Amazon.com reported a large number of errors on its front and back ends, causing sellers to cut their orders in half

Amazon's operating rules are changing ...

After the US coupon policy came into effect, some new products could not create coupons because of "no reference price"; many old products had large-scale coupon errors on the front and back ends, and many sellers' orders plummeted overnight. Under the new regulations, the platform not only requires sellers to promote in a white hat manner, but also requires them to offer the lowest price for internal circulation. What's more frightening is that new sellers may only be able to enter the market at low prices in the future, driving further price cuts in major categories.

Amazon coupons are widely reported as errors, causing sellers' orders to plummet

On March 12, the new coupon policy of the US site officially came into effect, causing a significant impact on sellers.

Many sellers woke up to find that their orders had dropped significantly. Some orders fell by one-third, while others were directly halved. After checking the reasons, they found that Amazon's front-end coupons were invalid, and the back-end coupons were all reported as errors.

On March 5, Amazon issued an announcement to remind sellers that new coupon regulations will be implemented on the 12th, and products must meet two conditions before coupons can be used.

First, you need to provide a discount percentage between the minimum discount (5%) and the maximum discount (50%);

Second, the product must also have a sales history to be eligible for a coupon, and the promotional price should be lower than its "historical selling price" or recent lowest price.

At the time, the policy was criticized by sellers, and many people believed that it would affect their operations. Now the actual impact of the new coupon policy has made sellers panic.

Regarding new products , according to the new coupon policy, coupons cannot be created for products without sales records. Some sellers have personally tested that new products have been restricted from using coupons because of "no reference price."

For old products , many sellers’ coupons are invalid because they do not meet the coupon policy. The specific manifestations are: 1. When you open the coupon page, you will see "Notes", most of which are "No reference price" errors; 2. The coupons on the product page are stopped; 3. The coupon page cannot be opened directly.

Some sellers posted coupons on the front desk, but reported errors on the back desk, while some sellers reported errors on both the front desk and back desk. When the coupons reported errors, orders from many sellers dropped, and the extent of the drop varied depending on the specific circumstances.

This problem is not an isolated case. For some sellers, all coupons for products with no orders or low star ratings have been suspended. Some sellers cannot see the coupons. There are two situations with the old links: one is that the backend coupon reports an error, but the frontend still shows normal sales; the other is that the frontend coupon is gone directly, and sales are reduced by one third.

A colleague told me that only two of the newly set coupons were not displayed. After the new coupon regulations came into effect, those that were normally displayed began to report errors, and all the coupons disappeared when the front desk was refreshed.

"All the coupons are reported incorrectly. The mechanism is the same as the member discount. It will not work to secretly raise prices and then issue coupons in the future. Amazon's current rule is: either you sell at a high price, and once you lower the price, the chance of raising the price is zero." An industry insider lamented.

Coupon error solution is here

With coupons reporting errors on a large scale, sellers are eager to find the cause and solve the problem. Some peers are still confused about the coupon rules.

According to the suggestions provided by Amazon, if the seller's coupon is reported incorrectly, you can do the following:

Item Price History Question: For this item to qualify, a sales history could be built up by selling more items to generate a "Historical Selling Price".

This is mainly for new products. New products without sales records cannot use coupons. Sellers can try to use them after the product is sold. This is not good for promoting new products. In the past, many sellers raised prices when launching new products and stimulated new product sales with large coupons, but now it doesn't work.

Increase discount: The promotional price (purchase price - discount value) must be lower than the historical selling price or the most recent lowest price. Sellers need to increase the discount to make it lower than the historical selling price and the lowest price to meet the criteria.

Min /Max Discount Issue: Update the sale price discount percentage so that it is between the minimum discount (5%) and the maximum discount (50%).

Old products involve historical selling prices, lowest and highest discounts, etc. The reason why many sellers report coupon errors is that they cannot distinguish between "historical selling prices" and "recent lowest prices". Some people consulted Amazon customer service, and according to the reply, the historical selling price is determined based on the middle price of the buyer's purchase of the product on Amazon in the past 90 days (excluding certain promotional prices), and the recent lowest price is the lowest price in the past 30 days.

However, some dimensions are not so clear. One seller pointed out that according to the new rules, the price after the coupon must be lower than the "was price" or the most recent lowest price, which means that there is no clear time reference range for the discounted price of the coupon. The lowest price shown in my coupon error is a low price from a long time ago. It is the lowest price this product has ever sold at, without any time limit.

In response to coupon errors with different problems, experienced colleagues have provided solutions: change the background "your price" and "tax-inclusive price" to the same as your sales price, and then reopen the coupon to make it work normally. Discard the struck-out price. This operation is acceptable for one of the error reports. If there has been a price increase recently, the corresponding discount will also be required to be increased.

Now, some sellers have adjusted the coupons and they can display them normally, but the error appears again a few hours later , which makes many people at a loss and question Amazon's rules. But there is one consensus that everyone seems to know: the platform repeatedly sends error signals to let sellers directly offer the lowest price.

The platform requires sellers to pay floor price to grab traffic

In the battle for traffic among major e-commerce platforms, low prices are clearly a tried and tested weapon. Some industry insiders believe that Amazon has also begun to waver under the fierce competition, and this wave of operations may be influenced by Temu, which has prompted sellers to take the initiative to reduce prices.

Temu has grown rapidly since its launch and was the most downloaded iPhone app in the United States in 2023. According to data released by SimilarWeb, Temu had 467 million unique visitors in December 2023, ranking second in the world. Amazon ranked first with 2.659 billion users.

Data from research firm Apptopia shows that in the second quarter of 2023, U.S. shoppers spent 18 minutes a day on Temu's app, compared with 10 minutes on Amazon.

Temu is grabbing Amazon's users and user time. Seeing the new entrant Temu's conquest, Amazon can't help but take action. Last year, the platform drastically cut the commission of the clothing category, forcing sellers to lower prices to retain customers. Now it has taken action again, with the new coupon rules that have come out of nowhere, forcing sellers to go to low prices.

Some sellers pointed out directly: " Amazon has just introduced a warehousing configuration fee, sellers' operating costs have increased, and the new coupon regulations require low prices. These series of outrageous policies have made it increasingly difficult for small sellers to survive "!

However, on the other hand, Amazon's new coupon policy has to some extent controlled the behavior that disrupts market prices. Previously, after sellers raised prices, the operation of increasing coupons and offering false discounts is no longer feasible, which has prompted more sellers to operate in compliance with regulations.

Amazon

Meiya

Front and back office

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