Online Marketplace Ideas for Aspiring Entrepreneurs — Start from $500 to $5000

Starting with the basics, an online marketplace is a website or an app where customers can buy products from different sellers on one platform. The owner or admin of such a website may or may not own any inventory. The vendors’ inventory is in a marketplace that facilitates transactions between consumer and seller. What eBay and Amazon started as a disruptive model decades ago has turned into one of the most widespread business trends in today’s world.

Clearly, this is a highly competitive space and one of the more difficult business ideas to develop traction with. But if you can find a niche that clicks, the upside could be tremendous.  But like any complex and competitive business, you’ve first got to learn all that you can about how to start a business and then put together a really thorough business plan.

In the recent quarter, Amazon’s net income amounted to $2.5 billion, a 53% rise from the preceding quarter with $1.63 billion. Similar is the case with Chinese e-commerce marketplace Alibaba. It recorded consolidated revenues of 250.3 billion Yuan (approximately $39.9 billion).

Related Resources:

• How to Start an Amazon Store
• Should I Sell Products at My Own Website or a Third Party Marketplace?

Launching an online marketplace in the 21st century is a viable option for aspiring entrepreneurs. But they must consider several parameters before they actually launch one. Some essential parameters are:

– Idea on which you are building a marketplace
– Features to include in your marketplace
– Technology on which the marketplace will be built
– The total amount of investment required to plan, design, develop, and grow.

Coming Back to the Point

With Amazon and Alibaba taking the world by storm, many e-commerce stores popped up to follow the trend. And why not? With so much shopping happening over the internet today, the odds of your business succeeding have increased multifold. People especially love shopping from a multi-vendor e-commerce website as they get more and better product and price options.

Many entrepreneurs believe launching a multi-vendor e-commerce store like Amazon might be a costly affair, but not necessarily. Find a readymade system that is built for small and medium-sized businesses and has all the features your business requires.

Speaking of different industries, the online marketplace in itself carries a variety of business models to choose from. Let’s take a look at various businesses the internet has to offer:

Rental Marketplace Idea

The rental business in the U.S. is huge. People now prefer to make money from reusable products they own.

There are many products that are used once and left abandoned in one corner of the house later. People have now realized that these rarely used items can be rented out to users and that they can earn extra bucks from it. And, renters also prefer paying a small amount and using such products for a fixed amount of time. Renting has turned out to be among the most sought-after business models lately.

Renting out old goods gives people a way to make money while someone else uses them productively. All they need is a platform to showcase their products for renters. This is exactly why online rental marketplaces have emerged as the need of the hour. There are many ways to launch this business, but opting for a readymade system such as YoRent is a viable option for new startups.

Food Ordering and Delivery Marketplace

The U.S. food delivery market has seen massive growth. There’s a huge opportunity available in the online food ordering and delivery sector. People now prefer to get everything delivered to their doorstep — not just common products that you get from the likes of Amazon and eBay, but also food. Investing in this marketplace where restaurant owners can easily connect with consumers is a fruitful idea.

The website owner can easily earn revenue by deducting a set amount of commission from each online food order. There are other sources of revenue, too, such as advertisements, premium membership, etc. Make sure you launch your marketplace with a system that supports all these revenue streams.

Online Travel Activity Booking Marketplace

Travel booking is a leading industry. But today, traveling to a tourist destination is not the trend. People first look for activities they want to perform and then decide the destination. Instead of merely choosing a destination, travelers like to see what activities they can indulge in.

There are a lot of systems that an entrepreneur can choose to launch a travel activity booking website and starting a successful blog business around it. However, a better option may be to choose a readymade system such as FunAway or Pure Planner to launch your online travel marketplace.

Gigs Marketplace Idea for Event Planners

Whether it’s a wedding, a concert, or a fashion show, event planning also calls for making arrangements. Be it a musician or a clown or a party entertainer, there are many tasks for the person arranging the event. Different market players like Event Peppers and GigStart are earning profits from this business model.

It’s important for entrepreneurs to partner with a feature-rich system to launch their website. This is the only way to bring great user experience on the admin, planner, and artist front. Remember, people don’t buy goods or services — they buy experience.

An online gigs marketplace is all about experience. From easy browsing to quick searches to speedy bookings, your marketplace needs to do it all.

While discussing e-commerce business models with e-commerce experts at FATbit Technologies, we understood that an e-commerce marketplace idea is successful if the marketplace owner:

– Addresses an unresolved issue
– Has a clear business plan
– Knows the worth of their business
– Defines the scope
– Is willing to put customers first