Amazon Seller? Go Overseas!

At TSI, we take pride in our years of experience translating documents for Amazon sellers. In today’s online sales market, its nearly impossible for vendors to do business without utilizing Amazon’s selling platform.  Many brands who attempt to sell exclusively through their own website wind up seeing their products listed on Amazon eventually via third parties sold as used, or sometimes even counterfeited goods.  Amazon offers brand protection services to help deal with counterfeiting and copyright infringement which helps to an extent, but there’s other lesser known programs they offer that help sellers: to expand their business internationally.

We are referring to Fulfillment By Amazon (FBA), known to the consumer as Amazon Prime.  By joining the Amazon FBA program as a seller, your items are shipped to consumers free of charge domestically.  While the United States is by far Amazon’s largest marketplace, what about other territories? Depending on who is counting, there’s roughly 195 countries in the world. Amazon currently operates in almost two dozen markets throughout the world, so why limit yourself to just one?

One huge hurdle is language.  Product pages have very tactically written copy that helps describe the item for sale, but still generate top notch search engine results.  Keywords and descriptions are essential to having your product seen in searches before your competitors. Navigating this world in let’s say, Japan, would be nearly impossible as an English speaking seller.  Where do you even start with translating your item description? And what about keywords? To rely on computer translation software such as google translate will leave your listing in the dust, and also give consumers the impression that you’re not a serious seller or even worse, a scammer yourself.

Because we have extensive experience at TSI working with Amazon FBA sellers, we can assist in solving these issues for you. This way, you can put your mind at ease as a seller and focus on the other important aspect of business like retaining your buy box, managing reviews, and analyzing your sales conversion rates.

While Amazon Global Selling (AGS) helps you expand to other territories, they do not offer their own translation services.  This is why it’s essential that you choose wisely when using third party translation providers. However, third party providers open up a new can of worms. 

It’s no secret that Amazon has been plagued by seller scams and buy box wars between mom and pop sellers based in America who are now battling Chinese factories that are undercutting prices to unrealistically low levels.  A similar predicament exists in the translation and localization industry. Dozens of low cost translation companies have been popping up in China and India offering unbeatable rates. But as the old idiom goes, it’s too good to be true.  The quality of these translations are subpar. They are able to hit such low costs per word by employing computer translations which, as we’ve covered in previous articles, are dangerously unreliable. Another tactic they implement is using non-native language speakers who have no proficiency in the niche area for the document needed to be translated.  A comparison would be hiring an electrician to fix your plumbing: while they both work as handymen, their skill sets are completely different.

What sets TSI apart from other third party translation and localization providers is we never use computer translations.  Additionally, we employ translators who are native in the output language and have a deep understanding of the industry at hand.  While our rates are not rock bottom, they are in line with domestic industry standards.

Taking it a step further, we strive to help guide our customers through the process so they understand exactly what they are paying for.  At the end of the day, is paying a few dollars more worth the correct SEO, keywords and descriptions to lock in sales? We think it is. Feel free to reach out for an estimate on your project. In conjunction with Amazon’s Global Selling platform, we are eager to help you grow your business beyond North America.