#619 – From War Stories to Amazon Strategies

Imagine transitioning from a life on the battlefield to thriving in the world of e-commerce. That’s the remarkable journey of our guest, Andy Ackroyd, who shares his life’s extraordinary path from being a young soldier in the Rhodesian Bush War to becoming a successful Amazon seller. Raised in a close-knit community in Zimbabwe, Andy’s early years were defined by outdoor adventures and the profound lessons of resilience learned amidst warfare. His gripping tales of survival and fortitude during the war provide a powerful backdrop to his unexpected foray into the world of Amazon-selling —a journey filled with both challenges and triumphs.

Our conversation with Andy uncovers his relentless adaptability as he navigated personal and professional shifts across continents—from Zimbabwe and South Africa to the Middle East and Australia. It was in Australia that his interest in Amazon and e-commerce sparked, influenced by a charismatic entrepreneur, leading him to venture into Amazon sales. Andy opens up about the trials of launching products, overcoming patent hurdles, and the importance of nurturing strong partnerships with Chinese suppliers. His story is not just about survival but about thriving amidst change and harnessing opportunities in an ever-evolving marketplace.

Listeners will gain invaluable insights into strategies for Amazon-selling success, including the effective use of tools like Helium 10 and courses like Freedom Ticket. Andy discusses the significance of monitoring key metrics, influencer marketing, and platform diversification to stay ahead of market trends. His experiences highlight the importance of personal growth, continuous learning, and the power of building meaningful relationships within the Amazon seller community. Join us as we explore Andy’s journey and draw lessons from his unique story that are both inspiring and instructive for aspiring and experienced sellers alike.

In episode 619 of the Serious Sellers Podcast, Bradley and Andy discuss:

• 00:00 – Warrior Turned Successful Amazon Seller
• 01:10 – Amazon Entrepreneur’s Childhood in Zimbabwe
• 03:05 – Rhodesian Bush War Stories
• 04:26 – How Andy Got Started On Amazon
• 13:13 – Strategies for Amazon Success
• 18:25 – Amazon Income for Travel and Growth
• 19:44 – Foreign Friendship and More Amazon Strategies
• 22:56 – Exploring International E-Commerce Platforms
• 26:16 – Invest in Yourself for Amazon Success
• 31:44 – Invest in Yourself, Nurture Relationships
• 35:29 – Full Circle Experience For Andy

Transcript

Bradley Sutton:

Today we’ve got a first-time guest who’s got some great stories, such as how, in the 1970s, he spent 10 years straight on the battlefield in a war and then he tried different careers until discovering Amazon at a time when others his age, might be, considering retirement, and now he’s a six-figure seller with over 40% profit margins. How cool is that? Pretty cool, I think. Hello everybody, and welcome to another episode of the Serious Sellers Podcast by Helium 10. I am your host, Bradley Sutton, and this is the show. That’s a completely BS-free, unscripted and unrehearsed organic conversation about serious strategies for serious sellers of any level in the e-commerce world. And today we’ve got somebody who’s here on the show for the first time, but he kind of reminds me of not just because of the beard, but in America we had for a while these commercials for Dos Equis Beer and this guy was like the most interesting man on the planet or something was the catchphrase, and I think, hearing just bits and pieces of Andy’s life, he might qualify as the most interesting man in Amazon. So, Andy, welcome to the show.

Andy:

Thanks, Bradley.

Bradley Sutton:

Now we’re going to go into your Amazon backstory and how you’ve been, you know, using Helium 10 and even listening to the original AMPM podcast for years. But you know, when we were on that trip in Bali together, you know I would hear some of your stories. I was like you know what we’ve got to get him on the podcast to talk about it. So first of all, something I don’t know where were you born?

Andy:

So I was born in the old Rhodesia which then became Zimbabwe, and I was born in a wonderful time. I was born in a time before radios and telephones, and that’s why we had two-way radios and we had like the shortwave radios and the lounge and that kind of stuff. I was actually born before television was there as well, but it was a good time and family and community were good and like we didn’t have any of the stuff that we’ve got today. So we used to spend most of our time playing outside and that kind of stuff and grew up in a really wonderful time with the bush and hunting and that sort of thing. And then in 1970, the war broke out. So the whole country basically went into a state of war, and you know, one of the controversies around that was it was always seen as a white, indigenous war, but it wasn’t. You know we had most of our troops were actually indigenous people and that war carried on for 10 years. So there was a lot of

Bradley Sutton:

By that time, you were already of age to be in the military.

Andy:

Absolutely so when you got to 18, you went to the military. You know 18, 19. So in 1970, I was actually 19 when and at that stage the war had already stepped up. So you know, we went, we were flat out for 10 years.

Bradley Sutton:

So, for 10 years you were on the battlefield.

Andy:

Absolutely. So we were either military or paramilitary. So we’d go in six weeks into the bush and then we’d come out for six weeks and go back for six weeks, but a lot of the time we never got out. You know, we’d go out for six weeks and then come back two weeks and we go back out again and that sort of thing. And it was. It was a really a tough war. Um, we saw.

Bradley Sutton:

Give me one like I’m sure we could talk. We could spend a whole hour talking about it. But what is the number one like either craziest or most notable war story you have from those 10 years?

Andy:

Well, I think you know one of the things is you get a belief. In fact, you know. So, one day we were coming back we’d gone down to get water and we were coming back from water we used to move in quite small numbers and sticks and things like that and we got ambushed by like 30 freedom fighters and like that ambush carried on for like 30 minutes. There were two of us versus 30 for like 30 minutes and they actually brought in. You know this thing was they were, they were rock of us versus 30 for like 30 minutes and they actually brought in this thing. They were rocketing us, they were motoring us the whole 10 yards and this thing actually brought in troops from another unit which came back down and actually put in stop groups. It was only five guys, but at the end of the day it had a good outcome, but one of the things was that often you got into a situation that for a reason you didn’t go out and that day something would happen to the guys you normally worked with and things like that. So that gave me a very strong belief in faith. There’s a reason why things happen in life and that can save you from bad things, or it can take you to bad things itself.

Bradley Sutton:

So then, 10 years of fighting, and then what was the outcome and what was the next stage of your life?

Andy:

After the 10 years. We were actually going to go into a full-scale like a really hard battle and things like that, and then they cancelled it at the last minute. That was Operation Quartz. They cancelled it at the last minute. We were sitting on the back of the truck so we heard Mugabe got in we thought well, we’ll still give it a chance. But within two years there was so much witch hunting going on and that kind of stuff that I’ve been good at making bad decisions. I decided to go to South Africa and not go to Australia. There was a whole lot of us sitting there saying like, where are we going to go? We go to South Africa; we’re going to go to Australia. And I was one of the stupid guys who said, like we’ve got to South Africa so I went to South Africa I went through the same. Well, I wasn’t involved in the war at that stage, because I’ve now already started to push a bit of time, but got caught up in the same, in the same sort of revolution, attitude and atrocities and that kind of stuff. And then then in 95, when the ANC came into power, I went to the Middle East so I joined an Arab company. Very hard to deal with the Arabs, but coming from a multicultural society I could actually work with those guys quite well. And I stayed with them for 10 years and I got recruited from there in 2005.

Bradley Sutton:

What were you doing there?

Andy:

I was general manager of a construction and ready mix concrete and quarrying operation and in fact before I left they put me in charge of steam flooding of the occasional oil fields with Occidental, which I had, you know, mechanical, electromechanical I didn’t have much experience in, but they just said to me that working with Occidental, like I, was probably the best option they had there. Working with a US company out of Texas, infab, in a joint venture with us, so that was a very wonderful time in this alternate of a mile, a very, very wonderful time. And then I got recruited out in 2005. I got recruited by a major material supplier here in Australia, Boral, and I came across to Boral. It took a year to actually finalize how we were going to do this because it was already putting a bit of age on me. And I came across and I joined Boral here in Australia in 2005, and this has been basically where my kids and family have grown up for the last 19 years.

Bradley Sutton:

Now, what point did e-commerce come on your radar?

Andy:

Okay, so in 2020, I had a, I opened an Alibaba account, still in Oman, and that was for commodity trading and trying to get cement in and things like that.

Bradley Sutton:

So, even though you had left there, you still like

Andy:

No, I was still there at that moment. I was still in Oman. 

Bradley Sutton:

I think you said 2020.

Andy:

Sorry, no 2000.

Bradley Sutton:

Okay, you’re testing me to see if I’m paying attention. Okay, that’s good I passed that test.

Andy:

2000. Sorry, so in 2000, before I left Oman, I actually started an Alibaba account and we were trying to sort out cementing ports and commodities.

Bradley Sutton:

I didn’t even know Alibaba was around in those days.

Andy:

That was when they just started. They just started in 2000. They just started in 2000. And then I started on Amazon in 2017. There was a guy, Adam Hudson, here in Australia who went and told people like you can sell anything on Amazon, you’ll become rich, and I think you’ve seen Adam, before you’ve got a smile which is like this wide, hundreds of teeth, and he was convincing everybody that this was the greatest thing since bubblegum. He actually got 10,000 people joined his group, so absolutely massive.

Bradley Sutton:

What was your first product so 2017? What was your first product?

Andy:

So, I actually launched in 2018 with my brother-in-law in Oman, so he was still in Oman. He was still in Oman. I went over there to catch up with him and we launched our first product, which was a key folder, and it was doing really well. Then he got hit with a patent and they closed him down. He wasn’t quick enough on his feet and they closed him down and he never. He actually never went back into amazon again. And then I launched. Originally my first plan to launch was in sort of early to mid 2019. And then my supplier I wanted my product had to be stainless steel and top corrosion resistant for a million environment and after all the samples were made and everything else, he said I can’t do it. I’m going to do it in mild steel because you’re not a big enough customer and I don’t want to be changing materials and a thousand things. He said well, we can’t work together. And I put a request for quote out an RFQ, and a trading company came back to me and they said to me look, we are a manufacturer, we can make this. I said you’re not a manufacturer, but you know what I really need a good partner in China that I can work with. And this is this is something, uh Guangxi, which is so important. I built a relationship with those guys and we’ve been manufacturing together for the last four years with absolutely no problems and really, really good.

Bradley Sutton:

And then you went on a separate account like this is just by yourself now, without your brother-in-law.

Andy:

Yeah, no, I went without my brother-in-law. I gave him the idea for the first one. I said to him do you want to join venture? He said, no, I want to do it on my own. I said, okay, do it on your own. So that was probably quite fortunate for me.

Bradley Sutton:

Yeah, there you go. What was your best year of sales in the last looks like you’ve been selling for six years?

Andy:

$140,000 4 years.

Bradley Sutton:

Which year was that?

Andy:

That was last year this year I was, oh, so you know, in 2021, so I started in 2020. In 21, I started my very strong relationship with Tim Jordan, and that was in the days of Centurion League, and I followed his and your idea of blue ocean not going over the top, not putting yourself into heavy debt, and going in and making good margins with what Tim called his Cessna ideas. Go for smaller products and just go in a comfort zone, make yourself a good set of money and things like that. And this, of course, is exactly what you taught on Project X, this is exactly what you taught on the Maldives honeymoon, and this is one of the greatest things that we’ve got out. There is you know, people, gurus today, so-called gurus today are pushing it. Get yourself a million-dollar business, get yourself deep in debt, fight in the blood, get in the shark waters and everything else, and then sell it for a 7X. You know well, guess what that’s gone, and some people manage it. But if they haven’t got really strong business acumen at some stage, they go into a very high risk profile, and I’ve seen a lot of those guys like skyrocket and come down so sure. So I actually I actually joined Helium 10 a week before you did SSP 1.

Bradley Sutton:

Oh yeah, Now you’re episode 600, and I’m not sure what this is. Like 615, 616 or something like. That is what it’s going to be, and so you were a week before my very first episode.

Andy:

Okay, and I remember your very first episode with Manny and the handover and that kind of stuff. And you know, during that period I was spending an hour traveling to work and an hour traveling home and I used to spend that hour listening to one episode and I used to spend a traveling home listening to another one and when I got to the end of them, I start all over again listening to them all over again. So that was my, my travel time was on.

Bradley Sutton:

So this was before you even launched your first product then, or .

Andy:

This was just after, so I launched in 2020. And this was in 2021.

Bradley Sutton:

Now going back to your sales. What kind of profit margins do you have? 

Andy:

So I’m sitting like 45%.  

Bradley Sutton:

Oh, good grief. Even now?

Andy:

Yeah, even now. Even now still. Even now.

Bradley Sutton:

So that’s after PPC, after shipping and all that stuff.

Andy:

Absolutely so. Because I’m in a good niche, my PPC costs are really low. So, absolutely so, because I’m in a good niche, my PPC costs are really low. So I sit normally with PPC costs around 11, 12% and that’s ACoS which brings me back to TACoS of around about 6% or 7%, because I’m happy to actually get that real estate and pay a little bit extra to have sponsored where I could actually be just running organic. So I run sponsored organic. I’m not really worried about the predator effect or anything like that, I’m just happy that I can keep it like that and I can still retain, you know, 28%, 30% of market share in all the time and in really good times when it’s a fishing product, say two season off, in very good times then I’ll push that up to like 50%, 55% and things like that. And I’m looking at, I’m looking at doing some influencer stuff as well to try and see if I can, if I can push that up.

Bradley Sutton:

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Andy:

So I always, my daily routine is I get on to Helium 10 every evening at 5 o’clock my time, which is midnight your time and I go through and I check my sales and I check how I’m doing in terms of my P&L, which I use your P&L in there, you know, and I have a look once a week. I go into Keyword Tracker not into keyword tracker into Market Tracker and I see where I’m sitting in the market yeah, Market Tracker and I see where I’m sitting in the market, yeah. And then the other thing which I always used to do and I dropped it for four months and it caused me a lot of pain was I would go into my main keywords, see what’s happening on there. Where am I sitting in terms of my main keywords, who else is in there, what’s going on? So that’s your absolute footprint of what the customers see. So you can you know that really tells you exactly what’s going on, and I didn’t do that for a couple of months. So we came through normally Christmas time. We’re at the slow part. We start coming up in January, February. January, February was a bit slow. March was still a bit slow. I was like what’s going on here? I got on there and I found somebody had gone in there. Now, one of the issues that I had, I got closed down. My brother-in-law got closed down on a patent I got. I put a provisional patent in and I checked for patents when I did my product there was a patent in process and I got closed down as well. But I spoke to the owner of the patent. I tried to get the lawyers involved with during COVID. Couldn’t find, couldn’t get the lawyers to help. Got hold of the owner of the patent. I said like what are we going to do? He said give me $35,000. So I’m not going to give you $35,000. I’ll give you a dollar a unit. He said okay, cool. So. I made a royalty agreement with him and off the back of that royalty agreement I had the protection from his patent. Later on he actually sold me that, that whole patent and his trademarks and everything else. And we carried on in different directions, but it’s great friends.

Bradley Sutton:

So then, is that why you’ve been kind of you’re immune to kind of like you know what other people have to deal with, with a million you know sellers and you know factories from China all trying to sell the same thing is because you’re in a patented, uh kind of niche where they couldn’t be selling your products even if they wanted to.

Andy:

Yeah, so what happened with this guy that was on there, I got onto him and I said to him guy, you’ve got 48 hours to take your product down. 48 hours went past. Nothing happened. I got onto Amazon. This is my patent number, this is the infringement. Amazon took him down within 48 hours. So then I was watching and I saw him selling on AliExpress. So this was a little bit of a long bow to pull. What I did is I put an AliExpress order from the US to him and said you know what you’re doing it again and I’ll take you down on Alibaba. And, as I say, it was a bit of a long boat to pull because he was selling it in China, so someone from the US bought it. It would be a fight, item by item, but he said okay and he took it down. And then what I did is I bought all his stock off him for like 50% of what I would normally be paying for it. So, I actually picked up all that stock. So I don’t pay a lot for my stock because of the relationship I’ve got with that trading company in China, and I mean like these guys go the distance. I can get onto them and say, listen, I need you guys to pack me  2,000 units this week, and they’ll. They’ll get wobbly at the knees about it, but they’ll pack and they’ll get it out and they’ll shut out and I know there’s not much money in what they’re charging me because I pay them such a little amount of it. But you know that relationship is so important and IP is really going to get so critical because with Amazon’s new prophecy about bringing Chinese sellers in on this Fulfilled by China prophecy it’s going to be massive. So people say to me look, it doesn’t matter, it’s $20. Well, guess what that $20 product is what people here are selling for $100, $140. Because they’re taking us out, they’re taking out the fulfillment costs out, they’re taking everything out.

Bradley Sutton:

Yeah, interesting.

Andy:

So that’s going to be a massive thing.

Bradley Sutton:

I’m very curious how that’s going to play out. A lot of the information that’s out there is just kind of like second, third-hand information not many things or not anything confirmed by Amazon yet. But some things don’t make sense, like some One News articles like oh yeah, sofas, they have to be $20. There’s no such thing as a $20 sofa. So obviously some of these informations are a little bit wrong. But I’m very curious as to how it’s going to play out. And then now you know with you know political climate in the United States. You know like what’s going to happen as far as more tariffs, or is there going to be something where, where companies are going to you know they’re going to take that you know that loophole where they can ship to a U S. I mean, who knows what the future is going to hold. But, like you said pretty much, if, hey, if you’ve got a patent on your stuff, like you’re kind of immune to some of this stuff. Last year, we’re talking like 40, 50, $60,000 of profit for you. Is this your main income now? Are you still working outside of Amazon? Or you consider yourself retired outside of Amazon? Or what’s your monetary situation?

Andy:

I’m still doing some consulting on the civil engineering side of stuff, so I do a bit of that, but it’s nothing major. But the thing with it is that Amazon side of things gives me the ability to travel, so I’ll be upset. So you know, give me the chance to go to Singapore, go to China, go to India with Migla, you know, China with Steven Selikoff and that kind of stuff, and really to keep, to keep growing and keep growing that knowledge base. It’s so, so important, so important.

Bradley Sutton:

So for you, Amazon wasn’t necessarily, hey, I need to be able to quit everything else I do and just rely on Amazon income. It was kind of like, hey, I need some extra income to be able to do things like traveling, and it sounds like it’s worked out for you from that goal in 

Andy:

Very well, very, very well, very well, and you know it’s helped me as well because we built a great community here in Australia. All of these things keep growing stuff out. I met you in Bali, although I knew you already, but you didn’t know me. One of the guys I worked with in in a mod he was very, very high politically and he was a sheikh within the system and a customer came to me and said I know Adil Shafari. And I contacted Adil. I said you know this guy? He said, Andy, there’s like 4 million people know Adil Shafari, but Adil Shafari only knows 100 people. So don’t worry about it. You know what I mean. But I knew you, but you didn’t know me until Bali. And then we spent time together at Bali, Bali and I flew through to come and see you in Sydney because I couldn’t let that opportunity.

Bradley Sutton:

That was so awesome that I could see you in person in your home or your now home country instead of you. Sometimes it’s funny because I see people when I meet them and I see them everywhere, but where their home is, you know like, we’ll meet up. I mean, there’s nothing wrong with that, you know, but it’s just it was nice to see you in in Australia. There, apart from having a patent, uh, it’s not like you’re still, you know, it’s not like, oh, that’s going to guarantee anybody 40%, you know, profit margin. There’s obviously things that you’re doing that you think maybe are unique or that help you keep that edge, be it on your listing optimization, your keywords, the way you manage your PPC, your branding I’m not sure. So what do you? What else can you attribute your Amazon success to, aside from, obviously, the IP and patent things?

Andy:

Well, I think the most important thing is your community. So you’ve got people that you can lean into. You’ve got people you can ask. You’ve got people that you can get together. We have every three months I organize a long lunch here at Brisbane. We get a number of people come to that long lunch. Now, the good part about that is only people that are willing to be connected and are willing to actually do the right thing. Those are the people that will come. So you don’t get flybys. You get people that are committed that will do that sort of thing. So that, to me, was pretty critical. The other thing was the big killer is PPC. If you don’t understand PPC the same as if you don’t understand finances you’re actually going to get headed to a very tough place very quickly because it can absolutely take. We used to say in the old days they used to say 30% for you, 30% for the supplier and 30% for Amazon. Well, what it really turned into is 30% for Amazon, 30% for PPC, 30% for the supplier, nothing for you. So you have to be able to understand that and understand short-term pain might be long-term gain, et cetera. So PPC critical, really critical area, and I think that’s going to get tougher. You know, the Chinese in the beginning were not that good at their listings, but a couple of things have happened. The one is they started to drift to using American agencies to build their listings together and there was a definite step change on that. And then the second thing is now, with AI, they’re actually stepping it up on AI as well and they’ve got access to everything and their agencies now are getting pretty good at pushing those listings together, so that’s no longer a massive advantage that we always had before.

Bradley Sutton:

Are you doing other platforms other than Amazon USA? I know? Are you doing other Amazons or Walmarts or TikTok? I know a lot of these you. You can’t even if you’re a foreigner, but I’m not sure if you’ve found any ways to sell on some of these other platforms.

Andy:

Well, these are projects which I’ve got to go back into. As they loosen up, I think it’s going to get easier. TikTok shop, of course, is regional, unless you are Chinese, in which case it’s international. So because they don’t really have a region to sell, they’re selling out of these. So TikTok shop, I think, is going to be something which is going to probably be good going into the future. Australia, because it’s a small market, is very, very hard, especially if you’re niched. If you’re selling something like Pampers or something like that, you could probably do pretty well at it, but if you’re something small, niche, specialized, pretty difficult to do. On that I’m looking at getting myself smarter in terms of Shopify because I think, going into the future, we do need to be able to diversify. So get smart on Shopify and then build another brand around Shopify.

Bradley Sutton:

Are you selling in Australian marketplaces at all?

Andy:

I tried selling in an Australian marketplace in 21 and it didn’t work and I’m trying again now in 24. But I’m going to have to go hard on influencer marketing because one of the issues we’ve got here in Australia is my product is something which you know in the US like fishermen don’t like it. Fisheries here will like it, fishermen don’t like it, so it’s going to get into it. You should find something down the line and so I’ll have to do it through influencer marketing and things like that. But I mean, the US has been really good to me. Australia has been a little bit dry, so so we’ll see how we go but you know, I’ve got to, I’ve also got to go and diversify and do more stuff.

Bradley Sutton:

Yeah, that was. My next question is how many SKUs are you selling now and like, do you have a cadence of you? Try and launch a new one a year or you haven’t launched one in a while?

Andy:

I’m only selling three at the moment, you know, because I didn’t need it, but I think I’ve got it now that you know I need to go wider. But you know, the good part about it is, like, you know, my family sort of look at me and my Amazon business as being, like, you know, some kind of drug dealer or something like that. You know, you know one of these in tripping years. You know what are these guys up to? Things like this. You know, like, like it’s not. It’s not quite as bad as that but they don’t watch what I’m doing or follow what I’m doing, anything else, you know. But if I, as the Australian, say, if I fell off the perch tomorrow, the family would not end up losing the family home or anything, you know, all that would happen is my inventory in China would be like scrapped, and it’s not. It’s not a massive amount of money. So I need to wider, but I need to follow that same process and that same principle. You know, the thing which worries me is, you know, friends of mine have been on the seven-figure mission and then suddenly, for some reason, their product has started to fail, either because of Chinese competitors, because of Amazon issues, because of tariffs, because of shipping issues and that kind of stuff, and they stuck with, like you know, half a million dollars worth of inventory overseas that they’re up to the eyeballs in debt with and things like that, and the whole thing is just coming down in flames. So you know, I’ve got to thank you and Kevin King, Tim Jordan. Project X, Freedom Ticket best in the world, absolutely amazing, honestly. Such a great opportunity, such a great opportunity. People say to me like, oh, we don’t want to get Helium 10. Why did we do the auto dive? You know what, if you’re starting in Amazon, you can get the startup pack and you can do Freedom Ticket. I did Freedom Ticket. It cost me $1,000.

Bradley Sutton:

That’s right In those days it was $1, dollars and that’s right. In those days it was a thousand. 

Andy:

Yep absolutely. It was worth it. It was worth a thousand dollars. I would pay that. I’d pay that a hundred times again just to get that knowledge, because that was the only one that came in that gave you from bottom to top. Most of the gurus were saying buy anything, put it on there and pay me. So, really really so good. And I mean like even yourself, your SSP update, I think about two weeks ago or three weeks ago. Honeymoon again Maldives honeymoon update, Project X 5k. You know it says these are stuff which is thing. You got it. You got to keep up to date and you got to keep growing. If you don’t do that, you’re going to be dead in the water because things are changing so quickly and when you play an Amazon sandpit, they can chuck you out of there and send you to sit in the corner very quickly. It takes a long time. Even Brandon Young got closed out for about three or four weeks and he was absolutely, absolutely wetting himself that he was never going to get it back up and going again.

Bradley Sutton:

Amazon can shut anybody down. They don’t, they don’t care.

Andy:

That’s a 30 million dollar, you know player a year. Then I mean you look at the look at some of the stuff got taken down with the review story. There were 100 million, 200 million players out of China that could close down. 

Bradley Sutton:

What’s your favorite Helium 10 tool? I know you like a lot of them.

Andy:

So I’ve got my daily stuff but the one. So my daily stuff is around profits and market tracker, but the one tool which really has been outstanding for me over the four years is Cerebro. I love Cerebro, it’s just such a good tool. You tie that back in with Blackbox and you’ve got a very, very strong opportunity to find stuff. You know, guys like Data Dive and those kind of things will tell you how to verify a product in red water, but what they don’t tell you is how do you find that product? So that’s where you know, Helium 10 really comes into its own and Cerebro, tied in with Black Box, really really counts so much. But I use it. I use my Helium 10 every day, 5 o’clock, 6 o’clock in the evening, I sit down, I go in there and I see what’s happening with my products and things like that, and it tells me and the alerts tell me man, there’s somebody around there selling your stuff or you’ve lost the buy box or something has happened. You know and also follow up. I don’t know. I don’t know where the follow up is still going, but I’m still using it and I’ve been using it for four years and it gets me good reviews and that’s really great. You know you’ve got, you’re keeping up to date in terms of AI, both on Helium 10 and in your podcasts and things like that. So you know people have said to me why don’t I go to Jungle Scout, et cetera? This is a non-negotiable for me in my life to stay with H10 because-.

Bradley Sutton:

A smart man.

Andy:

We’ve been together all these years and I don’t see any reason to break a good relationship.

Bradley Sutton:

All right. So what’s the future looking like for you? You mentioned hey. You’ve seen the need to maybe expand your product line. What else are some of your goals that you haven’t achieved yet?

Andy:

The main thing is to go wide, but also go deeper, so I need to expand my products and I also need to look at different markets. That I’ve got a stop group if anything does happen on Amazon. So that’s really where I need to go in terms of my Amazon business.

Bradley Sutton:

All right, well, next year let’s try and get you on towards the end of the year and see if you were able to launch any products and how wide you were able to go and see what’s cooking. And then anybody who’s out there at any of these events that Andy goes to pull him aside, buy him a drink and ask for some war stories or some other stories in his interesting life, or just ask him about his Amazon business, and, as you can see, he’s happy to share his knowledge.

Andy:

Yeah, it’s been a good life. It hasn’t been a good life in terms of lots of money, but it’s been a very interesting life, you know to actually go from that stage before calculators, before mobile phones, the time of party lines, where you had eight phones in a line. You pick up the phone, seven other people pick it up and listen to your conversation because they got nothing better to do and you know being able to go down buffalo and things like that. That sort of thing is absolutely magic and to go through that whole change of life that we sit with now with AI.

Bradley Sutton:

Those days are no longer. We are definitely in a different world. You never would have thought about what’s happening with AI and all these other things in those days when you didn’t even use a regular telephone.

Andy:

So you’ve come a long way and no GPS there or nothing like that.

Bradley Sutton:

So any other tips or strategies that you can share with our listeners out there?

Andy:

I just want to say to people you are the biggest asset in your business, so always invest in yourself. Yeah, you know, like it doesn’t matter the rest of it, you can lose it, but that knowledge and that experience will keep you going into your next venture. It’s never, ever lost. At 63 years of age. I did a master’s degree and my wife said to me, like are you pissed? You know why do you want to do this at this stage of your life? And I said I’m doing it because I gave the opportunity to other youngsters that were working for me and they wouldn’t take it. And they said, well, like it’s fine for you see, like it’s fine for me, so I’ll do it. And I threw. I threw nearly two years of life away, in actual fact, doing that master’s degree when people were thinking of retiring at that point in time. But always invest in yourself. Always remember the day you stop growing is the day you start dying. So always remember that. Keep up to date on AI in terms of service, grow and nurture your community, because these are the guys that will get you out of the cactus and will be your support line. There’s a saying you’re only as good as the average of your five peers. And there’s also a saying I believe it’s a Chinese saying, but that might be also an urban legend but there was a saying that if you want to travel fast, travel alone, but if you want to travel far, travel together.

Bradley Sutton:

I actually heard that. That was a South African phrase. So there you go.

Andy:

It might be, and Amazon is a serious person. Don’t go there thinking that you can. You know, my son said to me I want to do Amazon, so you’ve got to just tell me how to win. I said no, you’ve got to learn how to win. You can’t just step into Amazon and win, and that’s something which has caused so many things wrong. And always remember, as the CEO or the owner of your company, you have to act as a CEO and use those dynamics and the other big thing dealing with suppliers and other businesses. The Chinese are as frightened of us falling off the park as we are of them. They’re worried about us paying 30%, manufacturing all this stuff and you’ve just gone away and you’re not around. They need also to have that trust and confidence. So once you’re going, once your business is established, et cetera, one of the first things you need to do go over to China, break bread with these guys, establish that relationship, Guangxi, and make sure that you don’t try and go over there and act like you’re a salesman for the guy or or someone like King’s Talk to Kings. As Steven Selikoff says, go there, negotiate on a top level when they have Guangxi with you and they have the confidence in you. Guess what. Your price goes down and your payment terms. Even more critical, the payment terms extend when your payment terms extend your cash flow extends, and that is the basis of any business, absolutely. You know I went to China with Steven and it was the most amazing trip ever and you know we learned so much and I was thinking I’m going over to this like another. Africa type sort of operation. I got over there and I found out how sharp these guys are and what beautiful people. Well, I knew from the training company that I worked with for like four years these guys will do anything. You know, even when I had problems and I had, uh, you know, like IP issues and things like that, these guys would go the distance for me, they would investigate for me, they would do anything for me. But the relationship is critical. Whether it’s in India, whether it’s an American supplier, whether it’s a Chinese supplier or anything else, it’s critical. Guangxi is the word the Chinese use for business relationship and always remember that Guangxi is stronger from Chinese to Chinese. But we as foreigners can also establish that relationship but we have to treat them with respect as partners and it’s amazing. And always remember last one Serious Seller Podcast, Bradley Sutton. Keep up to date.

Bradley Sutton:

Best advice right there, I love it, I love it. Well, now you’re a part of it, something that helps you, and now you’re a part of it and helping others. Others listening on their commutes to work right now, learning from your experience. So it’s come full circle.

Andy:

Well, you know, it’s strange that, because I mean we, you know, we sit in that situation where I used to go to work and it’s like these guys are so knowledgeable and they’re so important and everything else and we’ve come that full circle. Very humbling.

Bradley Sutton:

I love it. All right. Well, thank you so much, Andy. We wish you the best and we’ll be seeing you soon.

Andy:

Awesome. Take care Bradley See you soon brother. Take care.

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• Freedom Ticket: Taught by Amazon thought leader Kevin King, get A-Z Amazon strategies and techniques for establishing and solidifying your business.
• Helium 10: 30+ software tools to boost your entire sales pipeline from product research to customer communication and Amazon refund automation. Make running a successful Amazon or Walmart business easier with better data and insights. See what our customers have to say.
• Helium 10 Chrome Extension: Verify your Amazon product idea and validate how lucrative it can be with over a dozen data metrics and profitability estimation.
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