When Small Mistakes Hurt More Than Big Failures

This week I felt embarrassed.

I received a message from someone I value to the moon and back. She trusted me with her horseback riding experience. She told me she did not feel welcomed. She drove home crying because my team did not provide horsemanship at the level she expected.

Before that text, I was having a phenomenal day with my family. Then my heart dropped. My whole world dropped.

Every business has a weakness. Every startup feels growing pains. We all know this. I know the human factor is always there. Misunderstandings happen. Systems fail. Communication slips.

But in my head there was only one question: why did it happen to her? Why not to someone easier, someone less demanding, someone simpler to fix it with?

And then I realized something uncomfortable.

The Universe does not send you soft lessons when you need serious correction. 

It sends you the punch that hurts the most. Because that is the one that forces you to look at the problem without ego.

It does not matter if 79 people leave happy in one day. If one person leaves hurt, confused, or disappointed, that is the real metric. That is the mirror.

Did I know we had a weakness in horsemanship, in not always providing extensive learning depth? Yes, I did.

Did I believe we fixed it? Yes, I thought we did.

Apparently, we did not.

Did that message wake me up at 5 a.m. thinking about it? Yes.

Does she still talk to me? No.

Did I follow up and try to fix it? I did.

Will that mistake be forgiven? Probably not.

Why? Because she has very high standards. So do I.

And I asked myself the only question that matters: if I were in her position, would I come back?

If I am honest, probably not. Because my standards are high too.

That is growth. And growth is painful.

It does not mean we stop building. It does not mean we collapse under guilt. It means we tighten systems, retrain teams, raise standards, and become better operators.

Mistakes are human.

Neglecting them is a choice.

Success comes only from failing. And not always from the big collapses everyone sees. Sometimes the small moments, the single unhappy client, hurt far more than losing a big deal ever could.

So we keep moving. We fix what hurts. We raise the bar.

And we build a better version of ourselves and our business.

How to Engineer ROI Before You Spend a Dollar

Everyone wants guaranteed ROI.

Almost no one wants to slow down long enough to structure it.

This week inside my paid bootcamp, I showed sellers something simple but powerful. 

So for those who did not join the bootcamp, here is the foundational version of what we used.

Inside the paid session, this was layered with AI validation frameworks, margin modeling, and competitive pressure testing.

And at SellersSummit, I will go even deeper.

If you apply this properly, you are not just attending an event.

You are building a project that can realistically pay for your ticket, your hotel, and potentially 10X that investment within weeks.

Here is where it starts.

The Product Engineering Prompt

Copy this. Fill in every blank. Do not skip steps.

I am a [new / existing] Amazon seller.

If existing:
I currently sell in the [X niche].
I want to [stay in this niche / expand adjacent / diversify into a new niche].

My total available launch budget is $[X].

I am targeting products in the price range of $[X to X].

Product Filters

I prefer products that are:

• Not obvious or heavily trending

• Not dominated by major brands

• Easier to customize and develop

• Low to medium manufacturing complexity

• Not dependent on electronics or strict certifications, if applicable

I want products serving underserved segments or specific use cases rather than mass generic markets.

Pull product ideas from:

• Open source market observations

• Emerging consumer behavior trends

• Underserved lifestyle groups

• Niche communities

The Products Must:

1. Have real, consistent demand, not hype driven

2. Allow room for structural or functional improvement

3. Offer potential to justify a 20 to 40 percent higher price through differentiation

4. Be expandable into at least 3 to 5 complementary SKUs

5. Have reasonable shipping size and margin potential

For Each Suggestion, Require:

• Why this market may be underserved

• How it could be meaningfully improved

• How price elevation could be justified

• Expansion opportunities

• Key risks to validate before moving forward

Avoid saturated, obvious Amazon best seller products.

This is the difference between gambling and engineering.

At SellersSummit, I will show you how to:

• Validate conversion rates before sourcing

• Identify where structural improvement justifies price elevation

• Reverse engineer underserved demand

• Build a 3 to 5 SKU roadmap instead of a one product gamble

If you are serious about ROI, stop thinking in terms of products.

Start thinking in terms of structured opportunity.

That is what we are building together.

How to Turn Your Website Into an Instant Brand Asset Machine with Google Family

Now let me show you something that most Amazon sellers are completely underutilizing.

Google Family tools are not just for random AI experiments. When used correctly, they become a brand acceleration engine.

I gave it a website URL https://www.ecommastery.ai/ 

It pulled visual context directly from the site. Product angles. Colors. Branding cues. Lifestyle positioning. It understood the vibe without me having to explain it for 10 minutes.

That alone saves hours of briefing designers.

Here is the exact workflow I used:

1. Upload your website URL.

2. Select Photoshoot.

3. Choose your Aspect Ratio.

4. Select the Photo Type:

   • Contextual

   • In use

   • Floating

   • Studio style

5. Let it generate the photo.

6. Click Edit and give it a refinement prompt.

7. You can adjust the aspect ratio again if needed.

8. You can also upload new images to guide it further.

Why this matters for your brand:

First, consistency.

Most Amazon sellers have disconnected visuals. Listing images look one way. Social looks another way. Ads look like a third personality. That kills trust.

When AI pulls from your site, it anchors everything to your existing brand identity. Same tone. Same mood. Same visual language.

Second, speed.

Instead of organizing a $3,000 photoshoot every time you test a new variation, you can simulate angles, use cases, bundles, and even packaging concepts before spending money on physical inventory.

You can test:

• A new bundle configuration

• A premium repositioning angle

• A niche specific use case

• Seasonal creative

Before manufacturing.

Third, conversion leverage.

Amazon is visual. Your hero image, secondary images, A+ content visuals, and ads determine scroll stop power.

With this workflow, you can generate:

• Contextual lifestyle scenes that feel real

• Clean floating images for infographics

• “In use” visuals that communicate function instantly

• Different aspect ratios optimized for ads, PDP, and social

You are not guessing what your product looks like in the real world. You are showing it.

Fourth, brand expansion planning.

Remember the prompt I shared earlier? About building 3 to 5 complementary SKUs?

You can visually simulate the full product line before you launch it.

That changes how you think.

You stop thinking like a product flipper.
You start thinking like a brand architect.

And the cost of testing ideas visually drops close to zero.

The sellers who win in the next 24 months will not just validate data. They will validate perception.

Data tells you what to build.
Visual positioning tells the customer why to pay more.

That is where margin lives.

The Product Nobody Talks About That’s Feeding a Family

Look at this for a second.

A strange little Japanese electronic instrument. Not a kitchen gadget. Not a fitness product. Not a supplement. Not something “hot” on TikTok this week.

An Otamatone.

Monthly revenue around $161,800.

Over 4,000 units sold.
Price at $39.99.
Nearly 19,000 reviews.
BSR sitting at 1,709 in Toys & Games.

This is not obvious.

Nobody at a dinner party says, “You know what’s crushing it?

Quirky Japanese synthesizers.”

But it is.

Now let’s interpret this like an operator.

At $39.99 and roughly 4,046 units sold, you’re looking at real, consistent demand. This is not 200 units riding a viral wave. This is thousands of families buying every single month.

Even if you modeled a conservative 20 percent margin, that’s about $8 per unit. Multiply that by 4,000 units and you’re in the $30,000 a month gross profit range before deeper optimization.

That feeds a family.

Not one. Potentially several.

And here’s what most people miss.

This product lives in Electronic Learning & Education. It blends toy, music, and education. It’s giftable. It’s weird enough to stand out. It’s simple enough to manufacture at scale. It has emotional appeal. It has novelty. But it also has category stability.

This is the kind of product most sellers never even look at because it’s not “obvious.”

They’re busy researching garlic presses and desk organizers.

Meanwhile, a slightly quirky, culturally interesting product is quietly doing six figures a month.

Now let’s go deeper.

It has 19,000 reviews. That tells you longevity. This is not a one-month spike. This is years of sustained demand.

It’s priced accessibly under $40, which makes it impulse-friendly and gift-friendly.

It has color variations. Bundles. Different versions at higher price points.

That’s expansion logic.

And here’s the important part.

Somewhere, someone decided to look outside the “top 10 trending Amazon products” list. They looked at underserved niches. They looked at educational crossover markets. They looked at cultural products entering Western markets.

And they built around that.

That decision likely turned into a $60,000 to $100,000 a month operation over time.

Not because it was sexy.

Because it was structured.

This is why I push you to research differently.

There are products sitting in subcategories you’ve never opened. There are lifestyle segments you’ve never considered. There are cultural trends quietly crossing borders that are not obvious until you train your eye to see them.

You do not need a miracle product.

You need a product that:

Has consistent demand.
Has room for positioning.
Has giftability or emotional leverage.
Has SKU expansion potential.
Has margin buffer.

When you start reading data like this instead of scrolling for hype, your brain shifts.

You stop asking, “What’s trending?”

You start asking, “What’s quietly working?”

And that is where real businesses are built.

Happy Thursday!

See you in 2 weeks!

Izabella