hey what's up life masters this is
Stefan James from project life mastery
and I'm here right now with my beautiful
fiance Tatyana
and today we're gonna share with you how
we first found our first products on
Amazon that we started selling that
ended up making us around ten thousand
dollars a month so if you're watching
this and you're a brand-new seller
you're looking to get started selling on
Amazon we know what it's like to be at
that beginner phase we know what it's
like to be a little bit nervous or
anxious or that unknown or that
uncertainty or that excitement that you
might have to first launch that product
so we want to share with you our
experiences what we went through to find
our first products and even beyond that
with their second products their
products and fourth products and beyond
that so that way we can share our
stories and maybe help you guys with
that phase of what you might be in right
now what you can expect and maybe our
experiences can help benefit you
so you want to go first yeah sure so I
will I will mention first that one of we
first started selling on Amazon there we
didn't use tools like jungle Scout or
helium tan or all those tools that help
you save time during the product
research phase so we did it all manually
the hard way not recommended the way
where you can have human errors when
you're calculating using your calculator
and it's just those tools are gonna save
you a lot of time and be much more
accurate when you do your product
started my business when I first okay my
first product how did I find my first
product well I went through a course
called the amazing side machine we talk
about it a lot and in that course they
instructed me as my homework to come up
with a list of 10 to 15 products viable
products options that I would be
interested in private labeling so I did
that I came up with my list and you went
just to kind of clarify to when you
first started this did you have any
ideas around what kind of product that
you're gonna sell or were you just like
I have no idea one must sell the course
I'm going to go to the course now I did
not and it's actually an advantage to
not know what you want to sell and I'll
tell you why because a lot of people who
do start this business they go in with
an ID
yeah a fixed idea on a product that they
want to sell something that they love
they use it every day they think it's
amazing they're like wow this would be
so good online then they go and they go
and private label this product and sell
it on Amazon but guess what that was
their opinion that's not the market
place's opinion and when you're selling
on Amazon
you're what if you think a product is
great that's awesome but you have to
check in with the marketplace what do
the Amazon customers think about that
product and so oftentimes people think
they have a great opportunity but
there's no demand on Amazon and then
they fail so when you don't have a
product idea in mind it can actually be
a beneficial thing because you go in
with an open mind and open to new ideas
open to different products and so I
didn't have anything in mind in so I
just kind of made a list I didn't even
know what category I wanted to sell in I
like pets
I liked beauty I liked health and so in
what my list was I think I had 15
products but because I was on such a
tight budget I was in school I think I
was in school full-time with the yeah I
was in school full-time at that time
working as a server to make to pay for
school and did not have any any any room
any wiggle room you know just pain my
gas was stressful okay so I did not have
a lot of money to invest but I did save
$300 that I said you know what I'm going
to go for it and I'm gonna invest this
$300 aside from the course so $300 from
my initial inventory and and so out of
those 15 products most of those products
I couldn't afford because to invest in
that initial product it might be three
dollars a unit or four dollars a unit
and I didn't have that type of money so
I looked at my product list and I said
what is the cheapest product out of all
these products and there is one product
that was 20 cents unit and it was a
called a cognacs sponged they sell them
at Sephora today super popular so 20
cents unit I said okay perfect 20 cents
a unit I can get a thousand units for
$200 and then I have $100 to pay for my
air shipping perfect so I went with that
product purely because it
is the cheapest product it was all I
could afford but there was still some
demand for that product and therefore it
was a viable option at the end of the
day I wasn't really expecting much I was
just saying okay I just gonna use this
product to learn from it
because that is always a key takeaway is
to remember that this is a process this
is a learning curve once you learn it
the first time you learn from the good
the bad the ugly the mistakes the
successes and you take it with and you
implement that on your next product and
that's what helped me with my next
product making it more successful and my
third product and each product
thereafter becomes more successful
because of those experiences so I did
that I found my product launched it on
Amazon and I was making sales I started
to do well but because it is such a you
know it was selling at $10 a unit not
much potential there now when I look at
products to sell I look at what is the
potential for me to price this product
at a higher ticket is there potential
for me to increase the product price and
if you look at my products today the
waist trainers on Amazon there are waist
trainers selling for $15 and there are
waist trainers selling for $60 my
products I'm the only one who sells for
$60 but the potential for me for that
pricing variation is there and with my
first product there was no potential so
I started to make some money with that
product and once I started to pocket
some of that profit and save it for a
new product my next product because I
could have invested it back into that
product but I knew that there was just
not that much potential there and so I
was ready to move on to my second yeah
that's awesome you know share with you
guys my story as well because we
actually went through the amazement
selling machine together was back in
2014 and for me I already had experience
building my own online businesses I was
already doing project life mastery this
YouTube channel had success publishing
books on Amazon but I originally got
into it because Tatiana wanted to and we
were going through the training together
like separately but at the same time so
we both had a goal to launch a product
on Amazon
and we had a little bit of a competition
like who's gonna yeah and so she was
actually further ahead than means uh
like that motivated me that okay I got
to step up a bit I've got it put some
more work into this so that I can catch
up with her so we both kind of started
it already having full-time jobs work
businesses other responsibilities which
I know many of you guys are also in that
same situation so we just had to manage
whatever free time that we we had to put
into it but having that that like
competition was was fun too and it kind
of pushed us a bit more for me I I kind
of had an idea of a type of product that
I wanted to sell I knew I wanted to do
something around health and fitness
because at that time I was doing a
fitness competition I was either I think
like in the middle of it or finished it
I think you finished yes I think is I
just finished a fitness competition in
2014 and I was thinking about you know I
was really passionate about fitness
still am but at that time I was like
there's my whole life and I was really
thinking like what's a product that I
could sell that I could get behind and
I'd be excited for something that I use
already myself the product I was kind of
thinking before you can join TSM was a
water bottle and not a good idea like
she said to actually kind of go into it
with that thought because once I
actually went through ASM and I went
through the training and it I did the
research on it it was just not a smart
product to start with it could be a
great product for some but you know the
research that I did it just wasn't a
good one so for me I actually looked at
all the existing products that I was
using myself and so I thought about
maybe selling a supplement because I
love supplements I take a lot of
supplements there's a lot of supplements
I was using for my fitness competition a
lot of Fitness ones such as amino acids
al carnitine and CLA and a variety of
different supplements and so when I was
going through amazing selling machine
they have a criteria what they recommend
and so I just kind of followed that
criteria that they had I already had a
lot of experience with an online
business and selling on Amazon like I
said publishing books but I still wanted
to go through this with an open mind and
not allow my existing preconceived
notions and all that kind of
influence my decisions because I it was
a new business for me and I really had
to humble myself and say you know what
this is brand-new I've never done this
before
these guys are the experts so I'm gonna
trust the process that they've lived out
and and and just kind of follow that so
I made a list of 10-15 products I had a
spreadsheet of what they recommended we
didn't have jungle Scout at that time I
think jungle Scout was brand new or
wasn't popular back then so we had to
make I manually went through like all
the different listings and products that
were selling these different products
that I brainstormed and maybe we should
mention also this spreadsheet that we
have s/m they provide this spreadsheet
for you and inside the spreadsheet you
have the product link yeah you have the
category all the time yes are the
selling price both of those or profit
margins all of the information you need
to know laid I would in front of you
because that's important to help you
narrow down that list and make you an
educated decision yeah so it probably
took me like two weeks as well and it
was like it can be so much faster today
with jungle Scout but back then I had to
go through all the listings and pull
their best seller ranking and the number
reviews the each product had I had to
pull all that manually kind of fill up
the spreadsheet by anyways I as I was
going through this there was some
product so that I saw that had a lot of
potential but I I thought there would be
just be a little bit harder for me to
get into as a beginner and so it's
actually more looking for a product that
didn't have as much potential like I
knew going into some of these products
it wouldn't make me as much money but
there be a there be kind of like an
easier starter product for me because I
was already thinking one step ahead as
already thinking about what would be the
next product that I'd sell after this
one what would be the third product the
fourth product and I had this vision of
having like a whole supplement brand
that would have many products so I just
kind of made a list of those products
that I would eventually sell and I just
looked at the easiest one for me to
start with because I knew I could I
could kind of like use that to launch my
second product my third product so the
product that I picked was a supplement
called l-carnitine okay l-carnitine
which is an amino acid that I was taking
every day multiple times a day actually
for
fitness competition and it helps with
fat loss and muscle recovery and just
increasing your endurance when you're
working out at the gym very simple
product just one ingredient is ya
natural product once I found that
product and I started researching
suppliers and researched it I found out
I couldn't source it from China or
outside of the US because there is some
FDA regulation and there's a little bit
more requirements for selling
supplements it can be a little bit more
tricky than other products so I had to I
had to kind of spend more time figuring
that out and learning it but I ended up
finding finding suppliers in the United
States so sourcing it from the US and I
the way that I I was like really also
thinking about this product I got to
differentiate myself somehow because
it's just the same ingredient as
everything else and and so I actually
asked all his suppliers I really wanted
to make sure it was a really quality
supplement like that's one way I could
differentiate but most customers aren't
going to know that so what I actually
had to do is I had to like interview
these suppliers and ask for like there's
certain reports and information that
they provide on how they manufacture it
and so I actually have to research
supplements quite a bit and I had a
friend in the supplement industry and I
had him kind of go through it just so I
could determine out of all these
suppliers which is the best the best
manufacturer for this which is going to
be the best highest quality one so that
was important for me and then the other
thing that I was also planning for was
like how I could stand out with the
packaging so supplements mainly stand
out through packaging so I had to have
really great packaging designed for it
and just kind of differentiated a little
bit in that way and these other things I
thought about with my listing so those
are things that I also thought about
getting him to this was just not you
know like I I really had to kind of take
a scope of the existing products and how
I could stand out in different ways and
that that first product ended up making
me up to ten thousand dollars a month
but it was very actually there's things
I learned from that I'll share with you
when I go into my second product that
helped me that I learned from that
experience so one thing I think is worth
mentioning is that
for you guys who are looking instead of
getting your first product one thing I
tell people is don't go for something
that's adjustable or topical because in
just about like these have more of a
liability risk and when you're first
starting a business you just want to
eliminate your liabilities and you just
don't want to go with in that direction
like yes maybe down the road but as an
inexperienced to Amazon seller just go
with a simple product and so I would not
recommend supplements I wouldn't
recommend skincare because topicals are
also something remember anything that
you put on your skin can get put
penetrate into your bloodstream amazon
knows that they've got really
restrictive policies around people
selling topicals so just keep it simple
the simpler the product the better so I
say like if you can get like a plastic
kids bowl a washable plastic kids bowl
you know like simple simple products
better for your first one and then like
as you have more experience then you can
yeah like for me I had more I had money
that you know most people don't have in
the first starting out and experience
with business and all that - so you've
been you know ten eight years at the
time seven years but yes yeah so yeah
like that's one thing you gotta factor
it's not that you can't but for your
first one it's not recommended and
that's why a good course can help you
and some of these categories can be a
little bit more tricky to get into now
as well compared to when we got into it
- so you also got to factor that in and
make sure that you have the right
information that's relevant to Amazon
today but yeah you know just kind of
going back to that product the main way
that I sold that was just through Amazon
ads and for ranking it for its keyword
so I was really good at knowing the
keywords for that product - I did all
the research on that and how I could
rank it on Amazon so that was also an
important thing but the product the
biggest challenge that I faced with it
was just it was very hard to
differentiate and stand out and so what
I learned from that first product even
though it made up to like 10 10k a month
at a certain point what I learned from
that helped me so much because then my
next product which was CLA conjugated
linoleic acid which is another
supplement I was taking at the time when
I researched that just had way
more potential my third product was
BCAAs branch chain amino acids which
also had more potential and then my
fourth one a testosterone booster had
way more potential because the products
before that is hard to stand out with
was like the same ingredient as everyone
else but the testosterone booster it was
like a blend so I could kind of
differentially have my own unique blend
for it which allowed me to sell it for
more money to a much higher ticket price
than I could with the other ones so you
learn from every product you learn from
every product that you do say it one
thing that you also learn is that
supplements have an expiration date
right and if you overstock your supply
on Amazon that's all going into waste
right so you have to have it make sure
you're very conscious about how much you
stock another problem the testosterone
booster there was one ingredient not
harmful for you it's a natural
ingredient but it's an ingredient that's
not banned by FDA but banned by Amazon
and so because of that one ingredient
Stephan had to remove his inventory from
Amazon he couldn't sell that product on
Amazon anymore forced me to quit my own
store you ended up being a good thing
but yeah that was yeah so that's why you
do have to do your homework you have to
make sure that you know exactly what the
ingredients are in the products that
you're sourcing and that's why it's just
you know to pick a product that doesn't
have ingredients you know pick a watt
not a water bottle but you know a simple
product that does not have ingredients
for your first product it's gonna save
you so much time and give you peace of
mind yeah
don't you want to share this my second
product so with the experience for my
first product and a little bit of extra
cash you know now I didn't have the $300
I had maybe a couple thousand or a few
thousand dollars saved up from the
profits of that first product and I
think that's important to say because I
think oftentimes a lot of people once
they start making money on Amazon they
pay themselves really quickly and it's
it's totally up to you whether or not
you want to pay yourself but if you want
to scale your business if you want to
grow your business the best thing you
can do is reinvest that money back into
the business or save that money in the
business to reinvest it into a new
product or something else within that
business so for me I reinvested all the
money from the business for I think two
years
and that was really important because
that's what helped me because I didn't
have I didn't have money I like the $300
I started with is all I had that is what
led to now me making millions of dollars
every year it was from that initial $300
investment of just reinvesting profits
reinvesting profits and so now I had at
this point a few thousand dollars saved
up in it so I said to myself okay I can
go for a higher ticket product a product
that has more potential that would help
me profit more because the higher the
ticket oftentimes the higher the profit
margins and so at that time I saw that
there is this trend going on I was very
aware that was a trend and there was
this ladies you probably know this
mascara called unique and it was this 3d
fiber lash mascara really popular at
that time no longer popular it was a
trend no longer popular now what's
poplars eyelash extensions screw the
mascara we can just give you false
eyelashes that are permanent so I saw
that trend and I said why don't I become
one of the first Amazon sellers to sell
this product because of the time unique
was one of the best selling products I
don't even know if they sold on Amazon
but they were selling for like 30 40 50
bucks for a mascara was insane and so I
said what if I could private label the
same product super high quality and sell
it for $15 and so I was taking a risk
and I was aware of that but I said I'm
gonna do this I've got this eye so I
didn't go and make a whole new list of
products I went in with the intention of
doing this product and upon doing
research I thought I discovered that yes
there is a possibility that this could
go really well and I could make a lot of
money as a possibility that's gonna go
really bad and I could lose everything
but I was willing to take that risk and
so I invested in this product the
problem with this product was that it's
a topical product and there's a
liability risk you're putting a product
so close to someone's eye potentially it
goes in the eye and if someone has a
reaction or allergic reaction they could
sue you and so now in hindsight I would
not source a product like that
especially overseas
source that product from China they had
the FDA certificates all of the
certificates they needed but still it's
sourced from another country and so I'd
recommend to people if you're gonna be
sourcing supplements ingestible x'
topicals source some in the country in
which you are going to be selling in so
if you're selling in the u.s.
marketplace source in the US if you're
selling in europe source in europe
because they're gonna have different
regulations and i was kind of naive
about that and i thought oh it it'll
it'll be fine
and so i source from china had all the
documentation it started doing really
well i think i was making over 10k a
month on amazon with that product and
great customer reviews everyone loved
the product it wasn't for everyone there
was certainly some bad reviews but the
majority people loved the product
the downfall was that that product just
like supplements expired that product if
it's stored at Amazon for too long in
not the right conditions it dries up so
after maybe a few months someone would
receive the product they'd open up the
mascara and be dry and they'd say I just
paid for this product and it doesn't
work so that I would waste some
inventory that way and then I had this
one instance where my best friend she
got an allergic reaction to the product
and her eyes went blood-red and luckily
didn't happen to any customers on Amazon
but that was all of a sudden the red
flag that it took me that instance that
moment of my friend sending a picture of
her bloody red eye where I freaked out I
said okay I don't want to sell this
anymore I don't want this liability risk
and so I basically sold out of my
inventory and Amazon and I moved on to
my third product go into it thank you
yeah just these products we don't sell
anymore you know my supplements I don't
selling anymore either and you know that
that's because I mean you could I could
still sell them you could have still
sold those but when you find a new
opportunity that's better and you're
building a brand around it so these
other products we never really built a
brand or anything around it I kind of
did a bit for it but you know like
you're making more money through you
know your now product and brand I was
more money the other things that I was
doing so you know with you know you can
actually we learn from those products to
led us to these other opportunities and
I think that's something that a lot of
people don't think about they think that
their first product has to be that
product forever and it doesn't most
often it isn't sometimes it is but most
often it isn't first products are just
like you learn from them and you find
better products as you go and then you
eventually find the one that you want to
turn into a brand a business you love
you're passionate about and that can
provide the most for you and you can
have multiple brands if you can learn to
really outsource and automate one of
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