Traveling on vacation to another country? Going on a business trip or even moving permanently somewhere else? Getting to know new cultures and habits, learning a new language, and enjoying the local products is very exciting. But what if you want to buy your favourite brand of sunscreen, because that’s the only one that doesn’t trigger an allergy? Or that brand of almond milk you cannot imagine your morning without, and it’s simply not available? You go browsing local convenience shops and supermarkets, but there’s nothing even remotely as good as what you’re used to. Now you only have 2 options:
- Settle for less or worse
- Go to Amazon and buy what you’re looking for
Well, the second option sounds much better than the first one, right? But it’s not always easy to get THAT specific brand or product everywhere you travel.
Why Marketplace expansion
It’s true that Amazon Fulfillment Network should be able to transship the products virtually anywhere, although it’s not always true. When you want to make sure that your products are available everywhere without your brand represented correctly, the best option is to go with a Marketplace expansion service.
There are several automated solutions at Amazon Vendor or Seller Central already, but there’s one major drawback – you never have full control over the content of the detail page. These services often use automated translation services which can decrease the quality of your optimized content, and even if that wasn’t a sufficient reason to opt for a dedicated service, there is yet another flaw – the inability to update the content yourself.
When the product detail page gets translated and copied from another marketplace, such as the home marketplace Vendor/Seller operates on, they essentially don’t have any means of correcting any mistakes or insufficient brand representation. Clients may try contacting the SPS team at Amazon, but it’s very rare they’re able to help with this specific issue, simply because it’s a system limitation and the products are listed only “virtually”, meaning they’re not present in every Vendor/Seller Central Marketplace catalog, even though they are being offered.
Finally, there is a possibility that your variations might not be translated to all the marketplaces, simply because not all the marketplaces have access to identical variation themes. Now I believe you already have some experience with variations, and if not, let me tell you they’re pretty difficult to keep the way you want them, so having them break down in 6 different countries can certainly be mentally demanding.
The Solution
&The easiest solution here is to list the products separately in every marketplace you want to expand to. While this process takes longer and brings additional costs, such as asset translation or content optimization, it certainly pays off in the long run, because the last thing you want is to have misleading product names or completely incorrect descriptions in a different country without being able to fix it.
Expansion to new marketplaces opens new sales opportunities, however, also creates numerous challenges. In most of the cases we have experienced, the launch has been delayed due to a lack of listing readiness. As it may take between 1-4 weeks to successfully create the listings, and making any changes to product information during this time proves extremely difficult, preparation is a key to timely and successful product launch . We will be more than glad to help you with all the Marketplace Expansion related activities, so don’t hesitate to fill out our contact form for a free account audit and Marketplace Expansion consultation.
