If you have the means, create something and make people want it. If you don’t have the means, get into people’s lives and create something they love or truly need.
Why bother reinventing the wheel to attract customers?
Thinking about opening a bakery? Look around your town: there’s one every mile, sometimes even two just a few blocks apart. They’re all the same, mostly.
Considering starting an eCommerce to sell beauty products, home decor, stairlifts for seniors, household items, gym equipment, or organic foods?
You’ll find a thousand websites more famous, cheaper, with a wider range of products, and better at online marketing and customer support than yours.
There’s no secret strategy for finding customers online and offline if you produce or sell the same product or service as others.
You can bust your soul trying out all the strategies you find on the web, from freebies to the ones that cost you an arm and a leg: none make sense, none work for everyone, none has a magic wand, especially if you don’t offer anything unique, original, exclusive, fully customized.
The only way to attract customers is to invent something that doesn’t exist, starting from scratch!
Do you think I’ve lost my mind? Do you believe it’s impossible today because everything already exists and some Chinese, Indian, or Bangladeshi industry will copy you?
If you buy 100% into this statement, this article isn’t for you.
How to create something that does not exist?
There is only one way: ask your potential audience, who you would like to buy from you.
Buy what if I haven’t invented anything yet?
Indeed, ask your potential customers what problems they have.
Are you passionate about cycling and know it’s a profitable sector in several countries?
If you want to start your own entrepreneurial venture independently, ask cycling enthusiasts what their most important problem is, the one that keeps them up at night.
Do you think it’s a technical problem? A transmission problem? Something related to the wheels or other parts of the bike?
None of these: in many countries the main problem for bike lovers is theft!
Ask unknown cyclists, enthusiasts you meet by chance. Ask them and you’ll find the problem to solve.
Come up with a reliable, useful solution that cycling enthusiasts can buy at a price suitable for the niche market you want to serve.
This is the first way to create something that doesn’t exist.
To create something that does not exist, invent!
When it comes to creating something that doesn’t exist, just think outside the box and come up with the most outrageous ideas you can think of.
But keep in mind two important things:
- what problems your potential customers actually have (not just what they say they have),
- the demographic of the customers you want to target.
If you want to tackle a social issue, that’s great. But if your target market doesn’t have much purchasing power, meaning they’re in a lower-spending demographic and don’t have much money, then it’s probably better to move on.
Unless you’re okay with barely making a profit, just covering the costs, and paying yourself the minumum monthly salary. The choice is yours.
If you want to make money, invest in your business, create jobs, help your community, and not worry about counting pennies, then think about targeting customers who are willing to pay a premium price for something that doesn’t exist.
Here are a few tips
how about a handmade coffee mug customized with the customer’s name engraved and decorated with 24 karat gold?
Does it exist? Nope, although there could be a market for it among wealthy people and those willing to splurge to appear wealthy.
- Who would buy it? The real rich and the wannabe rich. The real rich have money to spare, the wannabes are willing to take out a loan to look wealthy. And that’s the majority.
- How much would it be worth paying for? I don’t know, maybe from $1,000 and more. Maybe even $2,000 or $5,000.
- How many could you sell? Maybe only 500 worldwide: if you sell it for $2,000 you can make $1,000,000 from your couch: outsourcing production just focusing on sales.
If you’re willing to put in the effort, you could create something even more valuable and unique by showcasing your skills as a ceramist and engraver.
Just consider the costs of running a business in your country if you’re working on your own. Things work differently depending on the country.
Quick Tip: Always start as the sole owner of a limited liability business unless you have found partners or investors. Never buy into the dream of being freer if you start a business operated by a single person. The sole proprietor is 100% personally liable for business debts and it’s a trap.
Do you still think you cannot create something from scratch?
Wrong!
Do you know how much a Sarto bicycle costs?
The Sarto Raso frame kit (ONLY THE FRAME KIT) with custom paint job starts at € 8,000. And with that amount you only get frame, fork, headset, seatpost, 2 bottle cages.
Sarto has started producing “Unique, custom carbon fibre speed machines, handmade in Venice, Italy by master builders since 1959” according to their website.
Let’s sum it up
If you want to find customers and you’re not completely clueless, come up with some ideas first, search the web to see if they already exist, use English first and then other languages because Google doesn’t like languages other than English that much, keep searching, wrack your brains and look for something that doesn’t exist that you can produce yourself, with your family, friends, or that you can have others produce and resell online.
Forget about the nonsense of dropshipping. You’re not inventing anything, just selling something that already exists and is mass-produced.
You make money by selling something perceived as unique and customized.
Create something that doesn’t exist and you’ll find customers right from the first sale. You might even start selling before you’ve created the first prototype.
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