Podcast 004 – Sell More with the Same Products

Sell more products and make more money with almost the same products… That’s the theme for our fourth Podcast.

No we haven’t gone mad, this is perfectly do-able and we are going to tell you, with examples how you too can use this to give your business a competitive advantage.

In this Podcast with Myself and Dave Furness we are going to discuss how you can use this to your advantage of this but MOST importantly we want you to TAKE ACTION.

[powerpress]

Because this is may be new to you, above is a green play button. Press play and you’re listening!

If you’d like to download the Podcast for listening to on your iPhone, Droid or iPad you can do or you can press the “Play in new window” button to be able to listen to the Podcast while browsing.  If you use iTunes, you can subscribe here for free.

 

Sell More with the Same Products

This Podcast is all about action, we want you to listen to us and then look at the products you sell and think about how you could sell more with the same products.

We’re laying down the challenge. 
If you don’t think that there are any natural items that you could bundle together with your existing products then let us know, and we will do our best to give you a couple of ideas.

The key here is to sell more with the same.  This is something that you will of seen many sellers doing on the marketplaces over the years and if you’re not doing it, we are going to show you why you should be.

Customers on the marketplaces want one thing over any other, and that is Convenience.  It’s why they use eBay & Amazon after all. They are going to these marketplaces rather than trawling the internet to find the products they want.

You’ll notice that I didn’t mention choice here, it’s because in the marketplaces there is an overwhelming choice of products to look at, but in the end, generally they are only ever going to buy one product. (hopefully yours).

A common question that I get asked through is: “Why don’t people buy from me?”  The answer is simple, they’re either not finding you or when they are, they’re overlooking you because you’re not making a compelling argument for them to choose you.

As we mention in the Podcast these will probably be one of the following:

  • A better offer elsewhere, from your Competitors?
  • Lacking key details in description (As we mentioned here in our first Podcast)
  • Poorer image?
  • Are they getting something for Free?

And that’s what we’re suggesting you do, take the customer to the tipping point of making the sell. In the Podcast we take you through the four standard physical product business models which consist of

  • Stocked
  • Manufacture
  • Virtual / Just in time
  • Asset recovery

Read more about the four business models here with some handy embedded video walk-throughs too.

The 5th one that we mention is the Hybrid model, which is a combination of all four of the product models combined, taking as many strengths and leaving out as many weaknesses.

In this instance we’re going to be making an edit to the Manufacture model and creating our own products from what we already have, but the manufacture model can easily be a Hybrid of the others combining different products to make a new product.

How to Make New Products?

Post it Notes

In Podcast Matt refers to using these Post it notes for book marks, imagine that your customer uses these as bookmarks and sees them every time they use that book. Neat eh?

So the key here is to make “Unique” products, set yourself apart from the competition and get people buying your product.

In the Podcast we use a lot of different terms for what we are describing.  These terms are Kits, Bundles, Packs and Sets which all mean the same thing.

Taking your item, putting a smaller/ inexpensive item with this product and selling them together.  Therefore setting yourself apart from your competition and hopefully taking the online shopper past the tipping point to buy your item.

We cover loads of examples in the Podcast of example products that can be bundled together and once you start trying to think of some we found more and more ideas came together, and we think the same will happen for you too.

This type of selling has been around for years and as I point out, one of my favourite TV Channels use it all the time to take their customers to the buying point. Best Direct TV Smart Pen

Here is a seller on eBay who has bundled a Free bottle holder with their nappy changing bags. See the listing here

A lot of easy examples can be found in consumer electronics and we talk extensively about iPads and bundling stylus’ or screen protectors with these items.  They are incredibly cheap to source and could be the only difference between you and your competitors.

Below are a quick list of other items that we touch on briefly in the podcast:

  • Books – With page holders and Markers
  • Laptops – Cases, Printers, Keyboards, Anti-Virus software
  • Handbag – Purses, Umbrellas
  • Photo equipment – Light boxes, White screen, Tripods, spare bulbs
  • Taking your item and selling multiples of them so packs of x5, x25, x50 etc

Whilst editing the Podcast we created a new kit of buying a stylus and getting a free screen protector and vice versa and in that space of 5 seconds we had created 2 new products!

Logistics of Selling Kits

There are a couple of issues that can crop up with selling kits and how the logistics of that will work internally with your business.  As long as you are aware of these

  • The logistics of stock control and order processing Maybe a shortened stock number to make them easily readable by humans (or your picking staff)
  • GS1 Barcodes –http://www.gs1uk.org/pages/default.aspx  For making unique SKU’s on Amazon and Google Product Base.
  • Don’t forget to tell your staff that you are selling kits, so when it comes to picking and re-ordering they know what is going on.

Our Challenge to You

We want you to take what we’ve covered today and put it into Action.

Think about what products you have already that you can bundle together to make it easier for customers to make a choice, they don;t have to be cheaper products and as we explain later on in the Podcast with the extra section is that you can easily bundle related items together, maybe from a range.

If you have any questions, get stuck for ideas or just need a hand, ask. We’re both here to support you with this and just leave a comment or a message in the forums.

Looking forward to hearing from you,

Dave & Matt

8 replies
  1. je72
    je72 says:

    Great post/podcast chaps! I thought it was time that I followed up properly to this. As you may recall I mentioned to you on twitter that I had created a “kit” for my customers. Guess what? People only started to buy my new kits! It was really just a test, nothing groundbreaking in fact I saw The Daily Mail retail site were already offering these products as a kit/bundle.

    What I did: I took 3 relatively low value products that essentially do the same job, but in different situations (think bedroom, cloakroom, kitchen etc) and bundled them together so you could buy one lot that would cover the whole house. Sorry if I’m being a bit cryptic, but not only do I not want to give the game away, but also if I name the products it might limit how creative people might feel when inventing “kits”. Mine was not very creative at all, but we have increased the sales of all the sku’s that go into making up the “kit”.

    So that’s a WIN right?

    Keep up the excellent work!

    Reply
  2. tony
    tony says:

    Hi Matt,
    I learned a lot from your post. You provoke me of thinking more about how to close a deal by
    giving the buyers good reasons to buy from me instead of others.

    Reply

Trackbacks & Pingbacks

  1. […] are like gold and we cover over free or inexpensive ways of leveraging kits aptly named Podcast sell more with the same products and this can work for anyone whether they’re using eSellerPro or not.eSellerPro […]

  2. “Sell More with the Same Products” #Podcast 004 http://t.co/4EzNHI1Q <= Get the advantage on #eBay & #Amazon

  3. @paulfeakins says:

    Sell More with the Same Products Podcast 004 http://t.co/rrpCzcdM

  4. @day2dayebay says:

    Podcast 004 – Sell More with the Same Products: Sell more products and make more money with almos… http://t.co/j6FPTJIA @lastdropofink

  5. RT @Dave_Furness: RT @Dave_Furness: The Podcast is Live now! Sell More with the Same Products Podcast 004 http://t.co/pznvhTCE Including a bonus section a …

  6. The Podcast is Live now! Sell More with the Same Products Podcast 004 http://t.co/pznvhTCE Including a bonus section added 1 hour ago

Leave a Reply

Want to join the discussion?
Feel free to contribute!

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *