It makes no sense to take product from one part of the world to another part of the world unless you can do it profitably.

Importing can be challenging, especially if there are other importers in your market. However, there are 7 simple steps you can take to maximise your importing profits.

Scroll down the page to learn more.

As an importer from Japan you're in the business of "Geo Arbitrage". This is just a fancy name for getting product from one country (where it's cheaper and better) and relocating it to another country where people will pay you a premium over the importing cost for that product.

The online auctions in Japan such as Yahoo!, TAU and the Wholesale Auto Auctions are an ideal place to research buying prices in Japan.

With a Shipping Estimator you can estimate shipping costs from Japan to the country you want to import to. And your Customs Broker can give you estimates for the costs of landing what you want to import. This will give you the "landed price" for what you're thinking of importing.

With this information your can "run the numbers" for the different makes, models and stock niches that you're thinking about importing, compare this to the prevailing sale prices in the country you're importing into and get an idea of potential profit.

Once you've run the numbers on different niches, makes and models you can begin the process of niche selection.

This is probably the most important phase and most importers will succeed or fail at this stage.

Get this stage wrong and you'll probably fail in your attempt to import from Japan. Get it right and you're on the road to importing success.

You need to select niches which offer:

• A High Return on Investment There's no magic figure but with risks such as currency fluctuations and some stock you import requiring work prior to putting it to sale, normally around 30% ROI should be an absolute minimum and skilled importers can achieve returns of 100%+ importing from Japan. A good idea is to set a "hurdle ROI". That is, unless something is going to give you a minimum return of a figure that you set you don't import it.


• Pricing Power If you select an attractive niche but don't have pricing power your returns will soon fall as other importers jump on the same opportunity, supply increases and margins fall.
  
  The key to getting the numbers to work is to carefully select the niches where there are barriers to entry for other players in your space to enter the market. Barriers to entry can include importing stock which is hard for other importers to get, requires a budget that many other importers don't have, or provide services which other importers find it hard to provide.

Avoid commoditised niches, unless you can create extra value which differentiates your offering on something other than price.

A commoditised niche is one with many sellers offering similar products where the main differentiation is price.

Over 90% of businesses fail and one big reason is that they're operating in commoditised niches. To survive in these markets you need to offer extra value which differentiates your offering from other similar offerings. The only other way it can be done is to control the market - like market giants WalMart, Costco and Amazon - which is normally not an option for small to medium sized enterprises.

There are lots of choices for importing from Japan.

Look for exporters who specialise in Business to Business services and give you benefits over and above Business to Consumer exporters.

(a brazen plug for a service like ours) TS REWARDS℠

With a Shipping Estimator you can estimate shipping costs from Japan to the country you want to import to for both Roll-On Roll-Off and containerised shipping. This means you can select the cheapest way to ship.

You want your product to arrive undamaged and without theft. If you're shipping in containers, full containers will give you the highest load factor and lowest landed cost per item of stock.

There are now more opportunities for ever for distributing your product:

Up-Sells, Cross-Sells & Customer Lifetime Value

You might have heard the phrase "Would you like fries with that?"

Take advantage of opportunities to add extra value to the buyer with Up-Sells and Cross-Sells. If you're a car seller does the buyer need finance, accessories or ongoing maintenance services? (much of the value on new car sales is created after the decision to buy by using Up-Sells and Cross-Sells).

If you're a parts seller, does the buyer need other parts for the same model that they're already buying? Would they like to know when more parts come in? You can them add them to your mailing list so they get automatic alerts. This gives you an opportunity to develop an ongoing relationship with that buyer and increase Customer Lifetime Value.

Just look on the back of your shampoo bottle for the last tip on how to maximise your importing profits, "Lather, rinse and repeat".

The world's leading business investor Warren Buffet says that asset growth is the transfer of wealth from the impatient to the patient.

Rather than rip profits from your business after every round of importing, benefit from the miracle of compounding and take your profits and re-invest them in more stock ... over and over... for maximum wealth creation.