Hot niches and products can be found in the unlikeliest of places!
Due to last weekends heavy showers, I eventually gave up trying to dodge the rain and decided instead to nip to my warm and dry local DIY store for some bits and bobs – yes boring and a typical ‘Sunday kind of thing to do’ I know but even the dogs didn’t feel the need to get themselves unnecessarily cold and wet – and normally they are first to head for the biggest puddle possible.
So there I was, wandering pretty aimlessly around the store, when I noticed a small TV on a display stand at the end of an aisle and it was playing what appeared to be an advertisement. I moved closer and saw that it was indeed a commercial for a type of Tippex style pen that claimed to get rid of scratches on your car. Then I noticed that directly below the TV was a large selection of the product. Genius!
This wasn’t a 20 second commercial though – it probably ran for at least 10 minutes – and it was on a loop – so started up again immediately it had finished. It was an all-singing, all-dancing promotion for the product, with a demonstration on screen which showed just how amazing this scratch filler pen was along with all the benefits. The key fact was that this was an exclusive product available at the store for the special introductory price today.
It actually reminded me of one of those shopping channels that you usually stumble across accidentally when you’re flicking mindlessly looking for something interesting to watch on TV! I remember last summer I discovered one such channel that was advertising all manner of Christmas nick-nacks and decorations (singing reindeers with flashing noses, inflatable Santa – you know the type of thing) and it was only August!
But, that’s the thing. Those Christmas products were being advertised in August because there was a demand for them and similarly, the scratch filler pens were being advertised with full demos in the DIY store because marketers know that they are reaching a really targeted market. People are in the right place and can also be manipulated into an impulse buy. Here’s what the product does…and here it is, available, right under your nose…now!
These shopping channels and instore promotions are designed to showcase products deemed ‘exclusive’ in exactly the right place, at exactly the right time for maximum sales. ‘As Seen On TV’ adds to the exclusivity and also buyers need or desire to buy that product. After all, if it’s been on TV, it must be amazing!
Anyway, these products in stores and on TV are actually known as ‘As Seen on TV’ (ASOTV) products – a generic name for items that are advertised on television for direct-response and mail order. You are very likely to have seen some of these products yourself as they are easily recognizable by the packaging which includes a red seal in the shape of a television screen with the words “AS SEEN ON TV” written in white. The products themselves can range from kitchen, household, cleaning, health and beauty products, exercise and fitness products, books and toys and games for children.
The great thing about these ASOTV products is that they are in fact proven hot sellers and can definitely be considered for resale within your online inventory.
What kind of ASOTV products could you consider selling?
The products themselves can be quirky, ingenious, or just plain daft but incredibly, the weirder the product, the more in-demand it seems to be.
For example look at this ASOTV product currently listed on eBay UK here
It’s a stuffed burger maker! Who would have thought such a product was even needed, let alone in demand!
And here is another one I discovered over on eBay UK. It’s a pocket hose. Starts small – grows big. Ingenious – and in fact I’ve created a full hot product report and profit calculation for a similar product which I uploaded to The Source Report earlier this week. Those are just two examples. Not all ASOTV products sell well and so you will need to learn how to determine which ones will sell well online, where to source them (or similar products) and how to make the big profits.
Sellers on eBay.com have been sourcing and listing ASOTV products for years and found that they absolutely flew off the shelves. Basically buyers were seeing them advertised on the shopping channels and then buying them instead on eBay. There are fewer ASOTV sellers listing in the UK even now and that’s why it could be a great niche to get into. So to get you started try following these simple research steps.
3 Steps to researching ASOTV products…
- First search eBay for As Seen on TV products that have already sold and check their final value. Simply click on ‘Sold Listings’ or ‘Completed Listings’ under the ‘Show Only’ heading on the left of your eBay page. It’s best to sort the results by ‘price + P&P highest first’ – just choose this from the drop down box at the top of the page – so that you can see the highest price that an ASOTV product has sold for and the popularity of a product.
- Next, you’ll need to go over to some of the international eBay sites such as eBay.com (USA), eBay.ca (Canada) and eBay.au (Australia). Once again search the completed and sold listings to see which products are selling well.
- Make sure you pay attention to the advertisements you see on TV and in store promotions especially the products being advertised on those shopping channels and in DIY stores and take note of what is popular, then you can research those products too. What these steps will do is build up a picture of the kind of products you will be successful at selling.
But where can you find these products at wholesale?
Well, there are actually quite a few websites where you can source these products at wholesale prices. They are mostly based in the USA so you will need to check out their shipping policies.
First though, make sure you visit the official As Seen on TV website and take a look at their products to give you an idea of their best selling products, most popular and featured products. Everything is categorised so easy to navigate. You can then use this information to choose the top products you should research. Often this site will run a Buy One Get One Free offer so it’s easy to use this offer to test order for a great price and then resell those products.
Please don’t be tempted to source ASOTV products from China – they are likely to be counterfeit. Instead, here are a few sites that you might like to consider to get you started once you have done your research:
What you must remember is that trends come and go online and what’s hot one month might not be so hot the next and this is true for ASOTV products too. There are always new products being released for sale so you do need to keep your wits about you and your eyes peeled for potential hot sellers. You absolutely must check out and research which are the definite hot selling products before you go ahead and source them to ensure that they will sell.
So, there’s a proven niche for you to get started with.
As always I wish you the very best of success,
