The best-kept secret to selling consumer electronics is to niche it.

You may have stars in your eyes to think you can build a consumer electronics business like Amazon.com. As a one or two-person entrepreneur, sole proprietorship, or partnership, how can you compare to Amazon.com organization that spent millions and millions to build online business that took 6 or 7 years to come into black with a profit? They obtained their operating and advertising money from capital investors and did a great selling job convincing investors to pour in money year after year.

If you're a small business and you want to sell consumer electronics you need to concentrate on selling items with which you can capture a percentage of market and make a decent profit margin.

You need to research your products for your supplier price and availability, and market price that you can sell at, then calculate your profit margin. Many retailers of consumer electronics pick popular items and cut their prices to bone to compete head to head with big guys like Best Buy, Amazon.com and Circuit City.

A better track to run on is choosing higher end products that better informed customers might prefer and build a value-added mini-market around those special pieces. Provide consumer electronics product, specialized accessories and related items making a profit center. Choose one central product like Home Entertainment, Racing Electronics or CB Radios and build around that theme every other product that goes with them. You will find most of related products at your wholesale suppliers and distributors.

Or provide a service center around one product type, like a camcorder battery replacement service for every type of camcorder on market. With right wholesale supplier you can have easy access to camcorder replacement battery grid and they will drop ship to your customer their particular camcorder battery.

Next time someone tells you about a problem, use these steps.

1. Listen politely, without offering any suggestions. Remember, it is not your problem.

2. Affirm that problem is really important. Just say, “That sounds like a really big problem.”

3. Ask, “What have you already tried (thought of) doing about problem?” You learn all suggestions to scratch off your list. And you subtly reinforce capabilities of person with problem.

4. After you hear answer, ask, “How did that work out?” You invite problem holder to rethink his or her own challenge. Often that leads to a solution on spot, with thanks to you for your brilliant suggestions. (Of course, you have not made any suggestions, but that doesn’t really matter.)