How Crowdfunding Works: Expert Strategies From A 7-figure Amazon Brand Owner
Nov 29, 2023Season 2Episode 53
The Amazon Strategist Show
Have you ever been so curious about how crowdfunding works? Hold tight as we unlock the possibilities of this strategy with our guest, Dylan Lam, CEO of various Amazon brands and the mastermind behind OmiRank, a digital marketing agency for Amazon sellers.
In this episode, we discuss the wonders of using crowdfunding platforms like Kickstarter and Indiegogo as a launchpad for your products on Amazon. Hear how these campaigns can turbocharge your cash flow, diversify risk, and build intangible assets that resonate with your audience. We also touch upon the power of brand building and the advantages of working with affiliate marketers.
Towards the end, we unravel the power of storytelling in product development and how AI can be your secret weapon in differentiating your products. Dylan also shares examples of brand storytelling and AI integration done right.
Episode link & contact info Shareable episode link - https://bit.ly/46vYKdi For content collaborations, please email us at: grei@sellercandy.com
Never Talk to Seller Support Again.
Seller Candy is the expert operations arm of your Amazon business. We provide outcome-driven support for time-consuming and challenging Seller Central issues so you Never Have to Talk to Seller Support Again! With Agency-Level security practices and an experienced team who’s been through the thick of it, we give sellers bandwidth on demand without the hassle of hiring, training, or managing.
Seller Candy is the expert operations arm of your Amazon business. We provide outcome-driven support for time-consuming and challenging Seller Central issues so you Never Have to Talk to Seller Support Again! With Agency-Level security practices and an experienced team who’s been through the thick of it, we give sellers bandwidth on demand without the hassle of hiring, training, or managing.
Have you ever been so curious about how crowdfunding works? Hold tight as we unlock the possibilities of this strategy with our guest, Dylan Lam, CEO of various Amazon brands and the mastermind behind OmiRank, a digital marketing agency for Amazon sellers.
In this episode, we discuss the wonders of using crowdfunding platforms like Kickstarter and Indiegogo as a launchpad for your products on Amazon. Hear how these campaigns can turbocharge your cash flow, diversify risk, and build intangible assets that resonate with your audience. We also touch upon the power of brand building and the advantages of working with affiliate marketers.
Towards the end, we unravel the power of storytelling in product development and how AI can be your secret weapon in differentiating your products. Dylan also shares examples of brand storytelling and AI integration done right.
Episode link & contact info Shareable episode link - https://bit.ly/46vYKdi For content collaborations, please email us at: grei@sellercandy.com
Never Talk to Seller Support Again.
Seller Candy is the expert operations arm of your Amazon business. We provide outcome-driven support for time-consuming and challenging Seller Central issues so you Never Have to Talk to Seller Support Again! With Agency-Level security practices and an experienced team who’s been through the thick of it, we give sellers bandwidth on demand without the hassle of hiring, training, or managing.
Seller Candy is the expert operations arm of your Amazon business. We provide outcome-driven support for time-consuming and challenging Seller Central issues so you Never Have to Talk to Seller Support Again! With Agency-Level security practices and an experienced team who’s been through the thick of it, we give sellers bandwidth on demand without the hassle of hiring, training, or managing.
If you don't start with brand building in mind when you start selling on Amazon, you don't have a path for yourself to exit in the future and, essentially, you don't know what you're doing. And if you're still on white legal lane retail arbitrage, if you are on those strategy in 2024, you are deemed to fail and that's why you want to focus on branding.
Speaker 2:
All right, I'm your host, ben, and welcome back to another episode of season two of the Amazon strategist show. The show that's all strategy, with no hacks, no silver bullets and no magic pills Just real, practical strategy for serious Amazon sellers. All right, I just wrapped up an awesome episode with Dylan Lam. Today, we talked a lot about crowdfunding and how you, as an Amazon seller, can use this to launch either your first or your second, third, fourth, any product along the way and capitalize on a ton of amazing benefits. So I know you're going to enjoy this episode. Let's dive right in. Today, we've got the pleasure of being joined by the incredible Dylan Lam, who's the CEO of various Amazon brands. He's also the mastermind behind OmniRank, which is a digital marketing agency that helps e-commerce and Amazon sellers succeed online. Dylan's got years of experience in this industry, and he and his team specialize in SEO, ppc, social media and email campaigns, all of which are aimed at delivering data driven results and exceptional customer service. So, dylan, welcome to the Amazon strategy show. How are you doing today?
Speaker 1:
I'm doing fine. I'm so excited to be on the show. Thank you, ben, for having me.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, thanks so much. All right, so right before the show started I was just commenting that you have a much more professional setup than I do, cause I could just tell because of the things that are in your background. So I'm curious do you do photography as well, or is this part of your business? You know, I don't know if it's part of the product launch stuff that you guys do, or tell me what's going on with your background.
Speaker 1:
I'm actually just creating SOP for a team right now. There's SOP that I need to create. That's why I have to stuff behind me. Yeah.
Speaker 2:
Well, you must create very professional SOPs.
Speaker 1:
then, with the setup that you got, I love that I got that light from Armix and those like the point. You know you can redeem those from the point and I got a light instead of a travel ticket because I can't go with China.
Speaker 2:
Well, that works out. Well then, I love it. So, dylan, I guess kind of how I like to start these shows, or just asking our guests if they can kind of take us back to the start of their Amazon or e-commerce journey. So I was wondering if you could do that and actually tell us how you got into this whole industry and this whole space.
Speaker 1:
Oh yeah, so I get into e-commerce, like back in 2014. Like I was first started on eBay trying to shift stuff by myself, essentially retail upper chart. I was doing I was trying to bring over to try components from Hong Kong and then I bring it back to UK and started eBay. And then I got. I was like shipping 10 a day, 20 a days to like further the days. I cannot do it by myself anymore. So I was like no, there's so much stuff that I have to do. Like I literally got all the packing and then I have two bags with me. I was writing a segue into the post office and I was trying to label the things on the floor one by one. So that was how it started e-commerce. That was back in the time when I was doing university.
Speaker 2:
Those are your grinding days. You wrote a segue into the post office.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, it's called. It's called like a one wheel, so yeah, yeah. It's like a one wheel that you can just like go to post office like what five minutes or 10 minutes trip away.
Speaker 2:
It would take me like while you're balancing all these packages, I'm imagining you, like you know, with one on your head and like both your arms, holding as much as possible yeah.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, e-commerce is about fun, right, that's part of the fun that I have in the past. And then I was like, okay, that was the time that was like sorry, I didn't imagine 2015, but I think I went into e-commerce in 2012 and then I started FBA on 2015 because that was just so good to be true. Like I don't even have the shift to my, my student condition. That time, like there was like I was living on a third floor. I was trying to have a palace shipping into the lift and then the reception saying that you can't do that anymore because there's so much stuff you know. And then, like the whole corridor was like I was laying down.
Speaker 1:
I was trying to put in all the label one by one, right? So I went one my like my friends all playing computer games that's how it got started. And then things got like just snowballed down like at the whole thing. We went went from like just 10K to six acres to seven acres. That was just within five years. I literally ride the wave during the time, like the golden age, which is now still the golden age, just a different method to sell on Amazon right now.
Speaker 2:
So, yeah, so you initially started with eBay and retail arbitrage. Is that what ultimately took you to scaling to six and seven figures? Was it retail arbitrage except on Amazon, or did you switch over to more and more private label as you went?
Speaker 1:
Yeah, I started as in retail arbitrage on eBay and then, like during that time take it as like a research race I realized, oh my God, I sell like 10 things and then all one of the things, and then there's two things that it's done so well. And then I started going to like Alibaba to to white label stuff and then started to bring them to Amazon, fba, and then different color, different variation, and then you can find your own mode as well. I have like tooling as well, like down the path, like I turn it into private label. That's why I do.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, that's actually a really cool idea too, because it's like you're getting paid to do research rather than like you having to pay for software and then just spend all this time researching, never order your product, or or, by the time you actually decide on a product, that's now too late, it's saturated, or something like that and said you were like, hey, I'm going to make money while I get the data and that, collect that information for myself and then use that to go and buy. Now I have the money to actually go get the products you know from my manufacturer and all that stuff. So that's actually really cool. I haven't thought about that before. So now take us to kind of where you're at today. So what is your kind of main focus and what does your team? I know I kind of read through your bio, but can you give us kind of a breakdown of what you guys specialize in? Sure, Okay.
Speaker 1:
So what we do right now is like because certain on Amazon right now require a lot of like research. It's not just about a simple product research by using David, the data dive or Hidim 10. It's not like just jungle scout kind of. Here I mean, we're not doing a certain Amazon, rather is of all about building brand Right.
Speaker 1:
So we utilize crowdfunding as like, as marketing method, rather than seeing crowdfunding is there to crowdfund for money, but then we are there to create media, so we aim to make as much as revenue to turn the brand into a recognizable brand, trying to become a FMCG brand.
Speaker 1:
So you get more backers to back your brand and then you got the email list and then ever you launch a product next on Amazon, then you already got the asset that you can launch with them and then you can scale much faster than just trying to snap a label and put on Amazon that you might fail, because what we are trying to do is we try to follow the product, different product and then follow the product three times. The first time we do just the normal kind of like research with keyword gap. Second one is like we see if there's demand in the market on social media by running kind of like back in the old days, like job, shipping, type of, as like it's like if you see as like, you try to have a lot of like product on the internet and then you see which one give you the best engagement, which you get to give you the lead.
Speaker 1:
And then you always like okay, so if you sell Amazon, you can sell on Facebook, that you can eventually drive external travics, and then internal as well, so that guarantees you that you can outweigh your competitors in the future. And then the first validation there was we launch on on car funding because eventually, like, if you can launch it in Kickstarter or Indiegogo, then it tells you that there is a big demand out there. No matter, it's a just a small feature that have enough differentiation to get you into, let's say, a thousand backers. You know, or just even like 500 backers. You know you already have your MMO kill mat and you don't have to be like a very cash flow intensive like Amazon that you have to buy free month of inventory and then put it into Amazon, that you might still fail. So that's what we do right now. We have crime, to develop a plan to fight it, the whole thing.
Speaker 2:
So crowdfunding has always been a really interesting topic to me selfishly because one I've never actually done it. I've been close to trying it out a few times but I mean it's extremely appealing, right because of at least the two big ones I'm going to say. Are the things you just noted right, which is that you get the validation of your product ahead of time and you get capital ahead of time? And correct me if I'm wrong on either of those, but I know there's a ton of other benefits. So I'm curious can you kind of lay out, like, what are the benefits to me as a you know, either a new or repeat Amazon seller? Like maybe I already have a couple of existing products on Amazon and we all know that?
Speaker 2:
You know, launching a product is challenging and there's certainly levers that you can pull. And if you're experienced, like that does help, but still, like, as it gets more and more competitive, like this could be a more effective strategy these days for some people, even if they're already experienced and have a big brand on Amazon, but for subsequent launches or if they're just getting started so sorry to rain that back in Can you kind of break down, like, what are the benefits to an Amazon seller from doing this strategy in terms of launching True.
Speaker 1:
So that's the thing like there's just. So I mean, the benefit is just so profound when it comes to launching and camping on platform because we treat it as in a marketing, but at the same time, it improves your cash flow as well, and then the risk that you're on right now. So the first biggest thing that, of course, launching on the Kickstarter is because you don't have to pay for inventory, which is the most expensive part, which is like around like 30% of the thing, of the whole product.
Speaker 1:
So it improves the cash flow. You only buy the inventory once you have collected the fund from the backers, right? You only have to do the marketing and then so it turns out that you don't have to invest three months in advance for all the inventory and you can still wait until, let's say, six months later after the camping finish. You can use the reason, as in, like I'm, we are still developing a product. That's why you have to wait for six months in order for us to ship your product, right. So that's essentially but that's another tactic, of course but normally it's like we will ship the product in Amazon immediately after the camping have finished. So that's the first benefit. Second benefit is well, we mentioned about the inventory, right, so I'm just going to skip that because you don't have to hold any inventory. But then the biggest thing that I would say for Amazon seller is like we really diversify the risk. We instead of putting all the egg in one basket.
Speaker 1:
A lot of seller that I work with in the past they're trying to get away from Amazon, but they're not quite successful because there's just so much stake in hand, right, they have so much revenue there, and then if they want to prove it out of the Amazon, they turn. It turns out like people are just shopping on Amazon but not their brand, but not like on the website. It's just hard for them to prove it to outside of Amazon. And once they get suspended, or if they're listing, got Tech Down or if there's like black haired from competitors, like maybe just a enrichment claim, right, and then the whole business cash flow was going to be went into a spiral in the North Southern, right, because there's no revenue coming in. So it helps you to diversify the risk, because you have the email list that you have and then people know you that is not Amazon specific audiences. You can make sure that your brand, your product that you are launching are able to attract sales, drive traffic from Facebook.
Speaker 1:
Social media take tope right Because it's kind of like a interactive marketing. So essentially it helps you diversify the holding and also you're like building a lot of intangible asset, because imagine if you, if you launch it on on Amazon, there's a lot of things that you might not have yet as in, like, you don't have a press release, you don't have influencer marketing video, you don't have, like, a proper listing video, you don't have all the creative asset, you don't have all the pay, an early media asset, and then you don't have you didn't work with actually marketer, as in like, because if you're running carpentry campaign, you have to work with affiliate marketer to get them, the bloggers, the youtuber, to get them into the, the campaign, to help you write the boost the traffic for the AI sake as well, for the algorithm text as well, right? So, so that's the intangible asset that we are getting Before you go on to Amazon. Right, you already have all those things, instead of like going to Amazon things like once a month in a time. It might, it might not work out the best and you might fail the portal as well. So it's being verified and then you get already asset as well.
Speaker 1:
You can retarget people as well from email list that you generate during the pre launch and during the launch as well, you can require those people, bring them back to Amazon or maybe use it as a like, local audience to go back to Shopify, et cetera, and and also you're building goodwill, essentially because this is the brand building that a lot, a lot of like sellers come to us because I always ask them a question, as in does your customer know? Where did they buy from? They would they say your brand name or would they say I buy from Amazon, because Amazon, because they the question. Yeah, because some always think like I got a mouse from this, from Logitech, why they have a big name, this right, why I can name Logitech.
Speaker 2:
But if you got the exact same one, I don't know. I have a very similar one though. That's fine.
Speaker 1:
But if they call like a mean G, right, who else can remember, right, right? No, no one. I throw it from Amazon. That's why, yeah, so that is how launching a Kickstarter campaign can help. There's so much more things I can talk about. If you want me to go for it, we'll go with that.
Speaker 2:
Well, yeah, I've got some follow-up questions. I think in some of these are just again maybe a little nitpicky ones, just because I haven't ever gone through this myself. So, and hopefully that's going to be, a lot of the people that are, you know, watching this. So they have. They're maybe just hearing about this for the first time, or maybe I've heard about crowdfunding but didn't know it's applicable to an Amazon launch, etc. But so I mean, just one is just on a basic level is do you have a preferred platform Kickstarter or Indiegogo, and I don't know if there's others. And I guess my second question is like can you launch on more than one crowdfunding platform at the same time, or do you normally advise people just to do one?
Speaker 1:
So it depends on the product. So the normal path is like you go on to Kickstarter first and then you go on to Indiegogo in demand afterward. But some of the product, like electric product, they sell better on Indiegogo. Okay, household product, they sell better on Kickstarter. So it really depends on like, what type of product they're selling. Then I can advise you where to go. But those are the general two platforms that you go for when you turn your launch to be a brand, as in using carbonate, as in marketing.
Speaker 2:
Gotcha, and so it's not like you would launch on both at the same time. They actually both serve slightly different markets, or?
Speaker 1:
purposes. Yeah, interesting, right. The thing is, what we see is, when we use the Localite audience from Kickstarter, it doesn't really appear to Indigo Localite audience. I mean, they are so different as, like, the way that they interact with the platform, because they really build a community behind them, and that's why, if you use the word crowdfunding, it turns out like we have to run e-commerce ad style to Indigo. But if you are running on Kickstarter, the targeting that we use is crowdfunding, so that's what we use.
Speaker 2:
That's interesting. And then so the other thing I think that you've been I think you already alluded to the answer here, but I'm gonna ask it anyways when you run these campaigns, you, as the person running the campaign, you get to keep the emails and the information that people who sign up to get notifications or that actually back your product. Is that right? Yeah, so that's a major benefit. Then right, because you can take that list and both one with your current launch. You can obviously use that, but then subsequent launches, I'm assuming is that part of your strategy? Is that when you go launch your second, third, fourth product, do you then go and reengage that audience?
Speaker 1:
Yeah, the more campaign you've launched, the product you have launched, the easier that is gonna be for your brand in the future. One of the other benefits by using those platforms is because you are increasing the touch point when you send an email. By that I don't mean by just using email, because the platform itself they're sending email yourself is sending email as well but just talk about we're not talking about those those like maybe queries or funnels, or we just talk about the email part. If you send an email, you have to deal with the SAP, dkim, which is you need to do that anyway, right, but then sometimes you might have a bad reputation. You might go to promotional impulse. That might be a problem, but whereas, like those platforms like Integral and Kickstarter, they have already have a lot of transaction on email and that's why they're not being flagged and putting the promotional email right.
Speaker 1:
So say if you're good enough, if you're able to have your DKIM SAP to be clean enough to be able to go into the good inbox, then you get one touch point. You get a second touch point when you're sending an update from the platform itself. So pass on yourself like there's a lot of like small detail that can help you increase the touch point where sometimes you just cannot reach them after you have done the launch or the first touch point. So if you're trying to say to launch on Shopify, you don't get those and those are the benefits Gotcha.
Speaker 2:
Oh, it's cool. So I guess another question is are there certain types of products that this does work really well with, and then are there products that this does not work as well with or that just should not be considered an option?
Speaker 1:
Yeah, I would say, rather than saying there's certain type of product. I would just give you example, as in like there is a, there is a, there is a brand called Misson. Okay, so Misson, they sell an often trade, so it's a modular often trade, right? So they turn that product there was quite innovative back in a few years ago and then they were like putting into the offer, like, and then it's a modular board, itself just one big trade. That was the problem that they're solving. And then they generate a few.
Speaker 1:
I think one point five million, right, amazing, just a cookware, just a lot of silicone, silicone tray. And then you got one from five million, right. So I'm not trying to emphasize about the one five million, because I want to emphasize what's next after. What's next is there's a competitors who saw Misson, who sell those tray and then just fall of like oh my god. I mean, it's very uncomfortable, it's very hard to pick up the tray. So they added a handle next to those tray Each of the moderate trade they need.
Speaker 1:
They added a little handle with a hole so you can pick up easily that they generated 100k. So it's all about whether or not if your product can really solve a problem, rather than saying if your product can be on Kickstarter. If there's a problem that you're solving, then that is already a new thing that you can launch it on Kickstarter. No matter how small is the revenue, you are still building the brand. If you are just saying that you target 550k, 40k, you're still building intangible asset along the way when you're trying to make and do a marketing on doing the whole process and then eventually it will just come back to your brand on the second launch, foot launch or those things.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, but so yeah, and just to, I guess, reiterate that point, the I guess the one thing that wouldn't work and you just called this out, it has to obviously have solve some kind of problem is it's not like you can go and be successful if you are like, hey, I just want to launch my version of a garlic press in this new color, but there's nothing new about it other than that it's your brand, right, because that's not going to have the same novelty to the audience At least this is my impression and do well on the platform. It would have to legitimately have some kind of innovative component. Is that accurate? Or maybe I'm wrong?
Speaker 1:
You're not wrong. But in the same time, like we have different way to tackle that and I'm going to tell you one example, as you like. There's two example that I can think of right now. There's one example is literally that they didn't change anything. It's actually the product that they were. They returned to you. But I'm just going to try to organize my way to tell the example.
Speaker 1:
So there is a, there is a cop. It's just like a normal cop you can imagine for whiskey okay, for whiskey. So they put insulation inside, as in like double, double, double glass inside, and then they were able to generate I think it's 250k. How do they do that? They were using storytelling, so they used to have brand by themselves, I think. I think it's I don't know what, whether or not they have a big brand.
Speaker 1:
But then to me that cup is just a normal cop, like just double, double glass cup glasses that they put it on Kickstarter and then got to an effort to buy, using storytelling. And that example is like a often stone right now it's not often trace open stone, so the stone that you can put it into the often often and then to make your pizza heated evenly rather than just putting a steel tray that might affect the temperature and it will aim to help you to heat up the thing faster, right? So back in 2010, there was a often stone live on Kickstarter already, and then back in 2019, there is this there's another competitor's just come in, changed nothing and then to just provide a better story, and then it get around almost. I think it's 170k that time for just buy storytelling.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, improving the story? Yeah, well, we're creating the story if it was not existing before. So storytelling is got is a huge component of this. You have to in, and that's kind of an interesting part too. If you don't, what? If you don't have the product created yet, how are you actually? Are you getting a sample and that's what you're using? Or are you using, just like you know, mockups or renderings of the product before you actually have the product, in order to then go tell the story or how's that piece actually work?
Speaker 1:
We use free printing, using rapid prototyping, to try to print a product and what we manufacture to get you the samples, and then we'll just start shooting videos and then use branded let's say use brand essence to provide the storytelling. That's what we do. So it's either like you can have one feature to add to have enough, just like that tray, a handle of the tray to end up to differentiate yourself, or you can use storytelling. Or maybe during the COVID time you're having a new VC cap. So because everyone wants to sterilize the gems bacteria at the time, so you put a UVC LED light under the cap and then just say snap and normal bottle right and that becoming product. So it's just, it's all about the right timing. If you do right now, I doubt they can get up and you care that time.
Speaker 2:
Are there tools that help with knowing that? By the way, sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt, but I'm just thinking. Like you know, is there with Amazon, we've got Jungle Scout and Healing Ten and now hundreds of other tools out there. But do these platforms have similar stuff or is it more just based on experience with selling on there or going and doing these crowdfunding things?
Speaker 1:
That's the beautiful thing, so that I can share about. In the past you only have like you can. Yeah, you can do as much things as like a data dive, keyword gap or all those like Google trend things, right. Or even you can go to TikTok, twitter Marketplace or maybe Facebook transparency to spy on people. But right now we have AI. You can essentially just pull the reviews from the internet. Let's say we're talking about a cable, the charging cable. Just pull the cable from the internet and then ask the GP to analyze the problem, look at the benefit and good things and suggest me with a new type of product, and then you can sort it out as in like oh okay, this is good, this is good. And then you can ask them again to refine the whole process again and then to give you a better choice again. So that gives you the initial idea on what you can do to just maybe add one more feature to enough to differentiate yourself. Right, it's all about like connecting the dog normally with AI, with the ability to connect the dog, and that you can come up with a new product. Or maybe you can just including the storytelling inside the product and then that would be a new product, a new angle, as in like, lately I was working with a client that they want to sell a modular bed. Okay, so modular bed is already out in the market already. But then AI suggested to him that instead of selling modular bed, he can sell modular mattress topper. Right, that is just. I was like, oh my God, you just, you just like a decrease the thickness, it became a topper, and then this guy exists in the market yet right now. So that's what we are working on right now and we almost live on Kickstarter. So I just want to share one more example.
Speaker 1:
I think, like there was one, one product that I was so appreciated, I think lately, as in like the, the wrinkle bottle.
Speaker 1:
Okay, the wrinkle bottle is actually another bottle, right, and now it's just a bottle, and then, like, you get they put a max safe on it, so while you're in gym, you can lift up the max safe and then you can just snap your phone on it and then you can use it yourself, right, so that's the max, that's the max safe bottle. So imagine, imagine as a bottle, a bottle you start with just a normal bottle to a plastic, to material, to maybe a bottle with a straw with a cap and then a tea infuser bottle. Right, the way that they progressed because of technological advancement. Right, because people love tea, because they, because the consumer is changing the behavior we are promoting healthy. That's why they have this lemon infuser kind of like a bottle, and then you got like people once nuts or pin inside the bottle. They got a container under the bottle and then right now, people want to, people love social media, so they always like, feel themselves and that's why they put a max safe on a bottle and you can pick myself.
Speaker 2:
Right, it's all about connecting Is there a bottle that has all three of those. Is there one that has the infuser, the film thing and the container for your snacks? There you go. That's the next one. There you go.
Speaker 1:
That's the next one, and I was thinking as well I haven't seen a air tech bottle right now. Right, so you just like to find yourself to the air tech everywhere.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So the latest one I can see is always like.
Speaker 1:
it's like NFC. You can you put NFC anywhere become a smart things. You can put air tech everywhere, or you can put max safe anywhere to become a new product. It's about looking at what's the latest trend and then connect a dog and then come up with a new product the other haven't think of yet. So it's actually not that hot.
Speaker 2:
There's always funny like. I talked to a lot of Amazon sellers and I won't say any specific products either, because, you know, sometimes people are very but cagey about their product types but it's always really fun to like meet people that have these crazy or at least they seem crazy to me sometimes and to everyone these product ideas that I've never heard of before. I'm thinking of one specific one right now, though, is this it's in the pets category, and when this client told me about it, I was like I have never in my life thought about that and I never like I never thought that that product you've just told me there was even a pain point for that, and now that I know about it, I'm like my mind was blown away and it's like then it's one of those things where you can't stop seeing it. And anyway, you know, I know I'm just kind of teasing everyone, because I don't, I can't say more than that, but yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 1:
Oh, you remind me of a campaign that I used to like. I was like mind blown as well in the past. It's the paper toy for cat. Okay, so there is something that exists already. So it's just like a a a toy, a maze, like you say, a horizontal one. You place it on the, on the floor and then it's like a maze inside, so the cat would just go in and play with the ball right. And you know what they add? They just add music and then make it like a fry, make it fry break and then, and then become a new toy. And then it sells for a million on Kickstarter. Like, how, how is that even possible? Like it's so the thing is just so cheap, as in, like it's paper, it's just made of paper, right? And then, um, yeah, then the cost of producing that is so cheap. And then, uh, I guess they built a community in the past, that's like they have a huge cat community, and then, uh, just make it what you say, move, moveable, and then that become a new toy.
Speaker 2:
Oh, my God, I love it. That's cool. Thanks for sharing that. So, dylan, I want to transition into kind of our next uh part of the show and ask you my normal question. I ask everyone of our guests but do you think that pineapple belongs on pizza?
Speaker 1:
Oh, uh as an Italian. I have an Italian vendor say that, Okay, they use antichoke and things like on pizza, but they hate pineapple. But I love it. I'm so sorry.
Speaker 2:
I love it. I'm also a fan of the Hawaiian pizza. But yeah, I was just uh, joking on our last podcast recording. We've had, I think, two or three Italians on the show so far and every single one of them is like you. I like that. It is just evil If I have to say like I don't even want to answer that question or even hear it, because it's just the worst thing on planet earth to hear about pineapple going on pizza First. I think it's amazing, but anyway. So I just like to hear what everyone says, and the reason I'm asking Dylan is cause this is our controversial take section of the show. So I like to ask everyone of our guests what's one of the kind of, you know, most controversial topics that maybe are things that you believe in, um, that maybe other people in the industry either don't believe in or just haven't come to also find or I don't know, align with? Where do you zig? What other people zag?
Speaker 1:
Right, definitely about brand building. Why? Why is it brand building? I work with a lot of Chinese sellers. A lot of things that, like I said in Florida, that might not quite understand is that a lot of sellers there to make money In China.
Speaker 1:
There's a lot of money laundry that they need to cash out. The best way for them is to go on to e-commerce, because maybe middleman will charge them for 50% off. You want to get away with 1 million, they will just pay you 500K only. But for Amazon, for them, if they can get away with just 40% or 20% off, they're happy. That's one thing. And then just love government subsidies from different market, at least not that I know of like in the UK or US there's any, but in China there's a lot of people that is getting government subsidies to launch a Amazon brand and for that reason, if you have to battle with them with the capitalism, you won't be having enough capital to battle with them, let's say, at the highest speed on Amazon PPC.
Speaker 1:
So without building a brand, you are deemed to fail. There's a lot of unseemly money that you cannot see in the market. What they're doing, why can? A screen protector can sell for 0.1 US dollar or just even 1 US dollar? Are they there to just do brand building? Are they there to just capture the market share? Or are they there to do the money laundry? I mean, no one knows. So if you don't start with brand building in mind when you start selling on Amazon, you don't have a path for yourself to exit in the future and essentially you don't know what you're doing. And if you're still on white legal lane retail arbitrage or maybe I don't know if you heard of like in the past, there's a thing called book just literally put everything on Amazon in bulk and then hopefully one will turns to be good. If you are on those strategy in 2024, you are deemed to fail and that's why you want to focus on branding.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, I mean, yeah, it's like at the end of it, it's Nike, Nike, the whole Nike shoe thing, like so many case studies around that, right Like you can buy a shoe that's just as good as a Nike shoe for probably a 10th of the price. But why do you buy the Nike shoe? It's in large part because of the brand, and that's the differentiator at the end of the day. Otherwise, it's a race to the bottom if you're not building up the brand. So, no, that's awesome. Thanks so much for sharing that.
Speaker 2:
So, dylan, we've kind of reached the end of the show and I just wanted to first off say thank you so much for coming on today. It's always fun to have people like yourself on here, so knowledgeable, especially about kind of this crowdfunding thing, because you know, especially with our audience being primarily Amazon sellers, we oftentimes this isn't something that we normally go to first or for subsequent product launches, and so I think now, as things have become more and more competitive, this really is a good way to potentially launch your first or your second, third, fourth, fifth product and there's, as you said, so many benefits to it. So, before we end the show, I do want to turn it around to you and give you the stage again to kind of you know, say where people can find you and any kind of parting words. So I'm going to do that right now. Yeah.
Speaker 1:
Thanks for having me on the show band. So if you guys want to find me, you can go to LinkedIn, digital Dylan official. So just come say hi to me and then I have a checklist for you guys that you can see whether or not, if you are suitable to sell on Kickstarter or in Google, and then what is the time I look like and essentially give you the time. We give you the step by step guide on how you can do by yourself as well. So please say hi to me.
Speaker 2:
Thank you, cool, yeah, and for anyone watching your listening, we'll put that down below in the show notes or in the YouTube description if you're watching on there as well, so you can reach out to Dylan pretty easily. So that's going to bring us to the end of this episode. Thanks again, everyone for tuning in and thank you to our wonderful guest, dylan. We're going to have to have him back real soon, but, with that being said, we're going to come to a close here and, yeah, we'll see you guys all at the next episode. Thanks again, dylan.
Speaker 1:
Okay, thank you.
Speaker 2:
All right, that's going to bring us to the end of another awesome episode, thanks to our wonderful guest, dylan Lam, as always. Thank you so much for tuning into another episode of the Amazon strategy show. If you did find some kind of value in today's discussion, we kindly request that you rate and review this podcast. All your favorite podcast player, or, if you're on YouTube, give us a thumbs up, let us know. That's helped us a ton with reaching new e-commerce enthusiasts, just like yourself. Also, don't forget to follow us on our social media pages. You're going to get updates behind the seeds content and a lot more there as well, and you can find the links to that and everything else down below in the show notes or the description, depending on where you're watching or listening to this episode. So that is it for today. Be sure to mark your calendars and join us again next week for another awesome interview. We have lots more guests lined up, so make sure you stay tuned. Until then, I'm your host, ben Smith, signing off and wishing you a happy selling.