Alibaba, rivaling Amazon, is the largest e-commerce B2B marketplace in the world, providing a directory to a wide range of manufacturers. Alibaba makes it possible for people to source from Alibaba and sell on Amazon without leaving home.
Importing from Alibaba to sell independently on Amazon is also a lucrative way to make money. It can work, however just in the event that you follow the techniques and guidelines required by both Alibaba and Amazon.
Therefore, in this passage, we try to elaborate on each procedure and guide you step by step to choose the products to sell on amazon, find the best suppliers on Alibaba and the best way to negotiate with suppliers.
Table of Content
Chapter 1 How to source from Alibaba and sell on Amazon?
Chapter 2 Four General ways to find Suppliers When Sourcing from Alibaba
Chapter 3 How to get the Best-match Supplier on Alibaba
Chapter 4 Six Things to Consider When source from Alibaba and sell on Amazon
Chapter 5 Negotiation with suppliers When Sourcing from Alibaba and sell on Amazon
Table of Contents
Chapter 1: How to Source from Alibaba and Sell on Amazon?
The underlying stage in starting your own Amazon business is to pick the right products to sell on Amazon. There are various ways that you can get inspiration on what to sell, anyway the certifiable critical bit of this movement is supporting your idea. To avoid putting all of your assets in products that possibly nobody needs, you have to do enough research. Here are several tips you can follow to locate a good product.
a. conduct an investigation in your market
Investigate the main 100 retailers to source from Alibaba and sell on amazon. Set aside the effort to go to their official sites and look at their smash hit records to start your creative mind. Doing this could give you some extraordinary thoughts.
b. check the Amazon’s bestseller list
Probably the quickest approaches to figure out how to discover an item to sell on Amazon is to glance through the Amazon Best Sellers List in various classifications to discover what is now selling. Do an inquiry on Amazon and take as much time as needed to peruse through the various classifications. See what they offer and what others are advertising. The Amazon Best Sellers page is another incredible spot to discover what is inclining right now.
c. choose Small size and lightweight product
Avoid huge things — the delivery costs will truly leave you with nothing. The equivalent goes with overwhelming items. The smaller an item is, the less transporting costs. With respect to toughness, this helps shield you from client grievances, and from sluggish shippers who handle bundles.
Staying within Amazon FBA’s classifications of Small Standard-Size (15-inches) and Large Standard-Size (18-inches) will ensure that the costs involved are low and the profit margin is high.
d. choose product with good quality
It’s critical to sell quality items on Amazon. Sell low-quality things and Amazon may drop your postings or even dismiss your posting benefits out and out. Negative reviews and below 5-star surveys may keep customers away from your item, leaving your deals in a droop. It’s imperative to find a way to guarantee quality control.
e. estimate the cost of products
While searching for items you have to first think about the Shipping cost, discount evaluating, and Amazon Seller expenses. The expense ought to be 25% to 35% of your objective selling cost and your desired selling cost ought to be in the scope of $10 to $50.
Chapter 2: Four General ways to find Suppliers When Sourcing From Alibaba
After making enough research about Source from Alibaba and sell on Amazon, you probably have come up with a list of good items. With the products list, you can now start to search for suppliers on Alibaba. There are mainly 4 ways to find suppliers.
a. Search by-products
Go to the main page of Alibaba, at the left side of the search bar, there is a drop-down box where searching by “Products” or “Suppliers” is optional.
When you click searching by-products, the results will show pages of product that is in accordance with your description.
Here is an example:
The mug is the product I need.
Firstly, we use a search by product. We put the mug in the searching bar, and click search by-product from the drop-down box on the left. Then, we get a long list of mugs. Just review the list, compare the design, the price, the material, and the MOQ. If there is any item you are interested in, save it to your account for comparison.
b. Search by supplier
Similarly, at the left side of the search bar, click searching by suppliers, the results will be pages of suppliers that sell relevant products to the description you submit.
Now, we check Search by the supplier.
We put Mug in the searching bar, and click search by the supplier from the drop-down box on the left, wait for a few seconds, the page will jump out with suppliers that sell mugs. Go over the suppliers, check their products, and registration information. Pick the adequate suppliers and save them to your account for the next stage.
Usually searching by the supplier is a faster way to get an appropriate supplier, since each supplier sells dozens of products, and every single product is displayed once, therefore it takes much longer time to go over products.
c. Search by image
Searching a product by the name sometimes may not get you exactly the product when source from Alibaba and sell on amazon. Therefore, another way is introduced: search by image. Image searching makes it possible for people to search for products without an exact name or clear description. We could even check the price for anything with a photo at hand.
Before using this feature, two things you need to know:
Ⅰ. In the picture, the body is clear against the background.
Ⅱ. the image demonstrates only one product, not several items.
With the image, you can go to the searching page, click on the camera icon at the right end of the search tab. Follow the instruction of uploading the image from your computer. The tool will process the image in a few seconds, and soon come up with products in accordance with your requirements.
d. Use Alibaba RFQ
With the slogan of One request, Multiple quotes, RFQ is a very convenient way for sourcing beginners to get quotes instantly. To specify how to use Alibaba RFQ, we conclude the procedures in 3 steps:
step1: submit an Alibaba RFQ
Get to the main page of RFQ here and click on button Try RFQ Now, a form will be presented for you to fill in. Complete the form as detailed as possible so that Alibaba could find the best match supplier for you, otherwise, a request with low credibility might be screened. After filling out the form, click the submitting button below, and wait for one or two days until you get quotes from suppliers.
step2: Receive quotes
Alibaba distribute your request to selected suppliers. Suppliers will give a quotation on your requirement and reply in a short time. Usually, you will receive 10 quotations from 1 RFQ submitted. You can check the quotation in your message center.
step3: Contact supplier
After you receive quotations, go over them and make comparisons. Select the suppliers that meet your requirement and contact them. If none of these quotations satisfy your need, you can submit RFQ one more time to solicit another round of quotations.
Chapter 3: How to get the Best-match Supplier after you source from Alibaba and sell on amazon
There are myriad of products and suppliers on Alibaba, you will probably get confused and don’t know how to deal with the suppliers if you just browse on the screen. What’s more, Alibaba can’t screen every email among suppliers and buyers on its foundation. There are fake representatives out there. There is a risk of getting scammed if you do not pick the verified supplier on Alibaba. Concerning all these, it’s imperative to learn a few tips to help find the best match supplier before you really set off.
a. use filter features when searching on the page
When buying from Alibaba suppliers, the number one rule is to look for a product fit that is as close as possible to the product you want to source. This includes the material, the design, the look and feel, and anything else that’s specific to your product.
For example, if you’re looking for glass baby bottles, then you shouldn’t consider plastic bottle manufacturers. Even though the shape may be similar, the materials are totally different. The whole production process and supply chain behind it will be different too. Look for a supplier that offers a product as similar as possible to the product design you have in mind.
b. Understand the Types of suppliers
If there are thousands of suppliers in the search results, you can filter the results to quickly reduce them to a manageable number.
you can use the following filters to narrow down the results to the key suppliers:
Ⅰ. Suppliers with 5 years or more as a Gold Supplier.
Ⅱ. Verified suppliers, meaning they have been checked on-site by a third-party inspection agency.
Ⅲ. Past export countries including the United States (or whichever country you are selling in).
Gold supplier: A Gold supplier pays a premium for increased ranking, marketing services, etc. and Alibaba does some limited identify verification of these suppliers. A Gold Supplier on Alibaba does not mean this Supplier has good quality products but it does give some indication this supplier is a semi-legitimate and somewhat invested seller.