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It’s the first week of January and I haven’t laid out my 2010 goals yet. I know what they are in my head, but most of us know that if goals aren’t written down, then our chances of accomplishing them go drastically down.
At some point this week, I need to take what’s in my head (that can be pretty scary), and put them on paper. Better yet, I’ll post them here. Maybe that will give me more incentive to try even harder to accomplish them before year’s end.
However, there is one big task or goal that I already know I want to tackle early this year. It has to do with my online bookselling business. My husband has been asking me for months, “What are you doing with all these books?” That’s his way of saying, “Get them out of here! They are taking up too much room!”
Well, I think I found the solution to my storage problem. What I’m about to say is no secret to some people already selling used books on Amazon. But recently, I learned about Amazon’s FBA (Fulfillment by Amazon) Program that looks promising as a solution for my online bookselling business.
Amazon’s FBA Program
Can’t get any better than that, can it? If I can send all of my used books taking up prime real estate on my bookshelves, PLUS have Amazon with their second-to-none customer service take care of everything for me, why wouldn’t I drop everything now and get my inventory the heck out of my house?!
Of course there are some fees I have to consider like Amazon’s warehouse and fulfillment fees, and commissions, but from what I understand, there are some big advantages to being part of the FBA Program. These advantages include:
- FBA items are eligible for free Super Saving Shipping
- FBA items can be shipped via Amazon’s one-day shipping option (I wouldn’t be able to do this if I shipped the books myself because the cost of one-day shipping would wipe out my profits).
- Customers know that they can trust Amazon to ship items on time. FBA listings are displayed with the “Fulfillment by Amazon” logo.
- Items can be competitively priced because FBA listings on Amazon.com are sorted by price without shipping costs because Amazon assumes they will ship via Super Saver Shipping or via Amazon Prime. This means an book priced at $3.99 can be listed above a book priced at $.01 because the item priced at $.01 has a shipping cost of $3.99 putting the total cost of the book at $4.00. People do pay a premium to have everything handled by Amazon. This will allow me to increase my prices, cover Amazon’s fees, and make a nice profit.
So there you have it. My first goal of the year written down for all to see. I plan on updating this post or have a series of posts relating to the Amazon FBA Program so my progress can be tracked. I’ll also include where I’m finding inventory, and how much money I’m making.
I highly encourage you to check out Amazon’s FBA Program
Let me know what you think of it. I’ve been using it for a few months now and really like it. I’ve also blogged about it quite a bit so if you get a minute come over and check it out. If you run the numbers and the book doesn’t stay in their warehouse for months on end tacking on storage fees, you actually make MORE money using FBA than you would selling it yourself.
– Adam