Q4 is one of the most significant times of the year for Amazon FBA sellers. Even for small third-party sellers, Q4 brings about the possibility of improving your bottom line, even in a few short weeks. Holidays and events such as Halloween, Thanksgiving, Black Friday, Cyber Monday, Christmas, and New Year see a significant spike in sales. If your Amazon store is well-prepared, you can make more sales than at any other time of the year.
Q1 requires just as much planning and preparation as Q4. Holidays and significant events such as Chinese New Year, Valentine's Day, St. Patrick's Day, Easter, and the Super Bowl happen during Q1. While these events are not Black Friday or Cyber Monday, people shop online to find gifts, essentials, and more for these holidays and events. You can't afford to slow down; it's up to you to keep the momentum going as Q1 approaches.
This article will touch on the various strategies Amazon sellers can borrow from Q4 to improve sales during Q1 and throughout the year.
5 Ways Amazon Sellers Can Improve Sales During Q1
After hitting unimaginable numbers during Q4, you may want to consider creating a strategy that equals or surpasses the planned success of the previous period. Q1 might be one of your most successful quarters when done right. Here's how:
#1 Clean Up Your Inventory To Make Room for Q1 Inventory
The year's final quarter is about spending on holiday gifts and items for your customers. When Q1 hits, spending slows down, which means that if you didn't sell all your holiday items during Q4, you might have plenty of inventory remaining in Amazon fulfillment centers.
Considering you'll still pay storage fees for inventory remaining in fulfillment centers, you want to find ways to eliminate these fees. Start planning up your inventory cleanup and begin preparations for upcoming Q1 events.
Take stock of your inventory and note down items taking up too much storage space. One of the best ways to clean up inventory is to have a clearance sale where you sell the items at discounted prices. Amazon Prime Day and Freedom Sales are the best times to organize clearance sales.
While you won't make as much money during clearance sales as you did during Black Friday or Cyber Monday, it's an excellent way to dispose of dead stock that you would have had to pay hefty storage fees on. Future clearance sales help with brand awareness as they keep your products and brand in the minds of your customers for the subsequent Q4 events.
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#2 Record Q4 Strengths and Weaknesses and Leverage These Insights in Your Q1 Strategy
One of the best ways you can prepare for Q1 is by tracking and reviewing the execution and outcomes of your Q4 strategy. Review your previous planned strategies and analyze what worked and what didn't.
What hidden lessons exist in Q4, and what can you do to ensure you don't repeat previous shortcomings? What months had low sales, and what factors influenced those numbers? Find out which products had the lowest conversion rate, and make some business decisions based on your findings. All of this data you can easily access from your Amazon seller central account.
Next, analyze customer reviews and find ways to improve your product and delivery. Past reviews are a goldmine of data and can be leveraged in multiple ways to enhance your offer and increase customer satisfaction.
Finally, review your planned advertising strategy. There's no point in spending high dollar amounts on PPC if ads are not effectively driving traffic and visibility. No matter how successful you feel, your last quarter was, data provide the key to your success in future quarters. Track, analyze, and optimize your strategy accordingly.
#3 Reinvest Some of Your Profits From Q4 Into Q1
If companies handled Q4 well, chances are that it was one of the most successful quarters for their business. Most Amazon sellers register more profits during Q4, but opportunities still exist in Q1. If you saw considerable earnings during Q4, you might consider reinvesting those profits into Q1 to keep the momentum going.
Most sellers' mistake is slowing down during Q1 because they earned so much more during Q4. There is nothing wrong with putting some of that money into a savings account but ensure you reinvest some of it into your business.
#4 Repurpose Q4 Products in Early Q1
When Q1 hits, chances are you have stock from your final quarter inventory lying in fulfillment centers. Rather than turning the items into dead stock, you can repurpose them in early Q1, as customers still purchase online following the holidays and into the dead of winter. Seasonal items can be remarketed and retargeted to boost sales and clear inventory.
Christmas-themed items such as gloves, winter boots, snowboards, and outdoor items are usable during winter. Re-do your winter copywriting to highlight features of these items that relate to winter. It's a viable way to boost sales during Q1 and clear up precious storage space without heavily discounting some of these necessities, which brings us to the next important point.
#5 Optimize Your Amazon Product Listings for Q1
Q4 is about optimizing your product listings to reflect the holiday spending spree. Listings include holiday-themed rich copy meant to boost sales during that time. During Q1, the holiday season ends, and the mindset of customers shifts; they're not looking to spend on holiday items. Your Amazon product listings should reflect those behavioral shifts.
Work to optimize your Amazon listings for holidays such as Valentine's Day, St. Patrick's Day, Easter, and significant events such as the Super Bowl. Go back to the drawing board and perform keyword research that targets each event or holiday. Find high-performing keywords that you can leverage to boost sales and provide an advantage over your competition.
Bonus Tips To Improve Your Sales During Q1
Here are more tips to help you make the most of Q1 and continue winning long after Q4:
- A successful Amazon advertising campaign is about targeting your ads correctly. As you approach Q1 and the holiday season closes, pause bidding for holiday-related items. Continue running promotions such as winter clearance sales, gift offers, and bulk-buy discounts to give customers a reason to return to your listing page.
- Diversify your inventory to offer products spawning from Q1 to Q3 before hitting selling strides again in Q4.
- Start preparing for the upcoming holidays early, such as Valentine's Day, St. Patrick's Day, Easter, and Chinese New Year, so you can move products in multiple categories to stay ahead of your competitors.
- Prepare to attend as many Amazon seller conferences, trade shows, and expos as possible. These events have a wealth of information to help you improve your online business.
- Keep up with the latest trends in e-commerce to understand what your customers are looking for, so your online store can meet customer needs for the majority of the year.
Summary
Q1 isn't a time to be forgotten. Amazon Q1 is just as crucial, if not more essential than Q4; Q1 sets the stage for the year ahead.
It's not a time to take a back seat and slow down on improving your offer or scaling your Amazon business. You need to keep the momentum going and work on improving your sales every quarter.
Take lessons from your Q4 sales book and see what you can incorporate into Q1 and what you can improve. While sales may slow following back-to-back events like Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and Christmas, your Amazon store may see a boost in Q1 and beyond if you take the time to strategize and plan accordingly.
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