The Tariff Tidal Wave: 5 Smart Steps for Amazon Sellers to Take Now

As you may have noticed, the T word is everywhere, as are the many interpretations of what tariffs will mean for Amazon sellers. Anyone who assists with product sourcing, delivery or shipping logistics, and overall costs of brand sales management will have opinions to share on a constant basis. Most sellers I’ve spoken to this month have already completed an initial strategy review, to prepare for the incoming cost surge. If you’re going to make drastic moves like increase your prices or slash your ads budget, you may have precious little time to figure that out.

Anticipating that tariffs won’t be going away anytime soon, I’ve advised everyone to identify some areas where they can cut costs within their operations before they decide to raise prices substantially on Amazon.

Clearly, tariffs represent the main trade negotiation tactic for this administration. In order to win concessions or to force favorable terms from other countries, they will attempt to redraw global trade using whatever market power the United States has at its disposal. Whether it takes a month, a year, or ten years isn’t factoring into this equation. If China doesn’t capitulate quickly and improve everyone’s bottom line for 2025, then they will be blamed publicly for dragging their feet. Those who question the logic or the strategy of the trade war don’t have a seat at the table, so, those voices don’t really count, for now. That means most Amazon sellers will be at the mercy of this excruciating process.

How does this impact Amazon seller business decisions? Even Andy Jassy has said publicly that prices will go up on everyday goods any time that costs increase, so it’s more or less accepted that sellers will need to recoup some losses that way.

Any other financial dents in a brand’s resources now, at a time where storage fees, reimbursement claim policy changes, and ads costs already have challenged sellers enormously, will prompt us all to say, “what’s next?” What is the next shoe to drop? We know this trade war will hurt sellers more than any other threat Amazon could come up with, aside from account deactivations, brand registry revocations and ASIN takedowns.

A commonly posted idea on LinkedIn or social channels is this: could you simply flip a switch and change countries? I suppose it depends on your product, but for most sellers, that would take time, involve travel and other costs, and risks of choosing the wrong factory in the wrong place. Potentially as well, you could pick a country other than China only to have tariffs go up for you based on a whim by the US government. We already have heard that Vietnam is a popular alternative, and India. A few others mention Cambodia or Thailand (my personal favorite). Rarely discussed is the second part of the equation: are brands sourcing all product parts or components in those countries too, or are they just assembling the product there? It’s unrealistic to expect that you can pick up and move quickly enough to avoid Amazon price hikes. Even less likely that you can suddenly move it all to the USA, given the costs associated with manufacturing inventory here.

As we’ve seen numerous times in the past, sellers who get squeezed from a few different directions at the same time tend to panic into error. Many execute hasty decisions that don’t serve their best interests.

Step #1 would be to assess all areas to save yourself costs, whether it’s tied to the Amazon account or the business at large, of course.

Most sellers I’ve spoken to recently have already done this, or some version of this. Anticipating that tariffs won’t be going away anytime soon, I’ve advised everyone to identify some areas where they can cut costs within their operations before they decide to raise prices substantially on Amazon.

There are no signs that this “negotiation tactic” will cease anytime soon. Since this trade war is playing out in public and not private, that means global markets will fly up or down with each announcement. If volatility is here to stay, you know that future tariff increases could come at any time, and at higher levels. Get ready for that now by making any painful decisions you have to, so you’re not scrambling later.

The only way to survive this and other typical Amazon challenges is to make sure you keep your listings up. Stay actively selling, if for no other reason than to stockpile as much cash as you can in anticipation of other damaging moves by Amazon (or by the government). Poor decisions caused by tariffs and other rising costs could combine to remove many active sellers, or to damage their account health and hurt their buy box wins. If it happens to your competitors, you may benefit big time. If it happens to you, then they win, instead.

How can you make sure your Amazon money train never stops, with revenue flowing in and uninterrupted selling to replenish your coffers for a possible rainy day?

These are my Top 5 tips to stay active, keep growing, and fend off any additional revenue problems.

Don’t slash your ads budget without an expert-level plan in place, only to start dropping in sales rank. You could go from relevant to unsearchable in no time. Maintain current ads levels until you know what that strategy is, and whether or not it will work. When you find a “better spend formula” that reduces this cost without hurting your presence on the marketplace you can make longer term moves on ads.
Look for opportunities to cut overhead costs unless you tie them directly to mainline revenue opportunities. Still have an office? Get rid of it. Go remote!
Don’t let ASIN restriction flags or listing takedowns fester. They can probably be resolved a lot faster than you think in most cases (when appealed the right way), so leaving them unresolved for longer periods not only costs you money to fight off other threats. As most Amazon sellers realize, it could also lead to entire account suspensions. I don’t need to tell you that having your whole account down for an extended period of time will hurt a lot more than tariffs do. And naturally, it could end up being permanent.
What Amazon resources do you have at your disposal? For example, are you paying for the SAS (Strategic Account Services) core program, i.e. for a paid account manager to help you grow on Amazon? What has or hasn’t been tried by SAS, and what worked, and what didn’t work? Make sure they’re doing everything they can or introducing as many Amazon-based resources as possible. If you’re unsure what else they could be doing, talk to me about it. I can provide loads of useful suggestions from our past experience. If you’re not in SAS core, are you aware of and working with other Amazon teams who specialize in brand development, e.g. Seller Success, and global selling/global expansion? Perhaps there are undiscovered regional marketplaces where you can sell a lot more than you realize.
Are you attempting to weather this storm on your own and in-house, or are you looking for and accepting help that already exists in the Amazon community? I’ve already reviewed numerous tariff-related resources to ensure I’m not missing anything and to up my game in case the tariff hikes reach a new level of complexity. I’m a quick study on most things Amazon-related, but there’s very little margin for error on this.

Sure, there are some uninformed on the topic or taking advantage of it, but others offer methods to reduce inefficiencies, to streamline operations, to minimize ad spend pain or to manage Amazon threats that could undermine your ability to focus on the tariff problem. Use them!

If you're struggling to pinpoint exactly where your margins are slipping—or how best to prepare for shifting costs—SellerPulse can help. With SKU-level profitability insights, we spotlight where you're overextended and where you can trim expenses, before you're forced into reactive decisions.