If you fancy yourself a bit of an entrepreneur and are considering starting an online business selling products, it’s imperative that you ask and answer several questions to make sure you’re selling something people actually want and put your business in the best position to succeed.
Because unfortunately, a lot of e-commerce businesses fail due to a lack of want or need of the products that they are selling.
Undertaking plenty of research into product trends and what’s in demand in the market can help ensure your e-commerce business not only survives, but thrives. Let’s get into the most important product research considerations to take on board for any new online retail business.
Which is the best product research tool?
There are a number of websites that can provide insights on current trending products that will certainly give you an indication of which the best products are to sell online. These include:
TrendWatching: As one of the leading consumer trend firms across the globe since way back in 2002, you can rest assured they know what they’re talking about. Their team consists of experts across a number of cities around the world who provide insight on the very latest trends.
Trend Hunter: The world’s largest and most popular trends platform consisting of 137,000 members and three million-plus fans, Trend Hunter offers inspiration for aspiring entrepreneurs like you to learn about current product trends.
Amazon Best Sellers: Learning what the best selling products on Amazon are via Amazon Best Sellers can be incredibly useful, while their Movers & Shakers is a rundown of the products that have gained the most traction over a 24-hour period which offers an insight into current trending products.
eBay Market Research: The Market Research tool available on eBay will show you what the best-performing product categories are at the moment.
AliExpress Popular: This tool provides a list of the products being purchased the most.
Etsy: You can simply jump onto the Etsy website and search for trending products using the search function which is nice and straightforward.
How do you determine best-selling products?
The best method to determine the best selling products is to utilise more than one of the above product research tools at a time and cross-reference each of the trending products.
If any of the products are showing an uptick in sales across a few of the tools, there’s a very high chance they’re the ones to look at stocking in your e-commerce store.
What products are high in demand right now?
Using Amazon Best Sellers as an example, the current product trends include Amazon Basics batteries and electronics such as the Apple Pencil, hard drives, gaming controllers, and microSD cards. These are the best-selling products on Amazon internationally as of today.
What are the most profitable items to sell online?
Your response to this question will differ from other aspiring online business owners out there, because everyone has their own connections to wholesalers so costs may vary greatly!
Consider the cost of purchasing whichever trending products you’re interested in stocking (per unit) against the retail price you’ll be charging for each of the units – this is your gross profit margin (without subtracting any overheads) per unit.
What you’re looking for is the highest possible profit margin per unit.
What is the most trending product?
Utilising Amazon’s Movers & Shakers search, the hottest product trends are split up by categories and are as follows:
Baby: First Essentials by NUK Sippy cups
Clothing, Shoes & Jewelry: Amazon Essentials Women’s Belice Ballet Flat
Health & Household: Charmin Ultra Soft Toilet Paper Family Mega Roll x 24
Camera & Photo Products: HEXEUM Telescope 70mm Aperture 500mm
Office Products: Ruled Index Cards 3” x 5” white x 300
Software: Windows 10 Home USB
Bring your business to greater heights
As you can see, finding the best products to sell online such as those that are trending will put your business in the best position to succeed. But there are also a number of other factors that will add to its success, too. A solid marketing strategy; proper design of your e-commerce website and social media platforms; having a reliable shipping company, and quality customer service are all major contributors as well.
Take a holistic approach to your new business venture to provide yourself the highest chance of success. Open an account with us today.