Last month, thousands of entrepreneurs gathered in Seattle for Amazon Accelerate 2025, the company’s signature conference for small sellers on its platform. Attendees came to hear from Amazon leaders and fellow sellers, discover new technologies, and learn how Amazon is advancing its support for independent creators and merchants like themselves.
Last year, I attended and reviewed Amazon Accelerate 2024 where AI was playing an increasing role in how small sellers aimed to benefit from new tools for marketing, customer support, and to better manage their companies. The new tools unveiled at the year’s event show how quickly the market is moving, with AI being utilized and integrated in innovative ways to support small sellers.
This year’s event focused on how new agentic artificial intelligence (AI) tools have been deployed to expand and unify Amazon’s already robust AI toolkit into a connected ecosystem. Rather than leaving sellers to piece together separate apps, these new solutions integrate seamlessly to power everything from product listings to smarter workflows, helping small sellers work more efficiently and compete more effectively on the platform.
What Accelerate 2025 made clear is that Amazon is built and continually working to amplify small business potential, not to overshadow it.
A Seamless AI Ecosystem Built for Small Sellers
Again, much to the excitement of Accelerate 2025 attendees, members of the Amazon team demonstrated how it is connecting previously separate AI tools into one advanced ecosystem.
The newly enhanced Seller Assistant tool with Agentic AI has evolved into a powerful, proactive business partner. First introduced as a generative AI assistant, it now includes agentic capabilities, meaning it can do more than simply answer questions. It can reason, plan, and take action with the seller’s permission, flagging potential issues such as slow-moving products that may lead to extra storage fees, suggesting pricing or advertising adjustments, and providing clear next steps to boost sales. Sellers can even run “what-if” scenarios to understand how decisions like restocking or discounting could impact their bottom line.
These agentic AI capabilities are bound to shape the next era of retail, where intelligent agents will shape how sellers operate and how consumers shop, giving small businesses on the platform an early edge as the shift unfolds.
Amazon also unveiled stronger listing and launch tools, including an upgraded Opportunity Explorer that highlights areas where customer demand is high but selection is limited, and an “Enhance My Listing” feature that suggests better titles, descriptions, and images to improve visibility and conversions. In addition, AI-powered creative and advertising tools now enable sellers to produce professional product videos, visuals, and ads in minutes, with AI recommending messaging and visuals based on shopper trends.
Because these capabilities are unified and built on the same underlying models, sellers no longer have to patch together separate apps. They benefit from a single, intelligent system that understands their business and supports every step, from product creation to marketing, inventory, and growth.
New Tools and Services to Save Time, Reduce Costs, and Reach More Customers
Beyond AI, Amazon introduced a range of new services and enhancements designed to streamline operations and help sellers expand their reach.
The expanded Multi-Channel Fulfillment (MCF) program now allows sellers to use Amazon’s logistics network to fulfill orders placed not only on Amazon but also on platforms like Shopify, Shein, Walmart, and their own e-commerce sites. These upgrades bring faster delivery speeds and real-time shipping estimates that can help sellers increase conversions and grow sales across channels.
Amazon also upgraded its Supply Chain by Amazon service, adding new prep, labeling, and distribution options, including “stickerless” inventory management. These features are expected to save sellers hundreds of millions of dollars in annual costs.
Sellers can also access improved analytics and dashboards, including Profit Analytics and business modeling tools, which make it easier to track profitability, plan for growth, and make smarter decisions. These operational and financial upgrades work with Amazon’s AI ecosystem, giving sellers both the intelligence and the infrastructure to compete at scale without adding complexity.
Innovating for Small Sellers in an Increasingly Competitive Marketplace
Make no mistake, Amazon’s new tools and offerings is a response to a competitive marketplace and to keep their customers – small sellers – selling successfully on Amazon. Of course, that reality has not sunk in with Federal Trade Commission (FTC) regulators and lawyers who are still pursuing an anti-trust case against Amazon, which also claims the platform is abusing small sellers.
The market is changing rapidly with big AI players – like Open AI through ChatGPT – offering innovative new tools that will allow small businesses to take advantage of “chat selling.” Small businesses will have access to Chat GPT users, and when their goods or products show up in a search and someone wants to make a purchase they can do so with Instant Checkout. Moreover, Amazon is but one of many channels that small sellers use to reach customers. As noted by the results of SBE Council’s 2025 tech survey, 73% of Amazon sellers report that less than 30% of their total sales come from Amazon, with the mean share being 22.9%. That means a lot of sales are coming from other methods.
When asked what other channels they use to generate sales, Amazon small sellers noted the following:
● 60% use social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram and TikTok
● 55% rely on their own websites
● 37% use platforms like Etsy, Shopify and eBay
● 35% turn to in-person events like farmer’s markets, fairs and festivals
● 29% partner with wholesalers or retailers
● 24% count on their brick-and-mortar storefronts
● 23% offer buy online, pick up in-store (BOPIS) facilities
● 21% utilize larger company platforms like Walmart
As the Amazon team demonstrated at Accelerate 2025, they are driven to keep small sellers on the platform and selling successfully. And, small sellers appear to be pleased with this partnership – 92% of sellers in the SBE Council survey noted above agree that Amazon charges a fair price for its services and 86% feel that Amazon provides them with significant support.
With AI and other innovations further woven into operations, marketing, and strategy, Amazon is creating a seamless, intelligent ecosystem that is a multiplier for small seller success. Already, small sellers contribute more than 60% of sales on Amazon.
No doubt, there will be more innovations to come for small sellers because the competitive marketplace demands that Amazon keep small sellers happy.