In a consumer space affected by COVID-19, customers are searching for online alternatives to their everyday purchases. New spaces have emerged home office equipment, entertainment, online education, and specialist products that were previously not explored to their full potential.
With shops and service providers closed and in some cases, lockdown laws have people stuck at home, e-commerce stores can help your customers get everything they need to last the isolation period. What's more, demand for many of these products is likely to sustain well beyond lockdown, so an online store could be another lucrative channel for your business.
Whether you're looking to start a dropshipping store or build your brand through private-label e-commerce products - COVID has spawned an abundance of opportunities in this industry.
We've come up with our best ideas for adapting or launching your business that you can start implementing right away to sustain into the future.
Health and Fitness
The fitness industry has thrived for decades and the demand remains higher than ever. Active customers seek to stay fit, but with the large majority of people stuck at home, they are unable to go outside for exercise.
Not only this, but physical fitness also helps aid mental health, protect against illness, and provides a focused activity for the whole family. It makes sense that health and fitness have become even bigger concerns on everyone's minds.
Health and fitness e-commerce stores have been hit with excessive demand, which means there is plenty of space for new entrants providing more products and services to fit the current circumstances.
This can include sports clothing, athletic equipment, personal trainers, health foods, gym videos, and lifestyle coaching. Gym and Fitness, shown below, sell a range of products suitable for home fitness.
Equipment such as yoga mats, weights, skipping ropes, treadmills, exercise bikes, and physical games, which can all be put to use at home, are also going to be essential purchases in the coming months.
Your online store doesn't have to sell products. Finding the right workouts and fitness program to cater to your specific needs was tough before. More than ever, customers are looking for expert guidance on how to take care of themselves during the lockdown.
Recorded videos, fitness coaches, and online classes are a great way to connect with audiences and gear fitness advice towards at home. Below is a form template to help you organize your own online fitness programs:
Work-From-Home Essentials
Many office-workers have been asked to continue working from home during social distancing measures. But if you're used to commuting to work every day, you probably won't have invested in setting up a comfortable at-home office.
A new desk space, a comfortable chair, organized storage, and appropriate tech equipment are now a must-have. Home furniture solutions that accommodate smaller spaces are also popular as are apps and courses on organization, scheduling, and working from home.
Take a look at Office Choice, a store selling office equipment, stationery, and furniture that is tailored to your remote working needs:
Another avenue to invest in is audio/video technology. As video-conferencing and virtual meetings become a staple of daily life, many of us are also investing in higher quality cameras and audio equipment.
Even once social-distancing measures are relaxed, it is likely many businesses will offer work-from-home options for many employees so these products will remain essential to many employees.
Gaming and Entertainment
Entertaining the kids all day is a tall order. Luckily, the gaming industry has never been so vast and so sophisticated as it is right now. There's something out there for kids of all ages (not to mention adults!) to keep idle hands busy and bored minds occupied.
The games industry is likely to be more resilient in the face of the COVID epidemic than the film and television industry, as games can be produced anywhere.
Even before lockdown, games dwarfed the movie business as the biggest entertainment industry. As far as entertainment goes, gaming is a smart area to invest in.
Along with a huge range of games consoles, computer set-ups, games, controllers, and repairs, Youtubers and reviewers provide entertaining commentary on this booming industry. Some games even provide their own in-game business opportunities, so there's plenty of options for finding your niche.
Home-Schooling
Many parents have been thrown in the deep-end with providing their kids with home-schooling. It's pretty tough keeping the kids on-task as it is, especially if you don't have the right equipment, resources, or space for the job.
Educational resources like online courses, educational games, and text-books, make home-schooling that little bit easier, as does stationary and equipment such as whiteboards, desks, sports equipment, and language tapes.
You can take inspiration from online education websites such as Coursera, Udemy, edX, and Masterclass, which have rapidly risen in popularity in recent weeks. Here is Coursera's COVID-19 response below:
Returning children to schools is a priority across the world. But exactly when this will be possible is still unknown, and educational resources remain a good investment either way.
You can use a timeline maker to plan what your child learns on a day to day basis so they continue developing as the dust settles and schools eventually reopen.
Cooking, Baking & Cocktails
With bars, bakeries, cafes, and restaurants closed, families are cooking and eating at home more than usual. Many people are discovering that their kitchen lacks the culinary essentials, not to mention more specialized equipment for their new baking hobby.
Quality cookware and essentials, as well as luxury items such as coffee machines, juicers, cocktail shakers, slow-cookers, artisan alcohols, and exotic ingredients are selling like hot-cakes. Because not only have you got to put three meals a day on the table - you've also got to find some way of keeping yourself entertained whilst the kids dominate the TV room.
Cooking, baking tutorials, and food blogs are also getting a lot of traffic, so if you're a whizz in the kitchen, you could be helping the hopeless produce delectable dishes and making a living as you do it.
If you're excited at the prospect of selling your baked goods, you can set up an e-commerce store to distribute your home creations in your local area. All you need to get you started is an order form where your products and payments can be managed in one platform. Here is an example of what it might look like:
Wrapping Up
Whether your online business is selling products or services, these in-demand industries will give you ideas on how you can still collect revenue amongst changing circumstances.
There is a great deal of potential for fitness, home essentials, gaming entertainment, and cooking stores to set up online channels with success. Whichever industry you choose, you can be certain that they will continue to be successful even after COVID-19 ceases.