How to win at eCommerce: differentiation, pricing, and curation

Executive overview

Most people starting an eCommerce business default to dropshipping the same products everyone else sells. Amazon has over 1,500 Amazon Basics products and will simply undercut or replace commodity resellers. To survive, you need a reason to exist that Amazon can't easily copy.

Noah Kagan frames three viable paths: sell a unique product, own the price extremes, or curate a niche better than anyone else.

Generic products sold at middle-market prices will get eliminated — differentiate or compete at the price extremes.

Why commodity dropshipping fails

• Everyone sources the same products from Alibaba or Amazon and lists them in the same places
• Amazon replicates bestselling categories under its own brand, cutting out third-party sellers
• Chinese manufacturers can also sell directly, removing the middleman entirely
• Middle-ground pricing is the most exposed — margins attract Amazon's attention

Three ways to win

• Unique product: build or source something that can't be found on Amazon — Noah is developing a lightweight laptop charger after finding nothing adequate on the market
• Price position: be the cheapest or the most premium; the middle gets squeezed out
• Curation: hand-pick the best products in a niche so buyers don't have to wade through millions of Amazon listings (example: PhotoJojo, which curated cool photography accessories)

How to find and source a product

• Solve a problem you have personally — real frustration produces better product instincts
• Contact founders of products you already like via LinkedIn and ask for sourcing referrals
• Use sourcing platforms: Sourcify, Bring.io, Hacks.co, or Alibaba to find manufacturers
• Visit China directly to see manufacturing firsthand and build supplier relationships