Mike Estey built a $15 million dollar Amazon FBA empire at 29 years old.
His Amazon journey started with ASM. Shortly afterward he started selling products on Amazon. Today, Mike has 15 Amazon accounts.
He sells products internationally with 22 virtual assistants full-time, 24-person full-time staff. It's fair to say that he is a super successful Amazon seller.
If you have dreams of building an Amazon FBA empire, this is an interview that you don't want to miss!
Watch the video below:
(Click here to watch on YouTube)
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Do you want to discover how to build a successful brand leveraging the power of Amazon? CLICK HERE to get my FREE training!
Mike Estey has an unbelievable Amazon FBA success story.
He started off selling products at trade shows and eventually transitioned into selling on Amazon. Within a 2-month period, he was able to build up his Amazon account to $30,000 per month in sales. In the first year, he made $80,000 per month. In his second year, $100,000 per month, and he kept doubling it every year after that.
Here is a sneak peek of my interview with Mike where we talk about his journey to building a $15 million dollar Amazon FBA empire. Let's dive in!
Can you share a little bit about your journey with Amazon?
I started selling products one-on-one when I was 18 years old. That's how I got into learning how people buy products. By doing this I got really familiar with the industry. I was a traveling salesperson that sold products at tradeshows. I did that job for eight years. If you've ever seen the movie “Up in The Air” with George Clooney, that was my life. I lived in hotels and on airplanes.
It took me eight years to figure out that the company that I was working for was taking 75% of the money, while I was only getting 25% of it. I thought that was just how it worked. Eventually, I started my own business.
I private labeled some products and started doing my own tradeshows.
However, I wasn't making any money. I had to purchase the tradeshow booth and pay for the staff and products. I was getting way less than my original 25%. In order to expand my business, I had to reinvest and keep booking more tradeshows. This was only causing me to go more into debt. That is when Amazon hit my radar. That's how I got interested in selling on Amazon in the first place.
How did you discover Amazon and how long ago was this?
This was four years ago. When I was 25, I was working at a tradeshow for the first brand that I started. I didn't do very well, which sucked because I had to pay my rent. In order to compensate for the money that I lost, I had to work at a tradeshow for a different company. At that event, a friend of mine told me about the Amazing Selling Machine. At that point, I had listed one of my products on Amazon. It was making one sale per day.
However, I did not know how to get it to make five sales per day. I didn't know anything about an Amazon Seller Central account. When I learned that there was an 8-week long extensive course that actually taught you all that stuff, I was sold. The problem was that I didn't have any money to buy ASM. I was already in debt.
I maxed out my credit card, put together some cash, and figured out how to buy the course.
When I got back to my hometown, I logged into the course and started to work on it. I had to go back to work and attend a few more tradeshows. I would stay up until 4 am studying and playing with the Amazon seller account, and then I would get up at 9 am the next morning and did it all over again.
By using the tools in the ASM course, I learned the Amazon game through trial and error. Eventually, I built my first product up to $10,000 per month by doing a lot of random things. At that moment, I knew that I had found the golden ticket. The second I learned that I could sell a product with a few button clicks on a computer while I was having coffee, I knew that I had found the golden ticket.
What motivated you to build such a successful Amazon business?
It started from a place of financial necessity because I had a lot of debt, on top of the debt that I accumulated from the ASM course. More importantly, I had the drive to be something bigger. I wanted to be a bigger man and grow. I knew that I had the capability to do great things in life.
When I worked in sales, 99% of the time I was the top salesman in the company. However, even as a top salesman you don't make much money because you are working 3-4 days per week. You cap at $50,000 per year.
What drove me to do well is that I had an interest in the Amazon business.
I immediately saw a spike in sales. For me to press buttons and make money got me really excited. If you are so interested in something that it gives you that butterfly effect, you can't do anything but think about it. That's the mentality that I've had behind pretty much all of the growth that I've experienced. This is why I worked 18 hour days. I couldn't think about watching T.V. because there were sales to be made online.
How beneficial was the ASM course for you?
Going through the ASM course opened up my eyes to the right way to find and launch a product on Amazon. A lot of creative products that I have now came from going through the first few modules of the course. I was able to modify my current product that I already had on Amazon to be better and write down the next products that I wanted to launch. From there, I learned how to optimize my listing in the correct way.
You were able to build up your first product to $10,000 per month. What was the growth that you experienced from there to get to where you are now?
This is where it got really exciting for me. In late November of 2014, I was on a month long vacation with some family. I was using a tool from a software program when I found a niche of a product. Instantly, I knew how to make the product better and hit it to a target audience in a way that nobody has ever done before.
At that point, I figured out how to put that product together from my existing supplier. I found a name for the product on the spot. Two weeks into December my product was live and it took off.
My daily sales were at $300-400 dollars.
All of a sudden my sales jumped to $1200 dollars in a short period of time. It's fair to say that my second product was way more successful than the first. For those two products, I found more tactics in order to keep growing them, which I did.
Of course, now I knew how the system worked. At this point, I launched my third product. I found a gap in the market with tons of search volume and that product took off. Since that time, I've launched a lot of unsuccessful products mixed with a lot of successful ones as well. I launched my first three products early on in the market. My first goal was to hit $100,000 per month. That's when I wanted to retire. Once I got there, I wanted to make more.
My new goal was to make $250,000 per month. That was a tough stretch for me. It took me a lot longer than I thought it would. However, I persisted through all of the problems that I experienced. I worked 7 days per week for weeks at a time. The game was fun for me because I wanted to win.
Once I started making $250,000 per month, I wanted more! I felt like a baby seller. Now the game became competing against the bigger sellers. If someone was making $500,000 per month, I was going to the do the same. It became a competition for me. After many more product launches, more advanced tactics, attending conferences, masterminds and the ASM event, eventually I hit $500,000 per month.
When I hit this mark I was exhausted, but happy.
I didn't just want to sell my business. Rather, I wanted to build an empire. I ended up merging with other companies. Today, I'm running a total of 15 Amazon accounts all over the world and multiple brands. I have 1200 SKUs available on Amazon.com websites.
What have you found to be the difference between a product that fails versus one that succeeds?
The right products are ones that fill a gap in the market. It's not like we invented them. Instead, we took something that already existed and we made it better. Those are always the most successful products. Conversely, the products that have failed are usually broad category products that applied to every single human being on planet Earth. This usually happens when we get too ambitious. That being said, some of those products that were in broad categories that we didn't expect to do well, did.
We still keep them because they are selling 20 units per day.
I always say that the better method is to get hard-hitting products. These are the ones that you put a lot of love and attention into, versus launching a thousand products and seeing which one will stick. It's actually harder and a lot more work doing this. I always suggest that you find a product that you know hasn't been done before.
Do you worry about competition?
There are so many buyers that visit Amazon. You could just throw a product on Amazon and it will always make sales. How many sales it makes is up to the quality of the product, the niche, the audience, the branding, etc. We've had some horribly designed products that still sold 5-10 units per day. In terms of competition, there are more buyers than there are sellers. I never worry about it too much.
What do you believe is the potential of Amazon?
As Amazon grows, so do my brands. That is the brilliance of it. If you've got a brand, you are riding the wave and growing alongside them. You could sell 10 units per day, without marketing, and still, watch it get up to 12-15 units per day over time.
This is because Amazon is constantly growing.
I've heard a theory that it's harder to sell on Amazon now, but it's actually the opposite. It is so much more of an opportunity now than it ever was before. A friend of mine who's been selling on Amazon since 1998 said that Amazon was a nightmare back in the day. His listing would get shut down weekly, products would be unlisted, and he would get over-billed for things.
The great news is that today, Amazon has got a lot of stuff figured out. This is why the opportunity is even bigger than it was five years ago. Amazon is making huge moves right now.
What advice would you give to someone that wants to get started selling on Amazon?
The best advice I could give someone is to prepare for a ride. You've got to really create your branding and you have to be interested in all the different parts of an Amazon business. The one thing that has allowed me to take my company to the next level has been my passion and fascination with Amazon. It's all I've ever wanted to do. Was it always fun? No, but I can always create that feeling in a heartbeat.
Think of Amazon as if it were your playground.
Go crazy and learn everything about it. Knowledge is one of the most important things in this business. You could literally spend two months only learning. That is one of the best investments you can make, even if you didn't do anything with it.
I tried to learn the Amazon game on my own, without a course. However, I soon realized that it was going to take me way too long. ASM is the only course out there that walks you through every step of how to build a profitable business selling on Amazon.
Mike Estey built a $15 million dollar Amazon FBA empire at 29 years old.
His story proves that it is still worth starting Amazon FBA in 2018. This proves the undeniable opportunities that exist on Amazon. Anything is possible, but it will require that you take a leap of faith and work your butt off in order to create the business of your wildest dreams. Don't quit until you have achieved the success that you desire. If Mike did it, so can you.
Do you want to discover how to build a successful brand leveraging the power of Amazon? CLICK HERE to get my FREE training!