Welcome to my personal Amazon FBA tool box
You will find all the courses I bought, groups I joined and tools I use on a daily basis for my international Amazon business. If you’re a reader of my blog you already know that I am using affiliate links for some products mentioned in this blog. However, I can honestly vouch for every single tool on this page, because I have personally purchased and used all of them.
:: COURSES ::
The Selling Family
Jessica Larrew inspired me to start with Amazon FBA when she got interviewed by Pat Flynn in 2014. Back then she quickly grew her business to over 300k in sales and brought on her husband full time to help. Today they are selling 7 figures and offer several coaching courses. I picked up several of her more specialized in-depth ebooks.
See all her courses & ebooks »
Fast Turn Coaching
Duane Malek’s coaching group was what I needed to get to the next level in my FBA business. I consider him a mentor and a friend. Unfortunately, he decided to stop coaching and focus entirely on selling and of course family. Thanks to Duane and his group I was able to build valuable relationships and also friendships with other sellers. I can only encourage everybody to find a group like that, too. It’ll bring your business to the next level and beyond.
International Coaching
Barrington McIntosh has one of the best success stories I’ve heard. He lives on an island and sells products all over the world online. With his coaching I got set up on Amazon.co.uk including VAT registration in less than 6 weeks. I now sell in 6 countries including my home land – Germany!!! He also offers the course “Get on AZ” especially for people outside the U.S.
:: SOFTWARE & PLUGINS ::
Jungle Scout
When you’re doing a lot of research for profitable products on Amazon you’re grateful for every click you save to get to the information you need. Jungle Scout pulls data like ranks, who’s the seller in the buy box, estimated sales, etc. at a click of a button. I use it all the time, because speeds up my buying decision tremendously.
Learn more about Jungle Scout »
Price Checker 2
One of the tools that I use on a regular basis for analysing wholesale lists on both Amazon.com as well as UK, Germany, France, Spain and Italy. Also works great for finding Amazon to Amazon flips between both continents. The creator James Rugg (an Australian guy) is very responsive to questions and keeps making PC2 better.
Review coming soon…
Tactical Arbitrage
After hearing lots of great reviews about TA, I just had to see it for myself. And I love it, because it helps me to quickly search over 400 websites for profitable products, both on .com and in Europe.
Review coming soon…
RevSeller – Chrome Extension
I’m selling a lot of shoes and clothing and there are usually a ton of different sizes and colors to choose from. Amazon’s sales rank can be misleading in this category, because all variations share a sales rank. RevSeller helps me to quickly identify the best selling size/color combination to make sure my inventory moves fast. 30-day free trial period!
How Many? – Chrome Extension
This inconspicuous but very powerful Chrome Extension gives you insight into your competition’s inventory levels with just one click. I use it every day to make smarter decisions and to differentiate the big from the small fish.
Review coming soon…
Keepa
I have the Keepa extension installed in Chrome. It shows me how the price and rank developed in the last few months. Keepa also has a page with the biggest daily price drops for deal hunters. Check out Keepa »
FBA Tool KitTooltip Text
:: BOOKS ::
Silent Sales Machine
The bestselling book Silent Sales Machine by Jim Cockrum is probably THE book that inspired many future online sellers to start this business. Many sellers I’ve talked to mentioned Jim’s book as the reason why they started selling online. It’s a great book for starters to put you in the right mindset and to find out if this business is for you.
Read the first chapter for FREE on Amazon »
Arbitrage
My first eBook that I bought about selling on Amazon was Arbitrage by Chris Green – often referred to as the “Godfather”. Chris was amongst the first FBA sellers when Amazon launched this service. He is also the founder of Scanpower. His book Arbitrage will give you insight in how selling on Amazon works, why it works and how it can work for you.
Read the first 6 pages for FREE on Amazon »
Wholesale Sourcing
The authors Charlene Anderson and Darla Flack, both with many years of wholesale experience, teamed up for this book all about Wholesale Sourcing. It comes at a higher price point for a good reason, because it’s a complete course packed in a book with lots of valuable information about the ins and outs of buying profitable inventory wholesale.
Lessons Learned…
From A Corporate Guy Who Left His Job To Sell On Amazon Full Time
Find out why Robert Bagley decided to sell on Amazon instead of keeping his $200,000+ corporate job. He shares a lot of personal details about his early career, his thought process, the online selling lessons he learned during the transition and also…. why he decided to go back to the corporate world at last.
Learn more about Robert’s book »
:: FACEBOOK GROUPS ::
There are so many great Facebook groups about selling on Amazon today, that it’s tough to name the very best ones. Some of them you can only get into, when you bought a certain course. But there are also lots of free groups. Before I name 20 groups I’ll give you the name of the two groups that I started out with in my first year:
Thrifting for Profit
Debra Conrad is known for her bundling strategies and finding treasures in thrift stores. She runs a weekly podcast called The Streamer Show (formerly the Thrifting for Profit podcast) and hosts the popular Facebook group Thrifting for Profit with currently over 17,000 members. I had the pleasure to listen to one of her bundling webinars, which gave me a lot of great ideas for new product listings.
Fast Turn Radio
Duane Malek runs this free to the public Facebook group all about finding off-the-shelf products that move… well, FAST – with steady profits. Duane is very humble and down-to-earth and shares a ton of knowledge for Retail & Online Arbitrage as well as buying wholesale.
:: SERVICES ::
Tax Jar
Selling online is a lot of fun. Dealing with taxes not so much. Gathering all the sales tax you collected and matching them up to the individual county taxes is real challenge. Tax Jar makes this time consuming process a lot faster. It automatically pulls all your sales data from your Amazon store, summarizes it by state and county and submits your sales tax return for you.
Simply VAT
If you’re selling in the United Kingdom this is for you. Claire Taylor started this service for business making sales in the UK. She and her team will make sure you pay the right amount of VAT (value added tax) on time to keep the UK government happy. I just completed my first VAT return with Claire and she made it very easy for me.
Inventory Lab
When you grow your inventory it becomes really challenging and time consuming to keep up with your numbers in a simple Excel spreadsheet. This is where Inventory Lab comes into play. I can finally analyze my inventory and review performance of individual products, overall profit and much more with a click of a button. I know exactly how much my business makes every day.
Learn more about Inventory Lab »
World First
If you’re selling on Amazon.co.uk or any countries in the Euro zone, you will be paid in British pounds and Euros. Amazon will transfer that money right to your U.S. bank account, however they charge a fee for that. World First charges a lot less and you get both a British Pounds and Euro bank account on top of that.
Learn more about World First »
Last Pass
Being signed up to multiple online stores, services to run my Amazon business as well as personal stuff, it’s difficult to have good passwords for all of them, let alone remembering them all. Instead of keeping a list of passwords I signed up for Last Pass. It remembers all my passwords on all my devices and I just have to remember one single password. Huge time saver!
Evernote
You probably already use Evernote. Besides personal notes, it helps my Amazon business to keep track of buying opportunities, and most of all, receipts. I snap a picture of them and send it right to a specific Evernote folder. The beauty is that Evernote does text recognition, so all my receipts become searchable.
Dropbox
To keep a backup of all my business files, I created a folder that syncs with my Dropbox. It’s free and as soon as I change any of my files, Dropbox has a backup copy that I can access from anywhere.
MileIQ
Mileage is tax deductible and worth tracking. Unfortunately I usually forget to do it. This app for your phone always tracks your trips in the background without having to turn it on or off. It records every trip, splits it up into segments and gives you the exact mileage, cost and even a map with your trip. A huge time saver and well worth the subscription fee.
:: ONLINE SELLING ESSENTIALS ::
Goo Gone
Some price labels just won’t come off easy and often times they leave a sticky residue on the product. That doesn’t look good and especially not NEW and professional. Goo Gone works miracles with any type of residue. Just sprinkle a little bit on a piece of cloth and it comes off instantly. Careful with uncoated paper packaging, because Goo Gone might leave stains on it.
Scotty Peeler Label Remover
I can’t believe it took me 3 months to finally invest in a Scotty Peeler. It is so much easier than fumbling to get the price labels off with your fingernails. And so much faster! Do yourself a favor and buy this right from the start. But stay away from the metal version. It’s too sharp and you will cut yourself bleeding all over your inventory.
Self-Seal Polybags with Suffocation Warning
I never go back to open polybags that I have to tape closed. Too annoying and time consuming! Self-Seal polybags cost a little more but are so much faster to use and it comes with a professional look. The suffocation warning is required from Amazon for openings of more than 5 inches.
Here’s a great Starter Combo in 4 often needed sizes »
Cheaper Alternative:
Open Polybags with clear Tape
You’ll save a few dollars compared to the self-seal polybags, but you’ll need a lot more time to close the bag with regular tape. I only use open polybags if I ran out of self-seal bags.
Here’s a great Starter Combo in 4 often needed sizes »
Shipping Tape
I’ve tried many different types of shipping tape. Some are louder, other quieter. It depends on where and when you are packing your boxes and on your budget.
Here’s one that I used before »
Tape Gun
Speeds up the packing process tremendously. No more fumbling with tape.
THIS IS A SET DO NOT SEPARATE labels
These labels are very important whenever you’re creating a bundle or multi-pack. They have to be on the polybag, so that the Amazon warehouse staff knows that this is considered one product.
Dymo LabelWriter 450 Turbo
I started out just using 30-up labels on my inkjet printer to put on my products. After winning this Dymo at a contest I was able to cut down on the time spent on the packing & shipping process. The Dymo is fast and the labels come off easily. It’s a must have if you want to get more efficient.
Dymo Labels
I never buy the original Dymo labels. These here are fairly inexpensive and work great with my Dymo.
