You’ve done the research, found a niche market and created a product that your customers would like to buy. However, sales remain sluggish and you wonder if setting up a website will solve your problems. The options listed below give an idea how to make the most of your website.
To make more sense of the options, assume that you’ve written and published a cookbook that specializes in Thai cuisine. You currently have 500 copies of this cookbook which you would like to sell as fast as possible.
Selling Your Own Product
Selling your self-published cookbook through your website allows you total control over each sale. Since you know the exact cost of publishing, you can fix a retail price higher than your cost price, but lower than what your competitors charge for similar books.
In addition, you will sell directly to your customers and ‘cut out the middle man’. For example, a similar cookbook might sell for $20.00 elsewhere. The cost price of your cookbook is $8.00. Even if you fix a retail price of $14.00, you will make a profit of $6.00 on each sale.
Drop-Ship Products
Drop-shippers keep clients’ stock in warehouses. Upon receipt of notification from the clients that a sale has been made, the drop-shipper packs the order and sends it to the clients’ customers.
With your cookbook, you begin by arranging for a drop-shipper to store all 500 copies of your cookbook. A customer visits your website and pays $14.00 for it and $7.00 for postage and packaging. When you receive the order, you send an email to the drop-shipper with your customer’s name together with postage and packaging information. The drop-shipper packs the cookbook, puts your label on the package and sends it to the customer.
The drop-shipper bills you for the wholesale price of your cookbook – assume that the cookbook's wholesale price is $9.00. The drop-shipper adds the $7.00 fee for postage and packaging. However, as you have passed the postage and packaging fee to the customer, you have just netted a profit of $5.00 (the retail price minus the wholesale price of your cookbook).
While the $5.00 profit may seem lesser than what you might earn if you sell the cookbook directly to your customer, remember that you did not use any of your resources to store the stock. Your only effort was to send an email to your drop-shipper.
Selling Your Services
Unlike selling a physical product, your chances of success when selling your services depends on how much time you have to provide it. Keeping your cookbook in mind, you can offer your services in two ways:
- Providing your services online: This involves things like desktop publishing, consultations and advertising. For example, you can create a newsletter and share little tips to enhance some of the recipes from your cookbook.
- Advertising your service online but delivering it offline: This involves expanding on what is already available in the physical product. For instance, one of your recipes is called ‘Chicken in Pandan Leaf’. Your customers may benefit from attending a class where they are taught how to wrap the marinated pieces of chicken in ‘pandan’ leaf.
The Most Profitable Thing You Can Sell Online
One of the most profitable things to sell online is something that can be delivered electronically. For example, if you can find a way to convert your cookbook into an eBook, you will have a finished product ready to be sold online, where you don't need to pay for storage, packaging or shipping.
To profit from a website, you must maximize the opportunities available to you. Following the options above will ensure that your business is on the right path to financial success.
Aneeta Sundararaj - Aneeta Sundararaj is an established freelance writer and published author who writes well-researched articles on various topics.
