Tag: amazon

July 26, 2021

Amazon Brand Protection

Amazon is the biggest retailer on the planet and most of their sales are not actually Amazon products but sold on behalf of other businesses using the Amazon platform and Amazon is a huge target for all sorts of scams and other types of fraud.

Amazon Brand Registry Program

This is Amazon’s way to tie brand owners more closely into Amazon and give them extra functions and services to protect and build on their brand. It is particularly useful if a product maker has multiple retailers selling their products online.

Amazon Describes The Benefits As :

It helps a brand to have control over their product listings
It ensures that the information given about a product is accurate
It helps to increase product sales
It helps protect the brand
It enhances the brand content
It helps improve efficiency
It helps to list the products without UPCs or EANs
It eases the listing of products
It helps create different product variations
It eliminates bad listings
It comes with enhanced customer support
It offers enhanced image search to match any fake logo(s) or product(s) through images

Who Qualifies to Use the Brand Register?

Sellers who sell their products under their brand name
Sellers who are manufacturers
Sellers who are actually private label brand owners
Sellers who produce white label products
Sellers who are actually distributors and who have the authority to own a trademark’s content in Amazon

If you have any experiences with these scams do let me know, by email.

July 19, 2021

Amazon Listing Hijack

This scam is nasty as it takes business from legitimate sellers and can blacken people’s names who know nothing about the scam being perpetrated using their name.

A scammer picks a high selling product on Amazon and then sets up entries on Amazon selling that same product and using copied photos and descriptions etc.

The scammers may simply duplicate the product entry on Amazon, take orders and then disappear but the most damage is caused where the scammer buys counterfeit products and sells them as if originals. The fakes, by their nature, will be inferior to the originals and complaints will lead back to the original seller whose reputation is then damaged, as well as not having made the sales.

The Amazon Buy Box

Typically, smaller companies may go to great lengths to ensure they have high quality products that no-one else sells and have put a lot of time and money into building a brand, only to see a scammer cashing in on that hard work.

Amazon has something called the Buy Box for certain products and this is where a supplier can be the ‘King’ of selling that item, but unscrupulous sellers can push in and take advantage of that on the same screen.

For some categories of products, Amazon automatically designate one seller as the default seller of a product. If a customer clicks the “Add to Cart” button, the seller that owns the Buy Box will get the sale (unless the customer specifically changes to purchase from a different seller). This is called Buy Box hijacking. Scammers selling counterfeit goods can undercut your pricing and take control of the Buy Box – killing your sales.

Their product quality is not going to be as good and they are likely to use your company details and contact details for complaints, so the result can be unhappy customers who blame you and you lose more sales.

Amazon know all about this scam and if you report an Amazon seller it will be dealt with in time. The process means you have to complain to the seller first and only if they fail to respond then Amazon will take action.

If you face this problem, start the complaint procedure with Amazon straightaway and collect all the evidence you will need.

If you have any experiences with these scams do let me know, by email.

April 25, 2020

Time-Wasters Update

The email exhorts me to update my Amazon account, as a temporary limit has been placed on it. This scam specifically wants me to update the payment method i.e. the scammer is after financial information so as to steal from me. The message is obviously a scam and if there was any doubt – it has been sent to a dead email address that cannot possibly ever have had an Amazon account.

Yet another cancer cure turns up on email. It claims to reveal the zombie outbreak that causes all chronic disease including cancer. Supposedly discovered at the Pennsylvania School of Medicine. This school does carry out cancer research and is linked with pharmaceutical companies but there they certainly have not announced any cancer cures. Just a scammer making things up as usual.

“Doctors cannot explain why this insane method passes every lab test”. The word ‘insane’ in this context tells you immediately that the message is a scam as it’s one of the scammer’s favourite words and its use is intended to work for people with a disbelief in authority. The message also claims ‘over 33.477’ people have already improved their hearing with this method. Quoting a specific number like this points to a scam as no-one knows how many people actually use any method and the phrase ’over NNNN’ means the number is made up. The message is actually claiming that an incredibly strong mineral will restore your hearing regardless of the reason for hearing loss. There are so many pointers to this being a scam that it’s amazing anyone could not spot that – but who knows?

Apparently the American government cannot believe they missed out on such an important discovery. This is another email claiming some magical way to generate electricity so you never have to pay an electric company bill again. If only it was that simple, but it isn’t. This email claims a small town in Orlando powers its homes for free and the picture what looks like electric pickup points along the side of a road. It is possible to generate electricity from cars passing over plates under the tarmac but you would need millions to power a small town and that’s not very practical as it would costs a fortune. Scammers sometimes take true stories and twist them ridiculously to con people. Don’t believe such rubbish.

A message arrives that contains around 200 lines and all of it seems to be random words in a foreign language – possible Indonesian as the word Indonesia turns up every so often in the giant word list. Other odd phrases also occur every so often such as ‘poker online’ or ‘bonuses paid’ and ‘promo bonus’. Very weird but very much a scam of some kind.

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March 2, 2020

The Amazon Business Account Scam

Amazon provides a business service called the Amazon Business Account and it is increasingly popular for people keen to spend a significant proportion of their business purchases with Amazon.

The real Amazon business account does offer free shipping, cheap prices, pay by invoice etc. and it starts at £80 per year for Amazon Business Prime – which gives the free shipping etc.

However, scammers have realised this is another target market they can go after.

Emails appear to be from Amazon and extol the virtues of opening a free business account with Amazon.

But, they are scammers looking for your login and password and payment details.

The link you click may get you to a website that looks like Amazon, but it’s a fake. Once they have your details, they can set up accounts with Amazon and lots of other retailers in your name and you will get the bills to pay.

If you want to try Amazon Business then go to the Amazon website directly – do not click on links in emails that may be from scammers.

If you have any experiences with scammers, spammers or time-waster do let me know, by email.

January 4, 2020

Time-Wasters Update

An offer of unlimited accountancy services for one monthly fee. The message is from bluehundredslynk.top which is not an accountancy domain therefore the message should be deleted. If you want professional services of any kind – do your own research and never trust unsolicited emails.

“If you or someone you know is fighting cancer, it is urgent you watch this video now” is a message from a particularly heartless scammer. The video is supposed to show you how to kill the cancer cells without needing chemotherapy or radiotherapy. There is no such method, just a nasty selfish scammer.

The next scam email is about diabetes and claims the real cause of diabetes has been found and is nothing to do with eating carbohydrates or sugar or any other food. We must watch the video before it is taken down by Big Pharma. No, we mustn’t watch videos created by scammers. Diabetes is heavily researched and answers may be found one day. But not by scammers.

Michelle Worsley sent me a message confirming our meeting on Wednesday at 11:30. A professional looking email but I’ve never heard of a Michelle Worsley so I know it’s from a scammer. Plus, the sender’s email address is noreply @turonames.net and noreply addresses are not used where you actually want a reply. It’s most likely from a scammer, testing if the email address is valid as she can sell valid ones for a higher price than untested ones.

An email from Amazon says my order number #74880 requires more information due to a mismatch in my card / billing address. The email has been spoofed to look as if from amazon but it’s a fake. I don’t have any outstanding orders with Amazon and if I did, they would know my name whereas the scammer who sent this message does not.

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May 22, 2018

The Amazon Code Scam

The Amazon code, also known as the AZ code, promises to give you the formula that will make you thousands of dollars a day in commissions in absolutely no time at all and with no experience needed.

This scam has been around for years and resurfaces every so often.

It’s about becoming an Amazon affiliate which means promoting Amazon products and earning commission on subsequent sales.

One man reports that he bought the package and it was instructions for how to be an Amazon merchant which means selling as a business on Amazon and clearly is of no use unless you already have a business selling products that could go on Amazon. Presumably this was a case of the wrong package dispatched.

Being an Amazon Affiliate

To become an Amazon affiliate, you need to apply to their affiliate program called Amazon Associates and they give affiliate links for the products you want to promote.

You then promote those products as you wish and if people buy then you get paid commission of (up to 10% of the price. You don’t actually sell the products and you don’t need stock – you’re just sending people via your affiliate link to Amazon and hoping they will buy things.

A lot of people make money this way – it’s perfectly legal and can be a good business for some.

But there’s a lot of competition and it’s not easy to make money unless you are very organized and efficient and a great Marketer.

The AZ Code claims you will make $40K a month, but even if you managed to make $40K in sales – that’s just the sales figure and the cost of the product, delivery etc. come out of that so any profit will be significantly less. To male $40K profit per month means selling huge amounts of stuff.

The sales pitch for the AZ Code contains a lot of testimonials saying how wonderful it is – but you have to question how valid these are – are they recent or many years out of date, are they genuine or paid for actors?

The AZ Code Documents (as reported by a recent purchaser)

There are four modules.

Module 1 – A Basic Introduction

Module 2 – Auto Website Building.

Automated website builders are very quick and easy to use but they produce basic website whereas if you want to stand out and actually make sales then you need something better. WORDPRESS websites are free and much better generally.

Module 3 – Traffic

Traffic means getting people to your website in large numbers. The module includes an auto traffic generator. Not recommended.

Module 4 – Start Making Money

The fantasy of making money with little to no effort grabs people’s attention but the reality is hard work is required and these products do not live up to expectations.

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