Sell items with the right size
As people order more and more items online, sellers must keep up with this trend and focus on spending less money on shipping. Seeing that e-commerce made up 14.3% of total retail sales in 2018 just in the US, it’s pretty clear that shipping has become as important as the sale itself.
After spending 517.36 billion dollars online just with American merchants and online retailers in 2018, up 15% more than the 449.88 billion spent the year before, it’s pretty safe to say that your customers deserve to be offered reliable shipping at a decent cost. But what are the best products to sell if you simply don’t wish to overspend on courier services?
A recent study shows that if you decide to focus on selling jewelry, electronics, medical accessories or simply medicine, you will surely ship smaller packages and thus spend less than 10% of the average order value on shipping. On the other hand, retailers who decide to sell food and grocery, for example, are used to more heavier parcels. As a result, they are spending as much as 18% of the total order cost just on shipping services.
There might be a connection between the higher average value per order in the medical business or jewelry industry, as products in these categories are more expensive than others so a higher order cost translates into a smaller percentage for shipping costs. For example, if you sell a gold ring worth 200$ on your eBay shop, which needs to be sent to another country on the same continent as yours, you will spend less for shipping compared to a 200$ order of groceries.
International shipping
International shipping is starting to become more and more common, as most online retailers offer to ship outside of the country where the items are stored. There is a change in the way international shoppers order online, as they don’t seem to shop for food, health and wellness, medical devices and prescription medicines from other countries, but prefer to order domestically. This happens although they are the cheapest products to ship internationally, statistically speaking, with just between 5% and 8,52% of the total order cost.
On the other hand, auto parts, electronics, and clothing or apparel sell like crazy internationally, but at a higher shipping cost. Auto parts usually take almost a quarter of the order value, 22,6%, Electronics cost almost 18,87% of the total order cost to ship and Apparel costs almost 17% of the total order cost to ship abroad.
A simple check on the 2019 U.S. Top 1000 Report shows that the average order value is one of the most-watched metrics for business owners worldwide because it offers a clear image on the general cost of shipment for each product category. Lowest average order costs are in the food and grocery category, with 78,7$ generally spent online on these types of products, while beauty and skincare products are usually ordered in the hundreds of dollars, at an average of 354,12$.
Using this information in your advantage will help you value your costumers more and “read” their interests better, thus boosting their loyalty towards your business. It will also help you understand what would be the best products for you to sell online, in case you don’t yet have a clear idea on the direction your online business should take in the future.
Once you have determined your niche and start to sell online, JustShipIT will help you manage all your shipping related responsibilities in order for your business to thrive.