E358: The Ugly Side of Amazon with Steven Pope

As e-commerce business owners, much of our livelihoods depend on Amazon. However, in this episode, Steven Pope and I bite the hand that feeds us as we unpack the ugly side of Amazon from a seller's standpoint.  Steven runs My Amazon Guy, a Seller Central Consulting Agency based in Georgia that helps sellers grow their Amazon businesses. He also hosts an awesome podcast and a YouTube channel. Today we uncover the ugly side of the Bezos empire, from its growing power over third-party sellers, the black hat activities that could affect your product listings, to Amazon workers having to pee into bottles to save time. We also talk about some big changes we think Amazon will be making over the next couple of years and things you can do to safeguard your business.  Timestamps  About Steven and his My Amazon Guy Podcast - 02:29 The evil side of Amazon - 3:38 Some big changes we think are coming to Amazon in 2021 and 2022 - 8:18 The ugliness of black hat attacks on sellers - 10:30 What you need to do to protect your business - 20:16 How Amazon seller support has degraded over the years - 22:20 Our culture problem with big business - 29:07 How automation threatens employment - 30:06 The problem of big business and big government being in bed with each other - 36:08 Why it's important to diversify where you sell - 41:11 Why I've lost confidence in Amazon as a consumer - 43:47 Our advice to ecommerce sellers - 46:30 I'd like to thank Steven for coming on the show. If you're interested in boosting your traffic and optimizing your conversion rates, make sure to check out myamazonguy.com.  You can find Sharon Even's video on having her ASINs taken down due to black hat attacks here. News article on fake Amazon reviews:Amazon is filled with fake reviews and it's getting harder to spot them Also, EcomCrew is holding a free public webinar on January 21 at 10 AM (PST), where we'll be sharing a tried-and-true roadmap for turning your leads into actual buyers. Don't forget to leave us a review over on iTunes if you like this episode, and be sure to let us know which ugly aspect of Amazon you find most disturbing. Happy selling!