Amazon Market Reversal, LinkedIn Stories, the Best Shopify App Deals: Newsletter November 23, 2018

Amazon has this week reversed the decision to block the Australian market from US e-commerce sales. A change in the Australian tax code required businesses making more than $75,000 AUD to charge 10% goods and services tax on low-value imports, leading Amazon to revoke availability of US inventory from Australian shoppers. Following backlash from Australian consumers, US products sold by Amazon itself are now available to Australian shoppers. This reversal has opened Australian consumers to 500 million products, up from 80 million, ahead of the Black Friday and Cyber Monday kick off to the shopping season.

In related Black Friday/Cyber Monday news, the leading content marketing and social media blog Dreamgrow this week published The Best Black Friday Deals for Shopify Sellers, detailing the highest-ROI App deals for Shopify store owners this shopping weekend. Make sure to check out the deals on offer and get these Apps in place before the Monday rush!

In social media news, LinkedIn has launched a stories function in an effort to continue its appeal to younger audiences. The first iteration will involve “Student Voices” featuring videos from university students in the US, which will be added to campus playlists and last for one week.

In SaaS news, Founder Thomas Smale was recently interviewed on SaaS Podcast Founder Views, where he sat down with host and successful SaaS Founder Kosta Panagoulias to discuss How to Increase the Value of and Successfully Sell your SaaS Business. Don’t miss these highly valuable sources of industry knowledge!

New in App business listings this week we have a $4M mobile photo and video editing software business, with a portfolio of proven Apps with strong revenue growth of c.128% CAGR for the 2015 to (e)2018 period, product market fit with millions of lifetime installs and an average App Store rating of over 4.5/5, top 100 grossing Apps in their respective categories in the US, low touch and highly scalable business model, allowing for low owner involvement and high net margins and critically acclaimed products, securing features in multiple notable publications.

New in SaaS business listings this week we have a $700K B2B marketing and SEO tools business, with years of operational history leading to a strong positioning in the digital marketing and SEO niche, robust functionality attracting a notable client base of hundreds of customers and multiple well-known brands, strong backlink profile with thousands of links and features in authoritative website and industry publications and highly scalable operational model allowing for low owner involvement and high net margins of c.80% in the LTM. Also new in SaaS listings this week we have a $184K B2B SEO analytics software business, with early presence in the rapidly-growing SEO space, steadily-growing customer base with a high customer lifetime value of c.$180 in the LTM, plenty of opportunities to capitalize on the free user base of c.130,000 users or c.120,000 email subscribers for growth and lean business model allowing for low-touch operations and strong cash flows. If you are interested in any of the above businesses, please follow the link to request a prospectus.

In events news, Thomas is heading to SaaS North in Ottawa on November 28-29, where he is looking forward to meeting fellow entrepreneurs in the SaaS space. Planning on attending SaaS North? Let us know in a reply to this email!

Continue reading below for more on Amazon’s reversal of the Australian tax decision, LinkedIn’s stories and the Black Friday Shopify Apps master post.

Listings

New
App – Mobile Photo & Video Editing – $107K gross/mo

  • Portfolio of proven Apps with strong revenue growth of c.128% CAGR for the period 2015 to (e)2018
  • Product market fit with millions of lifetime installs and an average App Store rating of over 4.5
  • Top 100 grossing Apps in their respective categories in the US
  • Low touch and highly scalable business model, allowing for low owner involvement and high net margins
  • Critically acclaimed products, securing features in multiple notable publications

Yearly net profit: $1,076,000
Asking price: $4,000,000

SaaS – B2B Digital Marketing & SEO Tools – $19.5K MRR

  • Years of operational history leading to a strong positioning in the digital marketing and SEO niche
  • Robust functionality, attracting a notable client base of hundreds of customers and multiple well-known brands
  • Strong backlink profile with thousands of links and features in authoritative website and industry publications
  • Highly scalable operational model allowing for low owner involvement and high net margins of c.80% in the LTM

Yearly net profit: $193,000
Asking price: $700,000

SaaS – B2B SEO Analytics Software – $4.1K MRR

  • Early presence in the rapidly-growing SEO space, allowing for an authoritative brand and key feature differentiation
  • Steadily-growing customer base with a high customer lifetime value of c.$180 in the LTM
  • Plenty of opportunities to capitalize on the free user base of c.130,000 users or c.120,000 email subscribers for growth
  • Lean business model allowing for low-touch operations and strong cash flows

Yearly net profit: $64,000
Asking price: $184,000

Sold

Display Advertising – Evergreen Lifestyle Products – $32K gross/mo

Affiliate – Survival & Outdoors – $10K gross/mo

SaaS – B2B E-Commerce Email Marketing App – $4.7K MRR

Display Advertising – Real Estate & Government Grants – $1.7K gross/mo

Display Advertising – Celebrity News and Net Worth – $2K gross/mo

In The News…

Amazon Reverses Australian Market

Amazon has decided it will reopen its US ecommerce site to the Australian market following backlash from consumers. Due to a 10% goods and services tax on low value imported items purchased by consumers, Australian shoppers have been redirected to Amazon.com.au beginning six months ago. At that same time, Amazon shut off shipping to Australia, which mean shoppers could only purchse items sold by local sellers on the marketplace. What was intended to prevent large online retailers from beating out small sellers resulted in consumers looking elsewhere, and local Amazon sellers ultimately selling less.

The reversal has opened the Australian market to 500 million products sold directly by Amazon.

LinkedIn Adds Stories Function

LinkedIn has launched a stories feature on the platform to maintain appeal with younger users.
A spokesperson described the motive of the function as the following: “It’s a great way for students to build out their profile and have this authentic content that shows who they are and what their academic and professional experiences have been. Having these videos live on their profile can help students grow their network, prepare for life after graduation, and help potential employers learn more about them.” Concerns have arisen that the feature will not carry a wide appeal due to the fact that stories are typically used for content that is not intended to have an influence on a user’s profile. The first version of the story is for Student Voices, which will involve students posting achievements on their university’s playlist and being encouraged to build their networks through sharing with others on the university playlists.
A logo for each university will denote the organization to which a student belongs.

Black Friday Shopify Apps Master Post

Shopify Apps are partaking in Black Friday deals to help merchants capitalize on the improvements the apps can bring to their stores.

It was reported that in 2017 on Cyber Monday, consumers spent a record-setting $6.59 billion in online shopping. This means an increase in traffic to the stores of Shopify merchants and an opportunity to capture leads as well as sales revenue. Having the appropriate apps will be essential in allowing merchants to benefit. Founder Thomas Smale has compiled the Shopify apps with the highest ROI in a guest post on leading content marketing and social media blog Dreamgrow. The apps include GrooveJar, ProductCustomizer, Wishl, and BlogFeeder among several others.

If you’re a Shopify store owner, taking advantage of these apps will supercharge sales over the holiday season and carry the benefits throughout the New Year.