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Welcome back friend!
And a big welcome to the +131 new readers this week!

Everyone wants the sexy shortcut. The loophole. The secret hack that will make a quick dollar.

But the truth? That crap does not last. If you chase black or grey hat tactics, you make money in the short term, and you get broke, or banned in the long term.

The boring stuff, the actual fundamentals, is where the real money hides. Doing things by the book. Playing it straight. Building an actual Amazon business.

It is not clickbait. It is not exciting. You are not going to trend on LinkedIn for filing your taxes right or spending hours negating keywords. But you know what is exciting? Waking up in five years with a million bucks sitting in your bank account and nobody breathing down your neck.

Head down. Do the work. Get the stuff done. The rest is noise.

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✅The Instant Value Section (IVS)✅

(aren't you glad you opened the email now?)

Huge thank you to Kevin Sanderson for sharing this week’s IVS. Getting to know Kevin has been a pleasure. He’s professional, efficient, and full of knowledge on all things Amazon. Kevin also always seems to be running a useful conference! Here’s the latest one: The Email Profit Summit (starts tomorrow)

Finding Long-Tail Keywords Slowly Eating your Margins

Ever noticed that you have a bunch of advertised keywords with a click or two when you optimize them?  Overtime, they add up, and Amazon’s reporting makes it harder to figure out which ones are slowing bleeding out your margins.

Here is what you can do… In Campaign Manager go to the Targeting tab.  Change the date range to Year to date.  Filter for 0 Orders and sort for Clicks.  Then filter for a high ACOS (ie greater than 70%) and sort by ACOS.  You will find unprofitable keywords that slipped through the cracks.

As a bonus, you can do this again by changing the date range to Lifetime.

You don't need to outrun the bear to survive (You just need to outrun the next guy)

You don't need to outrun the bear to survive. You just need to outrun the next guy.

Here's the logic: Your product might already be better than everyone else’s. Better images. Better reviews. Better price. Better CVR.

You just might not have enough traffic.

Here’s how to know:

IF you check your conversion rate for your hero keyword (use Jungle Scout or Amazon’s Search Query Performance Report) and it’s higher than the market average then your problem isn’t the product.

It's visibility.

AND IF that’s true, then all you have to do is get eyes on it. And the way to do that is with PPC.

AND IF you run PPC on that exact keyword root, and you spend enough to climb to rank 1–3, then you’re where you deserve to be.

AND IF you’re sitting at rank 1–3, and your conversion rate is still better than everyone else’s, then you don’t even need ads anymore.

Turn them off. Manually or with an automation.

Here's the interesting part: It may be profitable -- in the long run -- to spend like crazy on PPC to get up to those top spots. Said another way: It may make sense to lose money in the short term with high CPCs and high PPC spend if you can get to the top.

Why? Because your rank is going to hold. You're going to be sticky. And once you're on top, PPC doesn't need to be on.

Your rank shouldn't drop after killing ads (you have the highest conversion rate, after all).

So ask yourself this: is your problem just traffic?

Back to School!

The past two weeks have mostly been about settling into the new house. With the rainy season starting, we are still figuring out drainage and erosion control since there is no landscaping yet, and the red soil here gets everywhere.

The boys are back in school (grades 9 and 6), so we are adjusting to our new routine. The other night, they called me on the walkie-talkie, all excited, to come down to the man cave. When I got to the garage, they were pointing at a massive tarantula. I ended up finding a broken broom handle to scoot it outside.

In our old place on the 3rd floor, we never dealt with this kind of thing, but now at ground level the critters are making themselves known. Speaking of which, I still need to check the security cameras to figure out what animal keeps taking a dump in my pool every night. 💩

The Second Round of PPC Tools!

My good friend Anthony Nguyen over at Adscrafted has been quietly building an army of PPC tools. Here’s another one for you.

Meet the “Negative Finder.”

This one is pretty self-explanatory. Identifies poor-performing search terms that generate clicks but no conversions, and helps you negate them.

Enjoy!

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The Deep Dive (Premium Content)

Don’t ship this way in Q4

Don’t be like me. Last year during Q4 (which is right around the corner, by the way… are you orders in?) I shipped using this method:

LTL (Less than truckload).

Woops. Stuff took over a month to check in. Never again.

Just remember this equation.

• LTL = Cheap & Slow

• SPD (Small Parcel Delivery) = Expensive & Fast

So in Q4, when everyone is sending in inventory…

Don't make the same mistake I did.

Or at least, send in some SPD to go along with your LTL so you don't get screwed.

The Podcast is back! By the way… want a Honeymoon every year?

The podcast is back, and we kicked things off with a guest who’s an absolute GOAT in the travel hacking world. Eli The Travel Guy has helped business owners turn everyday expenses into millions of points, booked clients in business class to destinations most people only dream about, and mastered the art of luxury-for-less travel.

ICYMI: Max used Eli’s system to send his Mom to France for 3 weeks for SUUUPER cheap.

In this episode, Eli sits down with Rob to share the exact strategies, tools, and insider hacks he’s used to fly to overwater bungalows, lock in 5-star hotel stays, and plan epic family trips without breaking the bank. From the smartest credit cards to the “Honeymoon of the Year” travel philosophy, this is a masterclass in turning points into life-changing experiences.

Passport Photos: Take My Money

Sometimes people are not motivated by money. It happens everywhere, not just in Costa Rica. Sometimes I see a great opportunity and want to help someone take advantage of it, but they just don’t want it.

Last week Marsha needed a new passport photo. There was one dumpy place, Mr. TOM, but it had closed. Pretty much the only place around that did them. A friend told us the photographers at the Margaritaville Hotel down the road would do it. She WhatsApped them, and they even gave us an appointment… $25 for 10 minutes of work.

They asked how we found them, and I said a friend, Donnamarie, told us. I suggested they should post in the local Facebook groups since nobody else is offering this. They could easily clean up. Their reply: that’s not really what we want to do.

Oh. They just want to take beach photos of people on vacation, but they don’t work from 1 to 4 because it’s too hot. So every day they have a 3-hour gap, they could make $25 in ten minutes in an air-conditioned shop, and they just don’t want to. I guess passport photos are beneath them.

I suppose it’s the entrepreneur in me that notices these things. Opportunities are everywhere, but most people don’t see them, or they just don’t care.

Are you keeping your eyes open for opportunity?

• Should you register your corp in the US if you’re Canadian?

The “Burn them Down” Move

Some sellers can’t help themselves. They leave a 1-star review competitor, think they are clever, then act shocked when Amazon nukes their account.

I was talking to my friend Chris McCabe last week. Chris lives and breathes Amazon enforcement. According to him, Amazon is catching more of these “competitor reviews” than ever.

Everyone knows you will get nailed for padding your own 5-star reviews. What they miss is that Amazon treats negative reviews on competitors the same way. It does not matter if you hated the product or thought you were helping customers. You sell in the same category, which makes you biased.

Amazon does not have to dig deep to figure it out. Same category, bad timing, matching buyer account. Done. Maybe your competitor takes a hit for a week, but now you are flagged. And once you are on their radar, every future complaint looks worse.

Chris calls it self-sabotage disguised as strategy. I call it wasting your livelihood on cheap shots.

Play the long game. Make a better product. This stuff always bites you in the ass.

How was today's newsletter? Love it? Hate it? Daydreaming of sipping fresh lemonade under a straw hut? 🍋

• I loved it! ☀️☀️☀️

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To your unending happiness,

Rob & Max