AI boosted BFCM traffic — Amazon’s glitch boosted seller blood pressure 😮‍💨 [MDSR #61]

Hot Off The Presses 📰

Our community’s Black Friday poll revealed a split reality: plenty of sellers saw strong top-line lifts, but profitability was another story. 

Just over 1/3 of MDS members reported being up more than 30%, while others cited brutal margins thanks to peak fees, rising storage costs, and discount pressure. 

As one seller put it: “Sales are up, but so is ad cost, so profit is lower.” And with Trump still positioned to impose sweeping tariffs if his administration loses its Supreme Court case, profit stakes are even higher heading into peak.

The good news? Holiday demand is undeniably strong — record shopper turnout and $11.8B spent online over Black Friday.

But consumers are financing that surge in ways that signal strain. Americans put over $1B on BNPL in a single day, U.S. employers have shed 1.1M jobs this year, and Walmart’s CFO warns the affordability crisis is deepening.

That said, beauty demand is holding. Sellers planning 2026 inventory and pricing cycles may want to model more than one scenario — and product niche.

AI also delivered plenty of headlines, occasionally for the wrong reasons. GAP’s chatbot misfire sparked fresh brand safety concerns, and Amazon had to patch Alexa’s Elf-on-the-Shelf spoiler leak in an act of mercy to parents everywhere.

But beyond those flare-ups, AI is reshaping discovery far faster than most sellers realize. OpenAI’s new ChatGPT shopping tool offers “in-depth research” — for everything except Amazon products — hinting at a future where product visibility splinters across AI ecosystems. 

ChatGPT usage continues to explode (800M users, 29,000 prompts per second), AI-driven holiday traffic surged 670%, and ChatGPT referrals to retailer apps jumped 28% YoY.

Meanwhile, platforms pushed peak season into overdrive: shipping windows stretched to Christmas Eve, Shopify merchants logged their usual record-breaking BFCM, and TikTok saw elevated activity. 

In the background, Amazon’s BFCM deal glitch left sellers scrambling to understand why valid discounts weren’t surfacing.

TL;DR? Strong demand isn’t insulating anyone from rising costs or platform volatility. 

Now over to you ⤵

This edition’s poll 🗳️

Million Dollar Advice 💸 

If you want to scale sustainably, stop treating product cost like a back-of-the-napkin number. 

Your “true cost” rarely matches what you think it is. Between landed costs, packaging, prep, Amazon fees, storage, overhead, and the operational creep that shows up only once you’re moving volume, most sellers underestimate by a wide margin — and build their pricing, margin targets, and reorder strategy on shaky ground.

Dialing this in isn’t optional. It’s the difference between a product that prints cash and one that drains it quietly.

➜ This week’s featured read is here to help: How to Calculate Product Costs: The definitive Guide

Lock in early bird pricing for MDS Inspire 2026 ⏳

If Inspire 2026 is on your radar, now’s the moment to make it official. Early Bird pricing ends December 19, and once it closes, it’s gone for good.

Inspire is MDS’s biggest public event of the year — three days in Las Vegas packed with operator-level strategy, real talk, and the kind of proximity you can’t manufacture online. If you already know you’re joining us, locking in your pass now is the smartest play.

Current Early Bird Rates:

🎟️ Network Pass — $895

🎫 Conference Pass — $1,295

🚀 All Access — $1,595

Team coming with you? Group discounts are still live — but only while Early Bird is.

👉 Reserve your spot

Your Q1 product launch blueprint 📐

Peak season might be all-consuming, but Q1 is where operators either extend momentum or lose it. One of the cleanest ways to stay ahead: build a repeatable product launch blueprint using project management tools like Asana, ClickUp, or Monday.com. 

A good launch template eliminates guesswork, keeps cross-functional tasks on track, and ensures no critical step slips during the chaos of Q1.

Here’s a skimmable rundown of the core pillars to bake into that template:

✅ Validate before you build

Use keyword research, review mining, and competitor audits to confirm real demand. Every great launch starts with a proof-backed “why,” not instinct.

✅ Map inventory + cash cycles early

Your workflow should include lead times, FBA intake windows, freight contingencies, and post-BFCM congestion planning — the silent killers of Q1 launches.

✅ Build a conversion-optimized listing

Checklist items should include main-image tests, SEO pass, differentiation bullets, and video assets. Make your PDP answer every objection before shoppers ask.

✅ Engineer ranking momentum

Include tasks for PPC warmup, external traffic pulses, early reviews, influencer seeding, and keyword prioritization. Velocity doesn’t happen accidentally.

✅ Track, iterate, and troubleshoot

Your template should prompt daily monitoring of CTR, CVR, TACOS, keyword rank, and unit economics — with built-in decision points for when to pivot.

A solid launch workflow is how sellers turn Q4 energy into Q1 revenue. Not to mention, how top operators scale without burning cycles reinventing the wheel.

👉 Check out the full breakdown to build your own launch template and project plan.

Think this is helpful?

The seller circles that spark breakthroughs 💡

Proximity is a growth lever. The savviest operators don’t just learn from posts and podcasts — they get in the room where real strategy gets traded and real relationships get built.

MDS’s global Ecompreneur Socials are your chance to sharpen tactics, pressure test ideas, and meet the people shaping what’s next in eCommerce.

🤝 Ecompreneur Socials

Where off-the-record meets off-the-charts.

• December 15 — Singapore Ecom Founder Holiday Social

• December 17 — Sydney Ecom Founder Social

Get in the room. Big things happen there  👉 All Event Links

Did you see that post 📲

Q4 hype on the way in, thousand-yard stare on the way out…

Wishing you all a merciful Returnuary 🙏

Until next time ✌️

As always, thanks for sticking with us until the end. 

If you’d care to share your thoughts on this newsletter, we’re all ears. Just hit reply to sound off. 

See you next time with more of the latest and greatest content you need to succeed this year 🔥

Sincerely, 

Looking for a mastermind community?

Million Dollar Sellers (MDS) is an exclusive community of 650+ like-minded Amazon and DTC sellers from all over the world. Collectively, our members generate more than 8 billion in annual sales and dominate some of the biggest categories on Amazon. MDS offers world-class events, chapters, industry discounts, resource libraries full of SOPs, templates, and video recordings of private trainings, workshops, events and so much more.

If you are looking for a business professional community made for ecom entrepreneurs, then consider applying today. 

*To qualify, you must be a full-time seller or brand owner and do at least 1 million in verified annual revenue. Will Amazon’s Returnless Resolutions solve the returns debacle? [MDSR #30]