Ecommerce has become very competitive and even more so on popular marketplaces like eBay and Amazon which is driving sellers to the realization that they need to find a specific ecommerce niche to carve out. For a new seller to start now and try to create a brand on Amazon, Walmart or eBay as another reseller of products, they will find that unless what they have to offer is rare, it is already fairly crowded and will only win if they are willing to drive down their prices to become the cheapest option. A good tip to always remember is if you are only differentiating on price from your competition, you have a long road to success.
So how does a new seller stand out in a crowd and carve space for themselves to grow in ecommerce? Well the answer is to take the road less travelled and find an ecommerce niche. There are various levels of niches you can swim into and every category you can choose to sell has niches and within those niches could be a deeper layer of niches.
What do I mean by that?
Well take collectibles as that is the easiest example. If you want to sell in Collectibles you can choose to sell every and anything you find that is a collectible but that is tough to really compete. So within Collectibles you may choose to focus on collectible trading cards. From this level you are starting to create at least a system for your own buying and research to be successful but if you go even deeper to a third level for example I am only going to sell Trading Cards that are associated with games such as Magic the Gathering or Pokemon well then at that level you can research, acquire and grow within that space. You can establish a brand that focuses on that a specific offering and be the best or to “go to” brand for that specific thing.
Every category has this multi level sub category system and within sub categories are specialists of a specific thing. The more specialist you are, the more you can stand out within your ecommerce niche and put a better brand around your business to be the best in class of that type of product. Additionally, instead of not only selling on popular marketplaces like eBay or Amazon you can go and research ecommerce niche marketplaces that are specific for the subcategory you want to sell in. There are many marketplaces created to sell only trading cards and if you specialize in that, you can grow in those marketplaces instead of trying to compete on eBay where it is more competitive.
If you are selling today and finding it hard to compete or just getting started, I would look at the product category you have selected and try to find the specific vertical or subcategory within that product category you can go deeper in. Build your brand around that, find smaller more niche marketplaces and social selling opportunities associated with it and you will find that there is room to grow at that level. Keep in mind that while ecommerce is new in the grand scheme of things, it has been around long enough for many people to get a jump start. You need to really research the opportunity first and create your business around it once you find the ecommerce niche that works for you.
