, but the results did not seem to be the case.

Since her relatives took over, Xiaonan's store has been going downhill, relying on the previous capital to survive. Until this year, the previous accumulated capital has been spent, and the team has to disband.

When reviewing the situation afterwards, Xiaonan said she did not regret her previous choice. "Maybe it was due to the influence of my family. I felt that becoming a mother was very important to me, and I was already at this stage at that time." Xiaonan said.

In addition, Xiaonan also said that he did not intend to hold his relatives responsible. "After all, the overall market conditions were not very good at the time. Even if I were to do it, I might not be able to do better than him."

After resetting to zero, returning to work

Xiaonan acted calm about the store's "death" and quickly accepted the reality that she needed to return to the workplace.

Xiaonan said that she had originally planned to look for a job after the New Year, but she did not expect the store to close down so soon, so she had to move her job search plan forward.

It only took Xiaonan about a week to find an operations job with a base salary of 6,000 plus commission. It was not far from home, so Xiaonan decided to give it a try.

However, Xiaonan obviously overestimated herself. After working for a week, Xiaonan said frankly that she was now in a state where she had the will but not the ability. When she was running her own store, Xiaonan had handed over most of the operational work to the team, and she was mainly responsible for product selection.

After returning to the workplace, Xiaonan had to pick up all her previous work again, but her energy was obviously not as good as when she was young. In addition, she had to worry about her children. Xiaonan found it difficult to adapt to the work pace in the workplace.

Similar to Xiaonan's situation, Zhang Hao also returned to the workplace in dejection after working for a while without any results .

Unlike Xiaonan, Zhang Hao's entrepreneurial story only lasted a few months. Talking about this experience, Zhang Hao called it stopping losses in time.

According to Zhang Hao, he decided to go out on his own not long after working in his last job. During that time, he actively selected products every day, but this state only lasted for three months. As the business had not made any good breakthroughs and his self-control was poor, he began to become lazy. Feeling that there was no hope in such a life, he decided to go back to work.

In just three months, he completed the switch from an employee to an entrepreneur and then back to an employee.

As the dividends fade, working alone is no longer the best option

In recent years, when talking about Amazon, "involution" and "price war" are the two most talked about topics.

As the world's largest cross-border e-commerce platform, Amazon has attracted many sellers, especially Chinese sellers. The result of an increasing number of people is increasingly fierce competition.

In addition to intensified competition, Amazon's platform fees are also rising. Overseas media surveys show that between 2016 and 2021, Amazon's advertising costs as a percentage of sellers' overall costs have risen from 1.1% to 4.6%. In other words, Amazon's advertising costs have quadrupled in just five years.

An industry insider summarized: Now that Amazon is operating independently, it faces three challenges: first, competition on the Amazon platform has become increasingly fierce; second, more and more platforms are participating in the competition for traffic; third, overseas consumers are beginning to cut spending.

A seller who has been working alone for four years lamented: "It's not impossible to make money on Amazon now, it's just very difficult, and those who post about their huge orders all day are most likely trying to make money."

Previously, a seller said that he lost more than 1.7 million in the first year after starting his own business. The seller has to endure the torment, anxiety, and treading on thin ice at every step of the process alone.

Based on the feedback from sellers, working alone is clearly no longer the best option for operating on Amazon.

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