Until now import business used to be the exclusive right of people with plenty of money and technical know how, people who can travel around the world and all that. But right now, the story has changed, you can actually import goods from oversea right from your bedroom without having to travel anywhere!
One thing special about imported goods is that people get to respect it more than the locally made type (not necessarily superior in quality though) and tends to patronize it more.
Let’s face it — import business is a very big business but you need to know how to go about it to be able to make a lot of money from the goods you imported, you need to start by knowing what comes first and second and so on.. So how do you proceed to setting up your import business?
1. Look for hot Products
In those days you’d need to travel to many countries to be able to identify products to import. Now, you can seat back at the comfort of your bedroom and do it on the internet. Look for trending products or some that are not in the the country presently that you think people will love.
First of all, bring small quantity into Nigeria to see how people will react to it. That is, to quantify the acceptability of the product before importing. If a product is not acceptable, there is no need to invest your hard earned money into it because it wouldn’t sell to make you your money back. You must do this initial product trail by bringing small quantity first to see if people gonna like it.
After you showed it to your potential customers and they like it, make estimate of the quantity they would demand based on their interest and use the data to judge the volume of goods to be imported. Use the same process to get your subsequent products. Until the product become a household name.
2. Where to get the Products
Like I said before, you don’t have to travel oversea to get sample of the product — you can get it on the internet. Go to merchant websites like Alibaba.com, Ebay.com, etc or just Google the ‘keywords’ where to import goods from — browse through to see the type of product that may not already in Nigerian market.
Place your order by paying using your electronic Credit or Debit card. Most Nigerian Banks now have cards that are acceptable on these sites. You may write money through other means like bank deposit or money transfer. Once you’ve paid for the goods with shipment cost included. the next thing is to wait for the goods to arrive. You may not need the services of a clearing agent if the import is through premium Currier services Like DHL UPS and others.
3. Sell off the Products
You must have talked to your potential customers about your soon to arrive product using the sample from the previous product sample you brought in. Now that you have the main products, Get the product to them and sell off at whole sale price to make your profit.
Then repeat the process to as many times as it remains profitable. To be able to increase your capital, you need to reinvest your gain from the first and second trips until you have enough money to import in mega quantity.
Check from Nigeria import and export promotion commission (I’m not sure if that is their real name) to see types of products allowed into this country.
I will be sharing more details about import business in my subsequent articles. For now ask your question by commenting below and lets expand on the subject.
I like this write-up but I'm afraid to pay online to person or company abroad that I can't see or meet physically. If the person/company is fraudulent how can I trap him/it to recover back my money? I want to be sure my money is secured and deliver the goods.
ReplyDeletethank you.
Please i want to start both a pure water company and block industry in Imo state, i don't have a land yet cos i want to know the profit margins and how long it will take to recover my capital.
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