When it comes to selling on Amazon, there’s one thing that can make or break you: your inventory (or more specifically, how you manage it).
Whether it’s dealing with fluctuating order volumes, fulfillment issues, or stocking only the right amount of product, a good inventory management strategy is key to helping you achieve this goal.
It can also help you better meet demand, ensure customer satisfaction, and improve your Amazon ratings and account health—all of which can lead to more business in the long run.
“Effective inventory management is more important than ever, especially if you’re an Amazon seller. Over the past year, Amazon has introduced monthly long-term storage fees for slow-moving inventory, increased FBA fees, and launched a new Inventory Performance Index (IPI) metric.”
“The basic inventory management features available in Seller Central have also been improved. What these changes have in common is to help Amazon merchants manage their inventory more efficiently.”
1. Brightpearl
Brightpearl provides inventory, order, customer and financial management services in a single system. Brightpearl also helps sellers gain the efficiency and insights they need to accelerate growth and profits through retail accounting, multi-channel retail (online and offline), and order management software.
They also provide platforms for third-party systems to make your retail business more powerful, including eBay, Amazon.com and Shopify.
2. RestockPro
RestockPro is a cloud-based inventory management tool designed to help Amazon sellers save time when tracking inventory and shipments. Whether you are an FBA seller or manually fulfilling orders from your own warehouse, RestockPro can grow your Amazon business. You can also track all your inventory data, forecast sales, streamline operations, manage suppliers, print custom stickers, create kits, and more.
3. Forecastly
Forecastly is an FBA inventory replenishment tool that focuses on supply chain efficiency and preventing out-of-stocks. They use hard data to determine when to buy more inventory and how much to buy.
4. Skubana
Skubana manages inventory through cloud software and has successfully built a multi-channel e-commerce platform. According to Skubana, “You’re about to enter a world where you can fundamentally improve your operations and make the smartest business decisions possible.”
5. Joelister
JoeLister is the easiest and fastest way to list and fulfill your Amazon inventory on eBay. They can provide:
1. One-Click Listing - Automatically populate eBay listings with images, descriptions, and product information.
2. Quality Sync - Keep your product quantities synchronized between Amazon and eBay.
3. Automatic fulfillment - When your item sells on eBay and payment is received, Joe will automatically pass the order to Amazon for shipping, and Joe can also upload the tracking number to eBay.
6. Neatoscan
The Neatoscan service uses a barcode scanner, a PDA (portable data assistant) and a headset to let sellers determine the selling price of products on eBay or Amazon and provide inventory management tools.
7. Sellbrite
Sellbrite is one of the easiest ways for brands and retailers to list and sell their products on the world's largest online marketplace. Through a simple and intuitive interface, Sellbrite provides powerful tools and automation to streamline listings, prevent overselling, and optimize fulfillment.
8. SellerActive
SellerActive is a multi-channel listing management platform that efficiently maximizes your e-commerce product reach across marketplace giants like Amazon, eBay, and Walmart.
With SellerActive, you can:
1. Easily build a centralized product catalog, bulk upload new listings to multiple channels, and quickly resolve market issues
2. Set dynamic pricing rules using automated repricing technology to capture the Buy Box 72% of the time on average
3. Consolidate orders for easier packaging, shipping and tracking
4. With accurate reports and helpful reminders, you can view your items, sales, and orders in real time without worrying about overselling or out of stock.
With live support from our team of eCommerce experts, SellerActive can help you automate tasks, optimize your online presence, and scale your business.
9. Stitchlabs
Seamlessly sync inventory, orders, and data across all retail and wholesale channels and warehouses for profitable and scalable operations.
According to Stitchlabs, “To meet the demands of today’s connected customer, you have to have the right inventory in the right place at the right time and be able to pay for it quickly.”
Stitchlabs provides omnichannel inventory control, multichannel selling, order management, reporting and analytics, purchase orders, and operations.
10. TradeGecko
TradeGecko provides a powerful cloud-based commerce platform for small and medium-sized enterprises, and also serves B2B wholesalers, distributors and e-commerce companies, enabling them to: 1. Manage the entire supply chain ecosystem through a complete multi-channel inventory and order management platform; 2. Achieve real-time seamless integration with leading e-commerce platforms, marketplaces, accounting solutions, warehouse management and fulfillment systems; 3. Achieve highly personalized and digital wholesale through a proprietary B2B e-commerce store.
TradeGecko provides inventory and order management, B2B e-commerce, multi-channel selling, operations and integrations, reporting and analytics, and mobile applications.
11. Ecomdash
Ecomdash was designed with multi-channel sellers in mind, so if Amazon isn’t your market, or your products are spread across different sites and platforms, it could be a useful tool for you.
On the inventory side, it gives you real-time visibility into stock allocation levels across all your channels and integrates with dozens of platforms including eBay, Woo Commerce, Walmart, Magento, and even Etsy.
It also helps you manage orders across all channels, consolidate orders, pick and pack lists, shipping labels, etc., and helps you better manage third-party fulfillment.
Final points on inventory management:
Stats, Appath, and Inventory Lab Management are also popular choices, and most of them (as well as the ones listed above) offer free trials.
Often, Amazon sellers are so focused on finding new products to sell on Amazon that they often forget to maximize the profitability of their existing product groups. It is easier to increase a company's profits through proper inventory management than through new product procurement.
Effective inventory management, especially across multiple channels, will ensure that you don’t run out of stock when customers want to buy, and that cash is properly invested in products that have a market so that you can continue to convert inventory into profitable capital.