How to build a business through mediation. Intermediary business – profitable options and examples of development. Information for a novice intermediary

Almost every man sooner or later begins to think about starting his own business and working for himself. Today, the most widespread and profitable is mediation, which is why most people are interested in how to become an intermediary and make decent money from it.

How to become an intermediary between seller and buyer?

To become a mediator you do not need to have special skills, the main thing is to have desire and instinct. If you decide to make money through mediation, you must choose an area in which you will “rotate”, you must get the maximum, which will be little familiar to both the seller and the buyer, and you must be able to negotiate with people.

Options for mediation between seller and buyer may be, for example, the field of construction and repair. You can assemble a team of repair specialists who will carry out all the work proposed by the customer. By “supplying” workers you can make good money.

The trade sector is also very profitable. When purchasing a product from a manufacturer, you, after marking it up for yourself, sell it to the end buyer. This is exactly how the modern sales market works; today manufacturers rarely sell their goods directly to the buyer.

How to become an online store intermediary?

Another “field” for earning money could be. You can make quite good money as an intermediary selling goods on the World Wide Web. For example, foreign online stores, many people are afraid to “contact” with foreign manufacturers, even on the Internet, but the desire to purchase goods at a really low price does not leave them. Here you can act as an intermediary, receive your percentage, place an order and deliver the goods for an indecisive buyer.

Online stores have long ceased to be a rare phenomenon, and on the contrary, they are rapidly gaining popularity among the Russian-speaking audience. More and more people are buying us electronics, furniture, building materials and much more, realizing that it will cost them much less than if they went to the nearest supermarket. On the other hand, it would be even more profitable to purchase from foreign online stores, but most are hampered by difficulties associated with payment and delivery, or by simple ignorance of the language. And here intermediaries come to the rescue, taking all the troubles upon themselves, asking for an appropriate remuneration for this.

How to become an online store intermediary Study the topic “from cover to cover”

Otherwise, the work will be at your loss. You need to know the specifics of the goods that you will have to deal with, the methods of their delivery, the conditions of insurance and payment of compensation in the event of a defective product, issues related to customs duties. If at first it all seems too complicated, it is better to find a competent person/people who will advise you at first. Believe me, the purchase of goods in the United States and its subsequent transportation from the village of Kukuevo, Mukhosran region, is tantamount to developing a plan for a military operation.

Make connections

Of course, you can start a business alone by overpaying foreign suppliers for goods, but it will be better if you can make a profitable acquaintance “on the other side of the border.” The second intermediary will pay for the goods directly and send it independently - this is much cheaper and safer (bourgeois manufacturers do not consider it necessary to pay enough attention to the packaging and delivery of purchases, and some, in general, have never sent anything to Russia and the CIS countries and do not intend to ). You can find Russian-speaking partners on special forums and websites, but there are plenty of cases of scammers there, so it will still be better if your partner is a person you know.

Prepare a commercial proposal

Before you start work, you should figure out how to convince potential clients of your usefulness, so that they do not consider you a banal reseller. Try to bring to their attention that the process of purchasing and transporting goods is fraught with a lot of risks, including fraud, defective products, errors by postal workers and other problems, and you, as an intermediary, can provide a guarantee of speedy delivery and safety of purchased items. With all this, your prices should not be “biting”, otherwise most people will ignore even the most tempting offer. 7-10% for delivery is more than enough, although in some cases, if delivery and customs clearance costs a pretty penny, the price jumps to 20-30%.

Find buyers

The best option for this would be to create your own website, properly designed and promoted. Most of the content should be product descriptions with links to order (sales are especially effective if you provide them with review videos that clearly demonstrate the appearance of the product and its performance). Alternatively, you can search for clients in their natural habitat. If you are delivering women's goods, it's time to post your offer and contact information on women's websites and groups on social networks. If you sell car parts, run to the car enthusiasts forum. And so on, in general, you understand.

Prospects for intermediary business

At the initial stage, such a small enterprise requires virtually no capital investment. Five to six thousand rubles will be enough to place a couple of commercial advertisements, get a bank card for payments and pay for hosting services and a domain name for a year in advance. There will still be some left.

Despite the small investment, the profit is quite high. Even without straining too much, in a couple of months it is quite possible to reach a monthly income level of 10 thousand rubles. And if you set up large-scale production, purchasing and selling dozens of items in bulk, the amounts will be disproportionately higher. Of course, in this case you will have to take care of hiring additional staff and paying them wages.

This is what business is like. Do you think it’s worth working in this direction or would it be better to immediately start creating your own online store? Let's discuss in the comments.

Reviews and comments

Mediation is a fairly promising type of earnings - the markup on goods can be set almost the same as in your own online store, and this type of trading risk, when you purchased a product, but it turned out to be of no use to anyone and is simply lying around in your warehouse, is absent in principle . On the other hand, when ordering products from foreign suppliers, you can fall into the trap of scammers who will send you some kind of dummy or defective product. Accordingly, the money will be wasted (if you refuse to compensate the buyer for the loss, you will only make it worse for yourself).

The lack of a reliable legal basis (or status, whatever you want!) is the main headache for such an intermediary. Legally he is nobody. And of course, as a result of this, he is not completely protected from scammers! One can only dream of a solid, stable income in this area. And trust, as it was rightly said, in such areas of activity is earned over years!

I think this type of business is quite promising. Many people are afraid to buy online because they are afraid of being discounted and receiving low-quality goods, especially from abroad. The intermediary will be able to eliminate this problem for the buyer and also earn money from it.

I think that if you sell online, you may encounter low demand, people who go to websites buy a lot on their own in online stores and are oriented in this topic. You can buy goods in an online store with convenient delivery, and sell them in your city.

These schemes will soon stop working, if only because I personally participate in joint purchases in these foreign online stores, not only is the organizer of this collective purchase basically doing everything for me, but I also take at wholesale prices, yes Delivery is also cheaper.

I think it is unlikely that the relevance of mediation will ever go away. Many people do not want to surf foreign Internet resources, study a large amount of information, or take risks. Some people simply don’t have time for this. It is easier for them to use the services of intermediaries than to do everything themselves.

I would still put the “search for buyers” item in first place, because there are groups of goods, the intermediation in the sale of which will lead to practically nothing in terms of profit: it will be minimal, and the risk that you will be “thrown away” will not exist get away!

prolisk, in the latter case, the main thing is not to overdo it with markup, my experience suggests that this markup should not exceed 1/3 of the original cost of the product, otherwise potential buyers simply will not be interested in your product!

And it seemed to me that when discussing how to become an intermediary of an online store, they were referring to affiliate programs. This is when a store assigns you an ID and provides banners that you can place on their website. All you need to do is for the client to go to the store’s website and buy the product there. Aren't affiliates and intermediaries the same thing? Please explain to me the difference.

Yuran123, by the way, here is one of the problems of such intermediation: my experience shows that in 90% of cases the client is a “one-time” client and does not make repeated purchases. According to my observations, customers are most often not satisfied with the price/quality ratio in online stores.

Do you want to say that if you work not through the admintab with online stores, then the clients will not be one-time, but if through the admintab, then they will be one-time? Don't you think this sounds a little crazy?

Yuran123, I didn’t say a word about your favorite admin tab, but outlined a problem common to most intermediaries on the World Wide Web. It’s strange that you, as an experienced intermediary in online sales, did not pay attention to this. The client is looking where it is better, and I didn’t come up with this, but the statistics are as follows!

Well, yes, it also seems to me that the idea is good, few ordinary people will look for something on foreign sites themselves, and then wait a long time for delivery, people mostly do everything at the last moment, so they will look for something “closer” and more reliable.

Do any of those who responded have personal experience with mediation? Who has already become or was an online store intermediary? Share your personal experience, I think many will be interested.

Following the example of one jewelry online store. I created a VKontakte group, posted a link to the product, a photo of the product and the price. After some time, people began to write themselves. At the same time, some goods (a gold necklace in one copy) quickly sold out and people wrote “can we make it to order?”

One CPA partner. Product: coffee for weight loss. I also sold through VKontakte groups, they asked a lot, they found out how much to take - a pack or more.

For another affiliate program - any goods. I wanted to create products on my domain - fitness mats. Support wrote to me that you can make a good store on the free blogspot platform (diaries from Google), but it didn’t go further than registering a blog.

Great! And the delivery and payments were made directly by the store itself, right? What criteria did you use to choose an online store? Still, before becoming an online store intermediary, you should have studied the reviews or paid attention to some aspects. How did you weed out the “reliable” and the not so reliable?

Mediation is a classic business, which is rightfully considered a connecting link between different spheres of management of the economic system. The more active intermediaries are, the more dynamic and quality the commodity-money turnover of all market participants, from manufacturers to the end consumer. But, despite its centuries-old history and rich practical experience, even today there are no precise theoretical materials on the topic of how to create a successful business through intermediary. Therefore, every aspiring mediator needs to be prepared to forge their own path. In this article we will look at the main points of organizing such activities.

How to make money through mediation

A more complex version of mediation is the so-called information and consulting cooperation, in which the agent offers his clients information that is of commercial interest to them. An example would be the activities of a broker. Read.

Business in intermediary in the service sector is the same as commodity cooperation, since the main role of the intermediary is to provide the service sector with the necessary goods.

Important! The first type of intermediation involves the entrepreneur using his own finances to purchase goods. The risks of such operations are quite high. The second option obliges the agent only to collect information about the market, transfer it to the customer and organize transactions. The agent's risks in this case are minimal.

However, despite the obvious benefits of the second option, it is difficult for an entrepreneur to become a highly paid agent. This requires good connections in business circles and a reliable business reputation.

Before trying to make money through mediation, an entrepreneur must determine for himself the basic parameters for searching for a product that will interest his clients. Most often, agents place bets on:

uniqueness and low availability of some product items;
rational proposals for promoting a product that is already on the market, but its potential has not been fully revealed;
the opportunity to purchase goods at a reduced price;
availability of information about the increase in the cost of certain commodity items in the near future.

The listed circumstances can become the basis for the implementation of a business idea in the field of intermediation, however, even the most favorable prerequisites and conditions will result in losses for the intermediary if he does not comply with the basic rules of the agent:

Documentation of all agreements (no oral agreements or negotiations);
personal support of the transaction at all stages (from concluding a contract to unloading at the customer’s warehouse);
establishing a fixed percentage of the transaction as a fee for your services (fair pricing policy inspires confidence among clients).

If an entrepreneur is ready to organize his intermediary business, adhering to the specified framework, it will be much easier for him to protect his interests and organize the accurate execution of client orders.

One of the most promising and rapidly growing areas of business in the field of intermediation is auto insurance. Read. We will tell you how much you can earn by issuing CASCO and MTPL.

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How to organize an intermediary business

Enterprises engaged in intermediation can exist in different organizational and legal forms. These can be individual entrepreneurs (see), LLCs, joint-stock companies and other business associations created according to the rules provided for by the laws of the Russian Federation. The choice of form remains with the entrepreneur.

However, when analyzing the options, it is necessary to remember that in the future the intermediary needs to enter into contracts and organize transactions between major players in the market, and for this it is desirable to have a form of activity that indicates the seriousness of entrepreneurial intentions. In this case, an LLC is most suitable.

You will need information about... Find out everything about the procedure and timing of this procedure.

Find out what you need and what information this document contains.

You also need to be careful when choosing OKVED codes for intermediary activities. If an entrepreneur enters erroneous information into the state register, he may be held liable for non-statutory activities.

There is no specialized code in OKVED for trade intermediation. In fact, this is the same trade. An entrepreneur just needs to choose the type of activity - wholesale trade. If the business involves highly specialized mediation, then in each specific case it is necessary to select a special code. This is required for the following types of services:

in the real estate industry (find out more about what it is);
when trading securities;
in the field of exchange trading, etc.

The code classifier is periodically revised by Gosstandart, so when registering business activities it is necessary to use current sources. During subsequent activities, codes can be changed in case of production necessity (when expanding activities or repurposing an enterprise).

How much does it cost to open and maintain a brokerage business?

The amount of initial investment in a company specializing in intermediation depends on the chosen format of activity. If the intermediary is only engaged in collecting information and organizing transactions, then minimal investments will be required:

renting premises for several months in advance (about 50 thousand rubles);
organization of two or three workplaces for employees (about 50 thousand rubles);
furniture, office equipment, repairs and advertising (about 150 thousand rubles);

In total it comes out to 300 thousand rubles.

If mediation is carried out with the purchase of consignments of goods, then it is necessary to rent a warehouse (up to 100 thousand rubles - rent) and have working capital for profitable purchases of consignments of goods of at least 1.5 - 2 million rubles.

However, in some cases, when starting a business, you can do without large investments. How? - Watch the following video:

The bulk of monthly expenses are wages and rent. Salaries can be minimized by hiring the necessary workers only at the time of completing a transaction or for the period of implementation of a certain business project. In total, you need to plan up to 200 thousand rubles for monthly basic expenses.

How quickly will your investment pay off?

With proper planning and detailed analysis of business information, an entrepreneur can make money quickly and a lot through intermediation. So, when purchasing products from a supplier for a total amount of 100 thousand rubles, and subsequently selling them with a classic intermediary margin of 30%, the intermediary will earn 30 thousand rubles on one transaction, and there should be at least ten such transactions per month. If a product is in short supply or if you have a good idea for promoting it, you can set higher percentages (from 50% to 100%).

In today's article we will talk about the idea of a business without start-up capital. The idea of this business came to me during my student years, it was later implemented and existed for quite a long time.

During my student years, I communicated very closely with a friend who serviced split systems. He worked for himself, did not register his activities in any way, but at the same time, popular rumor gave him a good influx of clients due to high-quality service. There was only one significant drawback - the lack of a car and he had to travel by taxi with all his equipment, which included a large box of tools, a mini-wash, a steam cleaner and a set of special chemicals. With such a set of tools, he had to pay not only for travel from point A to point B, but also for luggage, which, when calculated at the end of the month, amounted to a significant expense and amounted to a significant percentage of his earnings.

So he came up with the idea of involving me with my personal transport in his work, saving on taxis, but sharing an agreed percentage of earnings. Having increased the pace of work during the seasonal time for this work - summer, we began to work together, chipped in on gasoline together, and divided wages in half. The season ended and work began to decline, although I monitored the situation of my “colleagues” - they were still clearing out the backlog of orders.

After thinking about it, he suggested to his friend that he open an individual entrepreneur, give full-fledged advertising and continue to earn money, which he categorically refused. Being more proactive, I took matters into my own hands and began advertising his services on the Internet on local forums and free websites with my phone number. When the calls came in, I scheduled clients on a schedule and informed my partner where and when we would work. When I resumed my studies, I could no longer devote so much time to work, and we agreed that the clients were from me, the work was from him, and I received a small share for mediation.

This little story gave impetus to my further actions. Having spent a lot of time thinking about how to earn more money, I came to the logical conclusion - we need more people. But split systems are a seasonal job and you can’t survive the winter on rare orders in cold seasons. Developing the idea, I came to the point that there are many people who have their hands and can do a lot of things in everyday life, but for some reason they are sitting without work. So you can help them to your advantage! As they say, it's better to have 1% of a hundred people doing nothing than 100% doing everything alone :)

At my own risk, I placed advertisements on the Internet about the installation of satellite systems (there were guys I knew with whom I once worked in this area) in addition to the already existing ones about split systems. And thus I began to make profit from two areas. At first, the profit was not very great and they transferred it to my phone, or gave me cash when we met, but it was enough to go to a cafe with a girl. Deciding that this was not the ultimate dream, I began advertising all the services that people provide in job advertisements. After calling some of them, I offered them work on a flexible schedule - there is work, I call.
The percentage was agreed upon immediately. And when the order arrived, I delivered the work to the address and received my reward. With the first money I earned, I opened an individual entrepreneur, about 3,500 rubles at that time, and began advertising on the Internet and in the local newspaper about providing all household services, something like “husband for an hour.” Is the faucet leaking? Do you need to change the glass or nail down a painting? Anything you want, for your money!

Over time, the phone began to ring around the clock - someone needed to take out construction waste at 6 am, but there were no movers - we’ll find it now! Someone needed an emergency opening of the front door at 3 am - now we’ll open it!

A couple of months later, the first potential employee from the list of job seekers called with the question of a desperate person - do you need employees? -We need what you can do? -I can do everything around the house, maybe I’ll come to the interview and tell you? Here I had a slight stupor - I don’t have an office, inviting me to a student dormitory is not the best option.. A cafe! - Do you know such and such a cafe? Come by today at 17-00. Having looked for a standard employee employment contract, I sifted through a bunch of information on how best to do it, called the guys from the legal department and, having “manipulated” the contract in the right direction, I went for an interview. After 15 minutes, I had my first hired employee with a minimum salary of 2,000 rubles, 80% of earnings from the order received and a lot of free time, while there is no permanent job.

Of course, I couldn’t pay each unemployed person the minimum 2,000 rubles from my own pocket for the fact that he was available, so subsequent interviews usually came down to verbal agreements. Thus, without essentially doing anything, being an intermediary, I earned the initial money out of thin air.

Investments - 3500 from the first money earned. Payment for Internet and telephone - little things.
Risks - one inadequate person from the street, brought in for work, can spoil the client’s overall opinion of the organization, so you should be selective in choosing an employee.
There was no need to give bribes.

Profitability - it all depends on your grasp of the selected service areas. In my case, a few months after the active distribution of advertising, I changed my “six” to a fresh 2114 and did not think about having money when going on a date with a girl.

My further plans were to hire some freshman to process orders and get my dream job - traveling and collecting money, but due to family circumstances I had to change my city of residence and start doing a completely different job. A little later I saw an advertisement about a Unified Services Center, specializing in approximately the same thing, but with more narrowly focused services.

Remember the most important thing - feel confident. You don't owe anyone anything yet. A client who, desperate to find a master, calls you - you are the master of the situation. Plumber Uncle Vanya will also be grateful to you for the work provided. The range of services can be constantly expanded. The most important question is why will they call you and not through a private advertisement in the newspaper? Because many people have already made the mistake of such craftsmen who came to hang the cornice, but instead split the slope and nothing can be demanded from them. And you are a company that has some kind of responsibility to the customer, there is more trust. By approaching this work responsibly and understanding its potential, you can earn good money.

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Forward - Firm for intermediation in employment abroad

The risks associated with opening an online store are very high. First of all, this entails a large number of associated costs that threaten not to pay off.

However, the modern market offers a lot of interesting technologies that can increase the efficiency of e-commerce. One of them is dropshipping.

Literally translated, this term means “direct delivery”. In essence, dropshipping is a special type of interaction between an online store and customers with the participation of a third party - an intermediary.

The dropshipping scheme looks like this:

The intermediary (he is called a dropshipper) purchases the goods from the seller (online store);

At the same time, the intermediary receives an advance payment for the goods from the buyer and informs the seller of the delivery address;

The online store sends the product to the buyer, and the dropshipper receives the remaining amount of money from its total cost.

Thus, each participant in the transaction remains, as they say, “together.” The online store and dropshipper receive the necessary amount of money, and the buyer receives the goods.

The main feature of dropshipping

The main feature of this scheme is that, from a legal point of view, the buyer of the products will be the intermediary. In fact, the product is purchased by a visitor to the online store. At first glance, the activities of dropshippers resemble distribution. However, the distributor, unlike the dropshipper, takes the goods for temporary storage.

An intermediary cannot be called a sales agent. The latter does not purchase the goods from the seller and takes a pre-fixed amount of money as a commission. In turn, the dropshipper is not limited in the amount of markup on the product. Accordingly, he has the opportunity to make much greater profits.

Dropshipping is a relatively new scheme for cooperation in the field of e-commerce for the Russian market. Currently, it is at a stage of rapid development, stimulating a high level of competition.

Stages of activity of dropshippers

Search for an online store that sells goods at a price that is significantly lower than the retail price.
Carrying out a trial purchase and establishing contact. The dropshipper discusses a cooperation scheme with the seller and obtains guarantees for the timely dispatch of goods. A trial purchase is necessary to assess product quality.
Establishing sales channels for online store products on your own behalf.

Mutual benefits

When studying such a cooperation scheme, a fair question arises: what is the benefit for both parties?

We answer in order:

The seller (online store) acquires an established sales channel for its own products. As a rule, large companies use dropshipping, eliminating the need to independently engage in retail sales.
The intermediary gains the opportunity to receive a stable income that does not require serious financial investments and efforts to process and deliver orders.

Pros for a dropshipper:

Minimum investment. No capital investment is required to start an intermediary activity. The scheme allows you to make a net profit by placing the costs on the shoulders of the actual buyers of the products.
Minimum costs. There is no need to maintain warehouses or use courier services. The only equipment required for dropshipping activities is a computer or laptop connected to the Internet.
There is no connection to the assortment. The dropshipper does not have warehouse space, which means that at any convenient time it can reorient itself from selling, for example, electronic devices to selling clothing and shoes.
Freedom to choose partners. A dropshipper always has the opportunity to switch to cooperation with another online store.

Along with this, it is necessary to highlight the benefits that online store owners who cooperate with dropshippers receive.

Advantages for the supplier:

Expanding the target audience through the acquisition of new points of sale.
Timely receipt of advance payment. The seller does not lend to his partner, minimizing his own financial risks.
Reducing marketing costs. Dropshippers are involved in attracting buyers. This means that suppliers are significantly reducing the volume of marketing activities and the number of sales units.
Establishing feedback with clients. The task of a dropshipper in conditions of fairly fierce competition is to establish close contact with the end consumer. The activities of the intermediary in this direction automatically provide benefits to the online store.
Fast promotion. Since the seller/manufacturer sends the product to its customers (via an intermediary), its brand quickly becomes recognizable.

Possible risks

The benefits of dropshipping are obvious. However, when starting cooperation with the owners of trading portals, intermediaries face, among other things, certain risks:

The speed of delivery of goods, their quality, including packaging, depends solely on the final seller.
Possible problems with the availability of goods in the warehouse.
Possible difficulties with the work of the courier service and customs. In such cases, from the client’s point of view, the responsibility falls on the intermediary.
Geographical restrictions on activities. This aspect is relevant specifically for domestic dropshipping. As practice shows, buyers look for other suppliers if the delivery time of goods extends for more than 2 days. Thus, in Russian conditions, cooperation with online stores located in other regions looks difficult.

Conclusion

Dropshipping is an ideal way to start a business from scratch. It does not require major investments and minimizes the risk of losing money. In addition, dropshipping serves as an effective method for promoting and developing online stores. With a competent and responsible approach, this interaction scheme can result in benefits for both interested parties.

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