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Couple of questions on setting up an Amazon Account
 

Just got my 4 year old account put "under review" and am starting to panic because it was just beginning to be a very nice source of income.
I bought the Amazon Ghost book and found it very helpful, but have a few of basic questions.

I have a laptop that I don't think I have ever used to access Amazon (I've only had it for a few months). Can I clean it out, change the MAC address and use at a hotspot near my house? I assume that I can't use it on my home network which utilizes a modem/router combination which if I understand correctly you can do nothing to change the MAC address on.
If the old account gets banned, I'll simply buy a new router/modem (to get a different MAC address) for the house and then access the account from the laptop at home. Names addresses, phones, emails, bank accounts are no problem for me...mainly just need a little clarification on the hardware end of it.

If I have to start from scratch, I can't wait for an account to season to the point where I can run $3-5k a month through it...so could a guy set up up several accounts using VM on a laptop and jumping from hotspot to hotspot?

Need to get back up and selling quickly...thanks

"Under Review" does not mean you are banned. Did you do anything that could get you banned? You are jumping the gun a bit. Reviews are pretty normal.

No didn't do anything...actually think even after 4 years I sold too much, too fast (because unless you really bug your buyers no one leaves feedback on Amazon unless there was a problem). Sold 30 items in the last week and only had 50 feedbacks (out of 300 sales) over a 4 year period
Had 2 A-Z claims, but it was because the PO lost a package and damaged another...I had them both insured so I simply gave refunds.

I'm just concerned because I've read that Amazon will shut you down if you are selling too much...but on a 4 year old account?

You should be fine.......as long as you didn't do violate any Amazon rules.

Doesn't matter how old the account is. It is stated in amazon's policy to put any account under review due to unusual spikes in sales. No need to worry. Just ride it out.

So how does one ever increase their volume without having a "spike" in sales.
I thought that over the last few months that things had been working their way up.

You can gradually increase sales without a review. If you suddenly have a huge SPIKE in sales, it raises a red flag with Amazon. As long as you are playing by the rules, there is nothing to worry about it. They will review and be done with it.

What is less risky...
selling 50 $25 items every 10 days or
selling 4 $250 items?

Is it the transaction numbers or dollar amount?
If my review was caused by a spike, then it definitely was the volume and not the dollar amount

Why be scared of the reviews? You're going to have to pass one sooner or later to advance to greater sales levels. But if you're just looking to pass under the radar and make some quick feedback, selling a bunch of small items is the way to go. But you need to aggressively pursue feedback, provide quality product, or it's just another chance for a neutral or negative to offset the couple positives you will get. Lose some money on a couple sales if necessary. Building feedback is what you need, and a 20-30 dollar investment is worth it.

I guess from what I've been reading the reviews are a good thing and necessary for increasing your volume and velocity. Needless to say I'll be happy when it is over and I don't have to worry and can also rev up my sales.
Unfortunately it is so difficult to get feedback on Amazon as compared to ebay. I think on the new stealth acct I set up I will sell a couple of dozen loss leaders to get a good start

I don't think the review itself is a good thing. It's an evil concocted by Amazon, but you will need to pass it. I firmly believe that selling a couple cheap books on my account helped it achieve smooth sailing so far.

Dogfaceboy, I am in the same boat. I sold a new diet book like hot cakes. I have sold on Amazon five years and got suspended. I was told my feedback to sales ratio was off. There is a feedback letter someone on the forum has posted that I have started to use. I have gotten about 10 or so feedbacks from it. I don't know if they told you to get more feedback. This happened to me once before and I was reinstated after writing a plan of action to the top dog-Jeff Bezos. Here is the address jeff@amazon.com. I am still waiting, almost a month now. Plan on going stealth soon if I don't hear. Best of luck.
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I will go stealth before I write an action plan and such.
I jumped through all of the ebay hoops years ago before finding this forum and never got anywhere.
Since then I've set up about 10 stealth ebay accts running over 3 years and no issues with any of them related to the old accounts

Amazon
 

Good to hear that. AmazonGhost says Amazon is much harder to get back on. I am tired of waiting to hear back. I have so much inventory not moving.

It's almost a good thing that it happened to me when it did, because later the same day I was going to $500 of stuff to sell on the account. Guess I could sell it on ebay, but for some reason the stuff I'm selling sells faster and for more money on Amazon

Yes, I sell much more on Amazon too. Have you tried a new account yet. I am almost ready. Just trying to figure how to do the credit card. Also, wondering about the what will happen with the new tax law. I read on the seller forum that they will be asking for ss numbers soon.

I have the ability to get several different cards, just a matter of knowing what will work...might even pick up a couple of them just in case one doesn't work. As for ss#, who knows? That is something that has been discussed for a couple of years for Paypal. I'm not going to worry about it now. I'm sure when it happens there will be a workaround like FEIN number or something else.