Amazon launches a new round of strict review and imposes the most severe punishment

Amazon sellers’ nightmare is back. The platform is strictly investigating fake orders, especially new accounts. Once found, they will be punished severely. Sellers who insist on white hat operations are hit hard by the price war among their peers, and many categories are wailing...

In 2024, how to maintain profits on the basis of regular operations will become a major problem faced by many sellers.

Amazon begins strict review of new accounts for fake orders

Recently, Amazon has started a new round of strict inspections.

Some sellers in the industry received a notice: On February 20th, US time , Amazon began to mobilize a large number of personnel from other departments to cooperate in the investigation of product reviews . That is to say, the platform randomly checked multiple links in a store to check whether the buyer's comments were false purchase reviews and other behaviors.

The scope of this random inspection seems to be larger, which makes many sellers uneasy. In fact, Amazon's strict review of reviews is always in waves, because there are always sellers trying to take advantage of loopholes and use fake reviews to improve product rankings and sales. In addition, some people will give bad reviews to competitors to consolidate their position through malicious competition.

In addition to spot-checking store links, an insider said that Amazon is also strictly checking new accounts for fake orders. The insider warned: new accounts registered in recent months must be careful not to fake orders. Once caught, they will receive the most severe punishment - the seller's account will be unable to log in, and both the money and the goods will be lost.

According to feedback, some new accounts have been affected. One seller said that his new account was targeted, and he only placed three or four orders. Many sellers with new accounts said they dare not fake orders or reviews.

Amazon's strict inspection of reviews is no joke. A few days ago, many sellers received inexplicable emails from the platform to delete reviews. Without knowing it, many reviews were deleted, including some negative reviews. Based on past experience, Amazon takes action from the buyer's side. After finding the buyer's account that violates the rules, it deletes the non-compliant reviews left by these buyers.

As Amazon has repeatedly cracked down on fake orders and fake reviews, both new and old accounts can only stick to white hat operations. Everyone agrees that white hat operations are the king of safety . Black techniques such as fake orders and manipulated reviews can only achieve temporary sales, and in the end, there is always the worry of being retaliated by the platform later, or once a bad review comes, the order will immediately be bad, so sticking to white hat operations is the only way out. If you fake orders, you may be out of business the next day.

At this time, off-site resources become particularly important. Sellers can use social media discount codes to promote new products on social media platforms and deal platforms, short video delivery and other channels. Some colleagues believe that if you are caught for fake orders, you will have no way to survive. In the current market situation, it is better to put more products off-site and prepare more goods for orders.

With the entry of capital, the current operations that adhere to the white hat gameplay have also become different. Some large companies invest in Vine regardless of cost, focusing on the fact that they have a lot of money and can do whatever they want, but most importantly, it is formal and safe; some companies insist on investing in advertising fees, letting the advertising fees fly to drive orders; and some companies are more direct, relying on low-price internal circulation to drive sales regardless of cost.

Among these operations, low-price internal circulation is the most commonly used and is also considered by some peers to be one of the most effective methods.

The price war is going crazy, and the king of volume has reduced the price to the lowest

After the Spring Festival in 2024, a wave of low-price internal circulation swept in again. Perhaps it was the end of the peak season, coupled with the sales plans formulated by some companies after the New Year, sellers in many categories were selling at low prices and clearing inventory.

A seller checked the status of several competitors and found that more than one of them was clearing out inventory at low prices. This problem is not an isolated case. Another seller said that recently our category has also been in a price war. The top sellers have created a lot of low-price links. I don’t know whether they are trying to grab market share or clear inventory, which has pushed the price of the entire category lower and lower.

In addition, many sellers shipped a lot of goods, but due to poor sales during the peak season, a lot of inventory was left behind. Some sellers have not sold out their Black Friday goods yet, and can only clear out the goods at low prices after the New Year.

As the Spring Festival holiday comes to an end, companies are resuming operations. Currently, many categories are being sold at low prices, and this wave of low prices seems to be a bit fierce.

An industry insider said that after looking at the products for an afternoon, he found that there were several products with a profit margin of only 20% when the cost was 0. Apart from local self-delivery, I really couldn’t find their profit point. It was a bit too much . Another colleague lamented: “I have found many such links recently , and I don’t know where the profit is ! ”

There is a price war at the beginning of the year, 2024 is destined to be exciting!

As early as January, just after the peak season, many products were sold out. According to a seller, the product had been on the shelves for more than 400 days. It had been selling well before and had a high profit margin. Suddenly, many new products came to compete with the price war. Now the product's half-month data shows that advertising accounts for more than 70% of the total sales, with a conversion rate of more than 50%. Advertising is expensive, and the price is much lower than before. The profit has been eaten up by advertising. I have tried to sell it at a lower price than before + top advertising, but there is still no order after clicking on the advertisement.

In fact, new products entering the market and engaging in price wars to aggressively seize the market share of old products have occurred in almost every category. A Henan seller was helpless: "My category has also entered a price war, and everyone is using a profit-free strategy to increase sales. Acos is extremely high, and my prices have been forced to drop. At first, I wanted to spend money on advertising, but it basically lost money. Now I can't think of a better way."

The king of rolls made his peers tremble! A king of rolls shared his own operation and also expressed his helplessness. His product was on the shelves for a year and a half. In the first year, the profit was very high. At that time, there were relatively few sellers, but later there was a crazy influx of new sellers.

The King of Volumes used his ultimate move: a direct 25% price cut, bringing the price down to the lowest in the market, and reduced advertising by 50%. Because of its high weight, coupled with the price cut and reduced advertising, naturally there were a lot of orders, and the proportion of advertising expenses was reduced from 20% to 10%. The current profit has dropped by 1/3 compared to previous periods.

"If you are the most competitive one, you will never be able to beat me . " The King of Rolls's actions made it difficult for other competitors to cope with it, but the King of Rolls himself felt wronged: "Faced with a large number of competitors, I feel that if I don't lower my prices, I will not survive to the end."

The King of Rolls and fellow sellers each have their own frustrations. No matter how they fight, they will end up killing one thousand enemies and losing eight hundred of their own. Some far-sighted sellers seek to solve the problem fundamentally. Those who succeeded in doing so shared their methods: they improved the products, reduced costs but transformed the product advantages, and used the same ASIN for follow-selling and switched SKUs for shipment, so as to ensure BD and LD recommendations. After switching to the improved SK, they started running activities and increasing advertising, and now they have regained their first place.

Under Amazon's round after round of strict scrutiny, sellers who have to stick to white hat methods have had their profits severely hurt. And with the growing growth of platforms such as Temu and TikTok Shop, the days of a large number of Amazon sellers will become increasingly difficult.

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