How To Start Amazon FBA Business From Pakistan?

How can you start an Amazon FBA Business from Pakistan?

The Pakistan Project
6 min readMar 7, 2022
Photo by Bryan Angelo on Unsplash

The COVID-19 led pandemic has changed the way society functions. Since the COVID spreads through the air, it was vital to curb its spread for governments to place a lockdown within their jurisdictions, thus restricting the free movement of people.

However, the world still had to move; people still had to buy their daily commodities, and the businesses had to run their operations otherwise society as we know would not have survived. To solve this, the only thing that came to the rescue was eCommerce.

Due to eCommerce, people can sit within their homes and can acquire the things they want right in front of their doorstep. Companies such as Amazon made the best of their time and delivered services that would otherwise not have been possible. Due to this, many businesses associated with Amazon became successful, and many more wanted to enter the world of eCommerce.

In this article, I will dive deeper into Amazon FBA and how someone from Pakistan can start Amazon FBA.

What is Amazon, and Amazon FBA:

Amazon is the world’s largest eCommerce platform from where you can order anything (of course, the legal items). Founded in a garage by its Founder and ex CEO Jeff Bezos, Amazon has been lauded for its exceptional quality, customer care, and wide range of products. It truly is a one-stop for all.

However, as Amazon grew, it became nearly impossible for Amazon’s team to run everything on their own. Despite already operating such a wide and complex operational system at its end. In order to solve this, Amazon came up with the Amazon FBA.

Amazon FBA was founded in the year 2006, with an aim to provide convenience to third-party sellers. Amazon allows sellers to sell their items on their platform also by ensuring they will ship the order to their customers. Amazon FBA allows a seller to leverage the vast network of Amazon to find potential customers and store, pick, and pack the product towards its ultimate destination.

How did I start the Amazon FBA business from Pakistan?

I started my Amazon FBA business from Pakistan very easily using Consultisor services, they helped me a lot. Siddiq Balagam whom I have talked to start an Amazon FBA business has its own Amazon business and he helped me a lot in starting my own Amazon venture.

What services does Amazon FBA provide to its sellers?

First things first, any seller will have to enrol with Amazon’s FBA program. This is done to ensure the seller’s legitimacy is established with Amazon, along with the product they are selling. Think of it this way: Amazon does a thorough check-up to ensure whatever the item they are listing on their platform is free from any defaults, and the seller selling that product is the real owner of that product.

Usually, it is believed that once an Amazon FBA seller, Amazon is providing you with just shipping services. However, in reality, there is much more to what Amazon offers and this includes:

  • Providing 24/7 customer service to the seller if they have any questions or any issues to get resolved with.
  • Charging a small fee will be used for shipping the item. This will include the services of picking the item, packing it, and then shipping it off to its ultimate destination.
  • Lastly, endless access to the world’s largest e-Commerce market where buyers from all over the world will see your product and subsequently order it.

Amazon FBA in Pakistan: Can I start Amazon FBA from Pakistan?

It has not been long since Pakistan was placed on the list of approved sellers. The news, once it broke out, shook the entire social media of Pakistan as this was something many businessmen from Pakistan had wanted to happen because they had no other means to access the international markets.

As of March 2022. It is confirmed that Amazon FBA operates in Pakistan, and allows Pakistani products to be featured on their platform. While the news wasn’t a big hit for the Pakistani everyday consumer, it was something that the business community had been waiting for some time.

Therefore, as a Pakistani residing in Pakistan, you can start Amazon FBA.

Why Pakistan was not Amazon FBA’s list:

The Pakistani business community suffered a lot for not being a part of Amazon’s FBA program. There were plenty of reasons for it, and these reasons include:

  • Poor quality of products offered to sellers. Like I said earlier, to become a part of Amazon’s FBA program, you have to get verified by Amazon, which looks at the authenticity of your products and their quality. Pakistani sellers were simply not meeting the standards Amazon FBA had set.
  • Poor professionalism from Pakistani sellers is another reason why Amazon’s FBA program did not enter the Pakistani markets. Pakistani sellers were exposed to poor ratings since they were not able to deliver on time, and the standards of their products depreciated.
  • Pakistan facing issues with the Finance Action Task Force (FATF) is also another reason why Amazon refrained from entering the Pakistani market. As Pakistan was on FATF’s grey list for quite some time, the country was facing soft-economic sanctions. Thus Amazon FBA tried to avoid Pakistan for as long as they could since they did not want these soft sanctions to turn harsh on them, and thus Pakistan sellers failed to meet their orders.

What is the impact of Amazon FBA in Pakistan?

Currently, Amazon has over 2 million sellers who are selling different kinds of products through the help of the Amazon FBA program. While it’s true, the market is extremely competitive, however, it does not mean it is impossible to beat it. Rather, it helps the businesses to work harder on their products, and keep on engaging with their customers to make sure their product’s quality improves.

With the help of Amazon FBA officially entering the Pakistani market, Pakistani businesses can enter a much larger audience than they could before. This would allow not just for the local Pakistani businesses to grow, but will also help the economy as these businesses will invite the much-needed dollars within Pakistan’s foreign reserves.

Since Amazon looks at most of the things related to the shipment, it takes away the worries of sellers and rather they focus that much time and energy on the quality of the product. Thus, in the long run, it will help Pakistani brands to become multinational which is something the Pakistani brands do lag at the moment.

How to be a successful Amazon FBA seller?

Well, it truly comes down to what a seller is selling and to whom. Regardless, one of the main things that will help you to succeed on Amazon is two things: good marketing and good quality of the product.

  • Your product description is extremely important and if you are unable to give a welcoming product description, others will surely beat your way through it.
  • Your product quality is also very important. If the product’s quality is compromised leading towards a poor review on your Amazon profile. Unfortunately, this may very well make a life for your product very difficult on Amazon.

Conclusion:

As a Pakistani, you are now free to enter the world of Amazon through the help of its Amazon FBA program. However, the market is extremely competitive and there is no other way to succeed in it other than making sure that your product’s quality is top-notch.

Since it has not been too long since the Amazon FBA program has entered the Pakistani market, therefore, it is the job of Pakistani sellers to work hard and develop a name for themselves on Amazon.

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The Pakistan Project

Sharing stories about Pakistan on Medium. From Business to social equality to investments to everything that concern Pakistan.