Sourcing Items to Sell – by SaleHoo
Sourcing Items to Sell
Written by SaleHoo.com © All Rights Reserved
I’ve got my idea – now where do I go?
Not sure where to turn to find your stock? The best idea is to find a couple of supply sources for your items so that if one dries up during a busy period, you won’t be left high and dry.
1. Garage Sales
Garage sales can be a great opportunity to pick up potentially valuable items selling for pennies. However, they do require a regular time commitment and a lot of patience! You’ll quite likely travel around 5-8 sales before you find anything suitable. Going around garage sales requires planning and rising early. The best idea is to look through the morning papers as soon as they arrive. Plan your route to make most efficient use of your time so that you are not doubling back. Make a list of items you would like to find and the maximum amount you would pay to make a profit. And finally, don’t forget to take cash! Take small bills and some change as most garage sale owners only have a small amount on hand. It’s a waste of everyone’s time if you have to race down to the ATM machine. Garage sales can be useful sources, but they rely on luck and have a high time cost per item. Thus, serious sellers don’t rely on garage sales as their sole provider.
2. Liquidation sales
Liquidation sales are a fantastic way of finding brand-name items at enormous discounts. Check your newspapers and look for sales in your area. Before buying from a liquidator check to see why the goods are being sold. Most of the time liquidation sales take place for legitimate reasons such as company bankruptcy, store relocation and so on. However, it always pays to check as you don’t want to end up with a pile of stock you can’t shift. Another thing – don’t bother with liquidation stock that is outside the scope of your business. There is no point buying liquidation bicycle equipment just because it’s cheap when you only sell jewelry.
Alternatively, you can find liquidation sites on the Internet – one such site is http://www.liquidation.com. These sites make it extremely easy to buy liquidation, particularly if you live in an outlying area. One thing – just make sure that the possibility of damaged stock and used or returned items included in the lots is small or non-existent.
Liquidation sales are a great way to supplement your stock, but they can’t be relied upon to restock the shelves.
3. Estate sales
Estate sales can be a goldmine for anyone selling jewelry, vintage clothing, books, furniture and so on. Once again, you need to have an idea of how much you can afford to spend before you go. Don’t forget to buy items your customers would like, rather simply getting caught up in your own enthusiasm for what is for sale. Note that estate sales run by an agent are unlikely to garner the same bargains as one run by the family.
4. Clearance stores
At certain times of the year, most major stores will have a stock clear-out sale. Some of these sales give you the opportunity to buy goods 50% or more below the regular retail value. This can be a fantastic opportunity to find items to sell – or replenish your stocks. Good clearance sales can be equal to or even below a good wholesale price. Don’t forget to overlook small hobby shops in your area with clearance sales either. If you know the store is going to have clearance sales regularly, then this can be one method of getting stock.
5. Wholesalers
Wholesalers are the most reliable method of sourcing goods. While the initial process can be time consuming at first, it is effort that pays off. When you have found a wholesale, you now have certainty of when you are going to receive stock and how much you will have to pay for it. The best way to find wholesalers is to use a directory. Directories remove the risk of dealing with illegitimate wholesalers and give you some peace of mind when dealing with wholesalers and manufacturers from China. Wholesalers should be the mainstay behind your product sourcing.
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About the Author: SaleHoo is one of the fastest growing product sourcing portals on the internet. It contains a database of drop ship, wholesale, closeout and manufacturing suppliers offering thousands of product suppliers to consumers! Located at www.SaleHoo.com, visitors are allowed to sign up for unlimited and lifetime access to the completely searchable database of products and suppliers. The database is regularly updated, ensuring that the latest retail products are always available for purchase and SaleHoo carries the BBB Reliability Seal!
Join SaleHoo Today for their Special Startup Offer!
Get Started With Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing is for everyone, in fact every person who has an online presence be it just an email address should incorporate some form of affiliate marketing otherwise you could be losing potential earnings (more on this later).
Here are some of benefits of affiliate marketing.
- Excellent way to build passive income from via the internet.
- Becoming an affiliate is easy and simple.
- You can start earning immediately.
- Zero or minimal costs.
- You don’t need to have your own products.
- You don’t need to be a technical geek. Basic computer skill and ability to follow simple instructions is all you need.
- You don’t need to have your own website (although I highly recommend you having one for your opt-in page).
What is Affiliate Marketing?
Affiliate marketing is simply promoting other peoples products/services by driving traffic to their website via your unique affiliate link.
How does it work?
Once you have decided to promote a particular website which has an affiliate program and register as an affiliate, you get a unique affiliate link.
Your aim is then to get people to click on your unique affiliate link which will take them (the visitor) to the website you are promoting. You will then get paid a commission if the visitor takes the necessary actions such as purchasing a product (paid per sale) or registering as a member (paid per lead).
How can people click on your affiliate link?
There are many sources for you to promote your unique affiliate links. You should not limit yourself to one source but instead should utilize a combination of the following sources. The more links you have out there the more clicks you are bound to get and the more commission you will make (provided they were placed in the right target market).
Places where you can place your links:-
- Your website (if you have one)
- In your email signature
- In articles, ebooks, ezines and reports you write
- Forums and blogs you participate in
- When you join groups or networking websites
- Advertisement such as Google Adwords (pay per click), freeadforum.com (free advertising), related websites (paid advertising) and with companies that have a huge list (your target market)
- Email marketing – buy a list and send out an email promoting your affiliate link/website
How to join affiliate program?
Affiliate marketing has become increasingly popular in recent years. Most internet marketers and even some large corporate companies and small businesses have an affiliate program in place to promote their products/services.
The majority of affiliate programs promote digital products (ebooks, videos, software programs etc) and membership websites (privilege access to information, monthly reports/downloads).
You can visit any website and look to see if they have an affiliate program in place or Google the keywords “affiliate program” along with the keywords representing the market you are interested in.
The best way is to visit sites that manage affiliate programs such as Clickbank and Commission Junction.
If you are selling or promoting downloadable information products, I highly recommend Clickbank.
Clickbank is the marketplace where thousands of people sell their digital information products and it is the number one website where people join as an affiliate. You can find any niche products to promote. The best part is that you can promote as many websites you want through Clickbank with one registration and get paid commission for all your sales (from all the sites you promote) by Clickbank. This certainly makes managing your account and tracking your commissions and payments so much easier.
Registering with Clickbank
To get started, register with Clickbank (click here), select the “Marketplace” menu. Here you will find thousands of affiliate programs which you can join. Enter the category or keywords relating to your interest. Before making a decision to join a particular affiliate program, make sure you check out their sales page, the commission and conversion rate. If you are happy with your choice, click the “Create my Hoplink” button, copy the url generated. This url is your unique affiliate link for promoting this particular program.
Take action and get started now.
Focus, achieve and succeed!
Kham Lee Tran
Ps. Join my mailing list to recieve your free copy of “How to make your first $1000 online in 30 days?”
Dropship & Wholesale Suppliers List
I personally have used SaleHoo and in addition to the following, I must say their support team has been extremely helpful and prompt.
Here are some of the benefits SaleHoo offers their clients:
- Global suppliers with over 5,347 Wholesale Product Suppliers
- All wholesalers must meet minimum standards of service.
- SaleHoo don’t just talk to their suppliers… each week they anonymously purchase from different suppliers and then rate them on price, speed, quality and service!
- Have a large directory of dropshippers more than willing to supply single items or small quantities.
- If they don’t have it, they can find it for you. SaleHoo have staff working 7 days a week, available to answer your questions and find suppliers if they’re not already listed in their directories.
- Over 150 categories of goods, from jewelery and DVDs to plumbing supplies
- generic goods and brand-name goods, including Gucci, Prada, D&G, Versace, Polo, YSL, and Seven, etc
- Over 40,000 members worldwide
- SaleHoo offer a 56-day money-back guarantee.
Unfortunately, since I have been satisfied with SaleHoo, I have not personally used other wholesale list myself. If anyone has, please share your experience here.
To learn more about SaleHoo Click Here.
Other Resources:
Focus, achieve and succeed!
Kham Lee Tran
Where to find products to sell?
Products are everywhere. You can literally sell just about everything you see around you.
You can start selling your personal items that you no longer want.
You can make you own products to sell.
You can buy products from
- garage sale
- auction
- warehouse sale
- retail sale
You can buy bulk at wholesale price.
Some of these require research and a lot of time in traveling and handling of the products.
If you don’t want to spend a lot of time having to go garage sale or auctions etc,
the best way is to source your products direct from a supplier (either a manufacturer or distributor).
This method is one of the best ways to source your products and so I will cover it in more detail.
Option 1: Buy direct from a supplier
If you are able to find a supplier (manufacturer) who is willing to sell direct to you at a reasonable discount,
then you may be able to make a profit as a distributor. Don’t forget to take into account the shipping and handling (your time) cost.
Finding a manufacturer that is willing to sell direct to you may be difficult unless you already have a related business.
Many manufacturers don’t like dealing with small accounts.
Also, many of these suppliers may require you to buy bulk quantities. This means you will need space to store the items and capital to pay for the items in advance.
OPTION 2: Drop shipping
You may have heard of the term drop shipping. This is simply buying from a supplier and having them ship the item direct to your customer.
Drop shipping has become popular in recent years and many people are even selling directories listing suppliers that are willing to drop ship.
But be warned, as information from most directories are out dated or incorrect. I myself have found some directories where the contact details & websites were disconnected.
I’ll share with you a little later a couple of reliable directories. Meanwhile here are some benefits and drawbacks in using Drop Shipping method.
Benefits:
- No inventory cost – you don’t have to buy any products in advance (until you make a sale)
- No warehouse/storage space required – save on space and rent
- No product handling – you don’t have to spend time packaging and shipping the item, it is done for you
- Cashflow – you sell the item before buying it, ie you collect the money before distributing the money to your supplier and yourself (the profit)
- Guarantee profit – as long as you sell the item for more than what your supplier charges, you will always be guaranteed to make a profit since you never need to pay for the item until after you have sold it.
Drawback:
- You rely on the supplier to be professional and provide excellent customer service, this includes quick delivery, prompt response to enquiries etc.
- Your supplier may not provide the service level as good as you would have done it yourself.
- If there is a problem with the delivery or the product the customer will want immediate resolution from you, however you may need to follow up with the supplier who may not be so quick to respond.
Remember to focus, achieve and succeed!
Kham Lee Tran
Are Paid Surveys A Waste Of Your Time?
Concept of PAID SURVEYS is simple, you only need to know how to read English and use email. It’s been a couple of years since I tried this out. I personally think it is a waste of time and would not recommend this as a way of making money online. OK, sure a lot may have changed and improved since I gave it a go and you might consider starting this just to make some easy money. Just keep in mind the ultimate internet business is one which you can make passive income (money while you sleep or on holidays). Unfortunately, making money with paid surveys is active, ie if you stop doing the surveys, you make zero dollars.
What is Paid Surveys?
Definition of Paid Surveys is exactly that. You get paid for completing surveys. Payment can be in the form of cash, rewards points, prizes of entry into a draw.
Typical Sales Pitch?
You will be told that companies are investing in market research and would rather pay you then employ a researcher to go do the market research.
You will be led to believe that making money is easy, just complete surveys and get paid as much as $30-$50 for a 5 minute survey. OK, this is true subject to the many conditions that must happen first which of course they don’t tell you until you join.
How it really works?
You pay and join as a member usually with a market research company. In exchange, you get access to one or more of the following:-
- List of companies that will send you surveys from time to time
- List of other market research companies (similar to the one you just joined)
Register with companies
Once you have access to the list, you now have to register with EACH of the companies you want surveys from. You will need to include your detail, demographics and interests and will need to keep a record of the company website, login & password. This really fustrates me considering at most a particular company may only do a couple of surveys a month.
To receive surveys on a daily basis, you will need to register with about 50-100 companies. Not to mention, you’ll have to keep track of your earnings and payments (cheques etc).
Ideally, the market research company should only require you to register with them and they should be sending you surveys from all the companies registered with them and any earnings you’ve made should be paid by the market research company. I haven’t come across any market research company that does this, if you do please let me know (I may then change my perception of paid surveys).
Lets say you were really keen and have registered with 100 companies, you now start to get a decent amount of emails requesting your participation in completing the surveys.
Payment
Some companies will pay cash for completed surveys, reward points which can be redeemed for prizes or a chance to go into a draw to win a major prize.
You will know what sort of payment plan the company offers when you register with them.
Completing the survey
When you get an email requesting your participation to complete a survey, this does not mean you will be rewarded with full payment. Let me clarify.
If the email says you will be paid $30 for completing a survey, that means you must pass the qualification process and only when you have actually completed the survey, will they reward you with the $30.
You will be asked several qualifying questions to determine if you are the target market for that particular survey, if you don’t meet their criteria, then you do NOT qualify and do not get to complete the rest of the survey. Hence you don’t get the $30 and if you are lucky they might reward you with an entry into a draw to for wasting your time (getting this far). If you DO qualify (the target market) then you get to complete the survey which may take an additional 20 minutes of your time and yes you get the $30. Companies are only prepared to pay for opinions of the target market and this is why they will put you through a qualifying process first. (eg. why would they pay you $30 if you are a non-smoker and the survey is relating understanding which cigarette brands are mostly preferred etc).
Is Paid Survey for you?
Like I said, it has been a while since my attempt with paid surveys and my opinion is based on my personal experience.
If you just love reading tons of emails jand you really think it is the thing for you, then sure give it a go.
Here are some popular Paid Surveys.
I highly recommend you choose one where they offer a trial period or some sort of money back guarantee.
If you have tried any paid surveys programs with success or failure, why not share your experiences here with other viewers.
Focus, achieve and succeed!
Kham Lee Tran
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