Learn 4 successful tips to help land your first Amazon wholesale contract! Find products to grow your Amazon business connecting with wholesale manufacturers!
After setting up your Amazon FBA business and seller account, the next obstacle is identifying wholesale manufacturers and contacting different suppliers to build your catalog and stockpile.
This may seem like a daunting task, but it is simple if you know the procedures. Something to note before you read these tips, be ready and be okay with hearing the word “no.” This is nothing against you or your business, but you have to realize that some manufacturers are extremely picky. The best way to prepare is to learn to accept rejection and stay motivated to contact more suppliers despite rejection.
If you’re trying to find ways to increase your hit rates, you’re at the right place! These 4 successful tips will help you get more acceptances from wholesale manufacturers and make sure that you land those accounts! Let’s get started!
How to Contact Wholesale Suppliers
The first tip is to contact wholesale suppliers. You might be wondering, where do I even find wholesale manufacturers to contact? If you’re not sure where to start, the first thing you can do is determine where and how you want to get your products. Some sellers stick strictly with American or domestic suppliers while others don’t mind working with international suppliers such as Asia or Europe. Depending on your preferences, you can use various online resources and websites. Some sellers who use international suppliers can find products on websites like Alibaba, Wish, or even eBay. If you want a general list of suppliers, a common site used to find suppliers is WorldWide Brands, which has an online database of suppliers.
The biggest risk of randomly contacting suppliers is that you can’t guarantee any success with these products. If you want to reduce this risk, we recommend using tailored Amazon FBA tools. Sellgo offers a couple of these tools to identify manufacturers such as the Profit Finder. Using the Profit Finder shows the top-performing products and the exact manufacturers who make the products. Simply take their names and in a quick Google Search, you’ll find the contact information to get into contact with these manufacturers. The Profit Finder also provides sales estimations and profit margins to ensure that the products and manufacturers you pick will lead to profits! Then comes the next step, making the first point of contact!
Be an Amazon Professional Seller
Before you send that first email, there’s a couple of notes to take into consideration. Like we mentioned previously, suppliers can be very picky. Before sending an email or making a phone call, always convey levels of professionalism. If someone asks you, are you a professional seller? ALWAYS SAY YES! If you ever apply for a job, you always want to show that you are competent and can handle the responsibilities. Suppliers are not going to trust unprofessional, inexperienced, or unproven sellers. From a business standpoint, it makes sense. Would you ever trust a new and unproven seller with your inventory? Unproven sellers are risks suppliers do not like to take!
Before you send that email, ask yourself, do I sound like a professional Amazon seller? If the answer is no, then you need to take the time to build your professional brand and business profile. Build that trust and experience so that your resume speaks for itself! This can also be done by building your brand and Amazon business like simply making a business email, creating a website, applying for a business entity structure such as an LLC or C-Corp, or applying for a business bank account.
If you need more help building your professional portfolio, you can read this article, “3 Steps Before You Can Start Selling Amazon Wholesale” for tips!
Determine Your Unique Value Proposition
The next step to take into consideration before you make the first point of contact is to determine and convey your unique value proposition. Simply put,
What benefits and advantages do you provide to the manufacturer?
If you become one of their select sellers, how will you help the supplier?
You want to show them that you can provide a symbiotic relationship where the seller will get access to the supplies and the suppliers will get a mutual benefit. Everyone usually says the same thing, promising a “good sales record” and “return on investment” if the wholesalers can supply the product. While this may work sometimes, there is no added value that puts you over another seller.
So the real question is, how do I determine my unique value proposition? The best way to determine this is by simply asking yourself, what makes me different from other sellers? You may have a unique history selling a certain product or category of products, you may have some previous relationships with suppliers or customers. These are the key points that may make you different. Our tips are different, break the mold, and change the game.
If you can build your professional brand and develop a clear unique value proposition, your hit rates will reflect this growth and suppliers will line up for you to sell their products!
Request a Probation Period
Once you make that first touchpoint with potential suppliers, it’s a waiting game. In the end, they can either yes or no.
If they agree to become your wholesale supplier, then you can start looking through their product catalog and choose which products you’d like to sell.
If no, then don’t be discouraged! Rejection is never a final ruling. When facing rejection, you have two options on how to move forward.
If you aren’t a perfect match with a supplier, then it may be best to move on and contact other suppliers that are more compatible with your business.
If your bid is rejected and you still want to stick with this specific supplier, you can try to salvage the relationship. Sometimes a wholesaler will be hesitant to give you an account contract if you seem inexperienced or unproven. One way to solve this issue is by requesting a probation period. The probation period is usually set between 30 days to 90 days. Within this period, the supplier will provide a small, limited amount of products. Think of this as a trial run. They’re going to test your bandwidth and check if you have the drive to meet their quotas. If you can prove your skills and sell their product, they may offer you a wholesale account as a reward for proving yourself.
Nonetheless, remember that each of these steps will be vital for you to build strong relationships with these brands. As you become a better seller, you’ll see that manufacturers value that experience. Next, you want to make sure to maintain these relationships.
Prioritize Transparent Communication
Landing wholesale accounts are great but are only half the battle. Don’t forget that there is a whole other battle that revolves around maintaining strong, consistent relationships.
Relationships are always a two-way street. To sustain positive and symbiotic relationships, there is a level of mutual respect that both parties have to agree to. Remember, sellers can’t operate without wholesale suppliers and vice versa. We always want to encourage sellers to maintain clarity and transparency with their suppliers. Holding information (unless it’s private/confidential) can often lead to miscommunication or misinformation that can potentially turn any healthy relationship extremely sour. Some manufacturers refuse to supply Amazon sellers, regardless of their history, and may revoke contracts if they don’t like the seller or their business. This is just one example of how the lack of communication can negatively impact your Amazon FBA business.
Our tips to maintain healthy relationships follow the three C’s of communication: clearly, concisely, and consistently. By following these guidelines, it’ll not only build trust but may lead to additional benefits or opportunities you might not even know or about.
Step Up Your Wholesale Game with Exclusive Products
Now, this last tip is very dependent on the previous three and the level of execution of each step. If you can build strong relationships with suppliers and increase the level of trust, you may hit the goldmine of products: Amazon Exclusive products.
While this may not seem like a big deal, let me clarify why you should always look towards exclusive products; Exclusive products are only given to the top sellers or sellers that have built those strong relationships with manufacturers. They don’t just give these privileges to just anyone, so reaching this point is its accomplishment for top Amazon sellers. Simply put, exclusive products are limited in competition and may have high earning potential.
Because these products are only given to a limited number of sellers, the competition to sell this product is much lower than the rest of the manufacturer’s catalog. As a result, the likelihood of making more sales and market share significantly increases with exclusive items. In addition to market share, many exclusive products have higher earning potentials because they can be provided at a low wholesale price from the suppliers and sold for high-profit margins on Amazon.
Imagine it like a pie, where every seller selling a certain product gets a slice. This is how it is when selling any product from a wholesale catalog. With exclusive products, that slice gets a whole lot bigger! In rare cases, if suppliers like you enough, you may even become the sole seller for that exclusive product. Instead of taking a slice of the pie, you take the whole thing! This is the ultimate goal when creating relationships with wholesalers. If you put in the work to build relationships and establish a high level of trust, you can reach the pinnacle of Amazon wholesale with exclusive products.
Land Your First Wholesale Account
By following these simple steps, you can expect to see a much higher success rate landing these important wholesale contracts. Always remember that landing the accounts is only half the battle. Maintaining and sustaining these accounts will be the true key to growing your Amazon business.
Soon, you’ll start seeing manufacturers lining up to get you to become one of their sellers or better yet, the sole seller for an exclusive product. This can’t happen unless you know the procedures and get to work. The first step is always the hardest, but we can help you get there. For more advice on jumpstarting your Amazon wholesale business, visit us at sellgo.com and start finding suppliers now!
