Amazon Prime Day 2026 came earlier than ever, kicking off on June 23rd and lasting until the 27th.

While this should have been a long-awaited moment for Amazon sellers to experience a sales boom, what we saw from social media and various seller communities was not solely the joy of a bountiful harvest, but rather a complex mix of emotions—including helplessness, anxiety, and the difficult choice between "not competing" and "having to compete."

01 A Group of Sellers Choose "Protect Profit, Don't Join the Race"

It was only the second day of the promotion, and already a group of sellers expressed their decision to "lie flat" and maintain their profit margins. Their strategy was clear: not to sign up for official events, not to increase advertising budgets, and simply adjust prices to stabilize rankings.

"As a small seller, profit is the priority," Jack voiced the sentiment of many.

Some sellers admitted that due to fierce competition in their categories, with most peers participating in the event, their unregistered links only achieved half the usual sales volume. But they were not regretful: "A smaller amount is better than losing money for publicity," they felt. In their view, big sellers lose money to boost rankings, and the platform also prioritizes traffic for them, so it's a long-term strategy for small sellers to stay stable without losses.

This mindset was quite common during this year's Prime Day. It's evident that as the promotion period has extended to five days, many sellers have begun to reflect on the value of "losing money for publicity."

Jack stated outright: "Cyber Monday and Black Friday used to be just a one or two-day discount fun, but now the period is getting longer and longer, often lasting a week or even half a month. The time to lose money is getting longer, various costs are increasing year by year, and the traffic is not as good as before."

If sellers who did not participate in the event are "Buddhist," then those who did experienced what it's like to be in "a world of extremes."

Looking at the data, the polarization is extremely severe. A seller summarized the situation of their store:

 The top products, boosted by promotional traffic, broke through like bamboo, with sales volume tripling the usual.

Mid-tier products were in an awkward position, and even with event participation, they could only barely maintain their usual level, with growth almost negligible.

 What's more lamentable is the products below the mid-tier—those medium and lower links that usually have stable sales, saw their volume plummet from over 20 orders to single digits because they did not participate in the event.

 And the bottom products completely sank, whether they participated or not, it was difficult to change the declining trend, even more dismal than usual.

These data intuitively reflect the reality that the traffic dividends of promotions are highly concentrated in the top products. The platform seems more inclined to allocate traffic to those products that are already ranked high and have high conversion rates, while mid and lower links, even if they participate in the event, may just be running alongside, with ads burning without effect and conversions being unimpressive.

What makes everyone feel more exhausted is that even if sales have increased, profits have been greatly compressed. Some sellers said: "The main link doubled, but an inconspicuous small link increased tenfold, catching a cold." Behind this kind of "cold" surprise is the extreme pressure on prices, even at a loss.

How was the situation during Prime Day? Scan the code to join the group and chat ↓

02 Why Are Promotions Becoming More and more Flat?

"Prime Day is just sellers competing with themselves," a seller's complaint seems to pinpoint the essence. This phenomenon is particularly prominent in category products. Competitors didn't raise prices before the event, participated during the event, and those who didn't participate疯狂降价，整个市场陷入内卷。结果是单量被卷没了，利润也是负的。

This "prisoner's dilemma" makes many small and medium-sized sellers feel tired. Sign up for the event, profits are eroded, or even lose money; Do not sign up for the event, traffic is intercepted, sales decline.

What's more worrying is that Amazon's various fees - registration fees, sales commission, and the upcoming peak season storage fees - are constantly squeezing the already meager profit margins.

"The overall profit has been eroded, and it's not even as good as the profit on weekends with good traffic," this sentence expresses the pain in many sellers' hearts.

In the face of this year's Prime Day, many sellers sighed that "it's getting worse year by year". Some people think that, like domestic promotions such as 618 and Double 11, as time goes by, consumers' sense of novelty is declining and their aesthetic is fatigued. At the same time, external traffic entrances are also decreasing, coupled with the obstruction of emerging platforms, the overall traffic is not as good as before.

Some sellers also noticed that even during the promotion period, advertising consumption was still astonishing, but order growth was not proportional. "Advertising is really burning without leaving room for maneuver, and looking at the orders, there's not much motivation, so it's still mainly to protect profits."

Amidst the chorus of pessimism, there are also different voices. Some people think it's a bit better than last year, although the discount is too strong and the price is too low; others say that sales have returned to the normal level of the peak season, but there is no surprise of "blowout".

But no matter what, an undeniable fact is that pure "discount promotion" is gradually losing its magic. After all, promotions will eventually pass, and the "protracted war" is the norm. As a seller said: "Try to keep calm during these days, and still have to fight a protracted war."

03 How to Maintain "Stability" After Prime Day

For most Amazon sellers, the performance during the promotion period may be like a roller coaster, but no matter how well or poorly the performance of Prime Day is, the "stabilization" after the promotion is crucial.

First is the return aspect. Many consumers shop during Prime Day because they are attracted by the product design or discount and choose to place an order without too much consideration of product reviews and quality issues. After receiving the goods, if they find that the product does not meet their expectations, they will initiate a large number of returns, which is also one of the important reasons for the significant increase in the return rate after Prime Day.

The phenomenon of returns will also show polarization: sellers who do not pay attention to product quality and attract users with low prices will face the double blow of bad reviews and returns, while sellers with qualified product quality may welcome the secondary repurchase of users.

In the face of the return problem after the promotion, if the user leaves a message about the reason for the return when returning, then the seller should find the relevant order and apologize to the user by email, indicating which aspects will be improved in the future; If there is no message about the reason for return, the seller should also send an email to inquire about the real reason for the user's return, collect relevant user feedback, and then optimize on the product page and supply chain.

In response to the problem of bad reviews, some sellers suggest that if the user gives a one-star or two-star bad review, then at least three consecutive days, one email per day to follow up, negotiate with the user, and give a reasonable solution. If it still cannot be resolved, the seller can consider other actions to delete the review.

Returns and bad reviews have a crucial impact on the operation of Amazon sellers, and sellers must handle them properly. In addition, after Prime Day, the stability of keywords on the operation side is also a focus for sellers.

Many Amazon sellers are confused after the end of Prime Day about why their product rankings are "sometimes on the fifth page, sometimes on the first page, and sometimes on the eighth page". In fact, this instability is not accidental, it is mainly determined by four core factors behind it, namely weak and unstable historical order data accumulation, conversion rate performance is sometimes good and sometimes bad, lack of positive review growth and the natural impact of product life cycle.

If you want to make the natural ranking more stable and higher, then you need to meet two elements - stable order volume and stable conversion rate.

The first step is to avoid "roller coaster" orders. Sellers should ensure that the daily order volume remains within a relatively stable range to avoid large fluctuations, even if the volume is increased through off-site means, it must be ensured that there is no too large fluctuation.

The second step is precise "replenishment". If the keywords that sellers have been investing in for a long time can't reach the homepage, they can consider "replenishing" through off-site volume expansion and other methods, but the overall conversion rate of the listing must be guaranteed during the replenishment process.

If the daily conversion rate is 15%, and the conversion rate drops sharply to 2% during off-site volume expansion, it indicates that inaccurate "junk traffic" has been introduced, which is of no benefit to the link weight, and even harmful. Therefore, during the off-site volume expansion and replenishment process, sellers should also pay attention to the conversion situation regularly.

The period after Prime Day is also a "watershed" for seller growth. Insiders say that what really determines the long-term victory or defeat is not the performance during the promotion period, but whether the "fluctuations" can be transformed into "stability" after the promotion, and this is the real "trump card" for sellers.

(Source: Hugo Cross-border Editorial Department)

Seller Home Review

In the face of the traffic and price competition brought about by the early arrival of Prime Day, instead of blindly following the trend and losing money to increase volume, it is better to return to the essence of profit. It is recommended that sellers take this opportunity to re-examine their inventory strategy and advertising ROI, and shift their efforts to product diversification and customer repurchase, which is the long-term solution to deal with promotion fatigue.

Source: Hugo Cross-border Original link: https://www.cifnews.com/article/187011