Saturday, March 25, 2006
Finding Products to Sell in Your Web Store
"What do I sell in my Web store?" is usually the first question new business owners ask when they decide to start a Web store. To me, that's jumping ahead about three steps on the process of starting a business.
But I won't repeat what I continually harp on about how important it is to know what people are looking for before you decide what to sell. I'll simply refer you to an article on my site about discovering profitable niches.
Instead, I'll assume you've already found a potentially profitable niche and have identified problems common to that niche. I'll assume you already have identified the types of products that solve those problems.
The best places to find products are the two top dropship directories:
Both are excellent sources of current and reputable dropshippers.
Again, I won't repeat what I've covered in detail elsewhere. I've reviewed both Worldwide Brands and Hienote individually and done a comparison of them as well. I'll just say that I've been so happy with them that I wouldn't even bother checking out any others.
Both of them list companies that dropship for you. In other words, the companies in these directories will sell you products one at a time and ship them directly from their warehouse to your buyers.
This is a great way to do business if you don't want to deal with stocking inventory or shipping!
In addition, Worldwide Brands also has a separate directory of manufacturers and distributors who will sell to you in a more traditional way. Companies listed in their Light Bulk Wholesale list will sell products to you in bulk and at a volume discount so you get an even better price per item than you would with a dropshipping arrangement.
Of course, you are then responsible for stocking it and shipping it yourself, but you have lower prices and greater control over your inventory.
Finding whatever types of product you want to sell is no problem with either Hienote or Worldwide Brands. Worldwide Brands has over 4,000 brand names with over 3,000,000 individual products. And while Hienote can't match those numbers, it also lets you get your feet wet in dropshipping at a bargain rate.
Overall, these two directories are the best place to find products to sell in any Web store. And if you want to find out more about how to successfully set up dropshipping arrangements with manufacturers, Worldwide Brands also offers a free ebook, Starting Your Internet Business Right, that is excellent in walking you through the whole process.
Jeff
"What do I sell in my Web store?" is usually the first question new business owners ask when they decide to start a Web store. To me, that's jumping ahead about three steps on the process of starting a business.
But I won't repeat what I continually harp on about how important it is to know what people are looking for before you decide what to sell. I'll simply refer you to an article on my site about discovering profitable niches.
Instead, I'll assume you've already found a potentially profitable niche and have identified problems common to that niche. I'll assume you already have identified the types of products that solve those problems.
The best places to find products are the two top dropship directories:
Both are excellent sources of current and reputable dropshippers.
Again, I won't repeat what I've covered in detail elsewhere. I've reviewed both Worldwide Brands and Hienote individually and done a comparison of them as well. I'll just say that I've been so happy with them that I wouldn't even bother checking out any others.
Both of them list companies that dropship for you. In other words, the companies in these directories will sell you products one at a time and ship them directly from their warehouse to your buyers.
This is a great way to do business if you don't want to deal with stocking inventory or shipping!
In addition, Worldwide Brands also has a separate directory of manufacturers and distributors who will sell to you in a more traditional way. Companies listed in their Light Bulk Wholesale list will sell products to you in bulk and at a volume discount so you get an even better price per item than you would with a dropshipping arrangement.
Of course, you are then responsible for stocking it and shipping it yourself, but you have lower prices and greater control over your inventory.
Finding whatever types of product you want to sell is no problem with either Hienote or Worldwide Brands. Worldwide Brands has over 4,000 brand names with over 3,000,000 individual products. And while Hienote can't match those numbers, it also lets you get your feet wet in dropshipping at a bargain rate.
Overall, these two directories are the best place to find products to sell in any Web store. And if you want to find out more about how to successfully set up dropshipping arrangements with manufacturers, Worldwide Brands also offers a free ebook, Starting Your Internet Business Right, that is excellent in walking you through the whole process.
Jeff
Friday, March 24, 2006
The Danger of Buying a Ready-Made Store
Before I get into how to find a profitable niche for your business, I realized there was one warning I needed to make. There are plenty of scammers and semi-scammers out there who gladly offer to set up a complete store for you, filled with lots of cheap and sparkly products. Just pay them a chunk of money and you have a real online store to call your very own!
What a deal, huh? Well, it isn't. Here's why. By the time you've bought your ready-made store, thousands of other suckers--excuse me--budding entrepreneurs have already bought a site identical to yours. That means the Web is flooded with the exact same cheap and sparkly products you're trying to sell.
You're trying to sell products that people stumble across everywhere--or that they would if the owners had any idea of how to promote their sites. The companies that sell ready-made sites don't give you any help learning how to promote your site on the Web; they're counting on three things:
Before I get into how to find a profitable niche for your business, I realized there was one warning I needed to make. There are plenty of scammers and semi-scammers out there who gladly offer to set up a complete store for you, filled with lots of cheap and sparkly products. Just pay them a chunk of money and you have a real online store to call your very own!
What a deal, huh? Well, it isn't. Here's why. By the time you've bought your ready-made store, thousands of other suckers--excuse me--budding entrepreneurs have already bought a site identical to yours. That means the Web is flooded with the exact same cheap and sparkly products you're trying to sell.
You're trying to sell products that people stumble across everywhere--or that they would if the owners had any idea of how to promote their sites. The companies that sell ready-made sites don't give you any help learning how to promote your site on the Web; they're counting on three things:
- They'll get a good chunk of money up front for something that takes them no more than a few seconds to duplicate
- Each site owner will want everyone they know to see their new business venture
- Some of their friends will make a polite purchase on the site and the site-selling company will get a cut of the sale in addition to the money they made selling the site
Once the friends have seen the site, traffic virtually ceases, unless the site owner gets serious about learning how to promote a business. And when they do get serious they discover that the products they're selling are a tough sell because they're nothing more than impulse items that nobody is actually looking for.
So if you run across a too-good-to-be-true offer of a ready-made web store you can have built for you in 15 minutes, already filled with products, do yourself a favor. Run away from it.
Jeff
Thursday, March 23, 2006
Making Money Online With a Web Store
I've said in the past that most people who start a business online immediately think of only three possibilities:
The temptation is great to think you need a huge store that sells everything and anything. The problems with this are:
Let me make this clearer: I know of absolutely no one who has succeeded in starting businesses online who recommends anything other than finding a niche market to serve. It is an undisputed truth and you fly in the face of all reputable advice if you do otherwise.
Tomorrow, I'll go more into how to find a profitable niche for your online store.
Jeff
I've said in the past that most people who start a business online immediately think of only three possibilities:
- Affiliate marketing
- Online auctions
- Online store
The temptation is great to think you need a huge store that sells everything and anything. The problems with this are:
- A huge store takes a huge amount of time to build and offers you no income while you build it
- A huge store that sells everything and anything is sure to have tons of well-established, well-financed competition that can eat your shorts in one gulp
Let me make this clearer: I know of absolutely no one who has succeeded in starting businesses online who recommends anything other than finding a niche market to serve. It is an undisputed truth and you fly in the face of all reputable advice if you do otherwise.
Tomorrow, I'll go more into how to find a profitable niche for your online store.
Jeff
Tuesday, March 21, 2006
Wrapping Up Making Money With eBay Auctions
I mentioned yesterday that one of my favorite ebooks about making money with eBay auctions is The Silent Sales Machine Hiding on eBay. And a big part of it is one major section of it that shares tips on how to turn people who visit your auctions into buyers by developing a relationship with them, even if they didn't even bid on your auction.
Author Jim Cockrum urges eBay sellers to do this by creating an About Me page on eBay and driving visitors to it by offering free reports or other information that can entice them to sign up for your mailing list. You can then use that mailing list to develop a relationship with them that can lead not to just one, single sale, but an ongoing customer relationship.
It needs to be done quite carefully to work within eBay's rules, but it's powerful stuff that EVERY eBay seller should consider doing.
Cockrum has even written a followup ebook, Turn Your Auction Traffic Into Cash, to take you through all the steps of carrying this powerful strategy out. I highly recommend both to anyone serious about taking their eBay business to the next level.
Jeff
I mentioned yesterday that one of my favorite ebooks about making money with eBay auctions is The Silent Sales Machine Hiding on eBay. And a big part of it is one major section of it that shares tips on how to turn people who visit your auctions into buyers by developing a relationship with them, even if they didn't even bid on your auction.
Author Jim Cockrum urges eBay sellers to do this by creating an About Me page on eBay and driving visitors to it by offering free reports or other information that can entice them to sign up for your mailing list. You can then use that mailing list to develop a relationship with them that can lead not to just one, single sale, but an ongoing customer relationship.
It needs to be done quite carefully to work within eBay's rules, but it's powerful stuff that EVERY eBay seller should consider doing.
Cockrum has even written a followup ebook, Turn Your Auction Traffic Into Cash, to take you through all the steps of carrying this powerful strategy out. I highly recommend both to anyone serious about taking their eBay business to the next level.
Jeff
Monday, March 20, 2006
Finding Products for an eBay Business
Once you've gotten a feel for selling on eBay by researching, listing, and successfully selling odds and ends from your home, there's no lack of products you can find to sell.
Hot Item Finder
An extremely popular way to find products for eBay is through Hot Item Finder. This tool uncovers some of the hottest selling categories and products on eBay to help you find profitable products to sell in your areas of interest. And not only does it help you find them, but it helps you determine what keywords to put in your listings to maximize traffic to your auctions.
Hard goods through drop-shipping arrangements
Figuring out what to sell is only half of the equation, though. You also need to find sources for your products.
There are excellent companies that research and list reputable drop-ship companies for you in their directories. The companies they list are manufacturers or official distributors for a wide variety of name-brand and/or unique products.
The scope of companies and products in these directories is massive. You definitely need to have a good idea (backed by solid research, of course) of what you want to sell before you start browsing through the directories. It's too easy to get lost in them if you don't go in with a plan!
As with all drop-shipping arrangements, after you set up your arrangement with the companies, you can sell their products without having to stock or ship anything. Just pass the orders you receive on to them and they will ship them directly to your buyers.
Trading your time for money by handling your own inventory
Of course, having drop-shippers do all the inventorying and shipping for you costs extra. You can make more money buying in bulk and handling the inventory yourself. It means extra work, but the next step up the ladder comes when you start doing this.
And ebooks like Janiece Smith's quirkily titled "How An Overworked, Traveling, Soggy Sandwich Eating Dental Hygienist Made up to $11,212.00 a Month--100% Online" and the training tools she offers help you break down the doors into a world where your business can buy from name-brand manufacturers at below-wholesale costs and sell brands that people are really searching for.
Finding hidden treasures to sell
There are also ways to find products at next to no cost—if you're resourceful and know where to look. The Silent Sales Machine Hiding on eBay is one of the best eBay selling ebooks I've found. It shows you opportunities to build your business that most eBay sellers are completely blind to.
And its large section on product sourcing ideas gives you a treasure trove of ingenious sources for low- or no-cost products to sell.
And there are ebooks, as well, on what kinds of items to look for in garage sales and storage auctions, two sources where you can pick up profitable items for next to nothing and sell them at huge profits.
Product that give you 100% profit
Then, finally, there are products you can sell at 100% profit. That's right—products that don't cost you a cent. Plenty of people are selling kits, ebooks, and self-made videos on eBay as a source of nearly hands-free income once you put your product together.
And it's easier than you think. Check out this course "Sell Books and Videos on eBay" to see how other people who have no formal training are making huge profits by putting together e-products for niche markets on eBay.
Or check out "How to Write Your Own eBook in as Little as Seven Days" for a simple pattern to follow to quickly write a profitable ebook.
Really, the only limit to the profitable products you can come up with is your own imagination.
Jeff
Once you've gotten a feel for selling on eBay by researching, listing, and successfully selling odds and ends from your home, there's no lack of products you can find to sell.
Hot Item Finder
An extremely popular way to find products for eBay is through Hot Item Finder. This tool uncovers some of the hottest selling categories and products on eBay to help you find profitable products to sell in your areas of interest. And not only does it help you find them, but it helps you determine what keywords to put in your listings to maximize traffic to your auctions.
Hard goods through drop-shipping arrangements
Figuring out what to sell is only half of the equation, though. You also need to find sources for your products.
There are excellent companies that research and list reputable drop-ship companies for you in their directories. The companies they list are manufacturers or official distributors for a wide variety of name-brand and/or unique products.
The scope of companies and products in these directories is massive. You definitely need to have a good idea (backed by solid research, of course) of what you want to sell before you start browsing through the directories. It's too easy to get lost in them if you don't go in with a plan!
As with all drop-shipping arrangements, after you set up your arrangement with the companies, you can sell their products without having to stock or ship anything. Just pass the orders you receive on to them and they will ship them directly to your buyers.
Trading your time for money by handling your own inventory
Of course, having drop-shippers do all the inventorying and shipping for you costs extra. You can make more money buying in bulk and handling the inventory yourself. It means extra work, but the next step up the ladder comes when you start doing this.
And ebooks like Janiece Smith's quirkily titled "How An Overworked, Traveling, Soggy Sandwich Eating Dental Hygienist Made up to $11,212.00 a Month--100% Online" and the training tools she offers help you break down the doors into a world where your business can buy from name-brand manufacturers at below-wholesale costs and sell brands that people are really searching for.
Finding hidden treasures to sell
There are also ways to find products at next to no cost—if you're resourceful and know where to look. The Silent Sales Machine Hiding on eBay is one of the best eBay selling ebooks I've found. It shows you opportunities to build your business that most eBay sellers are completely blind to.
And its large section on product sourcing ideas gives you a treasure trove of ingenious sources for low- or no-cost products to sell.
And there are ebooks, as well, on what kinds of items to look for in garage sales and storage auctions, two sources where you can pick up profitable items for next to nothing and sell them at huge profits.
Product that give you 100% profit
Then, finally, there are products you can sell at 100% profit. That's right—products that don't cost you a cent. Plenty of people are selling kits, ebooks, and self-made videos on eBay as a source of nearly hands-free income once you put your product together.
And it's easier than you think. Check out this course "Sell Books and Videos on eBay" to see how other people who have no formal training are making huge profits by putting together e-products for niche markets on eBay.
Or check out "How to Write Your Own eBook in as Little as Seven Days" for a simple pattern to follow to quickly write a profitable ebook.
Really, the only limit to the profitable products you can come up with is your own imagination.
Jeff
© 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010 Jeff Baas, One Stop Web Support
