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How you do anything Is how you do everything.

Starting any growing any business can be a daunting task. Selling on Amazon is no different. With that said, it’s worth the journey!

We hope you enjoy this weeks issue of the Internet Mastery Global Newsletter.

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Amazon feedback removal is a relatively simple process. What a lot of new sellers don’t know is that you can appeal to buyers to revise their reviews or contact Amazon support to remove seller feedback from Amazon if it doesn’t abide by a specific set of guidelines.

It can be extremely beneficial if you have negative reviews, and even neutral reviews, associated with your seller account.

Being proactive about removing unfavorable reviews could potentially save your sales, not only because it’s a public metric that customers see, but also because it helps Amazon determine whether or not you’re trustworthy enough to win the buy box. Getting ahead of unfairly posted Amazon seller reviews could save you a big headache, and big money, in the future.

In this blog, we’ll go over two ways to remove negative feedback and give you tips on how you can maintain a positive rating.

What Is Amazon Seller Feedback?

In a platform increasingly populated by third-party sellers, Amazon relies on a system of customer feedback to ensure that these sellers adhere to the high standards of service that the company requires.

According to Amazon, seller feedback “…enables buyers purchasing products from sellers to provide feedback comments and ratings regarding their order experience.“

Essentially, seller feedback is a review of the service you offer aside from your products. It gives your potential customers a look into who you are as a business. Can they trust you to fulfill their order in a timely manner? If an issue arises, are you easy to reach?

Ultimately, Amazon seller feedback gives you and your customers a baseline of what to expect from each other.

Amazon Seller Feedback Is not a Product Review

Often, product reviews by customers cannot be removed from a product page. The only way to publicly deal with a negative review is through “comments.” When communicating with an unhappy customer via comments, you can show potential buyers that you attempted to fix the problem.

In this article, we’re talking strictly about how to submit a feedback removal request for a negative review on a seller profile.

Why Amazon Seller Feedback is Important

Sellers with well-regulated shipping logistics and a strong customer support strategy in place generally don’t need to worry about customer feedback. However, almost every seller will encounter a case of irrelevant feedback at some point.

This feedback for Amazon can mean many things, but sometimes it’s simply without basis. For example, if a customer is upset that their order is late and leaves a poor review on your seller account but your items are fulfilled by Amazon.

Buyers are only allowed to submit one feedback per order, and it has to be done within 90 days of the order date. For sellers, this means that you will have to work relatively quickly if you’re hoping to get a customer to revise or remove their review.

Neutral Feedback Can Negatively Affect You

Although you appear as an agent on Amazon, your business is expected to provide the same level of customer support as a large corporation. Negative feedback on Amazon is treated as a “grade” for your account. Just like in school, if your percentage drops below a certain rate, you fail. Even an “average” 3-star rating can be compared to getting C’s in a sea of overachievers: not good enough.

You’ll Pay for Having A Bad Rating

You’ll want to avoid this at all costs on Amazon, as account suspensions are time-consuming and can get EXPENSIVE. This is especially true if your inventory is FBA. While you wait to get your account reinstated, your items sit in FBA and incur any storage, return, and removal fees.

You Can Lose the Buy Box & Other Seller Privileges

Customer feedback is taken so seriously that it directly affects your Account Health. Repeated instances of negative feedback will result in warnings from Amazon. If your feedback rating is deemed as underperforming, it could lead to account suspension, your inventory being removed from appearing visible searches, and losing the buy box.

Losing the buy box is one of the scariest things that could happen to a seller because at its worst it could involve hijackers and at the very least it could mean lost sales opportunities. It’s in your best interest to avoid having to win it back if you can.

Types of Feedback You Can Remove

Though Amazon will never remove buyer feedback from your account without reason, it can remove it or strike it from your feedback rating and Order Defect Rate (ODR)if it is deemed inappropriate.

Irrelevant feedback is a common occurrence, usually defined by a customer expressing dissatisfaction with the product rather than the seller. For example, if a customer complains only about the quality or price of the item they’ve received, that is considered a product review and can be removed from your seller feedback.

According to Amazon, feedback can be removed for the following reasons:

• Feedback contains obscene or profane language

• Feedback includes seller-specific, personally identifiable information, including email addresses, full names, or telephone numbers

• The entire feedback comment is a product review

• Feedback is regarding storage, packing, shipping, or customer service for an FBA product

In the case of FBA items, negative feedback that complains of slow shipping or late delivery times means that Amazon is at fault, rather than the seller. When this happens, Amazon will take responsibility for the negative experience and will not include it in calculating the seller’s ODR.

If you have received any of the above types of seller feedback, it is in your best interest to take the necessary steps to have it removed. You’ll have more accurate performance metrics, which will improve the rankings of your products. Begin your practice of regularly checking and removing the damaging, irrelevant feedback by following the steps outlined below.

Removal for Eligible Negative Feedback

To remove feedback that violates the guidelines above, you’ll have to open a feedback removal case with seller support.

Aside from working quickly to remove negative feedback on Amazon, you should also be sure to keep your delivery message to seller support short and concise. Doing so may help you get a quick and favorable response from the support agent.

Here’s the step-by-step guide on how to submit a request to remove seller feedback from Amazon:

• Step 1: Navigate to the Seller Central dashboard. Select the country you are working in from the dropdown menu.

• Step 2: Under Customer Feedback on the dashboard, click Ratings. It will be expressed as a star amount over the last year, as in “4.5 stars over the past 12 months.”

• Step 3: You will be directed to the Feedback Manager. From here, select Download Feedback Reports.

• Step 4: You will be prompted to choose a date range. Select 14 days, then Request Report to generate the report.

• Step 5: Refresh and allow 1-2 minutes for the report to populate. Once populated, select Download to save the report as a .txt file to your device.

• Step 6: Transfer the report to an Excel sheet by copying and pasting the values from the .txt file.

• Step 7: Copy Order ID from the Excel sheet.

• Step 8: Return to Seller Central. Navigate to the Help tab and select Contact Us.

• Step 9: On the Contact page, select Selling on Amazon, then Customers and Orders. Paste Order ID and hit Next.

• Step 10: The feedback will populate. If it is the correct feedback that you would like to have removed, hit Next again to send the removal request.

Removal for Ineligible Negative Feedback

Seller support will not remove negative feedback on Amazon if a comment contains both a product review and feedback about your service.

To remove constructive feedback that is justly given, or is ineligible for removal according to Amazon’s feedback guidelines, you can work to provide top-notch customer service then ask the buyer to remove the feedback.

A Word of Caution

While it is NOT recommended that you directly offer benefits in exchange for an updated review, you can contact the customer to try to make things right. You should be very careful about how you approach asking buyers to remove feedback.

Amazon will suspend your account if you provide an incentive in exchange for a review.

To mitigate the risk here, don’t offer monetary benefits right away. This may come off to the customer that you have ulterior motives other than their satisfaction with their purchase.

Instead, work to solve the problem and then give buyers the option to change or remove their review if they’re happy with the service you’ve provided them.

How to Ask A Buyer to Remove Negative Feedback

If you were at fault, send a message to the buyer apologizing for their experience and emphasize that you’d be willing to make things right for them. After they respond to accept and are satisfied with your service, you can politely ask that they remove their comment.

You’ll have to keep an eye on communication though because buyers are only able to remove the feedback within 60 days.

How to Maintain Positive Feedback Ratings

Removing feedback is just one of the things you can do to improve the health of your account.

Negative ratings can be caused by a variety of reasons. As we said above, instead of reacting to remove seller feedback Amazon, it may be more useful to be proactive in your strategy to prevent a negative feedback rating from being posted in the first place.

Here are a few additional things you can do to keep your seller profile in the green:

• Ensure your inventory is available, quantity is accurate and up-to-date to offerings are never out of stock

• Sellers should do what they can to ensure the customer receives their shipment on time by sending tracking information and removing consistently late shipped items

• Identify clear language on your return policies, and must provide a full refund return policy for a standard 30-day period

• Provide images that accurately portray the product and gives an idea of the accuracy of details, including size charts, descriptions, and image size requirements

• Streamline packing, picking, and shipping processes to ensure SKUs match with the product listed on Amazon so customers don’t receive the wrong size or wrong items

• Include usage instructions with your product and accurately describe your product in descriptions so buyers know how to use your product

• Respond to queries within 24 hours, and ensure that your contact information within Amazon help pages is up to date so buyers can contact you when necessary

The Takeaway

To stay in Amazon’s graces, be sure to follow the tips above to keep your account in good standing. Sellers with well-regulated shipping logistics and a strong customer support strategy in place generally don’t need to worry about negative customer feedback.

That said, almost every seller will encounter a case of irrelevant feedback at some point. In these cases, it pays to be prepared by being familiar with the steps needed to remove seller feedback from Amazon that drags down your performance metrics.

A short history of ChatGPT

You’ve heard of it… you might of used it… however do you know its history?

ChatGPT, developed by OpenAI, represents a significant evolution in the field of natural language processing (NLP) and artificial intelligence (AI). Its history traces back to the development of generative pre-trained transformers (GPT), with ChatGPT being a specialized variant designed for generating human-like text in conversational contexts.

The foundation of ChatGPT began with the introduction of the transformer model by Vaswani et al. in 2017, which revolutionized the way machines understand and generate human language. The transformer model's ability to handle sequential data made it particularly suitable for NLP tasks. Building on this, OpenAI introduced the first iteration of the GPT model, GPT-1, in June 2018. GPT-1 demonstrated the potential of transformers in generating coherent and diverse text across various domains.

The subsequent version, GPT-2, released in 2019, marked a significant leap in language model capabilities. With 1.5 billion parameters, GPT-2 showcased remarkable text generation and comprehension abilities, stirring both excitement and ethical debates within the AI community due to its potential for misuse in generating misleading information.

In June 2020, OpenAI unveiled GPT-3, an even more powerful model with 175 billion parameters. GPT-3's advanced capabilities enabled it to perform a wide range of language tasks with little to no task-specific training, setting new benchmarks for AI's creative and analytical abilities in language understanding.

ChatGPT, launched by OpenAI, is built upon the GPT-3 architecture and fine-tuned specifically for conversational interactions. Its development aimed to address the challenges of maintaining context, coherence, and relevance in ongoing dialogues, simulating a human-like conversational partner. ChatGPT incorporates learning from user interactions to improve its responses, making it a dynamic tool for applications ranging from customer service to educational tutoring.

The introduction of ChatGPT has sparked significant interest in both the technology and business sectors, highlighting the potential for AI to transform communication, content creation, and information retrieval. Its development reflects ongoing advancements in AI research and the growing importance of ethical considerations in AI deployment.

As ChatGPT continues to evolve, it stands as a testament to the rapid progress in AI and its increasing role in shaping the future of digital communication. OpenAI's commitment to improving and responsibly managing AI technology ensures that ChatGPT and its successors will remain at the forefront of innovation in natural language processing and artificial intelligence.

Congratulations!

We are super proud of the Internet Mastery Community - now surpassing more than $171,450,754.06 in sales on Amazon.

Check it out for your self here: https://app.internetmasterycommunity.com

Joke of the Week:

Try not to laugh out loud…

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_{Back in the day, before BOLO deals and BOLO videos, I did my sourcing online. It took me over a week to find my first product. I was so excited when I placed the order. But the order was canceled – not once, but three times.  I called the store, my credit card company, searched the Facebook group. Nothing helped. Did I give up? No. I went to the store and purchased 6 units of the item. Then, I had to learn how to label and ship to Amazon myself. And where would I find boxes? It was exciting and stressful at the same time. And it was confusing. I didn’t know if I had done something wrong or if this is just what happens sometimes.} 

_{Then I went looking for my second item. It took less than a week. That was an improvement! I followed the steps. Using my Rakuten savings, it was profitable. So, I placed my order and sent it to the Prep Center. It sold out immediately, so I ordered more and then more again. What happened next? The returns started. “Broken”, “Poor Quality”, “Junk”. Ugh! What’s happening? I had Amazon send the returns to my house so I could see what was happening. Yep, they were plastic games, and many broke during assembly. And to make matters worse, all of the ones I bought after the initial purchase lost money because I didn’t have Rakuten savings anymore on that item. Lesson: assess the profitability every time you buy. Prices change, and your costs change.}

_{Third item was great. I was sure it was selling on Amazon. It was profitable. I was ungated. But I only bought three just in case I ran into any unforeseen problems.  Good thing because I sold two of them, and then MerchSource came along with an IP complaint. I searched the Facebook group for “IP complaint” and learned that my retail receipt would not help prove authenticity. So, I lost money on that one. Again.} 

_{My first 3 items were so problematic. I could have given up. It took me six weeks to get a payment from Amazon for $26. Was I ready to quit? No way! I was so excited. Sure, I had spent all of this money to make $26, but I saw a way to make more!} 

_{I always made sure to tune into the weekly coaching sessions. One left us with an assignment of finding one new item per day and sending it to the Prep Center. Well, that just seemed impossible. Until I did it. The first day, it was getting close to 5 pm, and I hadn’t found anything. But then I did! The next day, I found something by noon. The day after that, I found 3 items by 10 am. All I did was believe that I would do it, and it snowballed. I kept thinking of Adam’s mantra, “The only way to fail is to give up.” I was not going to give up. Things improved. Items were selling and not being returned. I was locked up in my office working and the money started coming in. But I needed more.}

_{The most valuable thing I did was attend IM Live in Las Vegas in 2022. I met some great people! But it’s more than meeting great people. It’s Adam telling you that you can do it. It is all of the successful people in the room who prove that the system works and that you can become one of them. Connections and motivation are key in this business. You need the community to help you succeed. GET YOUR TICKETS HERE FOR THE NEXT EVENT.}

_{But it was the live event in San Diego 2023 that changed my business. First, I didn’t hang out with the new sellers (sorry newbies, I was there to learn); I sought out the million-dollar sellers. They had the knowledge I needed. Julie Grabb talked to me about strategies for scaling my business. Tracy Hoogenboom spurred me into branching out and opening my own store. Then Ghiloh Morgan told me about a trade show for my niche. I was in San Diego at the time. I live in New Hampshire. The trade show was a month later in California.  I really did not want to go to the trade show and deal with another trip across the country. It was expensive to fly out, buy my ticket to the show, and stay at a hotel. Shouldn’t I be spending my money on inventory? No! The advice I received at the live event propelled me to go to that one trade show that turned my business into a huge money maker. I made connections at that show that took me to the next level. I went from making $3 profit per sale to $75 profit per sale. And it happened because I went to the IM live events, talked to like-minded people who knew how to do what I wanted to do, and followed their advice. You combine all of that with Adam motivating us, knowing we can all succeed, and then giving us tools like the Repricer, and my business went through the roof.}

_{I remind myself of this story, which is great for people just starting out. Keep moving forward:}

_{This is hard, but you need to be gentle with yourself. You don’t yell at a bud because it isn’t a flower yet. It’s gonna be a flower, but it opens when it’s time for it to open.}

_{If you are working on something that is beyond your abilities at the moment, it doesn’t mean it will be beyond your ability in a month. But at the moment, it’s going to frustrate you. Acknowledge it and say, “I’m not getting this! I’m not achieving what I want to achieve right now.” Take a deep breath and tell yourself, “I’ll make another choice tomorrow. I will look at one of these elements another way.” Or, “I need to go and observe something.” Watch a coaching video or a BOLO video and see what you can learn from that. (You will learn something new each time you watch a BOLO video.) There may be days when you want to give up, but you must persevere. You are an entrepreneur. This is going to happen for you.} 

_{Adam often says spending your money to get to the live events is more important than spending it on inventory. And it’s true! You will take away so much from the live events that when you go home and return to your business, it will skyrocket. Double up! You’ve got this! See you in Vegas!} 

Amazon Cracks Down on Suspicious Reviews from Bad Actors, Sellers Express Mixed Reactions.

Sellers previously reported receiving such notifications back in October 2023 that this process by Amazon has started. It actually started earlier in 2023. In May 2023, Amazon quietly removed hundreds of thousands of reviews from some of its own Amazon Basics listings, a move that at that time suggested that a purge could be coming soon for fake reviews. Five months later, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) proposed a rule on fake reviews. If enacted into law, it will give the courts the authority to impose a hefty fine of up to $50,000 per violation on non-compliant individuals and possibly, eComm platforms themselves.

Aside from minimizing regulatory risk, Amazon’s recent move also aims to protect sellers from unfair practices, such as buyer extortion and fake reviews. However, this development has sparked diverse reactions among sellers who have received notifications regarding the removal of reviews associated with rule-breaking buyers.

“I hope they are working on cleaning up bad buyers. All they need to do is complain and get the right customer rep, and their account will be reinstated” one seller stated. This seller highlights a longstanding concern among Amazon sellers about the potential misuse of customer service channels by buyers with malicious intent.

Another seller raised the issue of buyer extortion, stating, “Buyers know that feedback and reviews are important for a brand owner. All they need to do is leave a bad review/feedback, and most likely, they will get a refund. Some will even reach out and contact you, stating they will leave a bad review if they don’t get a refund or discount.” This practice of leveraging reviews for personal gain has been a challenge for honest sellers (and customers) on the platform.

While some sellers welcome Amazon’s efforts to remove bogus reviews and address buyer misconduct, there are concerns about the potential for errors in the automated process.

One seller commented, “It’s helpful until Amazon AI makes a mistake like they always do and tags your buyer account with nefarious reviews, leading to the suspension of your seller account.”

The lack of transparency in the removal process also raises concerns. Another seller from lamented, “I have received this as well. Unfortunately, we aren’t told what the review was.” This lack of information leaves sellers in the dark about the specific issues leading to the removal of reviews, making it challenging for them to address any potential underlying problems.

Despite the challenges, some sellers view the crackdown positively. One seller remarked, “It’s a warning to let sellers know that they’re becoming more aware of fake reviews and taking action. It’s generally good news. Sure – we want fake reviews removed from our listings and more so – bad sellers’ listings.”

As Amazon continues to refine its review removal process, sellers are hopeful that these measures will contribute to a fairer and more trustworthy online marketplace. However, the platform must balance its efforts to combat misuse with transparency and accuracy to ensure a positive experience for both sellers and customers.

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Knowing No Boundaries,

Internet Mastery Newsletter Team!

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