I’m often asked how warcom has managed to succeed in such ‘doom and gloom’ industry like the IT industry.

Why is warcom successful?

We find niche product(s) and market the hell out of them!

So with that in mind, I figured I’d write a short and sweet blog detailing some of my most useful business weapons (so to speak). Hopefully I can help you succeed. Help you grow your own business and find your own niche products.

Let’s get started, shall we?

If your business is anything like warcom, you will have your various revenue streams, ranging from:

1. Sales Income.
2. Passive Income(s).
3. Commissions.

Most of these, could be considered a niche if managed correctly..

Let’s start off with a really simple one like sales income. Sales income ‘should’ hopefully explain itself (well, I would have hoped anyway?)

1. You buy something
2. You add a margin to the product, covering your overheads.
3. You sell it.
4. Sales Income = Successfully Generated?

———————–

Here’s my hot tips, to maximising your sales, your profits and keeping the product sales flowing long after products lose their ‘niche tag’..

1. Find niche products BEFORE some else does.
2. Do not PUBLICISE the fact you have found a niche product.
3. BUY THEM ALL (this is super important).
4. Get EXCLUSIVITY.
5. Know where your sales are COMING FROM.

Alright – now we’ve got five hints to expand on, let’s drill down..!

1. Find niche products BEFORE some else does.

If you can find a product that has just been imported into the country and no one is selling it and there’s massive demand for it – JUMP ON IT.

It really does not get any simpler than this. If you receive emails from customers requesting “please import this product” and down the path, you realise this product is available – whack it on the shelves and get back in contact with those clients. 90% of the time, if this happens – the product is going to be a hit.

If you get 5 > 100~ customers REQUESTING a product, the product is gold.

2. Do not PUBLICISE the fact you have found a niche product.

This is possibly the biggest mistake you can do if you’re a small player….. The MOMENT you advertise a top ten list, or a best sellers list on your website, your competitors are going to work their back sides off to find where you’re buying the product from, and get ‘said product’ on the shelves, quicker than you can say ‘where’d my sales go’?!

If you find a product you’re selling a truck load off – don’t tell anyone (not unless you are off course a distributor, in which case – TELL EVERYONE!

3. BUY THEM ALL (this is super important).

Back in the day, when warcom was about the only company selling large volumes of Billion or Draytek, my marketing strategy was really simple. BUY IT ALL.

At the time, all freight was being shipped (as in, “slow boated”, over to Australia from Taiwan, China, etc).. This could take up to three weeks to a month and a half… So if I had stock, I had free reign for a month!

So continuing on, If I was selling a lot of ‘said product’ and the importer does not hold a lot of ‘said product’ the best thing for me to do was to BUY ALL the importers stock, giving them just enough time to replenish their stock when I run out.

Let’s think expand on this a little further…. (I’ve numbered them, for ease of following).

1. I have 50 ‘product name’ on the shelf and my competitor has 5.
2. I notice the product is running hot, so I buy everything the importer has left!
3. I promote the product throughout our various marketing tactics. As does my competitor, through their methods.
4. I sell my five, my competitor sells his five.
5. I now have 45 + whatever I secured from the importer. My competitor has nothing.
6. I now reap the benefits of my marketing, and my competitors marketing.
7. I now have an additional month~ or so, to sell through whatever I have left.
8. Dodgy Tips: If I was a dodgy retailer, I could put my prices up, thankfully I’m not, but it’s an option.
9. : If the AU dollar is falling, buy up now and hold the stock, buy the time the importer brings in new stock, it’ll cost more. (Sell it at the new price – more margins for you!)

4. Get EXCLUSIVITY.

Well this one pretty much speaks for itself. If you find a kick ass product and you think you’ve got what it takes to promote it, get exclusivity.

Either by becoming the distributor for the product in Australia or licening writes to sell the product in Australia and then let someone else do all your dirty (marketing, promotion) work.

5.KNOW where your sales are COMING FROM.

Analytics are so important, yet so often forgotten or worse still – not use at all.

If you’re getting huge runs on products, you need to know where the the leads are coming from. If you run an online store, it’s a piece of cake! Jump into your webstats and check out what sites are linking to you.

More often or not it’ll either be a review site, a forum, or one of the millions of social networking sites flooding our interwebs.

If you can, jump onto those forums and introduce yourself, answer any and all questions people have and most of all -be friendly, don’t be spammy. This will help you understand what is driving your customer purchase, it should help you appear as a legit operation and an all round ‘nice guy’ and most of all, it should result in more sales.

———————–

Well, I hope this article has been of interest to some of you, these methods have certainly served me well over the years. I shall endeavour to add more info to is as time goes on.

I’m also more than happy to answer any questions anyone may have – so post away!

Sincerely,
Paul Warren.

Tags: commissions, doom and gloom, marketing, niche, niche product, passive income, revenue streams

This entry was posted on Wednesday, December 10th, 2008 at 1:47 pm and is filed under warcom. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.