Selling on Amazon is not one business. It is at least four different businesses that happen to share a checkout page, and choosing the wrong one for your situation is the most expensive mistake available to a beginner.
This guide covers the decisions in the order you actually face them: what model to run, how to set up, what it costs, how listings work, and how pricing determines whether any of it makes money.
Step 1: Pick a Business Model
Retail arbitrage. Buy discounted products in physical stores, resell on Amazon. Lowest barrier to entry, hardest to scale, because every unit requires you to physically find it. See Retail Arbitrage on Amazon.
Online arbitrage. The same idea sourced from online retailers instead of store shelves. Scales better than retail arbitrage because sourcing can be systematised, and it is where supplier price monitoring starts to matter. See our beginner's guide.
Wholesale. Buy in bulk directly from brands or distributors at trade prices, sell on existing listings. Higher capital requirement, much better margins, and the most predictable of the four. See Repricefy for wholesale.
Private label. Manufacture your own branded product and own the listing outright. No Buy Box competition, but the highest cost, the longest timeline, and the most risk concentrated in a single product.
For most people starting in 2026 with limited capital, online arbitrage or wholesale is the realistic entry point. Private label without capital is a slow way to lose the capital you do have.
Step 2: Set Up Your Seller Account
You will need a business or personal tax identity, a bank account that accepts deposits in your marketplace currency, a chargeable credit card, and a government ID for verification.
Choose the Professional plan if you expect more than about 40 sales a month. Below that, the Individual plan charges roughly 99 cents per item sold instead of a monthly fee. The maths crosses over around 40 units, and almost everyone who is serious crosses it in the first month.
Expect identity verification to take a few days. Use consistent business details across your registration, your bank, and your utility documents — mismatches are the most common cause of verification delays.
Step 3: Understand What Amazon Actually Charges
This is where new sellers lose money without noticing, so be precise about it.
- Referral fee — a percentage of the total sale price, typically 8 to 15 percent by category. This applies to every sale regardless of fulfillment method.
- FBA fulfillment fee — a per-unit charge based on size and weight, if Amazon ships for you.
- Storage fees — monthly, by cubic foot, with sharply higher rates in Q4 and long-term surcharges for aged inventory.
- Returns processing — in many categories a returned unit costs you the return handling and often the unit itself.
- Advertising — optional, but competitive categories are not really optional.
The trap is simple: a product that looks like a 30 percent margin on the sticker becomes an 8 percent margin after fees, and an 8 percent margin becomes a loss after one return. Run every product through the FBA calculator before you buy it, and read Understanding Amazon FBA Fees for the full breakdown.
Step 4: FBA or FBM
FBA means Amazon stores and ships your inventory. You get Prime eligibility, a meaningful advantage in Buy Box competition, and no packing to do. You pay fulfillment and storage fees, and your capital sits in Amazon's warehouse.
FBM means you ship it yourself. Lower fees, faster cash cycle, full control over the customer experience, and total responsibility for shipping speed. Your metrics live and die by your handling time.
You do not have to choose globally — many sellers run both, FBA for fast movers and FBM for bulky or slow items. Just be aware they compete differently for the Buy Box, which changes how you should price them. FBA vs FBM Repricing covers the pricing implications, and fulfillment types covers the mechanics.
Step 5: Find Products Worth Selling
The screening criteria that matter:
- Margin after all fees, not margin on the sticker price. Target 20 percent or better.
- Sales velocity — a product with a Best Sellers Rank in the low hundreds of thousands in a large category moves; one in the millions does not.
- Competition depth — a listing with 25 sellers will be a price war. Three to eight is workable.
- No brand gating — check you can actually list on the ASIN before you buy inventory.
- Restriction risk — avoid hazmat, oversized, and heavily counterfeited categories while you learn.
What to Sell on Amazon works through the research process in detail.
Step 6: Create Listings That Convert
On existing ASINs, you are adding an offer, not creating a page — so your competition is on price, fulfillment, and seller metrics rather than on copy.
When you do own the listing, the levers are: a title that leads with the product and its key attribute, images on white backgrounds with at least one scale reference, bullet points that answer objections rather than list specifications, and a backend search terms field filled with the synonyms your title could not fit.
Step 7: Win the Buy Box
Roughly 80 percent or more of Amazon sales go through the Buy Box. If you share a listing and you do not hold it, you are essentially invisible.
The factors that decide it:
- Landed price — item price plus shipping, not item price alone
- Fulfillment method — FBA and Seller-Fulfilled Prime carry real weight
- Seller metrics — Order Defect Rate, late shipment rate, cancellation rate
- Stock availability — you cannot win the box on an item you cannot ship
- Shipping speed — measured, not promised
Read How the Amazon Buy Box Algorithm Works and 5 Buy Box Strategies That Actually Work, or check a live listing with the Buy Box checker.
Step 8: Price It, Then Stop Pricing It By Hand
Manual pricing works for about 20 listings. After that, competitor prices move faster than you can respond, and every hour you spend responding is an hour not spent sourcing.
Two things need to be automatic:
A floor price on every listing, calculated from your true landed cost plus fees plus a minimum margin. This is the guardrail that makes automation safe.
A repricing strategy that adjusts within your floor and ceiling as competitors move. Start simple and rule-based, so you can explain every price you charge.
If your costs come from suppliers whose prices change, add a third: supplier monitoring, so your floor updates when your cost does and your listing goes to zero quantity when your source runs out. That combination is the difference between a hobby and an operation.
The First-Year Mistakes
Pricing on sticker margin. Fees turn a 30 percent product into an 8 percent product. Calculate before buying.
No floor price. The single most expensive omission available. Everything else is recoverable.
Selling stock you cannot get. Cancellations damage account health more than most beginners expect.
Scaling before the process works. A hundred listings you cannot monitor is worse than twenty you can.
Frequently Asked Questions
How much does it cost to start selling on Amazon?
The Professional selling plan is about 40 dollars a month, and Amazon takes a referral fee of roughly 8 to 15 percent on each sale. Beyond that your main cost is inventory, which for arbitrage or wholesale usually means a few hundred to a few thousand dollars to start.
Which is better for beginners, FBA or FBM?
FBA is simpler operationally and makes the Buy Box easier to win, but it adds fulfillment and storage fees and ties up capital in shipped inventory. FBM gives you lower fees and tighter cash flow control but makes you responsible for shipping speed and customer service.
How long before an Amazon business becomes profitable?
Most sellers who stay consistent see reliable profit somewhere between month three and month six. The first months are spent learning which products carry real margin after fees and building the seller metrics that qualify you for the Buy Box.
Do I need an LLC to sell on Amazon?
No. Amazon accepts sole proprietors. Many sellers form an LLC later for liability and tax reasons, but it is not a requirement to register or to sell.
What is the Buy Box and why does it matter?
The Buy Box is the Add to Cart box on a product page, and the seller who holds it receives the overwhelming majority of that listing's sales. On shared listings, winning it is essentially the difference between selling and not selling.
Repricefy is free for your first 25 listings, including supplier monitoring and automated repricing with floor protection. Start free or read the getting started guide.