Meldon Seeds founder Shaun Jennings shares his Amazon story on scaling his business.
When lockdown 2020 hit, Shaun Jennings saw an opportunity to change direction and try something new. His background as a farmer meant he had all the knowledge and insight needed to start a small business selling seeds.
Spurred on by his frustrations of poor service from leading seed suppliers, Shaun invested £100 in seed stock and started packing and distributing seeds from his lounge.
For a couple of years, he traded at a low level on eBay before turning to Amazon in 2023. He admits his approach to selling on Amazon was scattergun and it soon became clear that Amazon was a complex platform he needed help to master. He didn’t know what was and wasn’t working for him.
Turning to Sell Beyond, Shaun first sought 1-2-1 coaching from founder Dr Heloise Finch to help him understand the potential and the impact that selling successfully on Amazon could have on his hobby business.
Working together, Shaun developed a Fulfilled By Amazon (FBA) strategy and sales forecast, giving Shaun a clear sense of what could be achieved. Changing logistics options to Amazon FBA also allowed Shaun to save time on picking and packing his own brand products and gave him the opportunity to update inventory management systems with the time saved. Sell Beyond opened Shaun’s eyes to the impact that cutting back on non-profitable activity could have on his profits. Armed with clarity and direction, Shaun felt able to focus on priorities and think strategically about Amazon growth over the medium term.
This outside input was what Shaun needed to take Meldon Seeds to the next level.
The next phase of growth involved improving the Amazon customer offer and brand proposition to encourage conversion and repeat sales.
Working with Sell Beyond’s in-house marketing expert, Keeley Middleton, Shaun was able to update, improve and elevate the relevance of his Amazon listings for his target market – families buying seeds for their garden or allotment.
The team worked with him on his branding, content, product information and the positioning of Meldon Seeds as a reliable brand. This work transformed Meldon Seeds from being just a logo to having a brand identity, clear USP and guarantee, enabling Shaun to stand strong against competitors on and off Amazon.
Thanks to Keeley at Sell Beyond, Shaun was able to use what he learned to scale his brand and proposition across his whole product range. By learning the right operating processes to scale Amazon listing optimization, his products are now in the top 100 listings. Shaun has now been able to cut down from 500 to 200 non-branded products.
Working together, Shaun and Sell Beyond achieved growth in organic sales through content improvement and better conversion.
Having made these changes, Shaun’s confidence in the power of Amazon to transform his business grew. The final step was for him to embark on Pay-Per-Click (PPC) training with Sell Beyond’s Phil Revitt.
Phil’s 10 years of e-commerce experience and expertise in Amazon PPC ensured that Shaun’s scattergun approach to all-things Amazon was well and truly put to bed. With 121 training Shaun was given the skills he needed to understand how to maximize impact from PPC. He came to understand the relationship between adding products to FBA and linking this to a PPC campaign.
He now has a playbook he can turn to, enabling him to apply logic to his campaigns, giving him confidence to push forward with his own brand stock.
Shaun attributes his exponential growth on Amazon to his integrated approach to the platform. His investment in coaching, PPC training and improved listings have all driven profitable growth on Amazon for Meldon Seeds.
The result…
Last year Shaun faced the challenge of not knowing how to find an opportunity to grow his business to the point of it being worth the effort.
Today he finds himself at the point of navigating how to plan and manage business growth and cash-flow as Meldon Seeds becomes his main source of income.
Looking ahead, Shaun expects 2025 to be very busy, as his own brand products become fully embedded on Amazon and he puts his Sell Beyond experience into action.
Shaun’s investment in a scalable growth strategy on Amazon proved to be highly worthwhile!
If you want to ensure that your product gets the right judgement within 13 seconds, get in touch and review our Amazon Optimization pages.
If you would like a chat about Amazon, get in touch by emailing heloise.finch-boyer@sell-beyond.com or call 01206 899020.