High-Growth Technical VA | Paid Amazon PPC Apprenticeship @ Fun Ecom Co

- Are you looking for a good-paying job while working from anywhere?

- Do you want opportunities to learn new things and grow into a bigger role?

- Do you thrive in a high-stress environment filled with political infighting, bureaucracy, and corporate nonsense?

If so, then we are the place for you, except you might hate how nice of a company we have - filled with happy, generally competent people that don’t put up with jerks. Frankly, it makes me sick how nice everyone is.

We are remote full time, have very flexible hours, people are judged by their output, not by how much they suck up to the boss, and turnover is super low because the company believes that happy employees = happy customers = happy bank account. Simply disgusting, if you ask me.

--Is this a real job ad?--

Yup! Amazingly enough, we actually paid money to post this on a bunch of different job sites. And it’s not even a pyramid scheme! Plus, get this: the owner just started paying our 80ish employees with money instead of Pizza Hut coupons - we’re big time, people.

Our careers page is actually worth checking out to learn more about how insane we are (sidenote: it won a web design award in 1993 - we’re a pretty big deal):

http://www.jlstradingco.com/careers/

And check out our reviews on Google, Glassdoor, or Indeed to see that it’s not just the founder’s mother who says we’re cool.

--What do you guys do?--

We sell a lot of different things but our primary focus now is developing/engineering from scratch very cool products in a variety of niches. 

A small sampling:

- Bad Parking Cards (https://amz.run/5Eya)

- Steak Weights (https://amz.run/6kin)

- Beverage Barricades (https://amz.run/6kip)

Our business is growing rapidly every year, and it’s our intention to continue that for as long as possible, which means we need good people to help us keep up with the growth.

--What is your company like?--

1. Full Time Remote/Flexible Hours. You will be working from home in your pajamas, on your schedule. And we don’t care if you work 10 hour days 4 days a week or want to catch up on the weekend. So long as you get a lot of work done, we’re happy campers.

2. Complete Work/Life Balance. If you’re routinely working more than 45ish hours, you’re gonna get a friendly talking-to. We want you to be operating at 100% capacity, which means that you need to rest.

3. You Can Be Yourself. You don’t have to put on a fake, professional face. You can just be yourself. You can talk smack to the CEO, and no one will think anything of it.

4. Major Opportunities for Career Growth. We are not trying to just be a small business. We plan to be doing $100 million annually in the next few years. We promote quickly once we identify talent. It doesn’t matter what your credentials are – it matters what you get done.

5. Strongly Anti-BS. Anybody in the company can (and is expected to) tell the CEO when he is wrong. There are no bureaucratic or BS rules getting in the way of getting work done.

6. No Micro-Management. Once you’re trained and have demonstrated you know your stuff, we are pretty hands-off. In fact, if you need external management to stay on-task and motivated, we probably aren’t the place for you.

7. Supportive Environment. We don’t operate via intense stress or unreasonable top-down deadlines. Everyone wants you to be successful – internal politics are at a minimum here.

8. No Toxic People Allowed. We try very hard to screen out mean people before they get in, but in case they slip through, we fire them quickly. Imagine never having to interact with toxic people at work - how nice would that be?

9. We’ll Invest in Your Training. We want you and everyone to get better constantly. You’ll be learning new things all the time, and are strongly encouraged to invest time every day to learn new things, improve your system/work process, and just generally try to make your life easier.

10. 4-6+ Weeks Vacation. We 100% want you to recharge, so having plenty of time off is absolutely worth it.

11. Self-Funded So We Can Do What’s Right for Us. We don’t have to answer to anyone but ourselves, so we can make the right decision for the long-term health of the company vs trying to get big too fast or cut corners to appease some selfish investor.

--What are your company’s values?--

See here: http://www.jlstradingco.com/careers/

Yes, those are legitimately our values. The careers page is definitely worth checking out - it’s not just normal corporate BS. We promise you’ll learn a lot about us.

--OK, so I’ve read like 8 dang pages about you guys. Will you tell me what the actual job is?--

No.

--Wait... What?--

OK fine. Super short version:

Getting paid to learn and execute our regular Amazon tasks and make data-driven decisions using our PPC strategy

We’re gonna train you, test you, and put you on progressively harder projects as you gain skills and demonstrate capability. Some of your daily tasks include:

• Dealing with Amazon Seller Central for various administrative tasks like resolving compliance issues, fixing listing/pricing/inventory issues, etc
• Reading SOPs, watching training videos, or going through company-provided specialized courses
• Practicing and getting reps on analyzing customer search terms and sales performance
• Collaborating with a team lead via email or Zoom to make sure you’re on the same page
• If you have the skills, we do a LOT of work in Google Sheets and Apps Script that we could use help on
• Random tasks as they come up (research, file organization, recording webinars, writing SOPs, some customer service, etc)
  • If you’re ambitious and good at your job, we’ll definitely throw more work to you.

Things like that. Some will have existing SOPs, others won’t - so our ideal candidate is someone who’s comfortable figuring things out on your own.

The ability to figure things out independently at a high level is a rare one, and the more people we have in the company with the ability, the better off we’ll be.

We really want smart/ambitious people to join our organization. It is challenging, but fun work that’s going to require a lot of time and task management, problem-solving, and a reasonable amount of people skills.

--Do I need experience?--

We expect you to have a minimum of 70 years of experience (120+ preferred).

Oh, you haven't lived two lifetimes eating and breathing business 24/7/365? Who TF do you think you are, reading this job description? You absolute buffoon.

Oh, you haven't been directly involved in at least two (preferably three) World Wars? You're not even qualified to operate our coffee machine, you sentient potato.

Oh, you didn't observe the Big Bang as it happened? Get out of here, you pirated copy of Windows 95.

I am gonna literally throw up from the mere thought of your hubris, that you could apply for a junior position. Absolutely sickening.

Also, no you don't need any experience.

We want special people, and don’t give AF what their background is. Most of our best people did nothing remotely related to their current roles, so if you've never done anything like this before, don't sweat it. We hire 100x more for potential than existing knowledge. The Big Bang requirement still stands though.

--Do I need a college degree?--

You just need to be awesome.

--What is the salary range?--

We are mainly looking to hire people from the Philippines, where the rest of our VA team is located. This means we’re not looking to pay a Western rate at this time; this will start at $5 an hour for approximately 40-hours of work per week. 

--How good does my English need to be?--

Very, very good. At least in writing, an American should not easily be able to tell that they are corresponding with a non-native speaker.

--What are the hours like?--

We are in North Carolina, USA (EST Eastern time zone) but you will be working with our Filipino VA team for the most part during Filipino hours - we’re flexible though.

We work mostly from Mondays to Fridays. You can decide what your work hours will be, as long as you track them using Timecamp and make sure that tasks assigned to you are attended to within 48 business hours.

If you want to work more than 40 hours, that is fine, but you don’t have to.

If you need an occasional day off because you’re sick or your family needs help, that is fine, as long as you make sure that someone else is covering for you.

--What traits do I need to kick-ass?--

1. Be very smart. 
   1. You’re going to need to learn a lot of things and be able to operate independently.
2. Be able to identify problems on your own and then do your best to figure out how to solve them.
3. At the same time, have the self-awareness to recognize when you’re stuck and ask for help. 
   1. Smart people know that asking questions early saves hours of work later. We want curious minds who speak up when they need guidance.
4. Be extremely good on the computer and the web.
5. Speak and write fluent American English with near-perfect grammar.
6. Be coachable. If you don't like getting blunt, honest feedback (we're always nice about it for what it’s worth) and improving, we probably aren't a fit for each other.
7. Willingness to do whatever. We're still more or less a startup, so everyone has to wear multiple hats. Sometimes everyone has to chip in to help get orders shipped out, you know?
8. Have a fun attitude. We like people with a great sense of humor and overall happy outlook on life.

--Why Should I Work For You Guys?--

Good Question! We want really high-quality candidates, so we will be offering the following:

- Ability to earn more money if you take on more responsibility

- Work from home as long as you have fast and reliable internet

- Vacation time that starts after 3 months

- Time off for special situations

- Lots of training and learning opportunities. If you’re ambitious, and we find out that you kick-ass, then we’ll definitely give you more responsibility and money

- Working for super nice people that care about you

--This sounds pretty good, though I’m still skeptical that this isn’t a pyramid scheme.--

You sound just like our tax auditor!

--That doesn’t resolve any of my fears, but what do I need to do to apply?--

Please submit your information on the following page to apply:
 

https://jlstradingco.applytojob.com/apply/1SHBut5OUp/HighGrowth-Technical-VA-Paid-Amazon-PPC-Apprenticeship-Fun-Ecom-Co

We promise to respond within 5-10 business days even if our answer is No.

There will be multiple steps in this process, FYI, including a long written application, interviews with potentially a few different people, and paid work test(s). Hiring the right people is really hard and very expensive if we do it poorly, so we have to front-load the process. I'm sorry about that and thank you for sticking with us.

Once you’re in our pipeline though, I would anticipate giving you a final answer within a few weeks, depending on how it goes. We definitely don’t want to string you along, and as long as you do what we ask, we promise to tell you “yes” or “no”, and to not just ghost you (like everybody I match with on Tinder).

Thank you for your time and interest, and I hope we can work together soon!

----

JLS Trading Co. provides equal employment opportunities (EEO) to all employees and applicants for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability or genetics. In addition to federal law requirements, JLS Trading Co. complies with applicable state and local laws governing nondiscrimination in employment in every location in which the company has facilities. This policy applies to all terms and conditions of employment, including recruiting, hiring, placement, promotion, termination, layoff, recall, transfer, leaves of absence, compensation and training.

JLS Trading Co. expressly prohibits any form of workplace harassment based on race, color, religion, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, national origin, age, genetic information, disability, or veteran status. Improper interference with the ability of JLS Trading Co.’s employees to perform their job duties may result in discipline up to and including discharge