On today’s episode we discuss product research, how to approach Amazon product research strategies, and action steps going into 2022 from Amazon FBA sellers. Sharon Even, Co-founder of Amazon Alpha Coaching is joining today’s Lunch with Norm. Sharon has Podcast experience, being the Co-host of the Sellers Sessions podcast, Sharon has a passion for helping others achieve their goals. She coaches Amazon sellers and businesses to find, source, launch, and scale Products to create a profit.
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Episode: 222
Title: Norman Farrar Introduces Sharon Even – Founder of Amazon Alpha Coaching and Amazon expert
Subtitle: “Amazon Product Research Methods For 2022”
Final Show Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTyOR2V07Yk
Back on Lunch with Norm…Co-founder of Amazon Alpha Coaching Sraron Even, joins in on today’s show to talk about product research, action steps for Amazon FBA sellers going into 2022. Sharon coaches Amazon sellers and businesses to find, source, launch, and scale Products. She is also the co-host of the Sellers Session podcast.
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Norman Farrar 0:01
Hey everyone, it’s Norman Farrar, aka the beard guy here and welcome to another lunch with Norm the Amazon FBA and Ecommerce podcast.
Norman Farrar 0:21
Okay, we had to turn on a dime today. We were supposed to be having Wilford light hard on but he couldn’t show up at the last minute. So we have one of our favorites back on. And today we’re going to be talking about Amazon podcast research methods in 2022. Our guest, if you haven’t guessed, is the founder of Amazon Alpha coaching. You may recognize her as the co-host of sellers sessions with Danny Macmillan and Macmillan and Isabella Hamilton. She also coaches Amazon sellers to help find source launch and scale their businesses. And yes, I’m talking about Sharon Even. Okay, so before we get into anything, we just have a quick word from our sponsor. Thank you, solarize for sponsoring this episode of lunch with dorm seller eyes is your comprehensive solution for your everyday business needs. Everything you need to grow and scale your Amazon business is just one click away. For more information, contact Dimon his team over at solarize.com and remember solarize is with one R. Alright. Where is the squire?
Kelsey 1:40
Oh, yeah, I love that. That’s back in the neck.
Norman Farrar 1:45
I don’t know how we got back on it. But I like that.
Kelsey 1:48
Yeah, that’s a mystery. But welcome, everyone. Happy Monday. It’s good to see Tony and Jessica Rabbit. If you’re tuning in, let us know. And say hello in the comment sections. I’m over in Toronto, let us know where you’re watching from. Jessica Rabbit, aka Rosalyn is in Chile, Charlotte. We’ve got Tony also in Toronto, a fellow Canadian. Good to see Tony and Hello, boo. believe you’re from the UK. So we got a already an international crew. That’s awesome. So smash those like buttons. Also, don’t forget to follow us on social media, we have a bunch of cool things happening on social media. We’re doing more videos, we’re going to be doing kind of like reels and tick tock kind of videos there. They’ll be coming out shortly. And then also, if you’re watching from the YouTube channel, hit that subscribe button down below that big red button and that little bell as well that gets you those notifications that we’re going live. We have this is last minute. But we do actually have an awesome price today, which I think our audience is going to love our beard nation. And we also have a contest happening in our Facebook group. So that’s over at lunch with Norm. Amazon FBA ecommerce Collective, we got a bunch of stuff going on. So just tune in, make sure you like and follow us on social media. So you get all the updates, and today’s gonna be a good, good day. We’ve got Marshall joining us as well. Hello in red from Maryland. And Amar, so good to see everyone and let us know how are you feeling about Black Friday? Are you excited? Do you think it’s going to be better the same worse? Or do you just not care at all? Let us know in the comments section. Okay,
Kelsey 3:37
and one thing we should mention too, is, uh, I don’t know how we did it. But we coaxed Kevin to come back on to do a Black Friday segment. So he’s going to be coming on on the 26th. That’s Friday. So that’ll always be good. I always love having Mr. King on. So alright, so I think that’s about it. And I’ve just realized I said so about five times in the last few minutes. But anyways, throw your comments over in the question section or your questions over in the comment section. And let’s get started. So sit back, relax, grab a cup of coffee and enjoy the show Hey, how are ya?
Sharon Even 4:20
I’m good. I will correct you. You said at the beginning that we’re doing podcast research and we’re not we’re doing
Norman Farrar 4:27
product did I say podcast research you did?
Sharon Even 4:29
You did? You said podcast research.
Norman Farrar 4:32
Oh my gosh. That’s you know what? That’s the story of my life today. Okay, you are Lifesaver thank you for coming on and really short notice really, really short notice.
Sharon Even 4:44
No problem, no problem.
Norman Farrar 4:46
So and we are going to be talking about product research and the reason why we reached out not only because we were just like had our fingers crossed that we were hoping you to come on but we we heard some really great stuff. stuff from some of our listeners about a presentation that you just did. I think it was over a global was a global sources. Yeah, it
Sharon Even 5:08
was a global sources. Yeah. So
Norman Farrar 5:10
I heard a few people say some great things. So that’s what I want to talk about. But just in case people have not heard about you and what you do, you want to just dig in a little deeper than what I’ve already talked about.
Sharon Even 5:23
Um, you did a pretty good job. My name is Sharon Evan, as everyone knows, and I sell on Amazon. So I’m a seller first. And I also am a co host on cellar sessions. Which is, like my two favorite podcast before I was a co host on seller sessions will always sell a session to them when you started doing like the lunch with Darwin, my two favorite podcasts anyway, and I also do coaching with Amazon sellers and have a YouTube channel and I don’t know I do everything somehow.
Norman Farrar 5:58
Your YouTube channels Great. Anybody who hasn’t gone over and checked out? Sharon’s YouTube channel, check it out. It’s really cool. So why don’t we just dive right into this? So we’re talking about product research? What’s the difference between what we’re doing now? And what you’re talking about?
Sharon Even 6:19
And when you you mean, what most people do now? Yeah, well, you
Norman Farrar 6:23
There’s so many, there’s so many different ways of doing product research, and, you know, good, bad or ugly. So, yeah, let’s, let’s take just what people are doing. Now, there’s a mixed match. But what are you suggesting we should do?
Sharon Even 6:41
So theSharon Even way I see it, is Amazon’s very much going towards brand building today, it’s Amazon doesn’t want to Amazon’s changed a lot in general, a lot of things have changed. Also, on the seller side, everything is different. I’m not gonna say harder or easier, just different. And I feel that Amazon’s very much going towards brand building today. And also with the way that they reward you when you are an actual brand. And you, in my opinion, you can’t just go and use random tools. In order to do that you need to really dig deep and understand who you’re selling to, and what they’re all about and what is important to them. And it’s more than just an algorithm and getting keywords right getting keywords, right is crucial. You can’t sell on Amazon without understanding keywords. But you have to you have to go beyond just using a tool as a starting point and my opinion and experience. I’m making sure to say that
Norman Farrar 7:45
oh, okay. So you’re talking about really looking at a persona, is that correct?
Sharon Even 7:53
Yes. And nor like not necessarily just a, I call it avatar, you call it persona. It’s not. There’s so many different ways for a starting point. And my opinion, a starting point for finding like, the way that I look at it, there’s two different ways of doing product research, right? There’s a creative process. And then there’s what I like to call the random process through random processes where like, you just join a whole bunch of Facebook groups, or you go after like a whole bunch of different hashtags, or you watch random things, you start to get an idea for something, you start Googling it, but you have no interest in it necessarily. And the creative route to me is you have some sort of passion interest in whatever it is that you’re looking into, or someone close to you does. So I could for example, build a brand around something that I understand as a mother for my son or for for boys or for children. Um, but starting points don’t have to be from a buyer avatar starting points could be a category and your niching down like you know, your you could start off with yoga, no could start off with let’s let’s make a dramatic, you could start off with exercise. And then you could go into neat like Nisha down to yoga, and then you could niche it down even further for kids yoga, which there’s search volume around on Amazon, right and then focus on a specific, that specific niche. Yep. So it doesn’t necessarily the starting point doesn’t have to be a buyer avatar, but I do think that you have to understand the buyer avatar today. There’s so many times I’ll speak to someone about so like who buys this product and their answers so far from the actual type of buyer that buys their their product.
Norman Farrar 9:41
It’s a guess. Yeah, yeah. So you know, there is a tool, and I don’t know if you’ve ever used it, but we use it a lot and it just cuts through a lot of the fog and it’s called spark Toro. I mentioned it on the on the podcast quite a bit, and oh my gosh, you turn it on, and there’s an eight minute training video. And you can go through and you can understand who your competitors are, who their influencers are, and breaks down the demographics. So you can see, very quickly, you know, what the and it’s funny because I had the, the owner of the app, the founder of the app, come on, his name’s Rand Fishkin. And he was talking about, you know, people taking so much time to understand their avatar. And he said, this is this will help you just cut down to the time I forget how much he said, but it literally is cut it down from hours into not minutes, but you know, 15 minutes, and you have a good idea. It’s really crazy.
Sharon Even 10:50
You know, Norm, first of all, I know that most people today, I think you’re one of them, are the type of you know, like, life has changed, the world has changed. And it’s kind of like, people try and find tools for everything today, right. And I think that tools make life a lot easier for specially for people like, you know, like you and I who are so so busy. You know, it’s it’s very helpful. The only thing about tools is that a tool will find things that I won’t find, but I will find things that a tool won’t find. And so for example, for me hanging out, let’s just say that my niche is beards, okay? Because this is lunch with Norm and you’re the guy. Okay, let’s just say that the niche is beards. And I’m a woman, obviously, that doesn’t have a beard. So the first thing I would do is, I would probably make a fake Facebook account using someone that looks like you with a beard so that I can get into a Facebook group with a whole bunch of bearded guys. And from hanging out in there and looking at what they’re talking about, and looking at what type of images they put up in the Facebook group, etc. I will learn about so many things that bearded guys have that I may have not learned from a tool like answer the public or things like that actually being in there and seeing it, and then answer asking questions, and you’ll see it in the if I do get to a little bit of the presentation, you’ll see how like I fully found a whole niche from this Facebook group that I got into. So I think that we can’t rely too much on tools. I think tools are important, because like I said, they will find things that we weren’t right, especially analytical tools. And on the other hand, we’ll find things that tools won’t find, Sir Stephen black. Yeah. I do know Stephen blank. I mean, I don’t actually know him. But I know of him.
Norman Farrar 12:49
Yes. Stephen is awesome. When it comes to drilling down, finding that niche, and then doing exactly like you said, go into the go into a Facebook group, get to understand the lingo and what they’re talking about, and then dive even deeper. So you know what you’re saying I agree. 100%. And you have to learn the lingo. That’s your sort of your next step of understanding your audience. So yeah, and by the way, if we touch on anything that you want to show in your presentation, let’s switch over you have the ability to share your screen. The only thing I’ll ask is for those of us that might be just listening on the podcast that you can describe it.
Sharon Even 13:32
Yes. Okay, let me think about where to start because I want to I want to talk about very specific stuff. I don’t think we need to go through the whole niche but I want to show you something. Um, let me just quickly find it so I am I share my screen can you share my screen Kelsey? Okay, here we go. So this is a part of my presentation from global sources for product research 2022 I will say this new feature in streaming is so cool how we’re at the bottom anyway, is Mike and I will say that the whole beginning of this presentation this is like halfway through what you’re seeing now. Um, this hold on I’m trying to get my understand my mouse Okay, where is my mouse? Is it here? Okay, I’ve got two screens. I couldn’t get it. Okay, got it. Now. I will say that the first part of this presentation was all about how everything’s changed. Okay, so the way that we source have has changed the way that we the cash flow that we need today. It’s changed you need a lot more money to sell on Amazon today. I’m about diversifying all those things which I think are crucial when it comes to product research today because I feel that when you and I started nor I don’t know when you started, I started selling on Amazon truth and 16. And when I started selling on Amazon, you didn’t have to know that much about manufacturing or supply chain, like you do today, right, you could get away with not really understanding how your product is manufactured. And really just, you know, putting that your logo on it and not knowing a lot. Because it wasn’t a big deal today, knowing the more you know about your product, the more money it’s going to save you because you’ll know how to better optimize your shipping how to change a certain material from one material to another how by, you know, going from one country to another, it’ll save on, for example, lead time or whatever it may be. So just want to say that that was the first part of this presentation, because people are going to see it halfway through know what we’re seeing on my screen. Now. These so I run a product research marathon, once every four to six weeks, with like this product research course group that I have. And what I do is I send out a questionnaire which on the screen, these are just examples of how I get them to think of starting points. So for example, I’ll ask them to list hobbies, that they I’m reading it out, because I take into consideration we’ve got people with podcast perfect. So for example, ask them to list hobbies that interests them, or that interests, their loved ones. So that could be partner, child, parents, sister, brother, whatever it may be life changing experiences. So for example, or milestones that they’ve gone through. So for example, like pregnancy, or a sickness or a birth, or you’ve had a dream job or becoming a parent or losing a loved one or business. These are examples of obviously things that I’ve gone through. And it’s interesting how when you start to make this list, it gives you starting points for niches. Right? So one of my brands is a postpartum brand, I learned about the products there. After I gave birth and had a whole bunch of issues. I learned that there’s like this whole entire niche around it, right, for example. And if you’re someone who has, for example, survived cancer, right, there are a whole bunch of people out there that are looking for gifts for people with cancer. And there’s a lot of search volume around there. Not only are you doing good, and something that you also are the buyer avatar of but also there’s there’s demand around it, and weird things that you love. So for example, I have this thing for owls, right? Like there’s an owl everywhere in my house, there is an owl right here, if you’re watching us live. The reason is because my husband says that I look like an owl. Now that I’ve said it, you will not be able to unsee it.
Sharon Even 17:45
And if you were to look on Amazon, you’d see there’s like this whole thing around our decor, right? I have this thing about like for stationery and cute stationery and just remember that because it’ll lead into the thing and that was going to be the main conversation for me soon. Adult Lego superheroes, anything that’s cute, my mum has the things for shoes, my my I have a thing for Huskies, like, start to make this list jobs you’ve gone through favorite hobbies that your loved ones go through, etc. And then you have this piece of paper with like just full of starting points, right? And then you can even start to niche it down. Right, which looks something along the lines. So this is for we’re going through the presentation. So obviously hobbies, every single hobby in this world is connected to a product. There’s no hobby that you’ll ever be able to think of that doesn’t have a product. You’re welcome to think of it. Next round it Yes.
Norman Farrar 18:44
Why is ice hockey at the bottom of the list? Just wondering.
Sharon Even 18:50
I didn’t even notice that this is just a random photo. Okay. It’s true. But like, if you think about it, can you think of any hobby that doesn’t have a product somehow attached to it?
Norman Farrar 19:02
No, you’re absolutely right.
Sharon Even 19:05
Okay, and this is just Wikipedia. This can help you I looked up some random stuff that I found Wikipedia hobbies is what we’re seeing on the screen right now. I went to Google typed in hobbies came up with Wikipedia. I think there’s something like 400 Hobbies on there. The weirdest stuff. I’ll try not to swear because I swear a lot. The weirdest stuff that you’ll find that you didn’t even know about, like really weird things, right? On their careers a great starting points, right. Many, many people through their careers, they need products. Okay, nurses, anyone? Honestly any career that you need some sort of supplies, decor styles, right? So for example, music decor, podcasts, room decor, beard decor, you know? excetera and then once you have your list what we’re seeing on the screen right now is m hottie per How do you explain what this is? This is a list that I made of all sorts of different niches that you can think about. So let’s just say that I said that I loved cute stuff, okay, because I really do like I really love cute stuff and pink, cute stuff, right? Even even wearing pink today. So trying to see how you can niche that down. So you know, for example, cute stuff for men, women, kids, seniors, can you make cute stuff for people cute stuff was not a good example for this. But whatever illnesses or special needs cute stuff for religious groups, cute stuff for pets, animals decor languages, okay, because sometimes you could also think of a product idea and it made me saturate it. But the minute that you turn it into Spanish, like a clock or something like that, I don’t know why I said clock, but whatever, or a poster, or something. I don’t know, that is written and you turn it to Spanish, and it’s suddenly not saturated. And there’s people searching for these things, right. This is the latest update. If you guys talked about this already, the opportunity Explorer
Norman Farrar 21:13
we have in the Centurion League, we haven’t talked on the podcast about it.
Sharon Even 21:19
Okay, so I don’t use any tools here that cost money, I only use Amazon and this pot in this would equal presentation. So that’s why I quickly was telling people so I’m sure normal do a full on show about the product opportunity explorer, do you want me to spend five minutes explaining let’s do that. Okay, so Amazon came up with a new tool called the product opportunity explorer, where it’s supposed to help you to find niches. And it should be in your Seller Central account under growth, I think I show an example of it. Honestly, if you’re hearing this on the podcast, you got to find this on lunch with normal YouTube channel and watch the actual presentation because it’ll just make things so much easier for you. See, you go to growth it and go to product opportunity explorer. Now this specific account is an account where one of my beauty brands, so it’s already suggesting, for me niches that are to do with beauty. That’s what you can see on the on the screen here, right like shampoo dry, like all this stuff. But then you have the search over here. And you can put in any keyword to do with anything really, right. And then you can also remember this is on Amazon. So this is like real data from Amazon. And you can also select specific niches, sorry, specific categories, and you can give it certain parameters. So for example, do I show it here? Yes. And minimum search volume of, let’s say 100,000, or whatever it may be kind of like how you do on tools. And then it will show you actual data, like real data from Amazon, it will show you our search volume from either the last year from 50 to 160. Is that I can’t read my own thing. 160 days and the last 90 days for that specific niche. Should I stop for a sec? Do you have anything to say on that norm?
Norman Farrar 23:20
No, no, go ahead.
Sharon Even 23:22
Okay. I was looking for a way to take a sip of water. I’ll go ahead.
Norman Farrar 23:25
Kelsey usually comes in and sings a little tune while that happens.
Kelsey 23:31
Actually, I do think the this is a great time to talk about today’s giveaway as well. Oh, okay. All right. So yeah, Sharon, if you want to take it away, what is today’s giveaway?
Sharon Even 23:50
30 minutes consultation with me, right.
Kelsey 23:58
So if you are interested in a 30 minute consultation, this is available for everyone, all you need to do is put the hashtag, hashtag, we’ll have calcium, just put that in the comments section. If you want to take two people, you’ll get entered in for an extra entry. So it’s super easy. You’ll see them come in just like this hashtag. We’ll have Kelsey put them in the comment sections and you’ll be entered. And we’ll announce this at the end of the podcast.
Norman Farrar 24:26
Okay. And then also I just want to say Go ahead. Go ahead. Go ahead.
Kelsey 24:30
Okay, if you do have any questions throughout the podcast, we do kind of do like a q&a session. So just let us know put those in the questions. We’re going to be talking about product research for 2022. So if you have questions about the product, opportunity, explore anything just in the comment sections and we’ll get to them in a
Sharon Even 24:49
little bit. Not going to get way better than the product opportunity to explore but whatever, keep going.
Norman Farrar 24:54
Okay, so just before we get started and sharing, you can have another drink Water. Okay, we’re gonna go to another word from our sponsor. See if Kelsey is on the ball. Thank you Z CO for sponsoring this episode of lunch with Norm. Are you looking to take your ecommerce business from local to global, you can with the help of z and their brand new app. That’s right. You can track live shipments with push notifications. Get detailed lead times for each stage of your shipment, and store all compliance and VAT reclaim documents in the palm of your hand. All while listening to lunch with Norm. Ready to expand your E commerce empire. And take your Amazon FBA business global. Use the link in the description to learn more about Z’s new app that’s now available on desktop and mobile. That’s z.co z e.co. Back to you, Chevron. Cool.
Sharon Even 25:59
That was awesome. All right, hold on. Got it. Got it. Okay, cool. Okay, that was the opportunity to explore it has nothing to do with what I really want to get to. But I’m going to be using data from there, which is why I wanted to explain it, I have a full on tutorial from it on my YouTube channel, which anyone can find. Okay, so one of my favorite ways to do product research today and probably in the last six to 10 months, is through finding my own starting points. So like we did earlier when I had that, you know, that worksheet that I filled out and then to niche down and to start entering Facebook groups around those niches. Okay, so this is an example of Montessori. Okay, so for example, I’m interested in Montessori. I love Montessori as an age like as a mom. So for example, I would join a Montessori Facebook group, this Facebook group has 186,000 members. Now we’re remembering that this is for product research. I also love this for actually helping you to rank your product when you first launch and in general, but we’re going to focus on product research. So I’ll join a whole bunch of products, a whole bunch of groups around my niche. And remember that this is 186,000 members that are like my ideal buyer avatars as well. So the first thing I do when I tried to shortcut because we like to shortcut things. I just go straight to media, see how it says here media, just go straight to images. And now I’m just seeing images of products most of the time, right? Just straight up products. So for example, I saw this thing, I didn’t know what it was. Do you know what it was? Do you know what it is? Without reading? No idea. Okay, this is Devin, I forgot what it’s called. I think it’s called. It’s called a marble run. Okay, marble run. Now, I’ve never heard of a marble run in my life don’t know what it is. And I was like, this is interesting. And there were only six comments on this. But sometimes you’ll do this. And you’ll go into images. And there’s like 500 comments. And I’m not exaggerating, if it’s a big group, you can have a lot of comments where people are either giving their input on how they use whatever the product is. And this I just clicked on because I’ve never seen it before. I read that a woman here had called this Cuadrilla Marble Run. And I was like, Hmm, interesting. I went onto Amazon typed in Marble Run, and found that there was a lot of search volume around Marble Run, I will say that it was also quite a bit of competition. But I went to Amazon’s Niche Explorer, and it started to show me a whole bunch of keywords that people were searching for, for example, glow in the dark Marble Run. Right? Now I could spend time talking about this. I recommend that anyone just go and do this themselves because I have a way better niche that I’d like to show you guys how I found products from using this method. Okay, so taking a breath I feel like I’m talking so so fast. Remember how I told you I love cute stuff? Yes, remember that was an important part of this today, right? I love cute stuff. I love anything that’s pink. And I love anything that the typical Gamer Girls love even though I’m not a gamer girl Kawhi means cute in Japanese. And there is this whole entire niche around Kawhi. Now I did not know that the word Kawhi existed even though like I’m hardcore, a Kawhi lover now, but I found this through somebody tell me about this word meaning cute in Japanese. And I found this from doing so much research around cute keywords That’s right. Went to a whole bunch of Facebook groups. This one has 75,000 people in it. Notice that 75,000 people, it’s called khoy fines. Hold on trying to go to the next one. I went straight to media, which you can’t see here, but I went straight to media. And I saw this photo in there. What do we see? We’re seeing on the screen, right? A pink garbage bag. Okay, pink garbage bag, enormous faces. Like, why is she talking about a pink garbage bag? No, right? And how many people like this image? Can you see that there?
Norman Farrar 30:37
I cannot. But I’m blind. How many cats 1000 1000
Sharon Even 30:39
People like this photo 66 comments, and 162 shares. And I was like, What the eff? Why are so many people shared this? Why does so many people like this is just pink garbage bags, like what is going on? Now it’s bike lead, which is a huge brand. Can’t Ignore that. I went to this is just to show that there is a lot of search volume around this. I went to Amazon’s Niche Explorer thing. And I typed in khoy. Now remember, what we’re seeing on our screen right now is it says search volume 384,000. Okay, searches for the word khoy on its arm in the last 90 days, okay, in the last 90 days. If you look at the history of this, this has absolutely nothing to do with q4 khoy. Always has search volume around it doesn’t matter if it’s q4 or not. Anyway, and then I looked at okay, I just realized that like I missed a one of the things here but anyway, I’ll tell you how I got to this. I went to that I put it in here. Okay, let’s go through here. I found pink trash bags on Amazon. I think there were around like 50 of them. But I saw that all of them. Almost all of them were frequently bought with Believe it or not. Norm What do you think it is?
Norman Farrar 32:06
Is it a trash can?
Sharon Even 32:08
It is it’s okay, trash can. Okay, people Kawhia people are buying pink trash bags with pink trash cans. Which is like obviously if you understand the buyer avatar, it makes sense. Back to here. Pink trashcan has in the last 90 days had 35,000 search volume. Okay, pink trash bag, trick pink trash can. Now, if I want to make a khoy brand, I’m not selling anything I’m selling specifically, to the khoy buyer avatars, I’m not selling a pink trashcan, I’m selling a khoy Pink trashcan, right? So I wouldn’t just make it pink, I’d probably make it look something cute. Like this is a strawberry looking pink trashcan, right something along those lines, and I would sell them with pink trash bags, trash bags. And then also not only that, when the pink trash bags are done, they would come back and buy more trash bags for me I would sell it separately as well. And then I’m not even going after the trash bag keywords because they’d come back and they buy for me because I put an insert in there and I do something to make them come back and buy for me. So I’m not necessarily trying to rank on those keywords. Norwich I wrote in here I’m going after a specific buyer avatar Kawhi girls, I would be selling a trash can and bag set but targeting the khoy related keywords for example khoy decor khoy bathroom decor, I wouldn’t be targeting the keywords pink trash bag, right or, or pink trash can. I could find many day to day products but make them fit to this buyer avatar. So I’m repurposing simple products, right but targeting a very specific buyer avatar and build a Kowai brand full of basic products and use all sorts of different Facebook groups as well to help you launch them. This is just an example of how many Facebook groups around khoy There is 70,000 members, 43,000 members, 10,000 members, 9600 14,000 members, when you go to the media park and you look at their photos, you’re seeing a whole bunch of products, heaps and heaps of different products. Hold on and try to go the next one. And what you realize if I if someone came to you today norm and told you look nor I’m going to sell bedsheets on Amazon, right? Most people would be like, Dude, you can’t sell bedsheets on Amazon. They’re way too saturated. Right. But if I’m selling bedsheets with cute little strawberries on them, and I’m targeting Kawhia keywords, I’m not selling a bid sheet, I’m selling a khoy product that happens to be a bedsheet, right? If you look on the screen of all of these products, technically or Typical like saturated products right pillows, a saturated cups of saturated mirrors, a saturated laundry bags, or whatever that is. Chairs, right? But the minute that I make them pink, cute fitting Kawhi? Yes. What were you gonna say now
Norman Farrar 35:17
is that a pink safe,
Sharon Even 35:19
it is a pink safe. The Kawhi girls need to hide in their rooms. Here’s the thing, this is the thing that this is the thing about the tools that you were saying earlier, that it can’t find these things that I can find from joining these groups. When I join these groups, I become one of them. And I know everything about them. And I discover things that I did not know, you know, I discover stuff that like there was no way of me knowing about had I not been wherever it is that they hang out. Right? Sir, product research for 2022. In my opinion, nothing can be the same as what it used to be when people like you and I started, right, everything needs to be different. In my opinion, you cannot rely only on tools. I my opinion, the future is brand building have always been for brand building, but today think it’s like you either build a brand or, you know, just look for random stuff to sell forever. And, you know, it’s not really a proper business, in my opinion, today. Um, and these Facebook groups are amazing ways for you to find potential products. And the amount of stuff that I’ve found there is insane. And the starting points are from you, as well,
Norman Farrar 36:42
right? So if you are in these Facebook groups, and you’re starting to see a quiet image of a, I don’t want to use garbage bag that mirror Okay, so you see a nice little mirror? And would you then take it to either Etsy or Pinterest to go and see what other people are doing with a pink mirror like other designs that might have come up.
Sharon Even 37:07
I do everything. So I’d be going to Amazon, obviously I’d be going to Pinterest, I’d be going to Etsy, I’d be watching Kawhia YouTube channel girls, and seeing what kind of things they’re doing, what their room looks like in the background with their mirrors, where are they using the mirrors, what are their mirrors look like, I’d be going to Instagram and looking because if I’m looking at selling a mirror to a cult in the khoy niche, so like Hawaii, Nora, it would be going after a lot of khoy decor keywords khoy decor, then I need to see the aesthetics of the room. So I will be following a whole bunch of hashtags on Instagram as well. And looking at what the room background looks like, and things like that. So wherever my buyer avatars hang out, that’s where I’m going to be. And wherever the competitors hang out, that’s where I’m going to be. And then I get Greg, all that information along with keyword research, and then come up with the product and many products with it.
Norman Farrar 38:11
That’s that’s a really great, different way of going out and doing your product research. I really like that method. I’m sure we’re gonna have a few questions on that as well. But before we get to the questions, the question I have, right now a little bit off topic, but Black Friday, even post Black Friday, are you doing anything right now for Thursday, or anything to prepare for after Black Friday?
Sharon Even 38:44
Now it’s kind of too late. The early thing that I will be preparing will be flat files just in case I get attacked. That’s the only thing I’d be preparing now.
Norman Farrar 38:54
So let’s talk about that. When you talk about being attacked, a lot of new sellers don’t understand what could happen between now and Black Friday, or it was even two weeks back on Black Friday. Yeah. Or on Black Friday. So what are you talking about?
Sharon Even 39:09
So Prime Day 2020 I woke up in the morning everything was fine a source sales and then an hour later, I had no sales for one of my brands. And I was like what if I went in and so that all of my products with this within this specific brand had been flagged as restricted products. Through a lot of research on my own. In the beginning, I realized that somebody had uploaded a flat file with huge like so many drug related keywords, not pesticides. It was drug related keywords throughout Canadian account, okay through the Canadian account, which had triggered all of our US listings, which are best sellers. And that ended up going on for three and a half weeks. Okay, three products, I was able to get up within 24 hours through continuously uploading flat files, every time I’d upload a flat file, it would get over written, they would overwrite it with their own flat file, I think it was a bot. And, and the last one, it took me about three and a half wait weeks to get it back up and running. I still think it was an inside job from Amazon, but I can’t prove it. So I can’t say it. But, um, that’s what I mean. So preparation wise today, I mean, you should have been prepared by now on an inventory level or strategy on what you’re going to be doing with your PPC. If you’re working with any influencers, you know, putting up content and your Instagram and it wherever it is that you put up content around your brand, telling your buyers about what you’re going to be doing this weekend. I feel like like it’s it’ll be it’s not too late to do that. But the real thing that I will have it prepared yet that I will need to prepare is flat files to have ready just in case I need to go bomb upload.
Norman Farrar 41:05
Right. And I guess with those flat files, you should have as much or as many fields as possible filled out for that niche.
Sharon Even 41:15
A lot of people don’t have this prepared, and then suddenly they also lose their search terms, they lose their bullet points, they lose your title. So even if you don’t do this always having a backup for what you already have in there is also a important,
Norman Farrar 41:33
right? That’s and that’s just like having that plan of action in place. And just it’s all risk evaluation. So another really great point. Okay, Kelsey, let’s talk. Just take a few questions. I know Sharon’s got limited time. Okay. Are you?
Sharon Even 41:52
Yep, yep. Good. Good. I checked in. Okay.
Kelsey 41:56
All right. Sorry, my voice just cracked. From how do you use the groups to launch it? Most groups don’t allow selling things in their groups.
Sharon Even 42:08
So it depends, there’s two different ways. One, let me think about how I want to word it. One option is to make a fake Facebook account. Okay. So for example, if you’re selling in the beauty niche, so you know, like, I don’t know, five or green, instead of favoring with a different image that isn’t you don’t steal anyone’s identity. This is not legal, what I’m saying. So this is an option. And going into these groups, and every time so for example, if somebody will ask for a certain type of moisturizer, and I sell a certain type of moisturizer, then I’ll go in and say, Hey, I recently used this put up before after image and then put in the link, and it’s just like a normal person. That is the Blackhat way of doing it. When I say Blackhat, I’m not I don’t do any black hat on Amazon, right, like zero black hat on Amazon. So we’re talking about a Facebook group here. Second option is it depends on what type of group you’re in that you reach out to the admin and you ask them, many admins will allow for you to promote your product there either by paying them, or because they’ve actually tried your product and they love it, or because you’ve done a good job at pitching your product to them that they will allow it. So it depends on the group,
Norman Farrar 43:28
it could be also added value, right? You could be talking about like having an image there. But it could be information benefits about using lavender or whatever, aroma therapy or something like that.
Sharon Even 43:41
It could have been that I invented a Montessori product that really, really helps with this one problem that everyone in that Montessori group has. And I reach out and I tell the, the admin, hey, like I invented this, because I saw there was so many people in the group complaining about this. And you know, I’d love to not only send you out one, but to be able to let everyone know that I’m solving this problem. And I’m like, they’d have to be real, like ice cold to say no to that. Right, because you’re solving a problem too. But that’s those are the different ways that you can do it. Okay, that’s is that.
Kelsey 44:17
Okay, next question from Simon, what is your process of finding these niche groups?
Sharon Even 44:25
So are we talking about Simon about finding the groups or about finding the niche? Because we spoke earlier about how I find the niche, right? I have this questionnaire that I go through, where I ask, for example, myself a whole bunch of different questions to come up with starting points. So let’s just say if I got if I found kids yoga, right, or Hawaii, or whatever it may be, I just go to Facebook and I type in the search Kawhia and then I click on Groups, or kids yoga, or kids meditation and click on Groups and then that’s it. Do you find that there’s other places like Reddit and things like that as well? You know, I come from New Zealand and I live in Israel and like Reddit isn’t a thing here. Like, it’s not, it’s not really something. So for me groups make more sense. But there’s also Reddit. Of course it you can also do, but that’s how I find them.
Norman Farrar 45:18
Right. So Simon just said group, so yeah, just yeah, just type in the word Kawhi. And see, you know, people post groups, and you just hit groups. Yep. Okay.
Kelsey 45:33
Great.
Norman Farrar 45:34
Let’s Oh, and by the way, if you are interested in that 30 minute consult with Sharon. Hashtag, we’ll have Kelsey or tag to people and see if they can comment.
Kelseyv 45:47
Alright, this is from Rosalyn, you’ve joined your niche Facebook groups first than I did products. Once your launch your products on Amazon, what do you do if anything to direct customers directly to you? website back to Amazon store.
Sharon Even 46:05
It depends today personally, for my own brands, I don’t send any traffic to Amazon off of Amazon, I send everyone to my websites. If I was launching or if I was a first time seller, if I was in a different situation, I would probably sending traffic to my either my listing or my store depends on where they’re coming from. If they’re like a cold buyer completely, I’m probably going to send them straight to my listing, I don’t want to have get them to click on so many different links. And if they’re, you know, warmer buyer, then I may send them to my Amazon store if I sell other products that make sense for that buyer avatar. So it depends. But I can say that for myself. Today for my own stuff. All my external traffic goes to my website. I don’t want Amazon owning my buyers, I want to own them. Right.
Kelsey 47:00
Okay, and then this one was from a Facebook user, I believe. Let me see. What was the name of the Amazon tool you showed a bit ago.
Sharon Even 47:11
Amazon opportunity explorer, it should be in your Seller Central account undergrowth. And if you can’t see it, that then there’s an email that you can email Amazon, to ask them to give you access to it because it’s in beta. I can’t remember the email off the top of my head. But it’s in my it’s in the description of my YouTube video on it. I just can’t remember it. You guys remember
Norman Farrar 47:32
opportunity hyphen, Explorer? I think@amazon.com.
Sharon Even 47:37
There’s I think there’s one more word in there. It could be Amazon. Hi, there. I feel like there’s one more hyphen in there. I can find it. But it’s something like what Norm said I was making
Norman Farrar 47:49
it up. But no, something like that. I’ll find
Sharon Even 47:53
it is as you’re asking questions.
Kelsey 47:56
All right. We’ve got another one from Andy, do you request your category listing report and use that as your backup file? Yep.
Norman Farrar 48:06
And if you don’t know about that, this is something that you have to request from Amazon that you’ll not you won’t find it. But you have to request your catalog listing report. And then you have access to it. usually seven to 14 days.
Sharon Even 48:25
And yeah, usually, we say usually that long, but you can also get it a lot quicker. I found that email, opportunity hyphen, Explorer hyphen, request, ah, that’s what it was. Okay, yeah@amazon.com. And I will just say quickly, they’re going to ask you for your merchant token yet merchant token. And then a lot of people feel uncomfortable sending that but it really is Amazon. And if they don’t have your merchant token, they can’t give you access to it. So just don’t be scared to give it to them. Right.
Kelsey 48:57
Right. And so it looks like we have about two more questions. And before we get to those, make sure you smash those like buttons, and hit that subscribe button on YouTube, if you’re watching him there. If you’re watching on Facebook, you can always like and follow our profile picture or profile page. If you hit those three dots in the top corner, you’ll be able to push those notifications. So whenever we go live, you get those little notifications.
Norman Farrar 49:26
And I think the most important question, Kelsey came from Simon and are there any Kawhi groups? And I don’t know We’ll check on that. Because I really do want to. Yeah, Pink Beard. That would be nice. Oh, that’d be so great if we can see. Or accessories that would be awesome.
Kelsey 49:54
All right. Let’s see we got one more from Simon. Sorry. Just a second. How much? How much actual time do you spend getting lost in these groups, I feel it needs regular touches over a few months.
Sharon Even 50:13
Look, we’re talking about using it for product research. So if I’m looking for product, like I’m using it for product research, that’s the goal product research, I’m looking for products. So I will stay in these groups, even after I find the products in order to find many other products. But I can spend a lot of time in these groups, especially with it’s a collider group, I can spend hours in there. But the point is to actually do the job, which is make notes of products. So I will save or take screenshots of products that looked interesting to me. I’ll see what keywords people are using in the comments. Honestly, like it depends on the group, for example, Montessori groups, or the khoy groups, the two groups I showed you, there will be like hundreds of comments, especially decor, you know, what decor groups as well, there’s so many different types of decor styles, right? Like shabby chic, Boho, so many and like they kind of, I can’t think of any right now. But there’s many different types, okay. And if you find Facebook groups around them, people will put up a photo of their lounge, how they just redid their lounge, and then people will like put their own photos in there or ask questions. And sometimes you’ll see like 1000 comments, right? So I take note of these types of things, I take screenshots of what people are talking about, etc. And I use the same type of keywords they’re using to describe the products. And then I quickly go to Amazon, see if it’s a niche, use something to look at keywords, like a keyword tool, whether it’s like helium 10, or the Explorer tool that I showed whatever it is, and then I really quickly see, okay, is there a potential here, and if there is potential, go down the rabbit hole, which involves learning more about the nation being more in the group and asking questions, you don’t even need PickFu when you have this, by the way, as well, you just, you know, look up these different, you just put up an image and ask questions, hey, I was thinking about buying this or this? Or, hey, like, I don’t I can’t think of an exact question right now. But you get my point nor I can go on and on, you got to stop me.
Norman Farrar 52:19
No, but I like the way that I’ve heard others go in and become part of the group and add value. The way that you’re doing it, at least in the presentation is that you’ve cut to the chase, you’re going in looking at the media, looking at the products, seeing what’s there. And that’s taking you to the next step. Now getting the tone of the group and all of that, that that can be all later as well. But I like what you did, like you were just seeing what other people were posting, which was kind of cool.
Sharon Even 52:51
You can go into discussions where it says discussions and look at what people are talking about. And I do do that. But I also take into consideration when I’m making your presentation, people want to cut to the point and cut to the chase. So yeah, I spoke straightaway about how you can go to media, and you’ll see all the different images. But it’s not the only way that you could do it. It’s just the quickest way because we sell products through images, you know, so,
Norman Farrar 53:18
okay, any other questions?
Kelsey 53:22
We got one more. It’s a little big. So it’s a little big. So you can go as deep or as shallow as you want into this. Do you use influencers? If yes, what’s your process? It’s great to see you here by the way.
Sharon Even 53:41
I do use influencers. The question is for what are we talking about product research? Are we talking about brand awareness? Like what what are we talking about? Russell, it is probably my main question here. When it comes to so I’ll just answer everything when it comes to product research and influencers. I will follow usually it depends on where my the buyer avatar hangs out. So if it’s khoy I know that the buyer avatar is hanging out on Instagram and I know they hang out on Tik Tok. And I know they hang out on Pinterest. That’s the three main places and a whole bunch of Gamer Girls websites. But I’m not going to get into that now. So I will go into Instagram and I’ll go into tick tock and I’ll find who are the influencers, that these people are following whoever I’m talking about who they are, I’ll follow them. And I’ll see what kind of content they’re talking about when they’re using these products. How are they using these products? Right, etc. So that’s for product research. If we’re talking about brand awareness, then yeah, that’s, that’s okay. So she just worked brand awareness. So for brand awareness, so work with influencers around my niche, it’s not going to make sense for every single product out there. I specifically am in the beauty and the baby niches And a lot of my clients are like, I have one client that Norman knows about, which is in the exercise niche. They built their entire brand with zero money spent on advertising, just by working with influencers. They have NBA players using their products today, just because influencers were talking about them. They created the effect of oh my god, I have to have this product, because everyone that you would follow if you were this buyer Avatar was talking about their product. Right? So um, yeah, I use influencers is the main answer.
Norman Farrar 55:39
Very good. Yeah, there’s, there’s some brands that have just built there. And we’ve had like, Joseph Martin on, and he built a boxy charm, just with influencers, and he ended up going to the Kardashians spending big bucks. They loved his product. He sold his he sold his Boxy Charm box to Etsy, for $500 million. But that’s all only influence
Sharon Even 56:09
influences. Yep. You don’t normally, you know, the client that I’m thinking about, right? Oh, yeah. With Yep. So they had Chloe Kardashians coach, like her personal trainer reached out to them. And they made for all of the Kardashians, a personalized product with their logo on it, or their name on it. They’ve had so many, like, I can’t name everyone, but many, many large NBA players and really big people, celebrities as well. Sometimes, you’ll see you’ll see their products in like the background. But these really big influences like Chloe Kardashian has never made a post or a story of using the product because she hasn’t yet gotten paid for it. But we know that she uses their product when she works out. But her trainer has in the past, like put up a photo a story of somebody else not Chloe, and you can see their products in the background, my clients products in the background. So sometimes you can like set like in a mold. What’s the right way? Like not straight, like, you know, it’s kind of like that through the back door sometimes use these influencers to also promote your products. I don’t know what I’m trying to say no,
Norman Farrar 57:30
I know. But okay, so I think that’s it. I’m close. Is it time?
Kelsey 57:42
It is time. And Rosalyn is saying Chevron is an international treasure.
Sharon Even 57:49
Thank you.
Kelsey 57:51
Thank you. All right. So thank you everyone who participated in today’s we’ll, Kelsey, and here we go. Enjoy everyone. Oh, right, that
Norman Farrar 58:15
old hairstyle, by the way.
Kelsey 58:20
Well, thank you. I appreciate
Sharon Even 58:22
Kelsey 58:27
Oh, it’s going as soon as it hits December. So take as many screenshots as you like. All right. Welcome, everyone. This is a real Kelsey. This is our giveaway that we do every single podcast just entering one last person. Alright, so we’re going to shuffle these up. Make sure it’s not rigged, and everyone has an equal share. Here we go. Three to one. So if you are the winner please email me Kay at lunch with Norm calm. And it looks like the winner is late. Alright, so this is super important. From YouTube, please. Oh, email me K at lunch with norm.com K at lunch with Norm calm, and we will connect you and get you your prize. Congratulations.
Norman Farrar 59:30
Okay, and because it’s coming from YouTube, if we don’t hear from you miss F within what’s the time period 48 hours kills.
Sharon Even 59:42
How he wants to disappear?
Norman Farrar 59:43
He just does. Kelsey, come back. Oh, this is great. Yeah, internet. That’s
Kelsey 59:50
what it is. Yeah, sorry. I
Norman Farrar 59:51
think my okay, it’s 48 hours, right? If we don’t know. Okay,
Kelsey 59:55
yeah. If you don’t hear within 48 hours, please. Will you have to re spin so just you know, within those 48 hours and you’ll be good to go. Kelsey spins
Norman Farrar 1:00:05
in his head. So. Alright. Sherry, thank you for coming on today. Thank you. Last minute. I mean, it was just awesome that you could just come on and help us out. And we gained a lot of information. So that was really great. Love the subject. Okay, until we have you on again. All right, Sharon. We’ll see you later. Bye.
Sharon Even 1:00:29
Thank you. Bye, my.
Norman Farrar 1:00:32
Okay, so we are going to be having Talal Assad on and we had Vanessa on the other day, and we had such great response to her as well. So we’re bringing her back on. And we’re going to be talking about how to deal with Seller Support, SKU naming conventions, and just a bunch more. So can’t wait. That’s going to be on Wednesday. And before I get back to Kelsey, quick word from the sponsor. I think this is Kelsey, just making me stand here is how about ISIS out? Unless you’re gonna do your job? Are you doing your job? The sponsor, okay. I wanted to give a quick shout out and say thank you to global wired advisors for sponsoring this episode of lunch with Norm. Global wired advisors is a leading digital investment bank focused on optimizing the business sales process. For more information, please call Chris shuffling and his team over at global wired advisors.com You know, Kelsey, you are lucky that there are Patreon people paying for your cup of coffee because that would not happen today. Just saying. That’s it. Okay, so what do we got to say?
Kelsey 1:01:55
Alright, so welcome, or thank you for watching everyone. If we did miss your questions, I see that there’s a question that came in, after so if there ever times where we miss out on questions, you can still post those questions in our Facebook group. We have a bunch of our experts over there as well that can answer help answer your questions. So that’s lunch with Norm Amazon, FBA and E commerce collective. And we’ll get you an answer. Thank you guys so much for your questions. And participating in today’s we’ll have Kelsey, this is something that we do every single podcast. So if you enjoyed it, make sure you follow us on social media. Subscribe to us on YouTube, and norms Instagram profile tube. So I believe that’s it. We also have a blog that’s coming out. We’re really ramping up our blogs, we even have a new layout with our blogs on the entrepreneur website. So definitely give that or check that out. I’m going to put the link in the bio or in the captions as well. But I think that’s it. Yeah, I think we’re good to go.
Norman Farrar 1:03:05
Fantastic. So join us every Monday, Wednesday and Friday at noon Eastern Standard Time. Thanks everybody for being part of the community taking part in the podcast, and we couldn’t do it without you enjoy the rest of your day.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
