How To Stop Unauthorized Sellers On Amazon [7 Tips]

How To Stop Unauthorized Sellers On Amazon – Lots of trademark and copyright owners are going through untold stress battling against unauthorized listing of their products on Amazon.
Several brands’ image have been damaged by these fraudulent resellers who won’t mind sending counterfeit products to customers, they are so bent on making money even at the detriment of the manufacturers.

Every manufacturer wants their products to be appreciated and their brands to be recognized, this is why many of them fight tooth and nail to help Amazon in weeding out unauthorized sellers from the marketplace.

It isn’t quite easy to stop unauthorized sellers on Amazon, this platform is huge with thousands of daily listings, fishing out these fraudulent elements isn’t like a walk in the park.
However, there are ways manufacturers can shut down unauthorized resellers. Wondering how to stop unauthorized sellers on Amazon? Read on.

How To Stop Unauthorized Sellers On Amazon

You can stop unauthorized sellers on Amazon by registering on Amazon Brand Registry, this gives you some level of power to decide who lists your products on the marketplace. You’ll also need to make use of the Amazon Transparency Program, this is one powerful feature that has helped several brands to stop unauthorized sellers from shipping counterfeit products to customers.

You also need to put distribution agreements down and ensure strict compliant from distributors. Getting your brand to be listed as a restricted brand ensures that every seller will seek approval from you before selling your products.
If you want to learn more about how to stop unauthorized sellers on Amazon, continue reading this article.

Register Your Brand On Amazon Brand Registry

Yes, join the Amazon Brand Registry, this is probably your best option regarding how to stop unauthorized sellers on Amazon. You’ll be in the driving seat as per who lists your products on Amazon. As a brand registered seller, you’ll be privileged to certain protections by Amazon regarding your products.

Additionally, companies and businesses that are registered on Amazon brand registry have access to enhanced monitoring and enforcement tools, this doesn’t entirely stop unauthorized sellers but it does more than half the job.

Make Use Of The Amazon Transparency Program

This offers you a whole new level of manufacturer’s protection. With the Amazon Transparency Program, you’ll get access to a serialization service which will prevent your product counterfeits from being shipped to customers.

Once you enroll in the transparency program, you’ll get transparency codes to apply to your products, these codes are being scanned by Amazon to ensure that only authentic items are being shipped to buyers. With the transparency app, customers are able to authenticate units by scanning the code.

Companies that enroll in Amazon Transparency Program get their products scanned by Amazon to ensure customers receive only authentic products. Each transparency-enabled code is scanned individually whether they are directly shipped by selling partners or fulfilled by Amazon.
This doesn’t only help you stop unauthorized sellers, it also helps grow customer confidence in your products.

Contact The Seller And Offer Enticing Conditions

This doesn’t look ideal for top brands but trust me, it worked for average brands. Most of these unauthorized sellers are willing to do the right thing, reaching out to them might turn out to be the most effective way of making them stop listing your products without authorization.

Every seller on Amazon wants to sell and make profit, a large percent of these unauthorized sellers are extremely good in product marketing, how else will you explain their ability to push their listings above yours or some of your authorized resellers?
Try talking terms with them and see how you can offer them enticing conditions, it might work the magic, give it a try.

Provide Signed Distribution Agreement

Putting a distribution agreement in place will help in stopping unauthorized sellers from listing your products. This agreement must be put in place with each distributor you’ve authorized to sell your product on Amazon. This agreement must restrict your distributor from selling your product at a price that is cheaper than what you are selling. Once this is put in place, there will be no tendency of any distributor trying to resell your product to a third party.

You can’t overemphasise the importance of getting pricing and distribution policies in place from the start of your business relationship with distributors.
Monitor your distributors and ensure strict compliance to the agreement, stop supplies to any distributor that goes contrary, this will serve as a deterrent to other distributors who may want to go rogue.

Send A Cease & Desist Letter To Violators

Any business that has prepared its copyrights and intellectual property protection as well as its distribution policies can take legal actions against erring distributors. This can be done by creating and sending a cease and desist letter to violating distributors through a legal counsel.
Although, this may not entirely stop unauthorized sellers from listing your products, it helps keep your distributors on check, it strikes fear into their hearts and many of them might desist from violating your polices.

Offer Promotions and Coupon Codes To Customers

The goal is to draw customers’ attention to your listings as the trademark owner or to your authorized sellers, this can be achieved by offering promotions and coupon codes to customers once in a while.

Unauthorized sellers really can’t afford to offer promotions on products because they are already selling at cheaper rates, this means most of them sell at small profit margins. Making use of discounts can entice customers to buy from you, most of them will eventually realize that you are their sure source of getting an authentic product.

Also try extending these promotions to your distributors and encourage them to offer to their customers, ensure strict compliance to this, it might work.

Try Listing Your Brand As A Restricted Brand

Although, this might not be ideal for average brands, listing your brand as a Restricted Brand means every seller must seek approval from you before being allowed to sell your product. This method is ideal for brands having lots of counterfeit issues, it is also ideal for large brands.
Some of the product categories that might require restricted brand listing include handbags, cell phone accessories, and luxury beauty. If you spot a seller selling your product without approval, then you need to read How To Report Unauthorized Seller On Amazon.

Benefits of Joining Amazon Brand Registry

There are lots of benefits your brand will enjoy when you join Amazon Brand Registry, apart from controlling who lists your products, you’ll have access to some rare privileges that aren’t available in the Seller Central. Below are the benefits of joining Amazon Brand Registry.

• You’ll have unhindered access to Amazon support for urgent assistance anytime of the day.
• Ability to personally report IP infringements, wrong and misleading information, and other violations.
• Amazon Brand Registry dashboard gives you privilege to directly contact unauthorized sellers from their storefront.
• You have total control over who lists your products on Amazon.
• Amazon will use your brand information to remove any suspected inaccurate content or infringement pro-actively.
• You’ll be able to protect your brand’s image by ensuring no counterfeit product is sold. You can also read how to stop resellers or how to block seller on Amazon here.

How To Join Amazon Brand Registry

Joining the Amazon Brand Registry is pretty easy, Amazon requires that trademark owners personally submit their applications, no use of third party. Follow the steps below on how to join Amazon Brand Registry.

• On your web browser, visit Amazon Brand Registry.
• Scroll to the bottom of the page and click ‘Enroll now’.
• Chose the country where you wish to enroll your brand.
• Provide your Seller Central log in details to sign in (create Seller Central account if you don’t have).
• Navigate to the bottom of the page and click ‘Review terms and continue’.
• Accept the terms of use by clicking ‘Accept and continue’.
• Enroll a new brand if you haven’t registered any brand yet, click the ‘enroll a new brand’ button.
• A new page will appear showing you the information that will be required by Amazon. Click ‘Enroll your brand’ after reading.
• Take your time to provide your brand information, selling account information, and distribution information.
• Click ‘Next’ each time you are through with a particular page.
• Click ‘Submit’ when you are done.

Amazon Brand Registry Requirements

Below are information that may be required by Amazon.

• Your brand trademark number.
• Pictures showing your product branding and/or packaging.
• Vendor code (if there is an existing relationship between your brand and Amazon).
• Sample ASINs list showing your brand’s product on Amazon.
• Details on the various countries where your products are distributed.

Benefits Of Enrolling In Amazon Transparency Program

Enrolling in Amazon Transparency offers lots of unmatched benefits to manufacturers, below are the benefits of enrolling in Amazon Transparency Program.

• You’ll be sure that customers receive only authentic products.
• Reduces the number of your product counterfeits.
• Help in stopping lots of unauthorized sellers from listing and selling your products.
• Build strong customer confidence in your products.
• Allows you to offer customers unit-level product information, this could be enhanced product details, date of production, and place of production.

How To Enroll In Amazon Transparency Program

To enroll in Amazon Transparency, you need to join Amazon Brand Registry first, once you’ve done that you can follow the steps below for steps on how to enroll in Amazon Transparency Program.

• On your web browser, visit the Amazon Transparency Program page.
• Locate the ‘Get Started’ button and click on it.
• Scroll down and fill in the form to contact Amazon Transparency. Information required include valid email address, first and last name, brand name, brand registry status, registered trademark status, phone number, company location.
• Click ‘Request More Information’ when you are done.
  You’ll be contact by Amazon Transparency soon.

Amazon Transparency Program Requirements

Below are the few requirements to enroll in the Amazon Transparency Program.

• Amazon Brand Registry membership.
• Company’s trademark registration information.
• Company must have a location.

Can A Manufacturer Stop You From Selling On Amazon?

A manufacturer may not be able to directly stop you from selling on Amazon, but they can get Amazon to remove your listing if you violate any Amazon seller policy, or do anything that constitute an infringement on their intellectual property rights. If a seller makes a report of infringement to Amazon and you are fund guilty, your listing will be removed, it might even lead to Amazon banning you from selling on the platform.