Who wants what you are selling? Sure, you may have what you think is a great product, but maybe not everyone would agree with you. The thing is that you need to find your target market. Watch for the latest trends and you may want to subscribe to a couple advertising/marketing magazines to see what other people have out there. Lets just say for example that you're selling goofy helmets that hold beer cans. It is obvious that you shouldn't be marketing your product to minors or even groups that totally oppose alcohol consumption. IS what you are selling yours to sell? Make sure your product is your property, whether it is an electronic format or a design of something. You can get into really big trouble selling items that aren't yours. I knew of a guy that got busted for selling stock photo compilations on eBay that weren't his to sell. If you find something that you want to sell, check with the company that owns the product because there is a possibility that you can sell their stuff on commission. Can you support your product or service? This is an important issue to look at. If things go well, you may be swamped but thousands of emails a day. Can you handle that kind of surge? You can easily lose customers and your reputation if you turn out to be a company that cannot support a customer base. Plus, depending on your type of product or service, are you "technical" enough to support it? If you are selling a branded software package, you will more than likely get questions on how to use it, why it doesn't work and so on. You had better be ready to go to bat and have answers. What is the lifecycle of your product/service? Will your stuff stay afloat for a long time? You may be selling something that will only be usable for a certain amount of time. Plus, you may have a software package that could be outdated within a certain time frame or even offer upgrades to products and discontinues support for older versions of your products. |
