If you’ve just come across Amazon FBA and discovered how much it can increase your earnings by, you’re probably desperate to start selling on Amazon as quickly as possible. But when might that actually be I hear you ask? Well, there isn’t really a simple answer as it does vary massively from person to person, so in this article, let’s discuss the factors at play and when it’s likely that you can expect to start selling with Amazon FBA (and make a profit!)
Your Chosen Amazon FBA Selling Strategy
One of the biggest things that’s going to impact how quickly you can start making some wonga, is your chosen amazon selling strategy – arbitrage, wholesale, or private labelling, each of which comes with their own pros and cons that I’ve run through in a previous post.
Arbitrage (2-3 weeks)
If you’re starting with a smaller budget of under £1,000 and you’re happy to do a bit more leg work hunting around for products to sell, then the online arbitrage selling strategy is likely to be the most suitable for you, which has the benefit that you can start selling as soon as you’ve got your Amazon & business bank accounts set up, and you’ve found some deals that you can flip for a profit.
Deals can be found online within a matter of hours, so if you really get your skates on, you could be selling and making a profit within 2-3 weeks.
It’s important to note though that whilst you can get selling quickly with online arbitrage, you’ll only be selling for as long as the deal that you’ve found lasts. If you run out of inventory and can’t order more because the deal has ended, then you’ll have to search for another product to sell, which can often take a bit of time to find and results in in you going through blank periods where you’re not making any money at all.
Wholesale (~ 8 weeks)
If you’ve got a budget of up to £1,500 to spend and you’re not interested in building your own brand and business, then you might choose the wholesale selling strategy, which revolves around you purchasing large quantities of units from a wholesaler and then selling on Amazon for a profit.
Building relationships with wholesalers that have good products to sell takes time & effort, and because of that, on average it takes at least 8 weeks for people to start making money from wholesale products that they sell, so a bit longer than the arbitrage method, but at least once you find a decent supplier, you shouldn’t experience long periods where you’re not selling at all.
Private Label (10-12 weeks)
For those of you with decent sized budgets of more than £1,500 and an interest in building your own brand and a business that you can one day sell for millions, you’ll want to give the private label selling strategy a lot of consideration.
This method requires the most time & effort up front, but once it’s up and running, you’ll find that you’re able to generate profits every single day of the year without exerting too much brain power.
As there’s quite a lot of steps to follow with building a private label business, just learning exactly what there is to do and how to do it via a course such as the Smashers Academy can take up to 2 weeks. Following that, you’ll then start searching for a product to sell, sourcing suppliers and then putting your branded offer into production. From my experience in mentoring thousands of students over the years, the time it takes to complete this part of the process varies massively, with some people finding and ordering a product to sell in as little as 4 weeks, and others taking a bit longer.
Depending on the complexity of the product that you’ve ordered, the manufacturing process could be a week, or it could be a month, and depending on its size, you may decide to ship by air or go for the cheaper option of sea, which take 2 weeks and 5 weeks respectively. So by the time that you’ve followed all of those steps, on average you are looking at 10-12 weeks before you’ll be ready to start selling.
Although that might sound like a lengthier amount of time versus the other 2 options, the benefit of private label is that the majority of the work comes up front – as soon as you’ve found a product that sells, every time you come close to running out of stock, you’d just need to re-order with your supplier, rather than having to go through the process of finding new deals or wholesalers like you would do with the other two options.
Other Factors At Play
It’s important to note that the 3 timescales for each selling strategy that I’ve just run through are not set in stone, and of course there are many other factors that will impact how quickly you can start selling and making some money.
Your overall confidence, previous experience, attitude to risk and the amount of time that you put into the business each day are all going to play into the equation, which could result in you selling slightly quicker or a fair bit slower than the times that I’ve just run through.
Regardless of how confident you feel and which selling strategy you decide to go with, remember that what you’re building here is a real business, NOT a get rich quick scheme. Don’t rush the process just so you can get to the point of making sales as quickly as possible, because in all likelihood you’ll make mistakes and end up selling products that just don’t make a profit.
Amazon isn’t going anywhere, and as someone that’s been selling on the platform for 4 years now, I can tell you that there is always going to be an opportunity to make money if you do things correctly.
Use the timelines in this post to guide you on when you can start expecting to make money, but don’t get downbeat if you find that you’re taking longer than you’d like – selling on amazon is a marathon, not a race, everybody’s different, and your main focus should be reaching the point of selling all together, rather than doing it in the quickest time possible.
Conclusion
If you want to do private labelling, which is the most scalable Amazon strategy, but you also want to start selling as quickly as possible, then you can also consider doing online arbitrage at the same time, which is a good way to start building funds and gaining experience as you learn how to create and then sell your own private label products at the same time.
By the way – If you want to learn more about how you can do the same with your own Amazon FBA business, then check out my free training where I run through my exact 5 step strategy that I’ve repeatedly followed to continue launching successful products.
Or, if you’re ready to begin your journey and want to start with the best chances of success, check out the Smashers Academy.
P.s. if you want to learn more about my journey (highs and lows), check out my Amazon FBA review here.
