Amazon Listings/info

I can't answer all your questions but for some reason I recall when I signed my merchant agreement with amazon one of the conditions was that prices on my site were not allowed to be cheaper than what was listed on amazon. And they did check often and send me warnings. The other question I can answer, amazon did not allow me to list products as a new product if it already existed on their site. Lately I see them doing a big push to merge ASINs that are all the same product.

I think you still have to keep your own webstore prices the same or higher than your Amazon listings in the US but in Europe that's entirely abolished—sellers in European countries can sell their wares on Amazon and their own webstores at different prices.

I think because of this, the Amazon Product Ads might become popular—I wrote a post about the differences between that and the Amazon 'Sponsored Products' ad program: Amazon Sponsored Products Ads in the Spotlight - RepricerExpress

I'm sure it's only a matter of time before Amazon abolishes price parity restrictions in the US so maybe product ads will become more relevant then.

Not sure what you are thinking of selling on Amazon

BUT

Unless you can be the cheapest supplier you are hardly going to make any sales - unless all the other suppliers run out of stock.

In my view you are better to create your own brand so you can control the price and limit competition. It's not as hard as you probably think and can give you much better margins.

Amazon: lots of ready-to-buy customers but margins smaller. Own webstore: not so many customers but margins higher in theory, however, how will you drive customers to your webstore? That takes a lot of time and effort unless you're well-established etc. There's no right or wrong here but consider the cost of building and maintaining your website and the cost of driving customers to it as that reduces your overall margins a great deal.

Op your question is a bit wired you might be in confusion actually it still converts if you are an affiliate with Amazon and your website is ranking on top 5 and getting just a few a visitors... They will surely convert but the ratio would be not so good.

1) Prices are not inflated because people sell at lower than suggested retail. Prices are lower and margins are lower. Amazon is NOT a place where you will see price inflation.

2) Customers will just buy at the lower price. Amazon does a have a policy that your prices on your website should not be lower than prices on Amazon. They used to check this and send us emails sometimes on some products but we haven't seen anything from them on this for at least 2 years. There are just too many merchants to check on. Plus, in general prices on Amazon are almost always lower, i would say 95% of the time because of competition so it really isn't worth Amazons time to monitor it.

3) Amazon products do show up in Google for natural search results. Amazon has two CPC programs. One for ads for your products that will link to your site and one for products you sell on Amazon that would link to those products on Amazon. We did not have success with the first type, linking to our site and we are about 3 weeks in on the other type and too early to tell.

4) I don't understand the last question. Are you talking about creating your own product listings on Amazon or adding yourself to existing products already on Amazon?

If you sell on Amazon I'd try to sell under a private label that helps to limit competition. Also you could bundle Items to get more sales.

The way you deal with it is to build up sales on third party marketplaces to a point where you have the sales/customer base to launch your own platform (website).

When that situation arises, you will then be able to sell at prices you're comfortable with and you won't be paying any third party fees. Off course, many folks now use both their own website and third party marketplaces to sell stuff.