A successful new business model has come to the forefront, and it doesn’t require you to have an inventory. E-commerce stores are now trendy, and their online sales are projected to make up to 18.1% of global retail sales. It is easy to learn how to manage your e-commerce store without the extra work required to stock and ship goods.
Read on to learn more about the methods you can apply to manage your e-commerce store and business venture.
How You Can Manage Your E-Commerce Store With No Inventory
There are several strategies you can try to make your e-commerce store profitable. This includes affiliate marketing, print-on-demand, dropshipping, MLM Marketing, and third-party fulfillment.
Affiliate Marketing
You can promote a full-fledged product without an upfront investment. Instead of designing a product from scratch, you can promote another business’s products and get a commission from the sales you make. Your job is to advertise the products and get them to as many customers as possible. You can do this through blogs, email marketing, social media, and other marketing platforms.
In your pages, you can also try ads monetization and offer advertising spaces on your blog or website. Many brands promote their products using PPC ads, so there’s no lack of business to advertise.
Print-On-Demand
With print-on-demand, you get a little more control over the product and make the goods on your own if you have a flair for design. The product is created by a manufacturer who ships it out to the customer straight from the website. The customer only needs to order the product from your storefront, which means you won’t need an inventory. You can find information here on how print-on-demand works.
Drop shipping
You can incorporate drop shipping into your e-commerce web store and take the difficulty of inventory management out of the equation. You provide a store with products across various areas, and the customer fills their carts with their purchases. The order goes to a third-party fulfillment center, which then packages and ships the product directly to the customer.
You don’t have to manage anything except the setup of the store. For each product you sell, you make a margin or commission based on how you price them.
You can also use dropshipping software to sync your inventory, automatically update product prices and other details in real-time, track and manage orders, and more.
Multi-Level Marketing
This e-commerce model allows you to sell items without an inventory. You work with a business that creates a website for you. Your job is to attract customers to a product that is already popular and making sales. The inventory is stored at the business’s warehouses and shipped directly from there. This isn’t a favorite for everyone, and you have to do your research to ensure you’re not orchestrating a scam.
Third-Party Fulfillment Centers
You can consider working with an organization that is somewhat like a dropshipping company and allows you to customize your products. If you make your products at home or by hand, you can use a third-party fulfillment center to manage the packaging and shipping for you.
They can provide the inventory and product storage space. You start by taking orders from the manufacturer and then sending them to the third-party fulfillment center. They receive your products and then ship them to your customers.
Digital Products And Services
Another option is to consider offering e-commerce products that don’t require a physical space. Instead, you can try selling digital products, as these are just as profitable, can create less overhead costs, and have greater revenue. For example, through using digital downloads applications, you can upload and sell e-books and software for a lifelong residual income.
You can create an e-book on just about any subject, from cookbooks to business advice or even your personal life story. Another approach is to create your own software. If you have a background in programming or coding, you can get a team together and create a new platform that solves certain problems.
Many individuals launch software that helps with customer databases. Mobile games are also highly lucrative, where customers spend hours of their time playing on their phones and spending money to win. You can launch several mobile games and experiment.
Also popular are tutorial and coaching videos, where people sign up to learn or take courses with valuable information. Some other high-revenue digital goods include audio files, photography, videography, and music production software.
All of these require only digital products and no physical inventory.
Third-Party Logistics (3PL)
Third-party logistics can also provide you a way to sell goods with no inventory. This can be done by allowing you to store your products at a warehouse. Fortunately, this will differ greatly from Amazon’s approach. The boxes can be customized to a specific brand, and the business processes can adapt to your business needs.
The storage costs can vary, and you may find that the monthly storage requirements are more flexible on a monthly basis. 3PLs are more collaborative and will work with you to figure out how you would like to launch your e-commerce store.
You’ll also have the opportunity to fulfill business-to-business and business-to-customer shipments from your warehouse location. This way, businesses will make large repeat purchases from you, opening up avenues to greater profit.
Fulfilled By Amazon (FBA)
This no-inventory approach can be applied through the Amazon platform, where instead of storing your inventory, you send it to a storage center. The Amazon fulfillment center takes care of all customer interactions, and all you have to do is supply goods through your store shop.
Your goals include branding and production, while the Amazon platform connects you to warehouses and customer service. The only problem is that the storage costs tend to be higher than 3PL warehouses during holidays.
You should also note that there is no order customization because customers are managed through Amazon company policies. Amazon won’t allow you to provide bulk business-to-business shipments, and you will be unable to sell bulk orders that are delivered on pallets. Lastly, products are shipped in Amazon boxes, and alternatives can cost extra. If you don’t mind these processes, this route may work for you.
Learn More Tips On Managing An E-Commerce Store With Zero Inventory
If you need more ideas, you can discover additional tips from dropshipping companies that already have successful business models. You can try several methods to see what works best for you.