Over the past week, I have been running ideas through my head regarding which product I should sell on my online store. Product sourcing for home business is proving to be quite hard when there are so many possibilities out there. I am still in the midst of making up my mind but I do have a few options available. I will need to really think it through before making a final decision on this. If you have any suggestions for me, then please send me an email or leave me a comment.

Home business moms should make this one of their first priorities when starting a home business. Without a good solid product idea, chances are your business will fail. Here are some of the product sourcing for home business ideas I have currently, as well as their pros and cons:

Fashion Accessories

This is a no-brainer for me because I am quite interested in fashion and I like to accessorize all my outfits, be it for work or just a casual Sunday afternoon. I can sell a variety of accessories such as necklaces, bracelets, earrings, pendants, head-scarves and so on. These products can also be made from a variety of materials such as silver, gold, gemstones, wooden beads, white gold, or even a combination of these materials. Accessories are worn by people everywhere in the world and they are not only for women. A lot of men these days are into accessories as well as it is considered a fashion statement. This means I should have a lot of potential customers from everywhere in the world. However, a lot of retailers are already selling accessories so home business moms will have plenty of competitors as well. I think online stores selling accessories are a dime a dozen on the Internet. A lot of them are already established brandnames so it will be very difficult to attract the same crowd. Furthermore, accessories are fashionable items so each style or design is only popular for a short time period. Then once the trend dies off, that particular design will no longer be high on the must-have list. Plus, accessories which are made of silver or gold-plated will lose their sheen after a while so I will need to sell off all my stock as soon as possible each time or else I will be left with a bunch of unattractive and dull accessories.

Niche health products

I think home based business health products are good selling products. In general, people nowadays are more health conscious compared to in the past. I think about 6 out of every ten of my friends/colleagues goes to the gym twice a week or some even more. A lot of people jog a few times a week or play at least one type of sports. They are also eating healthier foods and salad bars as well as high-fiber cakes are becoming more and more popular. I feel that this behaviour will continue on as more and more people realize that exercising and eating healthy are very important in order to balance out today’s high-stress lifestyles. With that in mind, a work at home mum can sell a variety of products such as health supplements, exercise equipments, exercise DVDs for yoga, lower back exercise, pilates and so on. It is wiser to target a niche market such as for lower back exercise DVDs, instead of selling products which already have a high number of retailers.

Jigsaw puzzles

This would be an example of a niche Internet products. I have rarely seen shops specializing in only jigsaw puzzles at my local shopping malls. Normally, jigsaw puzzles can be found at a small section in the toys and crafts section, but that’s about it. The selection is usually very limited, therefore if I have an online store selling all kinds of jigsaw puzzles, I am sure I will be able to make a handsome sum of cash. Furthermore, for such a product, each visit to my online store is almost a guaranteed sale because someone would only purposely  go to an online store selling jigsaw puzzles when they are already looking to buy the product.

I have a few more funny product ideas recommended by Jake, one of them being anime comic books but I am sure it is going to be more difficult to find suppliers for that. What do you think?

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I am sure if you have been on the Internet, researching about work at home opportunities, you would have also come across the term wholesale dropshipper. So what is that actually? By definition, wholesale dropshipping is a supply chain management method, where the product is shipped from a supplier directly to a retailer’s customer. The product does not go through the retailer at all. This means that the retailer does not keep any stock, instead every time a customer places and pays for an order, then the supplier will pack and send the product directly to the customer.

Home business moms may wonder how does the retailer make a profit then? Well, the profit made by the retailer is the difference between the wholesale price and the retail price. Basically, the retailer pays a wholesale price to the wholesale dropshipper. Then it is up to the discretion of the retailer to decide on the retail price of the product.

Why should a work at home mum choose to sell dropshipping products? The benefits are aplenty!

• Don’t need to purchase any upfront inventory. This means that you do not need a big start-up capital.
• Don’t need to worry about inventory storage. No upfront inventory means no need to find a place to store any inventory.
• Don’t need to queue at the post office to send out customers’ orders. Once an order is made and paid for, the wholesale dropshipper will send it directly to your customer so you don’t need to waste your time doing it.
• Don’t need to search for suppliers and negotiate pricing. All the products are at one place, which is normally the wholesale dropshipping companies’ website so work at home mums do not need to waste energy and time looking for suppliers or negotiating on price.
  

• Easily add products to your store. You just need to select and click to add the dropshipping products to your online store and start selling immediately.
• Don’t need to worry about packaging the orders. Imagine if you have 50 orders a day. That means you need to spend a majority of your day packing orders for your customers or you might even need to hire extra help. Your time is precious, especially when you, as a work at home mum have a family to take care of. So it is wise to devote your working time to more important tasks such as marketing your store.
  
• Positive cash flow cycle. This occurs because the retailer does not need to purchase inventory upfront. The retailer is paid when an order is made by a customer. The retailer will have the customer’s money for a certain period of time because usually the retailer pays the wholesale dropshipper using credit card or credit terms.
• Diversify your products. You can sell a variety of products from beauty and fashion to hardware tools because they are all available at your dropshipper’s website. So you have the freedom to sell many different products without the hassle of finding different suppliers for each unique product.

Enjoy beautiful sunsets with your family and let your dropshipper worry about the orders

• You get to start a business with very little risk. Since there is no huge amounts of money invested that means you do not have to mortgage your home or get a loan just to start a business.Therefore, there is not much risk but the returns might be aplenty!

There are numerous wholesale dropshipping companies these days but for home business moms, make sure you research on each of them to see which fits you best. For instance, some dropshippers only sell in bulk, while others do not have a minimum order. It is all in the details so make sure you open your eyes and look through each website carefully before deciding on it.

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I mentioned a few posts back that I have decided on starting my own Ecommerce store as my home business. I did not just simply stumble onto this decision. I knew that the Internet presents possibilities and opportunities especially for home business moms. There are affiliate programs, online stores and also dropshipping services, a topic which I will elaborate on a bit further next time. Online stores have become more common these days because it is very easy for work at home mothers to purchase an ecommerce software solution.

So the big question is WHY an Ecommerce store?

Well, firstly, I am always in front of a computer, when I am at the office or when I come home from work. I actually don’t mind staring at a PC the whole day. I am also quite computer savvy. Keyword is “quite”.

Also, I want to do something I have a passion for and with an online store, I can choose anything to sell. It is all up to me. Furthermore, I want it to be easy when it comes to suppliers. These days there are dropshipping companies (Alibaba and Doba) and affiliate programs (Amazon) widely available online. So I do not need to hunt for suppliers or send out orders to customers. Furthermore, I can easily purchase a ecommerce web site software from companies such as InstanteStore, Volusion or Yahoo. With their ecommerce software solution, I can set up a professional looking store which works without any programming or web designing knowledge! Home business moms should definitely look into setting up an online store since such an ecommerce software solution is readily and widely available nowadays.

Apart from that, I am beginning to read up and research on SEO, Search Engine Optimization in order to make my store more successful. Hopefully it all works out the way I hope it to!

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I was thinking about what types of 101 marketing strategies I can utilize for my soon-to-be set up online store and did some research on it.

Read my article below regarding secret home business success factors:

“How do I increase my home business earnings?” That is the question that entrepreneurs, either home based or large scale, should be thinking about each day. I mean, the main purpose of starting a business is to make money, isn’t it? There are so many different marketing tactics out there today and a lot of entrepreneurs waste time and effort on those which do not bring the desired results. However, there are three methods which you can utilize to increase your small business success rate.

Secret #1: Growing your customer base.

There are a few ways to grow your customer base. Work at home mums can use email distribution or send out fliers regarding your business. You can also aim for the places or spots where your target customers are most likely to visit. For instance, what type of magazines do they read? Which websites do they visit on the Internet? Then you can place your advertisements on those “spots” to gain new customers. Remember that it is important to continuously get new customers but at the same time, do not neglect the needs of your current customers. A lot of companies often focus too heavily on growing their customer base and as a result, let their customer service to old and current customers deteriorate.

Secret #2: Increasing the size of the purchase.

It is crucial to not only sell one product but instead, always try to up-sell your customers or even ask them if they might be interested in another product similar to the one they are buying. This is widely practiced by fast food restaurants where they ask you if you would like to have fries with the burger you ordered? Or if you would like to increase the size of your soda to a Large for just an extra dollar? Or if you would like to get two banana pies instead of one for only 50 cents more? Or instance, if you run a hair salon from home and a customer walks in for a trim, you can ask if they would like a hair wash with that and a hair treatment session as well. Furthermore, if you are selling a product which requires servicing then you can include monthly servicing plans or even warranty plans for your customers to add on as extras. Maximising your customers’ buying power means maximising business success.

Apply the "Would you like fries with that?" approach

Secret #3: Increasing the frequency of purchases.

Work at home mums should remind their customers when they will be running low on supplies. For instance, most printers have a reminder which pops up on your computer screen every time the ink supply is low. You can try to apply this into your current home business marketing techniques. Other than that, you can use email marketing to keep in contact with them or even send them a Birthday card or Christmas card every year so that they will remember you when it is time to repurchase. When it is near Christmas time, send them an early Christmas card and include a leaflet or flier regarding your current products so they may purchase them as Christmas gifts for relatives and friends.

Those are the top 3 secret home business success factors to making more money in your business. You will be able to earn more in your home business and increase your home business success rate if you implement these strategies into your current marketing methods. Therefore, home business moms should spare a moment or two to think about how they can apply these tips into their work at home business.

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