How Do You Choose an Amazon Growth Partner for a US Launch?

Your export director has three proposals on the table. One came from a firm you met at an Amazon seller event, one from another factory owner who launched last year, and one from a message on LinkedIn. All three promise growth on Amazon US, and all three read well.

The choice matters more than the proposals let on. Whoever you pick decides which of your products cross the ocean, how much of each sale goes to Amazon's fees and ads, and whether your first shipment pays back or sits in a US warehouse. Switch partners after that shipment and you can lose a selling season.

So choose on evidence you can check. A partner worth hiring shows which products can be profitable on Amazon US and when. It names your account lead and supports its recommendations with your numbers before you sign.

Where do you find Amazon growth partners worth considering?

Amazon growth partners worth considering come from three places, Amazon's own provider directories, review sites such as Clutch, and referrals from manufacturers who have already launched in the US.

Start with Amazon. Its Service Provider Network describes itself as "a group of vetted third-party service providers", sorted into categories such as account management and advertising optimization, and the directory page lets you choose where you are based and where you want to sell. Read the fine print as well. Amazon says it "does not endorse any service provider", and you contract directly with whoever you hire. Amazon also runs country directories, and the one on Amazon's Vietnam seller site lists service firms and ad software side by side, so you'll need to tell the two apart yourself.

Clutch collects client reviews and says it verifies them. Its Amazon marketing ranking also marks its top rows as sponsored and states "We may earn a fee for some placements." Scroll past the paid rows before you treat position as quality.

Referrals carry the most weight, as long as you ask the right thing. A referrer will often say the launch went well, since few owners like to admit a poor hire. Ask instead what the first three months actually looked like, how fast problems were raised, and whether they'd hire the same firm again.

Write down where each candidate came from and what the referrer said, before the sales calls start shaping your memory.

How do you shortlist Amazon partners before the first call?

A shortlist of three Amazon partners is enough, and you reach it by cutting any firm that can't show work for brands selling into the US from outside it.

A manufacturer in Vietnam or Pakistan faces problems a US seller never meets. Your stock spends weeks at sea, payouts cross borders, and the person running your ads may sit twelve hours away from your factory. Ask each firm for one brand it has launched from outside the US and what it changed for that brand.

Look at what each firm leads with on its own site, too. A firm that sells ad management will propose ads, and one that sells product research will propose research. For a first launch you need someone who covers the whole path, from choosing products to scaling the ones that sell.

Then check how each firm states results. A strong candidate gives a starting point, a period and a ratio, such as conversion before and after over three months. A weak one shows a best-seller badge with no date.

One answer should end the conversation early. If a firm promises a sales figure by a date, cross it off. Nobody controls Amazon demand, competitor prices or your sea freight, and a guarantee is the first of several red flags in an Amazon marketing partner.

Keep the three firms that pass, and send each one the same short brief about your products and your current US buyers.

How do you compare Amazon partners before you sign?

Comparing Amazon partners works best on a scorecard that you fill in after every call, so the smoothest presentation doesn't win by default. Give the five rows below equal weight. When psychologist Robyn Dawes reviewed decades of prediction studies in a 1979 paper in American Psychologist, he found that even simple scoring rules beat expert intuition, and that equal weighting is "quite robust". People, he wrote, are "much better at selecting and coding information than they are at integrating it", so put your effort into choosing the rows.

Score each row from 1 to 5 and add them up, for a total out of 25. A firm that scores high on proof and low on the profit plan has told you more about its past clients than about your products. When two finalists land within a few points of each other, let the audit decide.

Spend your board's time agreeing what a 5 looks like on each row, before the first call. One check sits outside the scores. If a firm wants your Seller Central account or your brand registered in its own name, cross it off whatever it scores, because both should stay with you.

Price sits outside the scorecard on purpose. Compare fees only between proposals that cover the same work, or the cheapest one will look best because it leaves half the work to you.

Watch how each firm talks about ads. Many proposals lead with ACoS, which Amazon Ads defines as ad spend divided by ad revenue. A product can hit a good ACoS and still lose money once Amazon takes its cut, because referral fees vary by category, 15% in Home and Kitchen for example, before fulfillment, freight and duties.

Put the same questions to an Amazon growth partner to each finalist, then score them the same day while the answers are fresh.

Why should an audit be the final test before you sign?

An audit of your own catalog is the final test because it shows how a partner reasons with your products and costs, which no pitch deck can show you.

Send each finalist the same extract, a list of products with factory costs and the target price you have in mind. What comes back tells you a great deal. A useful audit names the products to launch first, the price that leaves a margin after Amazon's fees, the P&L for each product with its break-even month, and a plan for the first three months. You can see what belongs in one, and what the first 90 days should look like, in what an Amazon launch audit should show.

Pay attention to what each firm advises against. A partner that tells you to hold back a product, because the niche is too small or the fee tier eats the margin, is protecting your money before it has earned a cent from you.

Ask for the delivery date in writing, and make sure you keep the document whether or not you hire the firm.

What should your own team expect to do?

Your own team should expect to own the account and the product, while the partner runs the market work. Agreeing that split in writing is part of choosing well.

In the split we use for our Amazon launch services, the brand registers its Seller Central account, the seller account it trades through on Amazon, makes and packs the product, and ships stock to FBA. FBA, short for Fulfillment by Amazon, means Amazon stores your stock in its US warehouses and ships each order. We run research, listings, ads and scaling, and both sides build the P&L. From choosing the products to live listings and the first round of tuning takes about six to nine weeks.

Other firms split the work differently, and that's fine as long as nothing falls between the two teams. Freight bookings, packaging changes for US shoppers and the timing of the next production run are easy to leave without an owner, because each one sits halfway between the factory and the market.

Ask each finalist to write the split down line by line, and check that every task on it has a name next to it.

Frequently asked questions

Should we pick a partner based in our own country?

Being close helps with factory visits, language and contracts. Knowing how US shoppers buy matters at least as much, so look for a team that has both sides covered, with someone near your factory and someone who reads the US market every day.

Can Amazon help us directly instead of a partner?

Sometimes. Amazon's New Seller Success program gives a limited number of qualifying brands new to Amazon a dedicated account representative for up to 12 months, at no program cost. It is invite-only, and a brand with an active Seller Central account does not qualify. As an Amazon partner, we put qualifying brands forward and help them prepare the application. The representative helps with registration and listings, while product choice and ads still need an owner.

How long does the selection process take?

Plan on roughly a month. First calls with five or six firms fit in a week, audits from the finalists take about two more, and the decision needs a board meeting. Rushing to catch a sales season can cost more than the season brings in.

What if none of the finalists scores well?

Go back to the directories and referrals for a second round rather than settling. A weak partner on your first launch is harder to undo than a few weeks of delay, since stock, listings and ad history all carry over.