What is Amazon Automation and How Does It Help Your Business?

The eCommerce industry is huge. Unimaginably huge. Amazon alone has 9.7 million sellers worldwide!

If you’re not trying to take a piece of the pie for yourself, then you’re missing out. If you are, then you might know just how intense the competition is. Or just how hard it can be to be on the platform at all. 

There are a million things to juggle as an Amazon seller. Monitoring sales, managing inventory, marketing, optimizing your product listing, production, and so much more. Big eCommerce companies have the manpower and funding to smoothly run the operation. But as an independent seller or even as a small team, it could be overwhelming at times.

For those wanting to be on the same playing field as these companies or even get a slight advantage, then Amazon automation is the solution. If you’re looking for that slight edge you need to take your Amazon business to the next level, then read on. We put together a list of 6 different ways to incorporate Amazon automation into your business.

But first, let’s understand what Amazon automation is and why it matters.

What is Amazon Automation?

The term “Amazon automation” is an umbrella term that covers:

• Businesses that claim to sell a product for you. These businesses claim that with a “small initial investment” (usually a few thousand dollars), they’ll research a product for you, contract suppliers, handle shipping, manage your product listing, and handle marketing. And ultimately—share the profit with you. If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Are these businesses a scam? Most of the time. We’re not saying that there are legit businesses out there that do this, but the term was beaten to death by internet gurus ready to “transform your life”.
• Amazon’s FBA program, or fulfillment by Amazon. Automation isn’t an official term for FBA. It’s important to not get these two mixed up. FBA is a program in which you send inventory to Amazon and they handle shipping, handling, customer support, and more. They do it all for you which is why people say it’s “automated”, even though you have to handle a ton of other things yourself.
• Automating Amazon tasks such as inventory management, number crunching, bookkeeping, tracking, and more. It’s outsourcing your Amazon work to free up time for yourself. This is the most popular usage of the term and the one that really makes the most sense. That’s why we’re going to be talking about this definition of the term as it’s the most useful for Amazon sellers to understand.

Let’s dive further into what Amazon automation is and how it could help you as a seller on the platform!

Amazon automation can be achieved in different ways, and they can all be extremely helpful to your Amazon business. The purpose of automating tasks is to save time and resources. This time can be used to grow your business in more meaningful ways. 

Effective automation will help you:

• Save time
• Cut labor costs
• Improve efficiency
• Scale your business
• Reduce errors
• Manage inventory
• Get an edge over competitors

Now that you know what Amazon automation is and how it could help you, let’s go over 6 different ways you can incorporate it into your own business.

1. Automate the Fulfillment Process with FBA

We mentioned the Fulfillment by Amazon program earlier. We don’t think that FBA should be referred to as “Amazon automation” on its own, but it definitely plays a part in automating your Amazon tasks.

The program allows you to send inventory in and have Amazon handle shipping, handling, customer support, and more. It automates those certain processes for you. While you still have to handle things like marketing, product listing, inventory management, and more, it’s still a huge help.

However, keep in mind that the FBA program isn’t free. You have to pay a hefty amount of fees. Is it cheaper than just running distribution yourself? That’s up to you to decide. But FBA is a reliable, efficient way to automate fulfillment.

Click here to see how FBA compares against FBM or dropshipping.

2. Hire a Virtual Assistant or Freelancer

Hiring a virtual assistant to handle outreach, communications, and other simple tasks might be a good idea. Virtual assistants can provide great support. 

If you’re looking to handle something that needs a specific skill set, consider hiring a freelancer online. Freelancers online can do marketing, copywriting, photography, PPC management, graphic design, and so much more.

Hiring someone to do work is an investment. However, you can use that newfound time to work on something else or simply have more time to yourself.

3. Use Email Marketing Software

Send out emails to potential customers with email marketing software. On average, email marketing has the highest ROI out of all the marketing strategies. For every dollar, you can expect to see a $44 return.

Automatic email marketing software could customize messaging to individual customers and send out emails.

4. Use a Repricer Tool

Pricing on Amazon is essential to success. Finding a reputable repricing tool could be game-changing for your products.

These tools typically track the sales of other products and report back to you with what consumers are most likely to spend in your product niche. This allows you to effectively and competitively price your products.

Some of these tools even change the price for you, free of human input. This is an effective way to automate your pricing strategy.

5. Contract an Agency

Amazon agencies could be effective at helping you make more money. They take a lot of the load off your shoulders.

However, you must be careful with these agencies. Some of them might try to take too much control from you or impose fishy requirements.

If something’s too good to be true, it probably is.

If you’re an experienced seller, then you should have an easier time spotting scams. Scam agencies target new sellers who don’t have any experience.

6. Use ShipmentBot

ShipmentBot is an innovative software that uses AI technology to automate repetitive and complicated Amazon tasks. 

The software can manage your inventory, print labels, forecast inventory, and handle shipments—all while connecting to your vendor account!

If you’re ready to take your Amazon business to the next level with AI technology, then check out ShipmentBot.

Final Thoughts

Running an Amazon business is a beast of a feat. But with the ability to automate tasks and delegate work, it’ll be smooth sailing.

Click here to learn more about ShipmentBot and how it can change the way you run your business!