Etopia

In-house or agency:

How to manage Amazon

It’s fair to say that Amazon is widely regarded as Marmite – a marketplace vendors and sellers either love or hate. However, when you have an Amazon Mindset, you’ll learn to love this e-Commerce beast!

Etopia’s Managing Director, Asha Bhalsod

The heart of e-Commerce stems from Amazon and therefore taking an Amazon-first approach when creating an e-Commerce strategy will result in saving time, and money, leading to increased sales. With complex skills required to manage e-Commerce, as a strategy consultant and having worked with Amazon for over 10+ years, I often get asked what the correct model is – create your own in-house team or outsource to an agency.

When it comes to recruiting with Amazon in mind, you’ll need unique hiring strategies. Target the best talent, by aligning candidate traits to the job role. You simply can’t hire a National Account Manager to perform specialist Amazon tasks. Skills required to manage bricks and mortar customers are not nearly as transferable as we are led to believe.

Managing Amazon successfully requires individuals with cross-functional skill levels, and I believe the idea of a single individual properly skilled at handling everything related to Amazon end-to-end, is a fantasy. They’ll always need support on some Amazon discipline relating Analytics, Marketing, Content Creation, Sales, and Operations/Logistics, which they may not be well-versed in.

I’m sceptical that a single individual can be equally skilled at running highly efficient PPC campaigns, writing Amazon-optimised copy for product listings, staying on top of programme-and-policy developments, and overseeing inventory forecasts. And the expectation is that the same person should be highly skilled in strategic growthfocused areas, manage customer service, resolve cases, respond to product reviews, and scan products for unauthorised sellers and counterfeiters.

If budget allows and you have the capacity to create your dream team, go on a recruitment drive to hire an internal team. They will garner a wealth of specialist knowledge that can be applied to the day-to-day running of your Amazon business.

The common belief amongst brands is that agency costs are higher than hiring a dedicated person to manage Amazon. When you consider time saving and scaled efficiency, it exponentially outweighs perceived costs.

Internal team turnover

With a smaller internal team of Amazon experts, companies have significant “key person risk”. If that person provides 4 weeks’ notice, the company will struggle to keep momentum on Amazon while they backfill the position.

In today’s post-Covid climate, Amazon skills are in high demand as the market is under-skilled, and salaries have increased rapidly. From pre-Covid to today, Amazon salaries have increased an incredible 30%-50%. And when a company has their sights on a candidate, they have to move swiftly with the offer as counteroffers are very common.

Real-time comparative information

Because Amazon constantly changes its policies, staying on top of newly developed programmes can be tough. Different marketplaces follow different policies and your internal team needs to stay abreast of any changes on a global basis.

An internal Amazon team may have to spend time figuring out what the correct tactic is for the business where an agency, with multiple clients, is in a position to share the knowledge of quick wins. My team shares new discoveries on an ongoing basis.

Hiring an agency

It saves time! The in-house hiring process can take anywhere between 3-6 months, plus extra time for training and upskilling new team members, while an Amazon agency is fully trained and set up to start on your account straight away. We have clients coming to us with Amazon problems which

has been persisting for months, unresolved. As we are a team of experts that are troubleshooting daily, we are able to resolve these issues almost instantly.

Internal promotions, position changes, and new hires can all create turmoil in your Amazon world. When collaborating with an agency, you have the benefit of consistency and stability. The right agency will provide training for any new hires so that your Amazon strategy continues to deliver according to plan.

Improving efficiency

Since your in-house team only works on either Seller or Vendor account, their knowledge will be limited. Dealing with a plethora of clients helps an agency experience all aspects of selling on Amazon. It’s rare for an agency to encounter a problem they’ve never seen before! The cross-pollinated experience of working with various clients gives them the ability to tackle anything.

Agencies adapt to changes quickly and a good team should be able to forecast Amazon’s next move and prepare your Amazon store appropriately. With their cross-category experiences, they’ll know ahead of time how to best plan for your business. They will also have tried-andtested new programmes on previous clients to share with you.

An agency can help upskill your existing in-house team to understand best practices and dissect the correct strategy for growth with senior members of a business. Sometimes senior members of businesses don’t fully grasp the day-to-day challenges of running an Amazon business. A fresh pair of external eyes can supply valuable advice that may be easier to digest than getting the same information from internal resources.

What is the correct model for your business?

It’s not always a question of either-or. An Amazon agency shouldn’t be used to replace your existing e-Commerce team. The real question should be around how an agency can complement and support your team with specific Amazon marketplace knowledge and expertise. In my experience, the best, most profitable agency-client relationships are when clients see an Amazon agency as an extension of their in-house team, working in parallel to achieve their goals.

The most successful brands are the ones that have an Amazon Mindset and want to own their Amazon strategy. An expert agency can either upskill teams or outsource support to businesses to save time, money and ramp up those allimportant sales!

To learn more about Amazon, please feel free to reach out to me! asha@etopiaconsultancy.com