Going Beyond Buying Online: Trade Shows

Imagine if you will, an oversized showroom filled with eye-catching displays, free giveaways and hundreds of eager product suppliers, all enthusiastically vying for your attention and offering the best prices possible on the latest products out. As amazing as it sounds, it’s really not that far-fetched, it’s just a typical scene from your everyday trade show.

We’ve always encouraged our members to try out new ways of finding and sourcing products, and attending trade shows is one more fantastic way for you to do just that. There may come a time in your product-sourcing career when buying online will no longer cut it,  and it will be time for you to go beyond the limitations of Internet-based sourcing. When this time comes, you should definitely give trade shows a go!

What is a trade show?

A trade show (which may also be called a trade fair or trade expo) is an exhibition which has been organized by industry leaders or exhibition planners to bring together companies and service providers in specific industries to learn about new developments and products. Trade shows are expensive to hold, for both organizers and exhibitors who pay a fee to host their own stall, but can be very profitable, which is why many cities host large trade shows as a way of generating local income.

Why Trade Shows?

Bargains galore!

When you visit tradeshows, it’s almost guaranteed that you will get the very best price possible, so get ready to make some big savings! Trade show stands are usually held not by wholesalers, but by the manufacturers themselves which simplifies the buying chain and eliminates the middlemen and the commission they take!

The hottest products

One of the reasons why manufacturers exhibit at trades shows is to showcase their latest and upcoming products. This creates a highly unique opportunity to find niches and there are very few places a retailer can go to get so many great money-making niche ideas.

Finding new products and gaining a monopoly on them is a highly powerful accomplishment for retailers, especially eBay sellers, and should be something that all retailers both off and online should aspire to achieve. Being the sole distributor of a particular item doesn’t always last long, as others will eventually identify your product as being profitable and will hunt down a supplier (maybe even your supplier!), but for at least a few months, you can really bring home some big profits.

Relationship Building

You’ll already know how important it is to build up a strong relationship with your supplier and how it can go a long way in getting you better deals and greater access to new, hot-off-the-conveyor-belt products. Don’t be shy about getting to know new suppliers, it’s mutually beneficial for you to both get along and make acquaintances.

How to make the most out of a trade show:

Select the right show

This might seem obvious, but it’s important to make sure you attend the trade shows most relevant to you and your business. You can easily waste a lot of time and money on admissions fees if you attend a show which only has 1 or 2 exhibitors relevant to you. Pick industry-specific shows, rather than general ones, wherever you can that are most fitting for your business and for any product lines you would like to explore in the future. 

Plan your time

Whether you are going to a small trade show for a day, or scouring around a larger one for a week, it’s a good idea to plan how you will spend your time. When the marketing material is released, you can find out exactly who and what will be exhibiting there. Make a plan of who you want to visit, and if you are ultra organized (or just a big geek like me!) you could write down a few questions you want to ask each exhibitor.

Learn to say ‘no’

You will meet some of the best sales people in your industry when you attend trade shows, and they will either have strict sales targets to meet to help their company pay for their stall, or will be sales making maniacs who will be using the trade show as an opportunity to make some serious commissions. These salespeople can potentially waste hours of your time by trying to sell you ideas, products or services which may have no benefit to you whatsoever. If you get yourself into the sticky situation of being at the receiving end of a hard sales pitch, you need to know how to get yourself out of it.

Often, all it takes is a simple ‘no, thank you’ followed by a polite smile, but for some people this isn’t easy. If you struggle to get away from pushy sales people and would rather hand over your credit card for something you know you aren’t going to get any use out of, you are going to have to get creative! You have a couple of options here, both of which are tried and true. You could do the ‘sorry, this is fascinating, and I’m really interested, but I really need to go to the bathroom!’ or the old look-at-watch-and-exclaim ‘is that the time? Sorry, buddy, I gotta go, my wife/husband/boss is waiting for me’. Whichever approach you take, don’t feel bad for not taking the time to listen to a sales pitch on a product you have no intention of buying, you’ll be wasting their time too and they would rather spend it dealing with more solid prospective buyers.

How to find trade shows near you

The best way is to simply Google ‘trade show + your area’, but there are some helpful directories out there that can point you in the right direction which I have listed below.

www.tsnn.com

www.biztradeshows.com

http://directory.tradeshowweek.com/directory/index.asp

Virtual trade shows

If you can’t find one in your area, never fear! You can easily access virtual tradeshows from home. Virtual trade shows have really taken off recently, mainly because of how affordable they are compared to regular trade shows where exhibitors have to pay hundreds to host a stall and attendees may have to pay for travel and accommodation. Virtual trade shows offer everything a regular trade show does, but it’s all done online, meaning you can get the benefits of visiting a tradeshow all from home!

To find out about virtual trade shows in your industry, try Googling ‘virtual trade show + your industry’, or take a look here: http://www.conventions.net/marketplace/virtual_shows-c88.asp

The #1 Rule of Online Business

Could following one simple rule completely transform the way you do business and increase your profits? Yes! Can you guess what it is? If you think it’s offering the latest products or spending thousands on marketing, you are wrong! (Although these can certainly help) What if I told you that you could increase return buyers and make more money by simply offering exceptional customer service?

It’s a simple formula: 1 customer + first-class customer service = 1 great customer experience = repeat buyers = more sales for you!

So with all that money-making potential, what’s the best way to go about offering the greatest customer service possible? Read on to learn the craft, then wait for the positive feedback to roll in and watch your business grow!

Is there a difference between online and offline customer service?

Absolutely! When you go to a store or restaurant, what makes the service great? A warm smile when you arrive, a friendly and enthusiastic waitress, or maybe it’s the small talk between you and the salesperson behind the counter that leaves you feeling satisfied? Unfortunately for online retailers, this type of personal contact isn’t possible, which is precisely why we must go above and beyond to make our customers happy.

The good news is that while you can’t always greet buyers with a happy smile or give a friendly handshake after making a sale, there is plenty you can do to make your customers have a great experience when they shop with you.

Today we are going to go a little beyond the basics (which you have hopefully already implemented) such as listening to customer needs, dealing with complaints professionally and fairly, and bring you some more expert approaches to customer service which you can work towards:

Customize your email communications

Personalizing is everything, and while some of your emails might be automated, you can easily personalize any other communication you have with a buyer. Saying something as trivial as "have a great weekend" or "How’s the weather over there in Utah?" can make the entire transaction more pleasant for the buyer and give them greater confidence in buying from you.

Don’t skimp on the post sale communication

A week or so after the trade, it’s a good idea to send a quick email and ask if the item arrived safely. It’s the perfect way to let customers know that you appreciate their business, but also a great way to help get more sales in the future by letting buyers know about new promotions and products. This is a highly effective marketing tool because it’s quick and concise, and it won’t end up in a spam folder (as long as you use the email address you used to communicate with during the initial trade).

When buyers have a great experience with you the first time, they are more than happy to hear from you and learn about new product lines or sales. Remember that discount coupons for their next purchase are always a great incentive for them to revisit your web store or eBay listings.

Send out items as quickly as possible

This is crucial. Many buyers on eBay feel anxious during the time between when they pay for their item and when they receive it, especially first-time buyers. Therefore, getting their item out to them as soon as possible gives them confidence in buying from you, and significantly increases the chances of them telling their friends about you, or returning themselves.

Getting to the post office every time a payment comes through is far from efficient, so thankfully there is a solution! Our friends at USPS offer a free carrier pick up service so that you can give them a call and have them pick up your packages (that’s right you can do more than one at a time!) as long as you let them know by 2am (CST) on the day you want it picked up. Check out http://www.usps.com/pickup/welcome.htm for more details.

Make it easy for people to contact you

Responding to individual requests or questions won’t take up as much time as you think and there will always be customers who don’t read through full item descriptions or FAQs and will take up more of your time than others, but this is simply part of running any business. Always be patient and answer their questions thoroughly.

Make sure you list your contact details prominently. If you are selling on eBay, you can do this on your About Me page, or when using your own website, have a ‘Contact Us’ page and list at least two ways buyers can contact you such as email, phone or Skype.

To go that one step further, consider setting up an 800 number. This will help give you a competitive edge, and sellers of high-involvement or technical products will find this useful when buyers have a lot of questions. Plenty of phone companies only charge you on a per-call basis so you will only pay if and when a buyer uses it.

Remember that good customer service can be the cheapest way to make customers happy and keep them coming back for more. The truth is that when it comes to online business, you can master every other sales strategy from stocking the latest products to perfect keywords and searchability, but if you don’t keep the customers satisfied, these aren’t worth a dime!

Here come the profits: Wedding niches!

Did you know that the average cost of an American wedding is around US$30,000? And that Americans spend over US$50 billion on weddings each year? That’s a lot of zeros! However, the average cost of a wedding has plummeted as a result of the recession, meaning that people are really pinching their pennies and looking for cheaper alternatives. The good news? People are turning to buying online to save money!

I love bringing our fabulous members fantastic new ideas on what to sell to make themselves some serious cash, and after a recent lunch with a friend who is planning a huge wedding for next summer, I was feeling inspired by the number of wedding-related selling opportunities there are out there!

Anyone who has planned a wedding will know the mountain of stuff you have to buy. It starts with a couple of rings and a dress, then once you get into the finer details, you need flower girl dresses, table centrepieces, flower archways, and wedding favours (that’s when you give your guests a little something as thanks for attending your wedding – as if the free dinner and open bar wasn’t enough!). So to help you on your way to online selling bliss, I’ve crunched the numbers and done the research and come up with the best of the best in wedding niches!

Flower Girl’s Shoes

It just wouldn’t be a wedding without a precious little lady tossing satin petals down the aisle, looking shyly at her audience and showing off her sweet miniature dress. Maybe that’s why 7 out of 10 brides choose to have a flower girl (or flower girls) as part of their wedding party.

Why flower girl’s shoes will make you money:

While flower girl dresses have become an oversaturated market on eBay, there is still plenty of room for flower girl’s shoes to make you an online selling success. Best of all, they have a great selling success rate on eBay. Their impressive sell-through rate might have something to do with the fact that pageant moms will also be scouring the web for cheap shoes to complete their daughter’s many costumes they need for pageant competitions, which means your market just got a whole lot wider so you can expect to make even more sales!

 Make sure you keep your listing duration as long as possible (10+ days being optimal) so that the bride or mother of the flower girl can decide if they will complement the outfit and fit well. Plus you need to think of all the bridezillas out there who are ultra particular and won’t be ready to make a quick decision. Therefore giving them plenty of time to decide is always a good idea.

 ‘Just Married’ Flip Flops

As cheesy as they might sound, couples tend to get all mushy around their wedding and these are great for the happy couple to wear at their next-day family barbeque or on their honeymoon. These are great for sellers new to product sourcing as they are cheap to buy per unit and light and durable for importing.  

Why they will make you money:

Even if the newlyweds don’t buy these for themselves, a guest is sure to think they are the perfect gift. They’re just what buyers need for increasingly popular island and destination weddings, making them ideal for guests who are attending a destination wedding where a more expensive gift isn’t expected and baggage space means everything! These flip flops have a very high sell-through rate on eBay but currently aren’t selling in huge volumes, which means there is a lot of potential here. With some well-executed marketing and perseverance, they could be another eBay cult-buy in no time!

Hot tip: Make sure you sell them as pairs, but are flexible with sizing. For example, instead of selling 2 pairs of medium sized flip flops, allow buyers to select what they need to suit the couple.  

Wedding Cake Toppers

You know the ones; the miniature bride and groom who sit on top of the cake wearing mushy looks on their faces? They are big news on eBay and can bring you home a nice profit.

Why they will make you money:

Cake decorators and artists can charge a lot for these, so when brides find that they can get them cheaper online and take them directly to their cake decorator, the will come flocking! As with every item we have listed, wedding cake toppers are small enough to not require any storage space which can save you a lot of money in overheads and really increase your profit margins. Their small size also means they are cheap and hassle-free to ship out to buyers.

Hot Tip: Next season’s big colors for wedding party clothing, centrepieces and decor will be coral, tiffany blue and champagne for summer, and mocha, deep red, violet and teal for winter. Make sure you incorporate these colors into your range of wedding products as much as possible.

Disclaimer: The information published here is strictly for informational purposes. All above product items are only suggestions for possible products which will sell favorably, and should be used as a guide only. At the time of writing, all above products were researched using methods recommend by SaleHoo and found to be potentially profitable for sellers. All sellers are encouraged to conduct their own market and product research.

5 Steps to becoming a PowerSeller

Are you ready to become the next eBay success story? Wanting to leave your day job behind and move on to making serious cash from home? Join me as I reveal the five key steps to becoming an eBay PowerSeller.

What is a PowerSeller?

PowerSellers are quite simply eBay sellers who achieve a high level of sales and consistently receive positive feedback based on their exceptional customer service. Some PowerSellers really take online retail to the next level when they turn selling on eBay into a full blown business. These sellers work full time on their business for years and fully immerse themselves – and some even end up with millions of dollars in the bank!

Wondering how exactly you can become a PowerSeller? For starters, you need to have been an eBay member for at least 90 days and have a minimum of 100 feedback ratings. Of those 100 feedback ratings, at least 98% from the last 12 months must be positive. eBay’s sales volume requirement demands a minimum of US$1,000 in sales and 2 items sold per month, or 100 items sold per month.

And what do you get for all your hard work? You get discounts on your Final Value Fees, greater customer support (phone and chat), discounted UPS rates and more. Best of all, you’ll make more sales when buyers see your PowerSeller status on your listings which is represented by a shooting star icon next to your username and feedback.

Step 1: Acknowledge that becoming a PowerSeller and maintaining PowerSeller status is not easy.

It’s also not fast, or pain-free. That’s right; you are going to have to work hard to make some serious money… If you are still reading this blog now, well done! It means that unlike everyone who were turned off from reading the words "have to work hard", and closed their browser, you might just have what it takes to become a PowerSeller! That means you probably won’t be shocked to know that some of the best PowerSellers worked 15 hour days, 6 days a week for a year to get where they are. Still with me and not afraid of a bit of hard work? Keep reading!

Step 2: Carve out a niche

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again; you are much better off if you appeal to a smaller niche market, rather than trying to appeal to everyone. Remember the old saying "from small things, big things grow"? This is exactly how many eBay PowerSellers make it – by starting out small and selling one product, then expanding as they go by growing their product range.

We have talked about niches a lot over the past couple of months, but if you haven’t quite caught on, a niche is a certain segment of the population who you intend to concentrate selling your product to.  That means staying away from things like iPods and laptops, and instead, zooming in on more specific products. You’ll often find the best niches when you put two or more categories together such as left-handed can openers (rather than just can openers), alcohol-free sunscreen or in-ear headphones for small ears.

Step 3: Create a business plan

Want to know the biggest difference between a PowerSeller and a casual ‘just-here-to-make-some-quick-cash’ seller? PowerSellers plan to make it big. PowerSellers aren’t often made by chance; they plan their success right from the very beginning. And you need to do the same.

First and foremost, a business plan will help you to define exactly what you want to achieve and how and when you will achieve it. Writing a business plan out will also help you to foresee any potential problems you might face further down the track. For some, a business plan will be essential when it comes time to approach banks or investors. Without a professional plan, these guys won’t take you or your business seriously.

Here’s a quick list of what you should include in your business plan:

• A mission statement. This will state the purpose of the business, the problem it will solve or the audience it will cater to, and show how your business is different from others like it.

• A description of your business. This should include the legal structure of the business (Limited Liability Company, corporation, or partnership – find out more about these here), a description of the items you sell, where they come from, what they are made of and how you source them.

• Your goals. Write down what you want to achieve both short and long term with your business. It’s OK to talk about money here, but it might be better to say how many items you want to sell, rather than the focus being 100% on the money you will make. This gives potential investors a good impression as it shows them you are more about reaching out to customers, rather than simply making money.

• Outline your competition. This could be other successful eBay members who are selling the same or similar items as you. Getting familiar with your competitors is essential to your business, especially in the early planning stages. For example, you might find that your competitors have a great product, but have had a few negative feedbacks placed because the delivery time was slow, which would lead you to making fast shipping your point of difference.

• A run-down on your target audience. This is where you list who your customers will be. Investors will want to know basic information such as age group, sex and possibly race. Include what your audience will be looking for and why they need your product.

• A financial analysis. Here you need to itemise all overhead costs associated with your business including the cost of buying and shipping your items, importing and customs fees (if you are buying from overseas), eBay listing fees, rent on a storage unit and any costs associated with staff you might employ.

• Finally, talk about how you want to market your business. Will you have a blog, or maybe a website or a flyer drop? Also discuss business branding and the image you wish to portray to potential buyers.

Step 4: Maintain a steady supply of merchandise

One of the main practises that sets a PowerSeller apart from others is that they deal in huge bulk. A PowerSeller will always have their items in stock and ready. That means ready to list and ready to ship. PowerSellers build strong, mutually-beneficial relationships with suppliers. Buying in large bulk is always the preferable option as it means you will get the best price possible, but before you go ordering 1500 units of anything, you have to do some thorough research. All PowerSellers know that product and market research is paramount to the success of their business and spend more time on this than anything else.

Step 5: Always put your customers first

When it comes to selling in the big bad battlefield of eBay, make sure you always put your customers first. Rather than counting profits, PowerSellers know the importance of making buyers their number 1 priority. After all, if there were no customers, there would be no profits! To really show your customers you care, always respond to questions promptly and ship items as soon as you can!

Another sure-fire recipe for customer service success is offering free shipping on all items. This is common practise among PowerSellers and not only will it keep your customers happy and increase your number of sales, it will also help to boost the final price on bid auctions. How? Free shipping is favored by eBay search engines so your listings will rank higher, meaning you will get more visits, and therefore more bids!

When it comes to troubled customers, always keep your cool and remain professional. Communicate with them via email so that if they give you negative feedback unfairly, you can appeal it and have it removed. This is important for maintaining your minimum requirements to be a PowerSeller.

So there you have it, our five-steps to PowerSeller status revealed. Think you are up to becoming a PowerSeller yourself? There are no limits to what can be achieved by those who are ready to get stuck in and apply themselves 100% to making it on eBay.

If you are hungry for more information on Powersellers, or some inspiring stories to get you motivated, a quick Google search will give you a few options, or visit http://www.powersellersunite.com to tap into the world of eBay PowerSellers!