Merch By Amazon: Researching The Old School Way (Live)

About this video

In a live-style walkthrough, the creator shows his free, ‘old school’ Merch by Amazon research method using only Amazon product pages. Starting from one of his own shirts and a broad search term like ‘dog,’ he scrolls the first product page and its related-shirts and customers-also-shopped sections to brainstorm ideas, opening many related listings in new tabs. He says this old Amazon FBA-style trick reveals what customers are actually clicking on and buying. He checks each candidate for a sales rank, saying he looks for ranks below 500 as a sign of demand, and for verified-purchase reviews confirming someone bought it. Throughout, he keeps a trademark checker open and checks phrases and brands before adding an idea, noting some seemingly ordinary phrases turn out to be trademarked. When an idea passes, he copies the link into a spreadsheet for his designer to make a similar, but not pixel-for-pixel copied, shirt. He shows how one phrase like ‘rather be home with my dog’ can be sub-niched by breed, such as husky or Great Dane, to create many shirts. He cautions that lower-tier sellers need to find a test shirt that generates sales to tier up, while sellers in the 500 to 1,000 tier range can use these related-shirt ideas more directly.

Key takeaways

• Start from a single broad search or one product page and mine its related-shirts and also-shopped sections for proven design ideas at no cost.
• Only pursue ideas with a visible sales rank (he looks for below 500) and verified-purchase reviews as evidence of real demand.
• Run every phrase and brand through a trademark check before adding it to your design list, even for seemingly generic sayings.
• Save passing ideas as links in a spreadsheet for your designer, with instructions to make a different shirt, never a pixel-for-pixel copy.
• Sub-niche a winning phrase by breed, audience, or variation to expand one proven idea into many listings once your tier allows it.

Episode details: published September 22, 2017 · 10:32 long. Summary written by Self Growth Videos from the episode itself. Business results and any income figures mentioned are RJ Martinez’s own claims, shared for education — they are not typical or guaranteed.

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