You’ve probably noticed that there has been thousands of Facebook pages popping up over the last two years that link to Teespring and various other websites with products for sale. They post a cute meme or a link to an article and then spend two weeks promoting a shirt that will be for sale, but “for a limited time only” that then shows back up in your feed two weeks later.
You weren’t the only one that noticed the craze.
One year ago Amazon decided to get in on the game by launching Merch by Amazon. The application-only system has slowly allowed thousands of designers to create shirts that can be sold on the worlds largest online shop.
I wanted to see what it was all about, so I applied in late February. My application was just accepted last week.
There is a whole group of people making a living off of Merch, just like there were millionaires made from Teespring. I have seen screenshots of vendors making upwards of $13k a month and I am sure there are many more making above and beyond that amount. And of course, with it comes another whole group of people who aren’t focusing on selling shirts but rather making money off of the people who are attempting it.
Information, courses, ebooks.
I digress.
So here’s the real scoop…
- Merch by Amazon is application only. You have to apply and wait to get in. There are no back doors, no magic email to use and no way to get around the wait. Even if you’re Jesus. Especially if you’re Jesus.
- You “tier up” based on the number of items you sell. For example, you can only create 25 listings until you sell 25 shirts. At that point you are bumped up to 100 designs. Some people have as many as 5k slots.
- Many vendors price their shirts at little to no profit until they tier up.
- The system is full of copycats. Expect anything you work hard to promote to be ripped off and duplicated many times over. No joke. There are entire FB groups dedicated to stealing best sellers.
- And, if that doesn’t scare you off – there has been known ongoing issues with glitches in getting paid, but the good news is – everyone seems to get paid eventually.
So if you’re still interested in Merch by Amazon, it’s important to know that you can literally spend all day every day creating designs and uploading them so long as you’re promoting them and tiering up. It’s very much like Teespring, except you have your stuff on the biggest search engine marketplace in the world.
How should you promote your stuff?
- Just like you’d promote any other business…
- Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram
- SEO is IMPORTANT as balls. No joke.
- Write amazing product titles and descriptions. This applies to Etsy, Amazon, your store. Everything. Do it.
- Give yourself a brand name and buy the horse. Or the domain. Either works.
Comment with your link to your Merch account and we will send some lovin. Maybe. Depends on if your junk is awesome.
