Considerations For Selling Parts on Amazon

Dealerships are wise to consider selling auto parts on Amazon. Online sales of U.S. auto parts are growing at around 14% annually and Amazon’s growth rate is nearly double that. But without the right knowledge and setup for dealerships specifically, success and profitability on Amazon can be very difficult to achieve. Whether you’re a new seller on Amazon or have an established store, this article contains fundamental information to help you sell genuine OEM parts successfully.

First there are some challenges that need to be considered:

Keep on-hand inventory in sync with your Amazon store.
Amazon values fast delivery times to shoppers. That means, accuracy with your on-hand inventory is very important. If the inventory you show on your Amazon store is out of sync and inaccurate, you risk selling something you don’t have. Or missing out on the sale on something you do have. Manual inventory synchronization is difficult, error prone, and not scalable. Automated inventory sync is essential.

Accurately list your items, matching to what Amazon recognizes, and avoiding bad product pages that others have created.
This is a big topic – we could write an entire page on it. But suffice to say, there’s a decent amount of low quality and inaccurate product pages on Amazon that you’ll want to filter out and avoid listing on.

Maintain the right prices for your items.
It’s not easy to maintain pricing on a large number of items so that you to sell competitively and profitably and consider the commission that Amazon will receive. Generally, you will be selling around wholesale price.

Shipping cost.
Many of the weights and dimensions on product pages are inaccurate, so you’ll want to beware of that. But it’s advantageous to factor in free shipping anyway. The trick is, how do you execute intelligent shipping strategies that facilitate sales but cover your costs?

Shipping speed.
Meet the required day timeframe for shipped and delivered.

Win Amazon’s Buy Box.
On Amazon, multiple sellers can list on a single product page and the Ready to Buy Box, or Buy Box, is the most prominent location on the page where Amazon features a seller. Buy Box is overwhelmingly and effortlessly what shoppers select to add items to their carts. High sales are possible with higher percent of time displayed in the Buy Box But first you must become Buy Box eligible as a seller, then meet performance-based requirements to earn placement.

These are just the basics. There are many other important concepts and practices to understand such as returns, fees, accounting, FBA (Fulfillment By Amazon), Seller Fulfilled Prime, Amazon Sponsored Products, and more.

Consider a third party provider.

There are third party companies that will assist you setting up the entire process, two of them are Altos Digital and Revolution Parts. 

This article was reprinted in part by information from Altos Digital.