New Online Business Questions

[darrenwis]

Hi Business People!

I am looking into starting my own online business. It would be selling a range of items but i am having a bit of trouble deciding what stuff to sell. I am in to computers but would always be beaten by amazon and ebay. So i need to decide on something that will sell, any suggestions on how i would go about this and any other start up information.


Many Thanks In Advance,

Darren

[Scott-CopyandDesign]

If it was so easy to just decide to open an online shop, find something good to sell then do it and make money everyone would be doing it.

There's THOUSANDS of online shops selling just about everything. Unless you find a good niche type of product to sell and put some money and effort into it you wont make a penny.

-You need something to sell and reason for people to buy it from you instead of elsewhere.

-You need advertisements and marketing so people will actually know your website exists and visit it.

-You need to put money and effort into it for website development/hosting and to actually sell stuff.

[GameOn Sports]

Hi Business People!

I am looking into starting my own online business. It would be selling a range of items but i am having a bit of trouble deciding what stuff to sell. I am in to computers but would always be beaten by amazon and ebay. So i need to decide on something that will sell, any suggestions on how i would go about this and any other start up information.


Many Thanks In Advance,

Darren

Whoa!!! You have decided on a Sales technique and now you are trying to find a product to sell with that technique.
Whatever you are trying to sell you risk almost guaranteed failure because you've come at this 100% the wrong way.

Find a product or service first then decide on how to market and sell it would be my advice.

[Comspec]

Yep. all good advice.

I have been looking to set up my online presence for a number of months and am only getting it past the planing stage now!
I'd suggest a good read in here first, then other similar sites.

btw. If you want a couple of ebooks on the subject, i got some lately & will email them to you if you pm me. LKoad of reading, but some good pointers in there imho.

Good luck with it anyway...
Mark

[DarrenH]

Hi

Don't think that just because you're setting up on the net that it's any different to setting up a business offline, all the principles are the same.

it takes investment both in time, money and effort.

Thinking about how you're going to make money should be the last thing on your list.

First you've got to come up with a nitch that enough people want to know about.

then you've got to build a web site providing tons of quality content so you set yourself up as the place to go for info on that nitch.

Once you start to establish yourself as an authority on that topic, other sites will link to you with any luck and with a bit of help from the search engines you'll generate even more traffic.

Once you're getting repeat visitors to your site, you can start selling them on the idea that they might like to buy something from you, or visit one of the sites you're affiliated with, so you get a commission if they by from the 3rd party affiliate.

If you get the first three elements right (content, traffic, preselling) a good share of the monitising part should happen by itself.

You seem to have put the monitising part first...big mistake.

Darren

[pdecaux]

Whilst I wholeheartedly support everything that the previous posts have said, I would just offer one example that contradicts this advice:

http://www.milliondollarhomepage.com/

As reported on the BBC website (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/4585026.stm), "The first thing [Alex Tew] wrote in his pad was 'How can I become a millionaire?'"

[DarrenH]

Hi

There will always be the exception.

that was a very unique and extraordinary idea, one of those where you slap yourself round the face wondering how you didn't come up with it yourself.

So, unless the original poster has a very unique idea, all the usual business rules apply.

Darren

[SillyJokes]

I know what I would sell online if I had to start again.

But I'm not telling you.

You are right to realise that it would be a mistake to try and sell something that lots of others are doing well already.

You need to find out what people want and then give it to them.

In the olden days people used market research. I have seen it said that setting up a little website would cost less than this and if successful would actually have your foot on the first couple of rungs of the ladder so to speak.

You can sell anything online, virtually, but remember, if you can't ship it economically you should not sell it over distance, so steer clear (unless they sell for a lot of money) of large concrete garden ornaments.

[Top Hat]

Whoa!!! You have decided on a Sales technique and now you are trying to find a product to sell with that technique.
Whatever you are trying to sell you risk almost guaranteed failure because you've come at this 100% the wrong way.

Find a product or service first then decide on how to market and sell it would be my advice.

I disagree, perfectly valid to decide to go online, then search for a product/service. Jeff Bezos Amazons founder, decided to sell something online, listed about 20 products then chose books.

Perhaps Darren has some online skills (he's gonna need some :) )

So I'd look for in a product/range of products:


High margin, the bigger the better
Low shipping costs, or high value items
Niche, but not too niche, the markets got to be big enough to make some money
Not Unique, I'd find a product that is already being sold online, I'd find out how well the best do (in sales terms), then I'd do it better.