Amazon's Black Friday and Cyber Monday season has entered the preparation stage! Sellers, are you ready? During peak season, price cuts alone won't drive sales!

If deal submissions are not handled properly, store compliance has risks, listing conversion is weak, and inventory cannot keep up, peak-season traffic may be wasted.

Save this [Amazon Black Friday and Cyber Monday Preparation Guide]! Black Friday and Cyber Monday is not just about traffic, but also about early preparation!

1. Deal Submission: How to Set Discounts and Submit Deals?

During Black Friday and Cyber Monday, promotions can help products gain more exposure, but not all ASINs are eligible for deals. Sellers need to confirm promotion eligibility, discount thresholds, and price requirements in advance.

1. Check the submission entry: Log in to Seller Central, go to the Deals (Lightning Deals and promotions) page, and check system-recommended deals and ASIN eligibility.

2. Verify discount requirements: Minimum discounts, reference prices, and historical price requirements may vary by promotion type. Refer to the actual display in Seller Central.

3. Calculate profit in advance: Include discount costs, ad spend, FBA fulfillment fees, and peak-season surcharges to avoid rising orders but shrinking profits.

The Amazon US 2026 peak season guide previously announced the regular Best Deals submission deadline for Black Friday and Cyber Monday as October 20. Recently, it issued a notice extending it to November 13. Sellers are advised to immediately check the latest submission status for their own marketplace and backend, and not directly apply deadlines from other sites.

2. Store Safety: Check Store Risks

The larger the peak-season traffic, the more important account health and product compliance become. If listings are removed, promotions are canceled, or accounts are reviewed at critical sales moments, earlier investment may be affected.

Key checks:

1. Account health: Regularly check the Account Health Dashboard and promptly address policy violations, performance warnings, and pending issues.

2. Product compliance: Check product certifications, intellectual property, dangerous goods reviews, and category requirements to avoid sales disruptions due to incomplete documents.

3. Promotion status: Check whether participating ASINs are active and whether promotions are suppressed or invalid.

4. Payment and tax information: Confirm that payment, tax, and entity information is accurate and valid to avoid account operation issues caused by key data problems.

5. Do not wait until orders surge to check risks: Complete a full self-check before the event starts and continue monitoring backend notifications.

3. Listing Optimization: Optimize Keywords and Improve Conversion

Once traffic arrives, whether the product page can persuade consumers directly affects clicks and conversions. Sellers can optimize from two angles: search exposure and purchase decisions.

1. Keyword layout: Optimize titles, bullet points, and backend search terms based on core product selling points, usage scenarios, target audiences, and holiday shopping needs. On the advertising side, test keyword performance in advance to accumulate data for peak-season campaigns.

2. Images and page: The main image should clearly highlight the product itself, while secondary images show functions, dimensions, usage scenarios, and differentiators. Sellers who can should also improve A+ pages and product videos.

3. Advertising coordination: Test ad combinations and budgets in advance, and focus more resources on ASINs with strong conversion, sufficient inventory, and reasonable margins. Do not wait until the event day to start testing keywords and ads.

Amazon also recommends that sellers optimize product detail pages, improve image and video assets in advance, and keep promotional products in stock before and after the event.

4. Inventory Planning: Avoid Stockouts During Peak Season

Inventory preparation not only affects whether you can fulfill orders, but also impacts delivery speed, sales opportunities, and cash flow.

1. Forecast sales: Set inventory targets by ASIN based on prior-year sales, recent order trends, promotion intensity, and advertising plans.

2. Reserve safety stock: Closely monitor days of coverage for core bestsellers to avoid stockouts from sudden sales spikes.

3. Monitor inbound progress: Schedule shipments based on logistics transit, delivery appointment, and Amazon processing time. Do not just check whether goods have left the warehouse.

4. Calculate peak-season costs: The 2026 peak fulfillment surcharge for Amazon US applies from October 15 to January 14, 2027. Sellers should calculate actual profit in advance.

5. Plan post-event inventory: Consider not only Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales, but also reserve inventory for the Christmas shopping season to avoid overstocking or late replenishment.

Amazon US recommends preparing about 4–6 weeks of inventory for key products before the event, and dynamically adjusting based on demand forecasts, inventory health reports, and replenishment tools. Specific inventory levels should still be determined by product sales, logistics lead time, and capital conditions.

Final Note:

Sellers are advised to check the list item by item now, and not wait until the event starts to find problems.

That's all from Yiju Overseas. Feel free to leave comments and discuss below!