The 9 Best Online Shop Ideas

1. The 9 best online shop ideas with their pros and cons
2. 1. Shopify

Long live the Internet! This is how this article must start. Why? Because the invention of the internet has paved a glorious path for countless business ideas and has also given many entrepreneurs new ideas to think of. More and more projects are emerging faster and faster, creating business structures that make these projects possible.

When, for example, 20 years ago a few companies started selling their products online, HTML programmers had to get to work. Today, construction kits for online shops provide a simple foundation for every product idea. The main tasks are now much more focused on marketing and sales.

But what if you want to open an online shop and want to do something on the internet, but don't yet know exactly what it can be. We are happy to help and give you 9 e-commerce ideas to use, with which you can also take glorious paths. We will also discuss which online shops work best - based on real examples like Salesforce Commerce Cloud- and make suggestions about which products you could sell.

We also prepare the basic framework for each of these ideas: We show you the 8 most popular online shop construction kits. At the end of this article you definitely have a plan to get started in the e-commerce universe.

The 9 best online shop ideas with their pros and cons

1. Dropshipping

Dropshipping is the most cost-effective alternative for selling products on the internet. The approach can serve you as a way to test a market before you release your own products, or generally to establish an online shop business without the additional logistical effort. With dropshipping, you leave the logistics to a fulfillment company, which you connect with a dropshipping software. This can also be the producer of the products. If this is not the case, you are looking for both a fulfillment provider and a manufacturer to bring them together. Apart from that, you are responsible for ensuring that orders come in - which means that marketing needs to work and the online shop needs to function. The supplier accepts every order, picks, packs and dispatches it.

Cost-wise, the purchase of the goods, the payment of the fulfillment provider, the operation of the online shop and the marketing budget are up to you. Your project would be significantly more expensive and time-consuming if you were to manage the logistics yourself with all the trimmings.

Test the method first with a few products to experience the process and the collaboration with a fulfillment supplier. In this regard, it is important that you catch the right provider. One that acts reliably, processes orders quickly and whose products meet your quality standards. Poor quality articles or long delivery times only affect your brand, less the supplier in the background - keep that in mind!

If the dropshipping start went well, you can expand your online shop and add more products. If you are testing a market, you know which products you want to sell via dropshipping. If you don't have an idea yet, get inspired by AliExpress. There you often find contact to the suppliers. Trust your instinct and gut feeling, whether a wholesaler meets your expectations - regardless of whether they are based in Germany or abroad. Before you sign a collaboration, always have test products sent to you to check them thoroughly. Otherwise, such collaborations are mainly based on trust.

With Amazon FBA, the famous e-commerce giant also offers a fulfillment service, which also saves you the trouble of building an online shop. However, the costs for this are quite high, which is why it often makes more sense to build your own webshop and find partners for logistics. You have to weigh this up according to your plans.

This is how dropshipping works.

These are the advantages of dropshipping

• Cost-effective, little investment required
• You can start directly from the home office
• Great time saving, as if you were taking over the logistics yourself
• The supplier also takes care of the returns processing
• You have plenty of time to get your marketing and online shop up and running properly

These are the disadvantages of dropshipping

• You must trust that the dealer will keep the quality promises, as you do not see the products before each shipment
• You will probably have to spend a lot of time on customer service to maintain the image of your brand
• The e-commerce world is fast-moving, which is why you should always be up to date in order not to be overrun by the dropshipping competition

Example of a successful dropshipping online shop

Within 16 months Nathanael Ziegler cracked the revenue mark of one million euros with Apfelband. He sells bands for the Apple Watch and other Apple accessories via dropshipping.2. Meal-Prep ProviderIn the increasingly fast-moving world, many people try to make their time more effective in order to be more productive or not to waste time on things they don't feel like doing. Cooking is a good example. At this point you could come up with an online trading idea: Meal-Prep - ready-made meals, delivered to the customer by parcel service. You could offer vegan or vegetarian dishes, draw attention to yourself with organic quality or other sustainable features. The market is still fresh and is only being cultivated by a few providers. It looks different on the market for food boxes like the ones from HelloFresh.

The effort is much greater than with dropshipping, as you have to organize a catering service as well as the packaging and shipping. Not to forget, the maintenance of your online shop, marketing and sales. In addition, you need employees, as the effort for one or two people alone is hardly manageable. Since the demand for organic quality and sustainable food in our society continues to grow strongly and Generation Z will further explode demand in the future, it is a great opportunity to enter the meal-prep market before many others do.

Fittaste is an example of a successful meal-prep online shop.

Advantages of Meal-Prep Providers

Fresh market, which knows few competitors

Demand for high-quality food is steadily increasing

• Ready-to-eat food has a bad reputation in Germany, but is currently changing positively
• Meal-Prep dishes can also be sold offline through partnerships with supermarkets or smaller stores
• Disadvantages of Meal-Prep Providers
• Capital-intensive venture that demands many people involved (catering, supply chain, marketing, food regulations)

Usually only feasible with employees

• Example of a successful Meal-Prep online shop
• In 2015, the brothers Konstantin and Benjamin Ladwein founded

Fittaste

. The German meal-prep company not only makes healthy food that just needs to be heated up at home, but also focuses on fitness. In 2017 they were in „Die Höhle der Löwen“ with Fittaste and made a deal with Frank Thelen. Since then, the company has been growing Europe-wide with a well-filled and clear online shop for meal-prep products.3. Sell CreationsWhether it's greeting cards, unique wooden furniture, decorations or funny gift ideas: The range of creative products that you can get rid of via your online shop is almost limitless. So is the demand for custom-made products and products that are not from the stock of a large company. If you have a hobby in this direction, you can think about marketing; otherwise think about what talents are dormant in you. For example, greeting cards can quickly be created with

Canva

. The printing is done by a nearby copy shop or an online printing service.The effort consists only in the production of the creative items, in marketing and in shipping. All three things can be easily done from home, provided the size of the products does not exceed a certain framework. Advertising for creative things is easier than ever in the current time. All over TikTok, Instagram and Co. there are people showing how they make their unique items with love. This process attracts many views and ultimately also customers. This results in a disadvantage at the same time: Competition is large. It's best if you think up something really special. Niche search should also be the buzzword for creative products.Kartenmacherei is an example of a successful online shop for creative products.

Advantages of Selling Creations

Can be well managed from home

Relatively little investment required

• This online shop idea is ideal for a one-person operation
• Many promising marketing opportunities
• Disadvantages of Selling Creations
• Competition is strong, better to make niche products

Frequently you have to take care of everything yourself: production, marketing, logistics

• Example of a successful online shop for creative products
• After their second child, Jennifer and Christoph Behn decided in 2010 to found

Cardsfactory

after being dissatisfied with the cards available for the family after both births. Since then, they've been making millions in revenue each year. In episode #291 of the OMR podcast, Christoph Behn talks about Kartenmacherei.4. Feed a NicheGranted, point four applies to almost all points in our ranking. After all, it is often advisable to find a niche and establish yourself there without much competition. But there are also shop ideas that don't work according to the dropshipping method or in any other framework. It usually involves innovations and ideas that do not yet exist in the market.

If you have such an idea in mind and your thorough market research efforts have confirmed that you are the first person in the world to have this product idea, it's time to go full throttle. Whether you need capital for this, what tasks you face or whether a patent should be filed can only be answered individually.

It's a good thing there are many answers on the WWW. If you have this kind of online shop idea, you should start out on LinkedIn where you can connect with the right people.

Glossy Dreams successfully markets a niche product.

Advantages & Disadvantages

Both depend on the nature of your idea

But in general: every idea can be implemented; whether it finds a target group is another matter

• Example of a successful niche online shop
• A good example of a new online business idea is

Glossy Dreams

by Lina Bouhmidi. At just 20 years old, Lina has developed an impregnating stick for the seams of white and black sneakers, sells this in her own online shop and on top of that has also scored a deal on „Die Höhle der Löwen“. On the day of the show, she received over 5,000 orders. Until then, her marketing consisted exclusively of TikTok content.5. Selling Handmade GoodsJust like creative works, handmade goods are in high demand. These can be manufactured in other countries and sold by you in an online shop, or you can make them yourself. The most popular items are self-sewn clothes, as seen on social platforms like Instagram or Pinterest.

Especially fashion for babies and children is very popular. The range of ideas in this field is almost endless. Thus, you can also make soap, cosmetics or natural products and sell them in your online shop. The topic of sustainability is generally becoming more and more popular.

But the competition is big and growing. Your goal should therefore be to stand out from the crowd. If not with the products, then through marketing. Social media offers a lot of potential for this. Another special online shop design is also impressive. So, pay attention to attractive templates when choosing your

online shop kit

.From an offline carpentry shop became a successful online carpentry shop: Holzconnection.Advantages of Selling Handmade Goods

Such projects are well scalable

If you manufacture the goods yourself, you have a good overview of capital requirements and product quality

• Disadvantages of Selling Handmade Goods
• Selling handcrafted goods is also a big financial risk, as you need to buy material before you know if your products will sell

Example of a successful online shop for craft products

• Holzconnection

appeared in 2017 from his father's family carpentry workshop. Since then, Denys Nagel has created Carpentry 2.0. He makes made-to-measure furniture items using a computer and sells them along with related products like mattresses in his online shop. On Instagram, Holzconnection enjoys the attention of more than 20,000 people, on Facebook even almost 80,000.

6. Selling FashionSelling fashion also follows a similar vein as online shops for handmade products. It is less about you making the items yourself, but about setting up an online shop complete with supply chain and logistics. This is very time-consuming, but has the advantage that you are raising your own "baby" from small beginnings and are fully in control.

The fact is, fashion is still one of the world's most popular consumer goods. The target group is therefore large, as is the competition. Try not to emulate corporations like H&M, but find a niche instead. In the fashion industry, the topic of sustainability is also increasingly coming to the fore. You can also research what problems consumers are currently experiencing in the fashion world and find solutions for them. While large companies can only adapt slowly, you can get it right. Selling fashion requires preparation time from you, as you have to select suppliers and products.

Another activity that seems comprehensive is gathering numerous product information, which you should and must provide online for each item. The more information a customer has, the more likely they are to buy. This includes a wide range of professional product photos. To keep track of all the information, we recommend using a Product Information Management System. You can find out what exactly that is and what the

Top 7 PIM systems

are on OMR Reviews in another article.The example of Snocks shows you how a fashion online shop can work.Advantages of a Fashion Online ShopYou have influence on every area here, unlike dropshippingWith niche products you also have potential in a huge fashion market, as it is constantly changing

Disadvantages of a Fashion Online Shop

At the beginning, a certain amount of capital is necessary, which can quickly turn into five figures depending on the product and the size of the online shop

• Selling fashion while managing everything yourself also carries a high risk, which is why the business plan should be well thought out
• Example of a successful fashion online shop

Johannes Kliesch and Felix Bauer are cousins and founded

• Snocks
• in 2016. They started selling socks and boxer shorts on Amazon. Now they sell the underwear in organic quality in their own Shopify online shop and made over ten million euros turnover in 2020.

The two Snocks founders talk more about their company in episode #335 of the OMR podcast.

7. Sell Digital ProductsProducts that you can sell do not always have to be physical but can also be digital. E-Books, video courses, stock media, digital art or teaching material can you offer in your online shop. Construction kit providers like WooCommerce have the appropriate settings for this so that customers can download something instead of having it shipped by post.

Alternatively, you can offer your services such as graphic design or blog writing. Just ask your creativity about the possibilities beyond the online shops for physical products. To simplify the marketing of your digital product, you can use

Digistore24. The platform provides you with the necessary infrastructure and an affiliate program through which you can sell with commission.You can also sell digital products in an online shop.

Advantages of Selling Digital ProductsNo logistical effort necessaryEffortless venture

High profit margin

Many automated processes can be implemented despite external partner

• Disadvantages of Selling Digital Products
• There aren't really any disadvantages, as the risk is manageable
• You only pay tuition if your digital products don't sell
• Example of a successful online shop for digital products

Many people want to expand their knowledge, which is why they read a lot. Most of the time, it is about the area where they work.

• A Book Apart
• has taken advantage of a niche and sells e-books that are aimed at designers, authors, website operators and programmers. Users can choose between a physical and a digital version.

8. Print-on-Demand

Ordinary is out, people are looking for that certain something when it comes to clothing, greeting cards or the smartphone case. Here, you can help out with an online shop for print-on-demand products. All you need is a creative head, a little knowledge about graphic programs like Canva or Photoshop and a provider that prints and ships the products. The principle works similarly to dropshipping. The printing company provides the blanks and you transmit the design. Afterwards, it goes out to the buyer.

The blanks can be T-shirts, bags, hoodies, mugs, desk pads, posters and anything else that people often use and would like to own in a special way. In addition, it is crucial that your marketing machinery runs smoothly to reach buyers.

After you have found an exciting pattern for a hoodie, for example, passed the print to the print-on-demand supplier and loaded the product into your online shop, it's time to do advertising. There are a lot of ways to do this to make a brand out of your business: social media, SEO, email marketing, community marketing and many more. We recommend again to find a niche or build an audience that would like to wear you, for example.With Printful you can print products and sell them in your own online shop.Advantages Print-on-Demand

Low financial expenditure

Little time expenditure necessary

Implementation of numerous automated workflows possible despite external partner

Disadvantages Print-on-Demand

• Especially in the field of T-shirt printing, there are already many brands
• Finding a printing company that delivers high quality is a challenge because the market is particularly overrun by poor quality products - similar to dropshipping
• Example of a successful Print-on-Demand online shop

Instead of a concrete example, we refer at this point to the numerous successful Twitch streamers, YouTubers and influencers. They generate a part of their earnings through the sale of merch like for example the streamer Jens "Knossi" Knosalla (

• to be heard in episode #311 of the OMR Podcast
• ). The merch shops work in a similar way, as the creators would rather take care of content than complicated business models. The key is a community and good marketing if you want to run a successful print-on-demand online shop.

9. Link an online shop to your service

The conclusion of our 9 online shop ideas is the possibility to grow another business branch from your service. If you are working as a freelance photographer, copywriter or video editor, you can offer courses or products that are related to your service. As a photographer, you can sell your photos as posters or framed. As a copywriter or video editor, you can offer courses that can be booked in your online shop. As a freelancer or website operator, ask yourself which products fit your business.Freeletics is a good example of how a service provider has further expanded through an online shop.Advantages

You are expanding your established business with another branch, so the risk is low

Depending on the type of product, the costs are manageable

Disadvantages

The only disadvantage that can develop from such an online shop is the possibility that the products do not sell

• Example of a successful online shop that was created on the basis of a service
• In 2013,

Freeletics

• started as a fitness app and took off. More than 50 million users worldwide use the app to further develop themselves athletically and healthily. Freeletics now hosts an online shop on its website. There the company sells sportswear, fitness equipment and protein powder - all products that are related to its original service.

Implement your ideas with these 8 popular online shop construction kits

Now hopefully you are inspired and want to know which online shop construction kits are suitable to implement the ideas. For this we have looked around on OMR Reviews and collected the 8 most popular online shop construction kits.

1. Shopify

The name Shopify is probably the most famous in the world of online shop construction kits. Originally, founder Tobias Lütke wanted a solution to sell snowboards. From this a construction kit system developed, which makes it easy for everyone to create an online shop - without having to possess any programming skills or the like. Additionally, you don't need any IT infrastructure, as Shopify works as a SaaS solution.

The online shop builder is suitable for small and medium-sized enterprises. Are you currently researching for a large company on how to build an online shop, Shopify also offers individual enterprise solutions for you. The pricing starts at Shopify with 27 Euros per month.

With Shopify you can set up your online shop quickly and easily.2. WixWe can't get around, every time we write about

Wix

we need to pick up on the humor content behind the name. In addition, there is always the explanation that Wix comes from Israel and the name therefore only makes people in German-speaking countries chuckle. Apart from that, Wix is an ultra-easy-to-use cloud-based platform to build your online shop. Over 120 templates can be used directly and customized individually. The cheapest e-commerce tariff costs 42 Euros per month at Wix. With the Modalyst app you can start your dropshipping shop via

Wix

.3. Squarespace

4. Ecwid

Ecwid started as a widget that helped users integrate an online shop on their website. From this developed an online shop construction kit, which is especially aimed at small retailers. The good thing: Ecwid offers a free tariff. However, you can only sell 10 products with this. If you want to go higher straight away, you pay 12.50 Euros per month for a yearly transfer. This includes social media stores on Facebook and Instagram. Within the framework of the most expensive tariff, Ecwid even offers a branded iOS and Android app for you.

Ecwid specializes in small single entrepreneurs.

5. JimdoWithout a programmer or a designer, you can quickly and easily open your online shop with Jimdo

. Ideas have no limits here. Jimdo has thought of everything: no fees on your sales, Click&Collect options for your customers, Instagram and Facebook connection as well as legally complaint terms and conditions and GDPR-compliant legal texts. So all you have to do is worry about your business and your products. The basic plan starts at just 15 Euros per month and includes all of Jimdo's basic shop features.

6. IONOS

The IONOS builder for online shops is from 1&1. It offers numerous features in the areas of marketing, SEO, payment options and insights. The setup is simple with modern templates and numerous setting options. You can also use IONOS via an app. The entire builder offer is rounded off by social media connections, the application of discounts and a shipping assistant. If you choose the cheapest tariff from IONOS, expect to pay 19 Euros per month.

7. STRATO Homepage-Baukasten

The construction kit company from Germany has existed for more than 20 years and therefore offers corresponding expertise when it comes to building you an online shop. In addition, STRATO Homepage-Baukasten has services such as hosting, online marketing, server rental and cloud storage in its portfolio. So you can do everything in one place. The online shop construction kit from STRATO Homepage-Baukasten enables you to connect to eBay and Amazon marketplaces in addition to the usual features. In the dashboard you can also book free webinars, which make some e-commerce topics more understandable to you. The cheapest plan is actually free and is suitable primarily for getting into online trade. The next tariff already costs 25 Euros per month; often you benefit from discounts at the beginning.

To find out more about STRATO's services, all tools and helpful articles on the products can be found on

our company overview page of STRATO.8. GambioWith

Gambio you can sell omnichannel over different marketplaces. For this, the company from Bremen offers a large foundation of services that you can make use of for your online shop in spe. In addition to the shop templates, you can also customize email templates to optimally address your customers in their mailboxes. Particularly outstanding are the over 200 interfaces to agencies, review platforms, multichannel providers, marketing tools,

payment services

, web analytics features and many more. You can build your own Gambio online shop from 20 Euros per month. If you want to find out more about the services Gambio provides and get helpful articles about the products, you can find all the tools on our company overview page for Gambio.

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