This past year with Amazon Merch On Demand has been frustrating. I’m stuck on Tier 500 and don’t have enough sales to move up to the next tier. My slots are completely full so, unless I want to replace my designs that aren’t selling, there’s not much I can do. Still, I managed to find some things to do to try to improve my sales in 2024. Let’s see how they worked and figure out a plan for 2025.
How Much Did I Make in 2024?
In January 2024, I made 6 sales for a total of $25.49. In December, I had 23 sales for a total profit of $120.36. My best selling month was September where I made 32 sales for a profit of $176.86. Overall in 2024, I had 189 sales, 13 returns and made $930.50. My most sold product was the standard t-shirt with 160 sales, 2nd was the tote bag with 7 sales and 3rd was the pullover hoodie with 7 sales. I sold kids sizes 48% of the time, women sizes 28% of the time, and men sizes 19% of the time. Black, pink and purple were my top selling colors.
I also had advertising costs. I spent $235.29 on ads in 2024. I had an ACOS of 23.57% with 61 orders. I can’t figure out how to show just the year so here’s a lifetime graph of my advertising costs and ACOS.
2024 Amazon Merch on Demand Income: $695.21
What Went Right In 2024
- I shut off advertising for shirts that weren’t selling which helped improve my advertising ACOS over time.
- Older shirts started selling so I’m glad I didn’t decide to replace them.
- I learned how to use AI, particularly Ideogram, to design shirts. I think this will be helpful once I can get tiered up.
- I came up with a marketing plan. I can’t start using the plan until I get tiered up but I think it’s a solid strategy and I’m looking forward to trying it out in 2025.
What Went Wrong In 2024
- My advertising ACOS was really high most months. I was able to bring it down a little by turning off marketing to certain shirts but it’s still a little too high.
- I’m stuck in T500 and my designs aren’t selling very well. Sales started to pick up towards the end of the year but they were still below where I though they should be.
- I was too scared to delete designs that aren’t selling and replace them with something else. What if they are about to start selling and I take them down too early?
- I didn’t try marketing my current designs other than using Amazon Advertising. I should have tried Facebook or Instagram to market my current designs to try to boost sales.
Looking Ahead to 2025
In my very first income report in April 2024, I said that my goal with Merch on Demand is $1,500 a month. That is still my goal. I need to get tiered up to T1000 in order to reach my goal. In 2024, I averaged 16 sales a month and I’m currently at 420 sales. At that rate of sales per month, I can expect to be tiered up in 5 months or around June. So far this month, I’ve only made 8 sales. I need to find a way to boost sales on my current shirts either by doing better marketing with Amazon or by using social media.
Once I get tiered up to T1000, I plan on implementing my marketing strategy which is flooding a niche with related shirts and then starting an Instagram page promoting these shirts to the target audience.
2025 Goals
- Start advertising my current designs on social media – I’m going to have to do some research to figure out how to do this effectively.
- Tier up to T1000
- Start advertising internationally
- Complete the marketing plan that I came up with in 2024
- Fill all design slots in T1000
Overall, I am happy with how 2024 went but I really wish I could have gotten tiered up before the end of the year. Once I can get into some higher tiers with Merch on Demand, it will be a lot easier to make money as I can upload a lot more designs to sell. More designs = more sales = more money. Higher tiers also give me more slogs so I can also be more creative with my designs and not have to worry about wasting slots. I’m looking forward to the freedom that the higher tiers will bring. I have a good feeling that 2025 will be the year of tier ups for my Merch on Demand business.
