If you’ve been thinking about selling on Amazon, the time to make the move is now. Amazon is not only the Internet’s fastest growing ecommerce marketplace, it’s also driving the strongest growth for 3rd party merchants of consumer goods across the board.

Overall, Amazon’s sales were up 46% year-over-year in 2011. Compare that to the growth of ecommerce 15% , and eBay’s GMV at 10% and you can immediately see why Amazon is a “must consider” for your online business this year.

20% of the earth’s Internet population (that’s 1 in 5 people between the ages of 15-85) shopped an Amazon site in 2011. And that number will only continue to grow. Amazon is the #1 retailer online and

65%+ 3rd Party Merchant Growth

In last week’s earnings release Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos revealed “Our millions of third-party sellers had a tremendous 2011 holiday season with 65% unit growth and now represent 36% of total units sold.”

If you sold on Amazon during the 2011 holiday selling season, you experienced this first-hand.

But if you aren’t there yet, you haven’t missed the boat.

Amazon is actively looking to grow their 3rd party merchant sales this year. And they’re investing time, money and effort into making sure that happens…

• Amazon currently has over 2 million seller accounts. But with the rapid increase in sales, growth on Amazon is not a problem.

• These 3rd party merchants represent 36% of all products sold on Amazon (up from 32% in 2010). The percentage of 3rd party sales on Amazon will only continue to grow.

• Amazon has publicly stated and continues to demonstrate they’re investment in growing their 3rd party merchant business

• Amazon added 17 global fulfillment centers in 2011. These fulfillment centers directly support the growth of 3rd party merchants who use Amazon leverage Amazon FBA (Fulfillment By Amazon) to ship their orders. With more fulfillment centers to come in 2012, online sellers will have no problem getting out of the business of shipping and into the business of selling and making money on Amazon.com

And while the numbers are certainly impressive, the bottom line is “Is there opportunity for YOU on Amazon this year?”

The answer to this is a resounding “Yes!”

In fact for the past several years I’ve been working with students and clients to help them establish an Amazon sales channel.

During this time, I’ve shared with them that they were smart to get in now, because there would come a point where Amazon would gain so much market share, that anyone who doesn’t have an Amazon channel would be missing out on customers they couldn’t get any other way.

That day has come.

In one of the most shocking Amazon statistics to date, in a December 2011 article, the Wall Street Journal (subscription) and ComScore revealed that Amazon consistently has between three to four times as many product-related searches on its site as Google does through Google Product Search.

The bottom line on this is startling… shoppers are BYPASSING Google and going directly to Amazon to shop.

For sellers of consumer goods, this means that potentially 75-80% of buyers are missing your products if they aren’t represented on Amazon.

If you’re looking for a strong, growth oriented marketplace to sell in, this year is the to integrate Amazon into your business model!

And while the window of opportunity won’t be closing anytime soon. Why delay selling your products on the world’s fastest growing marketplace?

-Lisa