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The ideal home based business is one in which all you need is an internet connection. You can take your business anywhere as you only need your laptop to run it.
This means you don’t hold any physical inventory, deal with customers or returns and have much overhead.
How can you run this kind of business?
With Amazon FBA. Fulfillment By Amazon is a business in which you source a product, send it to Amazon, list it on Amazon’s store and when orders come in, Amazon ships it out.
It sounds easy, but it is quite a challenge to get right. Once you do, however, you can have a business that runs on autopilot. Once you have the basics down, then check out how to make more money as an FBA seller.
In this article, I will go over several things you need to do to start your own FBA business from home.
Pick a niche
A niche simply means an area of focus. For example, your niche could be kids’ toys, plumbing supplies or kitchen gadgets. Even better, you can find a niche within a niche to corner a segment of a market.
Think, steel flanges if you are considering plumbing as these flanges are needed to join large pipes. Chances are there are not many sellers in this area which will give you an advantage.
Many people who advise FBA sellers will tell you to go with something you are passionate about and are familiar with. While this is good advice, it is better to find an underserved area that not many people are focusing on.
Research the market
You may think you are a genius that found that flanges have a great markup and not much competition. Now you need to see if there is a market for them.
You’ll need to research a few things on Amazon. There is a number that you’ll see listed under the information that Amazon gives called the BSR. It stands for Best Seller Rank. The higher the number, the less that product actually sells.
Look for the lowest number under the products you are thinking of selling to see how much is possible. If there are only a handful of items for sale and they all have very high BSR, then it means there are not many sales and you may not make money.
If you see a handful being sold and they all have very low BSR then that means that there is good money to be made by entering with a better product.
Source your product
Many people look to China for their sourcing as they can usually get products cheaper. You may want to look closer to home as people like the Made In USA label as they feel the quality is better. Have your specs ready and shop around from many suppliers and even the factories themselves to get the best deal. You’ll probably have to have a big minimum order to get started, so make sure you budget for that.