As a new internet marketer, you have probably decided to go down the digital products route, selling ebooks and other downloadable items, probably using one of the large affiliate product sites such as Clickbank.
This is a tried and tested method for making money online, but there are other options.
Most notably, the whole niche of physical product sales, where an actual tangible item is sold, and then physically shipped to the customer.
Below we take a top level view of physical product sales.
Product Choice
When it comes down to choosing a product, or range of products to sell in the physical products niche, there is one major decision you will need to make first. Are you going to sell consumable items, or non-consumable items?
Each has benefits that can be explained like this:
Consumable items – This covers things like printer ink, cosmetics, pharmaceuticals and anything else that will be purchased, used up and then purchased again repeatedly.
The great thing about consumable items is that in theory, a customer will come back to your site to purchase time and time again.
However, consumable items are usually low ticket price items, with a fairly slim profit margin.
Non-consumable items – This covers everything else, such as electronic goods, clothing, DVD videos and so forth.
The great thing about non-consumable goods is that they are usually fairly high priced items, and they give a good profit margin.
Affiliate Sales or Own Products?
Once you have decided whether you are going to sell consumable or non-consumable products, the next decision you will need to make is whether you are going to sell your own products, or try to make affiliate sales for another company.
Again, both options have advantages.
Selling your own products (or even dropshipping) will usually give more profit per sale. As a downside, you will need to set up some form of e-commerce site as your online store front.
Selling affiliate products will pay less per sale, but removes the overhead of setting up a complicated e-commerce website.
Selling Your Own Products
If you intend to sell your own products, then you have two basic options.
The first of these is to set up a traditional e-commerce site. Customers will place and order through this site and you collect the cash, and send the goods out to them.
This means you will need to do three things:
a) maintain stock of items,
b) set up an e-commerce site, and
c) have some form of delivery system in place.
If you lack the skills to set up your own self-hosted e-commerce site, there are other options, including companies that will host your e-commerce site for you.
The best of these is possibly Shopify, click here to take a look at their site.
Shopify can produce some really good looking e-commerce sites, here is an example:
The second option is using a dropshipping company to handle stock and deliveries. You will still need your own e-commerce site, but you will not have to keep stock of any items, and you will not need to arrange for order deliveries. Instead, a dropshipping company handles everything.
One of the top dropshipping companies is Dropshippers, click here to visit their site.
Dropshippers has an amazing number of products in its catalogue, covering many niches, and it also helps customers set up their e-commerce site.
Dropshippers have a very simple three part sign-up process as well, which makes it easy for newcomers to physical goods sales to get started:
Selling Affiliate Products
The alternative to selling your own physical products (or using a dropshipping company to sell products direct form the manufacturer) is to promote other peoples products and receive an affiliate commission for sales made.
There are dozens of physical goods sites that offer an affiliate scheme, but a good place to start is the world renowned Amazon Associates scheme.
The Amazon Associates affiliates scheme makes every single Amazon product available on a commission per sale basis, and also provides some excellent marketing tools.
This means that you can promote the full range of Amazon products, even Kindle ebooks, and receive up to 10% on each sale, as shown below:
Although Amazon only pays 10% commission, which is less than many other affiliate networks, it does provide an incredible number of marketing tools, and due to the power of the Amazon brand, affiliates sales convert very well indeed.
In Conclusion
Although most people believe that entering into the physical products niche is far more complicated than simply marketing downloadable products, it does have some major benefits.
Most notably, the fact that product churn is very low, with very few charge backs and product returns taking place. If you have the skills to pull it off, a good physical product site can earn great income.
Check out AffiliateX for the current most profitable niches to give you a jump start in your online profits.
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