Skip to main content

How to find a product to sell online.

There is no secret formula but here are some guidelines to follow.

1. Use Google Ads Keyword Planner to find key words for products you are interested in selling (free account!). 
Pay close attention to number of clicks as opposed to impressions. (You can select different states or countries to narrow your search.) Don't forget to use the "Keyword Ideas" tab in the upper left hand corner.

2. Find somewhere you can buy some products to test with (Like 1-10 pieces). 
Test small, fail fast. If it doesn't work at all, move on to another keyword or product. Something I learned from selling on Amazon is that you can test a keyword or sell page easily by buying several items from a retail store or competitor for your initial inventory. You don't have to make money on your first few sales, it's more important to find out if something sells and how much you can sell it for.

3. Find a supplier. 
After you have tested your product and know there is some demand, it's time to find a cheaper place to buy your inventory. Alibaba and AliExpress are great places to start for everyday products. There are varying qualities of products and suppliers so don't get too excited with the low prices. On samples there usually isn't much to worry about but on real orders remember there are tariffs on most goods and some paperwork to be done. As always there are people to help for a small fee. UPS and FedEx are fine to start out with.

4. Remember you are always testing.
All products have a cap on demand. There are only so many people that want any given item. If you find your sales have capped out, don't give up, but keep in mind that at some point the only way to sell more is to give them away for free. Try new keywords, ad campaigns, and new platforms (eBay, Walmart.com, etc...). Don't forget to test cheap and fail often. Ad campaigns especially, you can spend a lot of money here if you're not careful. Set reasonable spending limits and raise them slowly. There are caps here too.

5. Find the next product!
Once you have gone through the process it will be easier the next time.

Keep a journal or notes so you can go back and remember things that you tried in the past.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

How to choose a hosting service.

There are a lot of website hosting options out there, so how do you choose? Here are a few ideas for slimming down the competition: First, what kind of website are you building? What are the unique needs of this website? Is it a blog? Is it a drop-shipping site? Are you selling your own products or inventory? Each of these will have their own unique requirements for a website. Each hosting service offers different tools included in the package. Many even offer one free domain for a year. Second, what is your budget? Some hosting services are cheaper to start than others. If you go with a cheaper option you will probably have to sign up for a year or more and after the agreement period your cost will likely increase quite a bit. Make sure you study the plans they offer. Third, how much time do you want to spend building the website? With sites like Weebly , Wix or SquareSpace  the hosting, website builder and tools are all built in to the service. With GoDaddy, BlueHost and...