Things are starting to get tough lately, at least financially speaking. The pandemic has brought so much change in how we live life. New graduates are most likely having a hard time finding their first job. Seasoned employees are looking for new jobs because of lay-offs. Small business owners are looking for a new source of income for their business didn’t survive. If you are one of these groups, then let me help you by sharing with you 10 Ways to Make Money on Amazon.
Amazon is a multi-billion-dollar corporation so it is not surprising to know that it offers a lot of work and business opportunities. Amazon is known to be the best and biggest online retailer in North America and beyond but it also offers various services. Some of these services include Amazon Mechanical Turk, Amazon Services, Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing, etc. Amazon relies on 3rd party contractors as well as on their own employees to provide excellent products and services to the consumers.
In this article, I will share with you different Amazon opportunities that you can try. For each opportunity, I will let you know what it does, what you can expect if you wish to try the service, what income range you can expect from doing it, and finally guide you through the process so you can start right away.
9 Ways to Make Money On Amazon
1. Amazon Mechanical Turk
What is Amazon Mechanical Turk?
Amazon defines Amazon Mechanical Turk (Mturk) as
“a crowdsourcing marketplace that makes it easier for individuals and businesses to outsource their processes and jobs to a distributed workforce who can perform these tasks virtually. This could include anything from conducting simple data validation and research to more subjective tasks like survey participation, content moderation, and more. MTurk enables companies to harness the collective intelligence, skills, and insights from a global workforce to streamline business processes, augment data collection and analysis, and accelerate machine learning development.”
What to expect?
Honestly, there is nothing much to expect from Mturk at least in the beginning. When I tried to do Amazon Mechanical Turk, most jobs are only 0.01 – 0.05 cents. Of course, these jobs are so easy to do. The jobs include identifying pictures, answering surveys, multiple choices, and somewhere in between.
There are also jobs that pay more ($1 – $10) although they are hard to come by, require more time and skill to finish, and you need to have proven yourself (by doing a lot of jobs). The highest reward that I saw from Prajwal Karki and the job title is, “Voice Recording – Native Austrian German”.
Income Range
The study done by thehustle.co shows that the average Turker (Amazon Mechanical Turk Worker) earns just $2/hr and only 4% earn more than $7.25/hr
Who is this for?
This is best for students who needs an extra allowance. It is also good for people who are in between job who feels uncomfortable and useless when not doing anything. This is also a good option for retired people who wants to do something during the day.
I believe that Mturk will not be attractive to those who are already getting paid well since the return is so low. However, I believe this can be attractive for those who are workaholic and feels uncomfortable being idle.
How to become one?
Becoming a Turker is easy. Simple go to https://www.mturk.com/ and register. Then start choosing HITs to do.
2. Amazon Trade-In
What is Amazon Mechanical Trade-In?
Amazon defines Amazon Mechanical Turk (Mturk) as
[a program] that allows customers to receive an Amazon.com Gift Card in exchange for thousands of eligible items including Amazon Devices, cell phones, video games, and more. Some trade-ins may also be eligible for a limited-time, promotional credit off of a new qualifying Amazon Device. The process is easy and convenient with an immediate offer and free shipping.
What to expect?
As with any other trade-in programs, the Amazon trade-in program is not really a reliable and sustainable income stream because the payout is really small.
For example,
Right now, LG V60 ThinQ which has an MSRP of US$600 only has a trade-in value of US$201. Another example is Switch Lite which only has a trade-in value of US$67.70, way less than its MSRP of $198
Income Range
If the reason why you are reading this article is to find ways to create side-income streams, then I’ll be honest that the Amazon Trade-In program is not a good option.
Amazon Trade-In Program is great for those of you who are short on cash and you have electronics laying around and you know that they will never be used again.
A strategy that I could think of where you can take advantage of the program is by finding and buying electronics on online marketplaces such as eBay, Facebook, and Craig’s list the trading it on Amazon. Just be sure that the prices of the item that you will buy are smaller than the trade-in value.
Who is Amazon Trade-In Program For?
This is perfect for those who wants to sell used electronics quickly and hassle-free.
How to use Amazon Trade-In?
First, you have to have an Amazon account. Once you do, just log in and type, “trade-in” on the search bar.
Then, click the “trade-in” result. Here is the link if you are having a hard time finding it in Amazon: Amazon Trade-In Program.
Once inside the Amazon Trade-In, you will have the chance to select the item you have for trade-in. Choose the item then follow the instructions to ship it.
Alternatives
Listing your electronics on eBay, and Facebook marketplaces is a great alternative.
However, expect that it will not be as easy as sending your electronics to Amazon.
You will have to worry about listing your product, packing and shipping it, and possible customer service.
If you have no problem with that, then great! Profit is much higher using this method.
For more info about selling on eBay, please visit “Step by Step Guide for First Time eBay Sellers?”
So far, the first two ways to make money on Amazon that I shared with you seem to be trash and not really a viable option for a lucrative and sustainable income source. Don’t worry. Things will get better from here on out.
3. Amazon Affiliate
The first very lucrative way to make money on Amazon that I want to introduce to you is becoming an Amazon Affiliate Marketer through Amazon Associates.
What is Amazon Affiliate?
The first legit side-hustle you can do with Amazon is promoting their products as an affiliate marketer using Amazon Associates! (P.S. If you have no idea what affiliate marketing is, you can read my blog, “What is Affiliate Marketing and How Does it Work?” to get you on track.
Amazon defines Amazon Associates as
[a program that] helps content creators, publishers and bloggers monetize their traffic.
In a nutshell, being an Amazon Affiliate Marketer is simply promoting products from Amazon using affiliate links provided by Amazon Associates. Then, you get a commission for every successful transaction you make.
What to Expect
Becoming a successful Amazon Affiliate is not easy. It will take a lot of work in the beginning to set up your platform (blog, vlog, social media). At times, you will feel it is a dumb idea to do because you put work day in, day out but won’t see any result. However, once the side-hustle, gets going – it will GET going.
Becoming an Amazon Affiliate is like making a snowball. At first it is small and because of its size, you will need extra effort to roll it on the snow to make. However, as it gets bigger, the snowball picks up more snow as it rolls, thus making it bigger becomes easier.
Income Range
I am excited to let you know that the income range for Amazon affiliate marketers is somewhere in between Earth to the moon! Yes, it is a bit of an exaggeration but the truth is NOT far from it.
Some Amazon affiliate marketers make just a few dollars per month while there are also others who earn 5-digit income. One’s income generally depends on the niche they are in, the traffic to their platform (blog, vlog, or social media), how much of their traffic converts to a buying customer, and the commission rate of the item.
Therefore, as a beginner, expect to do all work and no party, but as your affiliate marketing side-hustle gets traction you can expect to party more!
How to become one?
First, you need to create a website. Then you need to register to Amazon Associates and follow the instructions. Next, you need to create contents that are relevant to the Amazon product that you will be promoting and make a call to action to buy the product using the links you have provided. Finally, promote your articles!
4. Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing
If you are more on the creative side and love writing, then you can become a self-published author through Amazon’s kindle direct publishing.
What is Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing?
According to Wikipedia, Kindle Direct Publishing is,
Amazon.com‘s e-book self-publishing platform launched in November 2007, concurrently with the first Amazon Kindle device. Amazon launched Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP), originally called Digital Text Platform, for authors and publishers to independently publish their books directly to the Kindle Store.
What to Expect?
Don’t expect to become a millionaire overnight. Even J.K. Rowling took years to become wealthy. Also, being a self-published author means you will have to put in a lot of work, i.e. writing and marketing your book. You will also most likely going to spend money (hiring someone to do your book cover, proofread your book, etc.
The good thing about doing it with Amazon is Amazon has already a platform, Amazon Kindle, and it has a big audience to give your book the best shot to be known and bought.
Income Range
Let us start with the best case scenario. According to thebalancesmb.com, Adam Croft was able to make $1.4 million in 2016. Croft started his mystery novel writing career back in 2011.
Ayt, $1.4 million in just 5 years is an awesome achievement, but many of you will probably ask, “what about me who is just a mere mortal, how much can I expect”? Well, it depends on how much you are selling your book for and it depends what royalty option you will choose.
There are 2 Royalty Option to choose from. First option will give you 35% royalty while the second one will give you 70%.
So if you choose the 35% royalty option and you are able to sell 100 books for $9.99, then you can earn $349.65 ($9.99×10*0.35). On the other hand, if you choose the 70% royalty option, then you can earn as much as $699.3 for 100 books priced at $9.99 sold.
For more information about royalty, please visit Amazon’s Kindle direct publishing.
How to Self-Publish a Book Using Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing?
Publishing a book via Kindle Direct Publishing is pretty simple.
All you really need to do is register on their site (Kindle Direct Publishing). Write your book an upload it to the site!
5. Amazon Seller
Let us now talk about the best and most lucrative (also the hardest) way to earn money on Amazon.
Selling on Amazon!
What is Selling on Amazon?
Believe it or not but Amazon started as an online bookstore, but it evolves into an e-commerce website. As the biggest e-commerce website, customers can expect to find just about anything and everything on Amazon. Another interesting thing about Amazon is they are not the ones who are responsible for procuring their merchandise.
The truth is Amazon relies on 3rd party merchants for their merchandise. Amazon is not like Walmart, Target, or Costco who does the procurement, distribution, marketing, etc. Think of Amazon as a mall. They provide the space for individual store owners then they charge them for using the mall’s space.
This is good news because this provides opportunities to individuals to set-up their own online store by registering as an Amazon Seller.
2 Methods to Sell on Amazon
There are two main methods to sell on Amazon.
The first way is called fulfilled by the merchant and the other one is fulfilled by Amazon (FBA).
Basically, the main difference is sellers who opt-in on fulfilled by merchant have the responsibility to ship their own products and handle customer support for orders they get from using Amazon. On the other hand, sellers who use Amazon FBA only have the responsibility to ship their product/s to an Amazon warehouse and Amazon will do the rest.
Strategies in Selling On Amazon
Private Label
The most common way to sell on Amazon is by doing private labels. A private label is simply putting your logo on the items you sell on Amazon. The items you sell on Amazon can be your own personal/company product, something you bought from 3rd parties such as Alibaba and Aliexpress, or a handcrafted item.
Retail Arbitrage
Another way to sell on Amazon is through Retail Arbitrage. Retail Arbitrage is simply going to Walmart, Target, Costco, etc. to buy clearance or discounted items then sell it on Amazon for a full-price. As you might have thought already, the difference between bought price and sold price less amazon selling fees is the profit you get to keep.
Pro Tip #1: Amazon doesn’t allow third parties to sell most brand names, so make sure to do your research first on whether you can sell a particular brand or not before engaging in retail arbitrage
Pro Tip #2: Be sure to use Amazon’s Seller Central app. To use the app, simply open it, click the “camera” icon and take the picture of the product you are thinking to sell. The app will give you valuable information such as whether the item needs approval (for brand name products), the price of the item, and the demand for the item.
Online Arbitrage
This is similar to retail arbitrage but instead of physically going to Walmart, Target, Costco, etc. to buy the products, online arbitrage only requires you to shop online on popular online retail stores or marketplaces.
As in retail arbitrage, you find items that are discounted, buy them in bulk (if possible) then get them shipped to your address. If you are doing fulfilled-by-merchant, then the next step would be to create a listing on Amazon and ship your product when you receive an order. If you are doing fulfilled by Amazon, ship your product to an Amazon fulfillment center, list your product on Amazon, and wait for a payout.
Similar to retail arbitrage, make sure the item that you will sell doesn’t require approval, and use the Amazon Seller Central app to find out important details about the product.
What to Expect
You can earn 6 digit figure on this business, but there are lots of work that needs to be done here.
For example, you need to do product research to ensure you are selling “hot items”. You also need to know where to source your products. Then, you need to understand how to list your items so you can the maximum exposure you can possibly get. Finally, you will need to employ tactics that will help you get 4 – 5 star reviews on your products.
Of course, the return for all of these hard-work is financial freedom!
Income Range
Similar to Amazon Affiliate, sky is the limit! But…
In the beginning, you will have to use your own savings to buy products to sell. You can also expect that some of the products that you will try to sell will be a flop. That said, expect to have a negative income in the beginning.
As you learn the business, you can expect to start getting revenue, but not profit.
Eventually, you will become an experience Amazon seller and you can expect generating profit month after month.
Finally, you can scale up to further increase your profit.
How to Sell on Amazon
It is really tempting for me to say to just go to Amazon Seller Central register and start listing your merchandise, but the truth is selling on Amazon is not as simple as that.
There are lots of things that need to be done and lots of processes to go through to be profitable on Amazon.
I haven’t tried selling on Amazon, so I can’t teach you the details, but I know an online course that you can buy that will really guide you through selling on Amazon.
If you are interested, then go to uDemy.com and search ” by Theo McArthur”. I really love the course because it provides very detailed instructions on how to start and grow an Amazon Seller Business.
6. Merch By Amazon
Do you love arts and crafts? Do you like designing things? If you do, then this way of making money on Amazon might be perfect for you.
What is Merch by Amazon?
Again, Amazon defines Merch by Amazon as
a simple way for you to get started selling branded merchandise from a product page on Amazon.com. There is no risk or out-of-pocket cost to you. Simply set up your Merch by Amazon account, upload the artwork for your product, and click submit. With Merch by Amazon, you can give your players a fun, new way to interact with your brand and help take your fans to the next level.
What to Expect?
Similar to Selling on Amazon, treat this as a business. Expect that you might lose money as you in your first few months as you invest it to your business. Also expect that you will have to put a lot of work researching what designs sells, how to reach your customers, how to improve your product review,etc.
Like any other business, as soon as you overcome the initial learning curve, face and learn from many failures and gain knowledge and experience doing the business, then things will get be better. I wouldn’t say it would become an easy journey from there on out, but at least you are now equipped with tools, wisdom, and experience to take your business to the next level.
Income Rage
Like in Amazon KDP and Amazon Seller, the income range for Merch by Amazon really depends on how much work you want to put into it, and how patient you are in nurturing it.
Your income will be dependent on your product design or artwork and how you would advertise it. Basically, the more in-demand your design is and the more people see it, then the bigger your income would be.
For those who are looking for exact numbers, here is a snip of a chart that lets you know how much royalty you will get when you make a sale.
How to Sell on Merch by Amazon ?
You should know the drill by now…. To join Merch by Amazon, simply go to https://merch.amazon.com/landing, register, and follow the instructions.
If you are not tech-savvy, creating content is not your thing, creativity is beyond your league, arts and crafts is not your gifting, and selling makes you go insane, don’t lose hope.
In the following section, I will teach you ways to make money on Amazon that doesn’t require you to create a website or t-shirt arts/design, and certainly, you will not have to sell anything.
7.Amazon Flex Driver
Although Amazon is known as an online retail store, they still need employees to run the business behind the scene. That said, you can apply to Amazon as a regular employee or in this case a contractor and get paid for the service you provide.
The first job that I want to share that will make you money with Amazon is to become an Amazon Flex Driver. Amazon Flex Driver is not really an Amazon employee, rather, they are independent contractors.
What is Amazon Flex Driver?
Amazon Flex Driver is Amazon’s innovative solution to their last-mile delivery problem.
In essence, they use contractors to deliver products from their fulfillment centers to their customers’ front doors then pay them for finishing the job.
Income Range
According to Amazon, Flex Drivers in the USA earn $18-25 an hour on average. On the other hand, Flex Drivers in Canada earn $22-$27 an hour on average.
Realistically though, you have to take into account how congested the route that got assigned to you and how long it is, gas expenses, and wear and tear cost.
With all that said, Amazon Flex is probably not going to make you rich, but it is a good and convenient option to take when you are tight in cash,
How To Become an Amazon Flex Driver?
Anyone who is interested to do this gig must first download an app.
Then, drivers can choose and reserve a block through the app.
Next, they go to the Amazon fulfillment center to collect the packages they need to deliver.
Finally, they have to deliver every package within the time they are given. When they have done it, they get their pay.
8. Work From Home Employee
Amazon also offers work-from home jobs, and because of the pandemic, they doubled down on it.
Nothing much can be said here since this is basically the same as applying to any traditional job… except maybe the fact that you can do it at home using just a computer and a phone… but then again, because of COVID 19, that is now a normal thing to do.
What to Expect?
Honestly, there is nothing much to say here aside from expect it to be like a traditional job.
Income Range
Like in a traditional job, income varies depending on the skills required to do the job.
How to Apply?
Simply go to Amazon Job Posting Site and find a job that you are qualified to do.
9. Full/Part – Time Amazon Employee
Basically the same as #8. The only difference is you work on-site, doing things that you are responsible to do on top of what your boss is asking you to do.
What to Expect?
It is a traditional job. Nothing more, nothing less.
Income Range
You are in the same boat as someone who is an Amazon work-from-home employee. Your income varies depending on the skills required to do the job.
How to Apply?
To apply as a full/part-time Amazon Employee, simply go to Amazon’s Job Posting site and apply to a job you are qualified for.
Final Word
I hope this article provided a lot of value to you. Before I ask you 1 final question, please allow me to give you a quick summary of what we talked about.
9 Ways to Make Money on Amazon
- Amazon Mechanical Turk
- Amazon Trade-In Program
- Amazon Affiliate
- Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing
- Amazon Seller
- Merch by Amazon
- Amazon Flex Driver
- Work From home Employee
- Full/Part-Time Amazon Employees
As for the final question, which one (or more) of these items on the list will you try to do? Please let us know on the comment section down below.