Forum Moderators: buckworks
There are thousands and thousands of different niches/markets online, we all know that.
But I was wondering, could you mention a few BROAD markets for an ecommerce store which might yield relative to high profit margins?
Also, I was wondering what performs best, smaller items or bigger items in your store?
Brado
Your supposed to do this research your self!
That means spending money and sometimes losing it.
Like electronics or freakin antiques.
Plus my last question cannot be that difficult to answer, smaller or bigger items, which works best for a niche ecommerce store?
Some of my favorite niche markets are used Nasa Space Shuttles and decommissioned nuclear submarines.
Yeah sure fashion does well!
Oh and you might like to try (home electronics) 52" Plasma Screens do well! you should'nt have a problem shifting some of those.
adamnichols45, isn't home electronics a SUPER difficult market to break into? especially on the search engines?
For me, the word niche conjurs up the image of a profitable vertical market - which few folk will share with you because it is their livelihood and they don't want anymore competition. I also think you're going about this the wrong way.
IMHO the way you should be going about this is to research for possible niche areas that have little or no competition! How do you find them? That's the nut you have to crack. I know folks that will go buy a ton of obscure hobby and trade mags and look through them for ideas. Others spend all hours surfing following obscure links.
I have had many ideas/sites
The key is not just finding the niche product with out loads and loads of competetion the key is having the dedication to follow it through.
Dont be surprised if your not making money even 6 months after you start.
If you dont think that after 6 months you will still be as keen as the day you started then give up now because it just wont work.
Ok lets take an EXAMPLE here: Lets say I want to rank an ecommerce store in the SERPS against about 500000 direct competitors (those you find when you put the keywords in quotes).
If money was NO problem, how long do you think it would take to rank?
Also, 6 months is far too long to wait to see if a ecommerce store MIGHT be profitable. Where can I burn money (besides adwords) to get traffic fit for an ecommerce store so that I can test the store's profitability?
Thanks guys!
If money was NO problem, how long do you think it would take to rank?
Also, 6 months is far too long to wait to see if a ecommerce store MIGHT be profitable.
Ummm. You're done before you start with this sentence alone. Especially since you're looking to burn a bunch of cash at the outset on advertising...IMHO you are going about this completely the wrong way. I hope for your sake that you were born under a lucky star.
But I doubt it will take 6 months before I see a 1-2 page ranking. I think if I purchase an aged domain name and outsource SEO tasks to get one way links I might get a top ranking faster.
I'm not going to do this myself...I'm going to outsource everything.
There can be many different answers for different successful businesses - "I'm the cheapest", or "I'm the only one offering this", or "I can offer a level of pre-sales support which my competitors can't" (that one is mine for my main site) or "everyone else selling this product is buying from a distributor who messes up so badly it generally takes a month to provide a digital product" (got a small site doing nicely purely on this basis). But if you can't answer that question then you're probably looking at a failure.
I'm not sure how much the particular niche matters, since competition will even it out in the long run. The most important thing is to do something you both enjoy and are good at, and know why it is that you deserve to be successful.
I think you rather just put the final nail in the coffin!
What ever niche you choose there is going to be somebody that does not out source everything and one of the reasons for that is that they are passionate about that chosen niche and they do enjoy putting in 12+ hour days for the love and the money.
Thats the reason why they will outrank you.
Why on earth would I want to spend 12+ hours a day on something when I can reap the benefits by investing in the work of others? It's common business sense don't you think?
"I'm a businessman" not a very good one then.
You say you can reap the benefits by investing in others then go and invest and maybe they will tell you where you can get rich quick!
If you are by temperament a venture capitalist, why not be a venture capitalist, and look for those who have the temperament of shopkeepers to invest in?
I don't think you will be able to do it if you decide to start from scratch with online business, even if you start with big money. I think the most important part in succeeding in ecommerce is experience which you build as you grow your business. If you have no experience, no personal interest in the niche and only interested in quick profit I simply don't think you can do it. Outsourcing is not the answer to everthing. Sure it is nice to have money and pay for everything but you have to know what to demand from people. Not knowing "the inside" of ecommerce and your nieche with cost you a lot of money.
6 months to become profitable on brand new online business for me sounds unrealistic, unless you come up with second Amazon or Google.
Anyway, best of luck.
[edited by: Brado12 at 3:19 pm (utc) on Feb. 14, 2009]
I don't see myself building and maintaining EVERYTHING, that's just not smart no matter what you say. There is no leverage if you do things that way and you won't be able to quantify your business.
LOL everyone here outsources and delegates tasks. However, there are entrepreneurs, and then there are venture capitalists. You sound like the latter, attempting to be the former. I mean, if you want to outsource EVERYTHING...why not just fund someone else's great idea? Is it because you want the theoretical exponential profits all to yourself? If that is the case, what is the motivation for your theoretical managers to grow the business. That is where it becomes relevant who does the work. An entrepreneur puts in long hours, blood, sweat and tears to grow their business even before it is making a return. They have profit motivation. An outsourced manager just cashes their paycheck. Which is well and good for a healthy, profitable business...but when you are trying to get something off the ground, Passion for the Niche and a strong profit motive are two key ingredients that I think your setup would be lacking.
If you want a return within 6 months, buy stock in an existing company that you believe in.
I know how to do market research
People have offered general business advice from their own experience, but you have made it clear that you feel you have a better method, so that isn't helping you.
Don't really see there's much else anyone here can help with, but if there is I'm sure someone will if you ask.
