The global e-commerce market surpassed $4 trillion in 2024 and is expected to grow in 2025 and beyond. It is a massive market with lucrative opportunities for online sellers.
But how do I start selling online? What tools do I need to leverage the industry’s growth to build a successful business? We’ve written this guide to answer these questions. Read on to learn how to sell online and make substantial profits.
Selling online provides many benefits for entrepreneurs. You’ll have a large customer reach with no physical barriers, enabling you to scale your business rapidly. Online stores have lower startup costs than brick-and-mortar stores.
You can track everything in an online store, from your customer’s location to the products they added to their cart, the most viewed products, and more. Online sellers get valuable insights that brick-and-mortar retailers struggle to get. These valuable insights help you implement the right strategies to grow your business.
Every successful online store needs a unique brand identity. Creating this unique brand and design is crucial to learning how to sell online. Your store should have a short, easy-to-remember name. It should have distinctive colors, a motto, and a logo that people associate exclusively with your brand.
The unique colors should be integrated closely with your website. Suppose your logo is white, purple, and blue. Your online store can have a white background, a blue menu, and purple buttons. This way, customers who visit the website get a special experience that they’ll always associate with your brand.
Example of a well-designed store with minimal colors.
Source: Glossier
Helpful branding tips include:
Marketing is critical to learning how to sell online. No matter how good your products may be, they won’t sell without people hearing about them. You can create brand awareness via several channels, such as social media, search engine optimization (SEO), and email marketing.
You can advertise products on social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram. These platforms let you target ads to the perfect audience by age, gender, and interests.
You can also build organic followings on social media apps to create brand awareness, although this process takes more time than direct advertising.
SEO involves optimizing your website to rank high on search engines. It includes inserting high-quality product images with alternative text descriptions, product descriptions with relevant keywords that people search for, and accurate meta descriptions for all pages.
As part of SEO, you can create a blog to publish relevant content and attract visitors to your online store.
Email marketing involves promoting products via emails. You’ll first collect email addresses via a web form. Then, you’ll send regular messages promoting new arrivals, discounts, and bundles.
You can also send reminder emails to customers who added products to their carts but didn’t check out. A little discount can nudge the email recipient to complete the purchase.
Shipping and fulfillment are paramount to learning the best ways to sell online. You need a shipping system that lets you deliver products at optimal prices and times..
Choose the best shipping providers depending on the customer's location. For example, if your company is based in the U.S. and shipping to a domestic customer, you can choose couriers like UPS, USPS, and FedEx. If you’re dropshipping to global customers, you can select suppliers with robust shipping systems like Zendrop.
Pay attention to courier prices, which customers ultimately pay. Look for affordable shipping couriers to avoid discouraging customers because of high prices. Many online retailers offer free shipping to bulk buyers, e.g., $500 upwards. You can imitate this strategy to incentivize high-value orders.
Extensive market research is the first step in learning how to start selling things online. Research guides you on the products to sell and strategies to help your brand stand out from competitors.
Your best bet is a fast-growing niche with limited competition. A fast-growing niche opens many more opportunities to attract customers, and limited competition boosts your chances of outmaneuvering industry incumbents.
Research the market size of your desired niche and its growth history. You can check data sources like Statista and read news articles about your niche.
Suppose you want to sell cosmetics. Statista shows that the global cosmetics market reached $108 billion in 2024 and is expected to grow to $132 billion by 2029. These statistics indicate a rapidly expanding market you can latch onto and build a formidable business.
You may prefer a specific niche, but the statistics indicate low growth prospects and tough competition. It’s a signal to find an alternative niche with higher chances of success.
Having a precise target audience is critical in learning how to sell products online successfully. You need an accurate profile of your target customers, which will help you formulate the best marketing strategy.
Suppose you want to sell baby clothing. Your target audience is new parents, caregivers, and pregnant moms, as this cohort is the primary buyer of baby clothing. You can create social media ads targeting women aged 21 to 30 interested in “babies,” “pregnancy,” and “baby clothing.”
The above audience is more likely to respond positively to social media ads for baby clothes than any other demographic. The same logic applies to other niches like gaming accessories, school items, electronics, and sports apparel. You should clearly understand your target audience and create ads that speak directly to them.
E-commerce platforms simplify the process of creating an online store. Instead of hiring a programmer to build a store from scratch, you can choose an existing template from Shopify, Wix, WooCommerce, and similar e-commerce platforms to form your store’s foundation.
Shopify is the most popular e-commerce website builder. It currently hosts over 4 million online stores.
Source: Shopify
Professional e-commerce platforms provide customizable templates to build visually appealing stores without hassles. They let you edit your store’s visual elements extensively, including its background, colors, buttons, and checkout process.
Every e-commerce platform has its pros and cons. For example, Shopify has the most advanced features and templates, but it is an expensive platform. Wix has an intuitive interface but doesn’t have as many features as Shopify. WooCommerce has ubiquitous features but a more complex interface than Shopify and Wix.
Shopify is the top choice for online sellers because of its numerous features and extensive customizability. If you need a feature that Shopify doesn’t support natively, you’ll likely find it on the Shopify App Store.
After choosing your e-commerce platform, building the store is the next step in learning how to start selling things online.
E-commerce platforms like Shopify have simplified the process of building a store, but non-technical people often need help in the initial setup. For example, picking the correct template, fonts, and checkout process for your store can be challenging.
Our AI-based storebuilder eliminates the headaches of setting up an online store. It lets you create a Shopify store within minutes via text prompts, bypassing the traditional process that can take hours.
Tips for building an online store include
With your store ready, you can add products for customers to buy. Every product should have a precise description. This description makes human visitors understand the product better and feeds search engines accurate information to index.
Your products also need high-quality images and demonstration videos. These photos and videos illustrate a product’s look and function and help convince potential buyers. Suppose you’re selling fashion items. It’s advisable to have high-quality images of every product's front, back, and sides, preferably on a human model.
A sample fashion store with high-quality photos
Source: Fashion Nova
We’ve mentioned marketing being essential to every e-commerce business. You need to promote products to the right audience that’ll buy them. You can run social media and email campaigns for the perfect audience. You can also run targeted search engine ads to find customers.
Suppose you sell gaming chairs. You can run Google ads targeting the keywords “gaming chairs” and “gaming accessories.” When people search for these queries, your ad will appear on the results page. Anyone searching for these keywords is likely interested in acquiring a gaming chair and may buy it from your store.
You can collaborate with social media influencers to promote products. Influencers command huge followings and reputations in different niches. A recommendation from the right influencer can significantly increase your sales.
Fulfillment is crucial to your store’s success. You need to manage inventory rigorously, ensuring customers have access to high-demand products. Always keep tabs on your products and restock them when required.
You need to ship products to customers quickly, so choose shipping couriers with widespread coverage and reliability. Many entrepreneurs choose dropshipping because it removes many inventory management and shipping headaches. It involves outsourcing these tasks to a third party while focusing more on design and marketing.
Many online sellers choose the dropshipping model because of its convenience.
Zendrop is one of the best dropshipping suppliers for different niches. Our platform gives you access to high-quality products with industry-leading shipping times. We connect you directly to product manufacturers and control our supply chain to guarantee top-notch products.
Commoditized products are mass-market products with high demand. Examples are groceries, phone cases, and electronic accessories. Customers pay little attention to branding when buying these products.
Because branding doesn’t matter much for commoditized products, online sellers compete on price. You need to sell them at competitive prices to attract buyers. You can also stand out by selling high-quality, durable products.
Commoditized products are easy to source either directly or indirectly via dropshipping. You can procure them from multiple manufacturers and sell them at significant markups.
Niche products are customized for specific customer segments. Branding is the core factor buyers consider for niche products, so you need effective strategies to stand out from the crowd.
Niche product examples include fitness apparel, beverages, souvenirs, and cosmetic kits. You’ll customize the products with unique colors, logos, and materials that differentiate them from rivals. The key is partnering with manufacturers offering high-quality products at optimal prices.
Many entrepreneurs use the print-on-demand model for niche products. It involves designing custom products and outsourcing production to third parties. You’ll only pay the manufacturer after someone orders an item, saving you the risk of stocking products people may not buy. Many print-on-demand sites offer these services for online sellers.
The best product to sell is one that solves a problem. Problem-solving products have a clear value proposition, making convincing people to buy them easier. Some products might not solve pressing issues, but you can promote them from a problem-solving angle to win customers.
For example, pouches protect smartphones from damage, but many buy pouches more for their decorativeness than for their protective capabilities. When selling pouches, you can emphasize their protective capabilities more than decorativeness to win customers.
You can identify creative products that address unmet needs and market challenges. For example, affordable massage chairs solve pain problems for individuals. Pet hair remover brushes help dog owners remove scruffy hair that spills everywhere. Portable shoe racks help buyers keep their rooms arranged.
The world won’t run out of problems soon, so endless opportunities exist to sell problem-solving products. The key is identifying a pressing concern and selling innovative products that solve it.
You can leverage social trends to sell high-margin products. Social trends change rapidly, so you need to monitor these trends and adapt swiftly.
For example, product trends on TikTok lead to a sales uptick. You can monitor TikTok and quickly list trending products in your store. Sourcing new products can be hectic, but you can offload the headaches to third parties like Zendrop and focus more on promotion.
Zendrop simplifies the process of discovering trending products. We offer a curated list of best-selling products at any moment, helping you list items with the highest chances of selling.
Instagram, X (Twitter), Facebook, and Reddit are other popular social media platforms you can monitor for trends. It’s advisable to spot trends and capitalize on them early instead of waiting till they get too competitive.
Seek products with significant branding potential, as they provide ample opportunities to build a distinct brand and win customers. Cosmetics is one example of a niche with massive branding potential. Customers in this niche don’t mind paying high prices for their favorite products, so effective branding helps you capture more profits.
Apparel is another product with enormous branding potential. A loyal fanbase doesn’t mind paying much more for specific brands. An example is the Supreme streetwear brand, which has sky-high prices compared to competitors yet massive sales. You can sell branded apparel at high margins and make profits.
As an e-commerce entrepreneur, you can sell products from other brands or build your own brand. Print-on-demand enables you to create a distinct brand without investing much in production.
You’ll design the product, and a print-on-demand partner will handle the manufacturing and shipment. Zendrop is your ideal print-on-demand partner with industry-leading product quality and shipping times.
Seek products that resonate with customers’ passions and interests. Many entrepreneurs have built formidable businesses targeting hobbyists who don’t mind spending much money to pursue their passions.
For example, you can sell musical instruments to music hobbyists. This audience tends to spend substantial money to get cherished instruments, especially vintage ones. The key is sourcing high-quality products that’ll keep them coming for more.
Other hobbyist niches include fishing, archery, pottery, cooking, painting, and drawing. You can make significant sales by targeting these audiences with high-quality products. Social media is your best bet to promote products to hobbyists, as you can show ads to your perfect customer profile.
You can create an online store and list products for sale. Anyone can visit your store, add items to their cart, and pay for them. After receiving money, your duty is to ship the items quickly to customers.
An online store gives you control over branding and product selection. You can use custom colors and logos that people identify with your brand. You can run discounts and add or remove products without hassle.
In contrast, many third-party marketplaces restrict what you can sell. Some need explicit approval before listing a product, delaying the time it takes to sell trending products. An online store provides more control over your store’s fate.
Creating an online store might sound technically complex, but third-party platforms like Shopify and Wix have made it easy. These platforms handle the complicated back-end processes of your online store, and you’ll focus on the less challenging front-end aspects like design and branding.
You can sell products on social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok. These platforms have designated marketplaces that let customers buy your products in-app. Their massive audiences provide ample opportunities to find customers and boost sales.
E-commerce platforms like Shopify have direct integrations with TikTok Shop and the Facebook Marketplace. Hence, you can list products on both your online store and these platforms. Any product change from your store’s backend will be reflected in the social media listings.
Online marketplaces like eBay, Etsy, Walmart, and Amazon have enormous visitors. You can list products on these marketplaces to capture the attention of your target audience.
Listing a product on an online marketplace is like having a stall in a popular shopping mall. It makes it easier to find customers without investing excessively in ads. Shopify has integrations with popular marketplaces, so you can sell products on both your store and third-party platforms.
Major online selling tips for beginners include
Search engine optimization (SEO) helps attract organic traffic to your online store. Effective SEO can attract considerable visitors to your online store without much ad spending.
Conduct keyword research to learn the most queried terms in your niche. Tools like Semrush help you find these keywords, which you’ll strategically insert into your website.
Semrush is one of the best SEO research tools for e-commerce entrepreneurs
Source: Semrush
Insert relevant keywords naturally into your web pages instead of “stuffing” them, which search engines penalize. These natural insertions boost your site’s chances of appearing on search result pages.
Mobile optimization is another crucial SEO tenet. All your site’s visual elements should automatically adjust for mobile displays. Search engines consider mobile optimization when ranking sites, and many users will view your site from mobile smartphones, necessitating this optimization.
Optimize your site’s speed by compressing images and videos to the smallest sizes while maintaining quality. Google and Bing, the leading search engines, consider site speed for website rankings.
Your product descriptions should be clear and concise. Search engines will index these descriptions, which will help entice users to patronize your store.
We’ve mentioned mobile and speed optimization as part of SEO. Mobile devices account for over 60% of web traffic, so mobile optimization is necessary to attract and retain customers.
Every visual element on your website should automatically adjust to different mobile displays. Images, videos, and text should fit mobile or tablet screens without hassle. Avoid using too many visual elements because they can slow your website.
Your website should be easy for a layperson to navigate. Include a menu bar that leads visitors to all your store’s product categories. The footer menu should include informative links like the refund policy, a contact page, a site map, and order tracking.
Use minimal colors, preferably a white background, to make your website visually appealing.
Customers highly consider visuals when making a purchase. Hence, use high-definition images and videos to illustrate your products. The pictures should feel like the work of professional photographers. High-quality visuals help your store stand out from competitors.
In this era, you must not pay professional photographers or videographers to get high-quality visuals. Many apps, such as BeFunky and PicMonkey, let you create stunning product images with a smartphone camera. Some apps even allow you transfer a photo of a clothing item to a human model.
Customer support is a non-negotiable aspect of building a successful e-commerce business. Make customers feel esteemed by answering their inquiries promptly and informatively.
Complaints can sometimes arise, so be responsive and go the extra mile to help resolve them. Excellent support encourages customers to become repeat buyers.
Advisably, have a FAQ page that answers the most common inquiries. Customers with mundane inquiries will get answers from the FAQ page, while you’ll focus on responding to complex inquiries.
A successful online store begins with a few steps. This guide has explained how to start selling things online, including the key steps that will help you succeed in the long term.
Starting a successful e-commerce business might seem arduous. Of course, it isn’t all rosy, but it’s doable if you follow the required steps.
Zendrop is your ideal partner for launching an online store. We offer a vast selection of high-quality products across different niches. We’ll take care of shipping and fulfillment while you focus more on attracting customers. Start your Zendrop free trial today.
The best products to sell online are those with high demand and low competition. Products with significant branding potential are also suitable for online stores, e.g., cosmetics and apparel. Likewise, you can latch onto social media trends to list top-selling products.
Pricing, ease of use, and features are the primary considerations when choosing an e-commerce platform. You need the right balance between affordability, ubiquitousness, and intuitiveness to select the best e-commerce platform for your needs.
Yes, diversified sales channels help entrepreneurs build successful e-commerce businesses. Listing products on third-party sites helps broaden your customer base and boosts profits. It reduces the risks of relying on a single platform wherein a policy change can thwart your business.
You can run social media and search engine ads to attract customers. Social media apps and search engines let you create targeted campaigns for your perfect customer profile.
Search engine optimization and content marketing help attract customers without spending much money. However, these efforts take longer to yield results than ads.
It depends on your jurisdiction. Many countries and cities charge sales taxes but exempt small sellers from these taxes. It’s advisable to consult tax professionals for guidance in your relevant jurisdictions.
Consider the weight and price of an item when setting shipping costs. Also, consider your courier’s charges so that you can set shipping fees that’ll cover the charges.
You can charge a flat fee depending on the customer’s location. Set fees slightly above your shipping carrier’s rates for specific locations. You can also provide free shipping for high-value orders, as this strategy encourages customers to buy more items to hit the free shipping threshold.
