Player reputation and merchandise sales

[tmpusr]

It's not clear to me how player reputation, team success and merchandise sales interact.
I've become the most reputable club in the world and my merchandise sales is hovering around 12M , while the merchandise sales of e.g. Real Madrid is around 100M. Note that I purposely bought 2 Japanese players, 2 South Korean players, 1 Australian player and Donnarumma, and I've established commercial affiliations with clubs in Japan, China and Australia. Even though it does make sense to take a few years till I reach the sales of Real Madrid, unless I actively try to buy players with the goal of increasing merchandise sales they remain stagnant.

Essentially my question boils down to: in order to increase my merchandise sales I need players with high reputation (or mediocre reputation but originating from countries like Japan, South Korea and Australia), unless I'm missing something. If my team success doesn't increase the reputation of the players in my team, how can it be increased? Is there maybe another reason that merchandise sales are so lower for me (I'm playing with AEK from Greece) that I should focus on fixing?

Thanks!

Edited May 8, 2020 by tmpusr

[rinso]

who are you managing? what team/league.  

[tmpusr]

AEK, Greek Superleague (which currently is the 8th most reputable league).
Is the league reputation relevant?

Edited May 9, 2020 by tmpusr

[tmpusr]

Bump
Also a bonus question: if my merch sales increase after buying some players and then I sell them, do my sales return to the previous number (like the players never joined), do they remain at the new level (like the players never left) or do they drop somewhere in between (resembling an increased club profile)?

Edited May 10, 2020 by tmpusr