A competitor of my company (who ripped off our product) is using QR codes to solicit customer info and manipulate their listing ranking. I tried reporting it, but Amazon took them down for a week, and then they were up again QR code still in place. Now I am wondering if they just don’t care? Does anyone have any experience in this area?

A competitor of my company (who ripped off our product) is using QR codes to solicit customer info and manipulate their listing ranking. I tried reporting it, but Amazon took them down for a week, and then they were up again QR code still in place. Now I am wondering if they just don’t care? Does anyone have any experience in this area?

Hey everyone,

I’ve spent 10+ years in China supply chain — ran my own trading business exporting to China, then worked at Maersk coordinating LCL imports from China into Europe. I also sourced products directly in China, visited factories and negotiated in Mandarin.

I’m not here to sell anything. I’m genuinely trying to understand what problems importers and FBA sellers are dealing with right now — because I’m thinking about where I can actually add value.

So tell me: what’s your biggest China sourcing headache?

Bad suppliers? Quality issues after payment? Contracts that don’t hold up? Freight costs that don’t make sense?

I’ll answer every comment as best I can.

No pitch, just honest answers from someone who has been on the ground in China.

Hey everyone,

I’ve spent 10+ years in China supply chain — ran my own trading business exporting to China, then worked at Maersk coordinating LCL imports from China into Europe. I also sourced products directly in China, visited factories and negotiated in Mandarin.

I’m not here to sell anything. I’m genuinely trying to understand what problems importers and FBA sellers are dealing with right now — because I’m thinking about where I can actually add value.

So tell me: what’s your biggest China sourcing headache?

Bad suppliers? Quality issues after payment? Contracts that don’t hold up? Freight costs that don’t make sense?

I’ll answer every comment as best I can.

No pitch, just honest answers from someone who has been on the ground in China.

Decided to actually document every fulfillment mistake over the past two months instead of just dealing with them individually as they come up. Out of roughly 1000 orders: 31 errors. Wrong color, wrong size, wrong quantity, and one time I shipped someone’s order to a completely different address which was a fun conversation to have.

The thing is most of these happen because I’m doing this after my day job when I’m tired, the spare room is cluttered, I’m rushing to get everything out before midnight. Of course the error rate reflects that environment. But I also thought I was doing a reasonably good job until I looked at actual numbers and realized 3% means every month I’m generating dozens of disappointed customers, some of whom I never even hear from because they just leave quietly and buy from someone else next time.

Each error costs me roughly $15 to $20 between return shipping, replacement product, and the time to resolve it. Over a month that’s $500+ in avoidable costs on a side business where every dollar matters.

For people who went from doing their own pick and pack to outsourcing it, did accuracy actually improve or did you just trade your own tired midnight mistakes for someone else’s mistakes? And what’s considered a normal error rate in this space?

Decided to actually document every fulfillment mistake over the past two months instead of just dealing with them individually as they come up. Out of roughly 1000 orders: 31 errors. Wrong color, wrong size, wrong quantity, and one time I shipped someone’s order to a completely different address which was a fun conversation to have.

The thing is most of these happen because I’m doing this after my day job when I’m tired, the spare room is cluttered, I’m rushing to get everything out before midnight. Of course the error rate reflects that environment. But I also thought I was doing a reasonably good job until I looked at actual numbers and realized 3% means every month I’m generating dozens of disappointed customers, some of whom I never even hear from because they just leave quietly and buy from someone else next time.

Each error costs me roughly $15 to $20 between return shipping, replacement product, and the time to resolve it. Over a month that’s $500+ in avoidable costs on a side business where every dollar matters.

For people who went from doing their own pick and pack to outsourcing it, did accuracy actually improve or did you just trade your own tired midnight mistakes for someone else’s mistakes? And what’s considered a normal error rate in this space?

Decided to actually document every fulfillment mistake over the past two months instead of just dealing with them individually as they come up. Out of roughly 1000 orders: 31 errors. Wrong color, wrong size, wrong quantity, and one time I shipped someone’s order to a completely different address which was a fun conversation to have.

The thing is most of these happen because I’m doing this after my day job when I’m tired, the spare room is cluttered, I’m rushing to get everything out before midnight. Of course the error rate reflects that environment. But I also thought I was doing a reasonably good job until I looked at actual numbers and realized 3% means every month I’m generating dozens of disappointed customers, some of whom I never even hear from because they just leave quietly and buy from someone else next time.

Each error costs me roughly $15 to $20 between return shipping, replacement product, and the time to resolve it. Over a month that’s $500+ in avoidable costs on a side business where every dollar matters.

For people who went from doing their own pick and pack to outsourcing it, did accuracy actually improve or did you just trade your own tired midnight mistakes for someone else’s mistakes? And what’s considered a normal error rate in this space?

Decided to actually document every fulfillment mistake over the past two months instead of just dealing with them individually as they come up. Out of roughly 1000 orders: 31 errors. Wrong color, wrong size, wrong quantity, and one time I shipped someone’s order to a completely different address which was a fun conversation to have.

The thing is most of these happen because I’m doing this after my day job when I’m tired, the spare room is cluttered, I’m rushing to get everything out before midnight. Of course the error rate reflects that environment. But I also thought I was doing a reasonably good job until I looked at actual numbers and realized 3% means every month I’m generating dozens of disappointed customers, some of whom I never even hear from because they just leave quietly and buy from someone else next time.

Each error costs me roughly $15 to $20 between return shipping, replacement product, and the time to resolve it. Over a month that’s $500+ in avoidable costs on a side business where every dollar matters.

For people who went from doing their own pick and pack to outsourcing it, did accuracy actually improve or did you just trade your own tired midnight mistakes for someone else’s mistakes? And what’s considered a normal error rate in this space?

Looking for some advice from experienced sellers.

We run a fairly large catalog in the apparel category. The ASIN count looks huge because of variations.

Over the past few years we’ve worked with 3–4 Amazon PPC agencies, and the experience has been very similar each time. It usually starts with a strategy presentation and promises of restructuring and scaling, but in practice very little actually changes.

Our goal has always been growth, and I’ve repeatedly told them I’m comfortable increasing ad spend, even if ACOS/TACOS temporarily rise while scaling. Instead it feels like campaigns get launched, spend increases briefly, and then everything gets scaled right back down.

It also often feels like after onboarding the account gets handed off to an overseas account manager juggling many accounts, and the attention just isn’t there.

I’m now considering working with a freelancer instead of an agency, but not sure where people actually find good ones, or if it is even a good idea. Agencies always felt safer from an accountability standpoint.

For those running Amazon ads:
Where did you find a reliable PPC freelancer, and what should I look for when vetting them?

Any advice would be appreciated.

Looking for some advice from experienced sellers.

We run a fairly large catalog in the apparel category. The ASIN count looks huge because of variations.

Over the past few years we’ve worked with 3–4 Amazon PPC agencies, and the experience has been very similar each time. It usually starts with a strategy presentation and promises of restructuring and scaling, but in practice very little actually changes.

Our goal has always been growth, and I’ve repeatedly told them I’m comfortable increasing ad spend, even if ACOS/TACOS temporarily rise while scaling. Instead it feels like campaigns get launched, spend increases briefly, and then everything gets scaled right back down.

It also often feels like after onboarding the account gets handed off to an overseas account manager juggling many accounts, and the attention just isn’t there.

I’m now considering working with a freelancer instead of an agency, but not sure where people actually find good ones, or if it is even a good idea. Agencies always felt safer from an accountability standpoint.

For those running Amazon ads:
Where did you find a reliable PPC freelancer, and what should I look for when vetting them?

Any advice would be appreciated.