As Spring nears, it’s a great time to start cleaning after a long winter to prepare for sunny skies ahead. Spring cleaning is typically something we do every year, some of us a few times a year, to keep our homes in tip-top shape through the seasons.
Much like the spring cleaning of your home, your Amazon FBA business requires regular spring cleaning or hygiene to run smoothly all year round. Now is as great a time to develop a step-by-step hygiene routine to maintain your account in good standing, now and for the future.
As a new Amazon seller, you may not have much awareness about Amazon seller account health because your focus to date is growing your FBA business. Without routine hygiene, you may not know that your FBA business can be at severe risk.
This article will detail the most vital aspects of maintaining Amazon account hygiene so you can run a smooth and successful FBA business.
What does Amazon seller account hygiene mean?
Your Amazon seller central account contains a section entirely dedicated to account health. In this section of your account, you’ll find a slew of account metrics to keep your account in good standing and discover account level warnings that require your attention.
To access your Amazon Account Health page in Amazon Seller Central, open the performance tab and choose Account Health. Select Seller Central > Performance Menu > Account Health. Once in this section, you’ll discover an overview of compliances with Amazon policies.
Amazon seller account health is composed of three metrics:
- Customer Service Performance
- Product Policy Compliance
- Shipping Performance
On the Amazon Health page, you’ll be able to review negative feedback, and chargeback claims.
Where to begin with Amazon account hygiene
Amazon account hygiene requires ongoing attention to stay on top of policy and account health. When looking to create a systematic process for account hygiene, it’s a good idea to begin with the foundation within your Amazon account.
To start, focus on your catalog of products as the priority. From there, navigate any stranded inventory and negative feedback. While this may sound simple, you’ll want to develop a practical process that ensures you consistently maintain good account hygiene.
Step 1 – Review Your Entire Catalog
As a growing FBA business, you’re likely to consistently add products to your catalog. That’s excellent news in terms of your ability to scale. Unfortunately, adding more products can mean that sellers inadvertently overlook older products not intended for sale.
Often the addition of new products doesn’t always come with the intention of selling these products. Sellers frequently add new products to understand if they meet ungating requirements or specific permissions and compliances. But, if the product remains on the Manage Inventory Page, Amazon fully believes you intend to sell that product.
If for whatever reason, you receive an IP complaint (Intellectual Property Violation or Restricted Product Warning,) you could face a severe ASIN violation without your knowledge. If you were to list this product in the future and were not aware of the ASIN violation, you could experience a negative score against your account.
The Solution
Ensure the deletion of all products from inventory that you have no intention to sell. It’s a simple fix but often overlooked as you begin to scale your FBA business. The added benefit of deleting products you don’t intend to sell is that your inventory performance score will improve. The inventory performance score is vital to the quantity of inventory you can send to Amazon; therefore, a positive score is critical.
Step 2 – Deal With Stranded Inventory
If not careful, you can locate a substantial amount of stranded inventory and a stranded inventory Amazon FBA inventory error in your Amazon account. Stay on top of stranded inventory to keep your account in good health and to maintain a positive inventory performance score.
The Solution
How to fix stranded inventory on Amazon? Go into the stranded inventory page of Amazon Seller Central and reconcile each ASIN one by one. This may mean that you remove stranded inventory to your warehouse or home or that you have it disposed of by Amazon.
Removing stranded inventory can require a refresh of your inventory screen, a call to Seller Support, or an appeal. While appeals are common, it’s best to avoid the Amazon stranded inventory listing error and inventory languishing in this area.
Step 3 – Check The Feedback In Your Storefront
Amazon seller feedback is a metric that evaluates your selling performance. It’s available for Amazon customers and can be left when a customer returns an order or through the feedback page on Amazon.
Negative and neutral reviews can be mistakenly entered into this area by customers. A negative review can negatively affect your feedback performance score when that happens.
The Solution
Previously sellers could request negative reviews be removed from the feedback section by clicking a report feedback button. Today, sellers must open a case file for each incorrect feedback to have them removed. Remove all negative or neutral reviews from this area to increase your performance score and continue selling without issue.
Summary
You’ll want to check your Amazon Account Health dashboard on an ongoing basis and add this task to your daily standard operating procedures. Regularly address any ASIN violations or other policy violation warnings in your account health dashboard to maintain good account hygiene. Avoiding problems out of fear only increases risk and can make appeals more challenging if appeals are required.
The instances of poor account health and stranded deep inventory sneak up on sellers, especially if they don’t know where to look or how to address warnings and violations. It’s good to work with an account specialist who can provide a comprehensive violation review and an action plan to address each one.
We can’t stress enough the importance of regular Amazon account hygiene. It’s too easy to sell on the platform and ignore this crucial aspect of business, especially as sales continue to roll in. Create an ongoing hygiene review within your Amazon account, like your spring cleaning regime.
How do you perform routine Amazon account hygiene? Let us know in the comments.
Need help with an ASIN appeal or an Amazon seller account health issue?
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