Posts Tagged ‘online retailers’

Struggling to Find and Manage Products You Want to Sell?

Thursday, October 1st, 2009

Are you wanting to sell products online to make extra income?  Are you struggling to find wholesalers who will sell to an online store?  When you find a wholesaler and the products you want to sell, are you struggling to organize the information and get back to it quickly when you need it?  What can you do to drastically reduce the time it takes to assemble product information and then make sense of it?

To sell products successfully online, you need some critical information for each product:
1. Market and product research information
2. Current Demand
3. Current Supply
4. Current competition
5. Competitive pricing in eBay Auctions
6. Competitive pricing in major Retail (Amazon)

Once you secure the information for EACH product you want to sell, you need to sort it and track it different ways. It’s a major task to try to set this up on Excel Worksheets. That’s why the team at www.worldwidebrands.com has developed a unique Product Sourcing Tool designed to meet the needs of active online retailers. 

Research

Using a keyword, the Research Tool provides a complete Demand/Supply/Competion Picture for you in one place using simple organized tabs.  For each keyword you use to search, the tool identifies the other keywords used by browsers to find such a product.  This way you can perform multiple product searches to help identify the niche you can possibly sell into.  Your searches can be saved for later to help with trending.  There is no risk of errors trying to cut and paste or re-key information into an Excel Worksheet.

Suppliers

For each keyword search, The Product Sourcing Tool identifies qualified wholesale suppliers willing to work with online retailers and supply wholesale products to sell via Amazon, eBay, Yahoo! Stores or customized websites.  It identifies the wholesale supplier that offer products for dropshipping, light bulk, large volume & liquidation.separately.  Searches can be saved by Supplier.  Suppliers can be located by city, state or country in the tool as well, so if you want to locate a supplier in your region, you can easily locate them.   You can save your Preferred Suppliers separately - Add To My Suppliers.  You can also list suppliers that you cannot review when you see them but want to come back to them - Preferred Supplier.  It’s a fast way of finding retail wholesale relationships and identifying drop ship products.  http://www.worldwidebrands.com/pop_taketour.asp

Saving You Time

Time wasting for new online retailers includes:

  • Keying and emailing your company information to multiple wholesalers to request the opening of an account with those wholesalers.   The My Account section of the tool allows you to update the information once and then send an accurate, up-to-date information sheet to as many wholesalers as you need.
  • Looking for specific products you don’t find listed.  With WorldwideBrands.com, you don’t have to do the work.  Just contact info@worldwidebrands.com, tell us what product/s you need to find and we will do the research work for you and find the right wholesale supplier for you.
  • Identifying what’s new.  You can select Show Only Last 30 Added from the Tools’ Dashboard and bingo, all the latest stuff is there for your review.
  • Wasting time researching products that eventually you determine you cannot sell on eBay or Amazon anyway.  The Tool clearly identifies these in the search result before you spend any time contacting the wholesale supplier.

 

Time is of the essence when you start to develop your own online retail business.  As Product Sourcing is an ongoing requirement to keep your business fresh and alive, and growing, it’s important that you have an organized and swift method of getting product information and being able to recall quickly it any time you need it.

Visit the WorldwideBrands.com Testimonials section to hear how many others have saved time finding and managing the products they want to sell. 

MAP - “Manufacturer’s Advertised Price”

Wednesday, June 3rd, 2009

It helps when you talk with your wholesale suppliers, to talk in their own language.  Online sellers should know the common terms that REAL Wholesalers use.  This absolutely helps in building good business relationships with them.  Wholesalers have their own industry terms and jargon. As a retailer, it’s good for you to be able to talk with them in their own language. This avoids misunderstandings.  Also, you won’t have to stop them and ask that they explain what they mean.  They’ll treat you more seriously if they sense that you understand their business.

In this next set of tips, we will explore a few of the most common terms you’ll encounter when talking to your wholesalers. While many online retailers have heard these terms, most don’t really know what they mean or even how they influence their selling.

MAP - “Manufacturer’s Advertised Price”

Let’s begin with: “MAP” or “Manufacturer’s Advertised Price”. When a wholesaler requires you use MAP pricing, they are instructing you NOT to sell their products on eBay (or anywhere else!) for LESS than the MAP price.

There’s a very good reason why Suppliers enforce the MAP.  The MAP sets the market’s perception of the value of their products in the marketplace. Price cutting on eBay or other selling platforms by online sellers trying to out-do each other, devalues consumers’ perception of the product and brand.  When this happens, the large brick-and-mortar stores, with overhead costs higher than eBay sellers, stop selling the product because they cannot afford to sell it for those prices and still make a profit margin.

The wholesaler’s biggest volumes come from those large brick-and-mortar stores. If they stop carrying the wholesaler’s products, the wholesaler’s sales volumes slump and they can no longer justify selling the product. The small online sellers eventually loose out because they can no longer source the products. They have in fact, shot themselves in the foot.

The MAP is a protective measure to retain the product’s market value. This protects everyone in the product supply chain.

Click to review more of Chris Malta’s “Wholesale Tips”

Payment Processing Webinars - Recordings Now Available!

Wednesday, April 15th, 2009

The Recent Webinars about Payment Processing were recorded and are now available to watch. Here’s a quick summary of what they cover. Let us know what you think and please feel free to share:

Understanding Merchant Accounts (For Beginners)

Worldwidebrands.com’s President, Colette Marshall and Paul Levine, President of Superior Bankcard Service, an Intuit Company, discussed the basics of processing payments online and answered key questions asked by webinar attendees. The session covers:

  • • Understanding the payment process
  • • Questions to ask when talking with a potential Merchant Account provider
  • • Understanding of the application process when seeking a Merchant Account
  • • Avoiding Merchant Account mistakes
  • • Avoiding Charge Backs

Watch the free webinar recording here

Payment Processing (For Experienced Sellers & Wholesale Suppliers)

Worldwidebrands.com’s Director of Operations, Tisha Rogers and Paul Levine, President of Superior Bankcard Service, an Intuit Company, discussed what online retailers and wholesale suppliers, with existing Merchant Accounts, can do to reduce their current costs of processing. The session covered:

  • • What is a fair price to pay for processing?
  • • How to negotiate a better deal with your current provider
  • • How to explore and examine your options
  • • Going through a Gateway or going direct
  • • What are the main differences between payment processers?
  • • Understanding and avoiding charge backs

Watch the free webinar recording here