First E-commerce store from the ground up. (9)
Disclaimer: This whole thing will probably be TL : DR to experienced folks. However, I'm doing this to both hold myself accountable and try to give something back to this forum in the form of a ground up process.
I'm finally taking action and am in the process of creating my first E-commerce store. I'm planning for pretty open transparency here for several reasons. First, it's my first store and I'm sure I'll need lots of help. I've seen the value of the help I can receive here). Second, I think I've picked a pretty narrow niche that the big guys won't bother trying to steal.
My overall background: I first joined STM on a different account sometime around 2013. Poked around but took no action. Joined on this account around early 2014, got a bit of traction in dating ads on POF (a few +50 days), but ultimately quit working at it after a divorce. Renewed this account a couple months ago to see where the marketing world has gone. This time around my possible budget is pretty large (XX,XXX) but I've decided to also keep working at the same time (doing construction/remodel work) so I'm not totally lighting money on fire. I've have found that a little structure is beneficial to my overall productivity. With that in mind I'll be doing most of my E-commerce work before and after normal business hours. Once I really gain some traction here I can afford to scale that job back or leave entirely.
Why I picked E-commerce: While it doesn't seem like the quickest way to make a buck (or the easiest) I very much like the idea of building a true brand and the the potential larger stability of it.
After going through the vetting process of ideas I came up with a number that I'd like to try. This will just be the first. I had found myself in the deep dark hole (that I'm sure many of you understand) of reading too much but actually doing very little. So I took one idea and am running with it. If it fails or I didn't calculate my market correctly, so be it. Many of the programs that we need to use, while not difficult to navigate, just need to be experienced to start making true sense of all of this.
What I've done so far (mostly using the E-commerce cookbook and threads here as a guide):
-Created a business account on Facebook.
-Created a
-Picked a logo that I liked from Logojoy. I'm not totally sold on it and will be posting it below for input.
-Signed up with Mailchimp (although I've yet to even being learning how to use it).
-Signed up for Oberlo.
-Began sorting through products.
-Began learning my way around the
-Signed up for Google Analytics.
-Invested $1,400 in a pretty awesome Thinkpad laptop. My old computer wasn't gonna cut it.
The domain I registered is www.siberianhuskyfanatics.com (nothing to see at the moment).
The reason I chose this is I've worked as a dog sled guide for a few years now and the breed is pretty dear to my heart. (Most true sled dogs are actually mixed breeds but never mind that...). The niche also happens to seemingly fit the criteria.
I'm not entirely sure how it's going to shake out. Most of the available drop shipped products seem like they will target best to outsiders. By that I mean bored housewives and day to day husky owners who don't actually know anything about dog sledding. In other words, none of the products would be of interest to the people that own and run real dog kennels. That's okay, I've seen first hand the following that sled dog racers can gather from these people.
With that in mind this logo seemed to me that it would appeal to that crowd.
To kick this off I'll offer it up to input. I'm going to keep the store in a pretty basic black and white format. I think it fits with the general notion of the breed (Black/White with blue eyes). Will probably try to add some blue into the site and maybe the logo.
Let me know what you think.
Anyway, I'm most likely not going to be posting lengthy daily updates but will definetly be shooting for a decent update every 2-3 days. I hope to have a somewhat ready to launch shop within the week and will be sharing it here.
Goals for this week:
-Get a total store ready to launch.
-Get a decent grasp of all these new programs I signed up for and learn what I can do with them.
-Learn more about registering a business name and deciding if it's worth it for a first attempt.
-Decide if I want to pull the trigger on the I-stack FB ads course.
-Learn about how Instagram may help E-commerce stores. (I've never even had an account).
-Keep the momentum moving forward.
Thanks for reading.
-Evan
Looks good so far!
It's a very solid niche: I'd agree that the major issue you might have will be finding products. If that's the case, given your genuine expertise in the area, you have two options:
1) Consider infoproducts. Lots of people would probably pay for PDF or video guides from you on aspects of dogsledding.
2) Look at getting products from places other than Aliexpress. You probably already have a good idea of the space - are there producers out there who produce good products that you might be able to talk into dropshipping? Worth having some conversations, particularly if said producers are already contacts of yours.
I'd also strongly endorse video and content marketing as routes to consider in your case. You've got the expertise and it's a very visual topic. You could gather a lot of organic traffic that way.
Influencer marketing could also be big for you, assuming that you know some of the influencers in the space already.
Good luck, and looking forward to future updates!
Good stuff (as always), Caurmen!
To address a couple points:
I'm not really trying to sell anything to the people who actually run dogs. The reality is many of them live paycheck to paycheck (if even that well) and are very set in their ways/products. I'm going more for the people that follow the lifestyle from their couches and find it glamorous. The truth is, while it may be awesome in many ways, it almost never what people expect it to be.
People's conception: Fluffy puppies all day long! Gorgeous, sunny weather like we see in Disney movies!
Reality: Extremely hard work, miserable weather conditions, no real potential to make decent money, etc, etc.
That said, I'll be trying to sell to the false conception. I'm not against the idea of working towards something more targeted to true kennel owners but the problem is the market is tiny, they don't have much money to spend, and are set in their ways.
I'll definitely be looking outside Aliexpress for products and in fact have a couple ideas in mind that I may try to get produced.
The video/info realm of things is something I'll have to add the my list of items to learn more about.
As for the influencer marketing, I like the idea, but I believe that would have to come a bit farther down the line with more solid products. At least if it were to come from real names in the industry. There may be people who have built up followings on Instagram or other places that I'm unaware of that may be a bit better suited to the market I'm thinking of.
Anyway, thanks for all the thoughts!
Yup, that makes a lot of sense, and I'd say your targeting there is perfect. Don't try to sell things to very picky experts with no money!
On the video front, just to be clear - one of the reasons I'm suggesting that is that your armchair enthusiasts probably really love dogs. Thus, if you produce videos with lovely dogs in them - even before any content - you're likely to get lots of likes, shares and upvotes. A solid start to your content marketing strategy!
Ah, gotcha. That makes a lot of sense and fits a ton with my personal facebook page experience. I've generally stuck to only using it as a way to update people on my travel/adventures but consistently dogs pics/videos get the most interaction.
Update: I suck at motivating myself.
Upside: It's because my life is pretty great already.
That's the TL
R.
Here's the long story:
I haven't made much progress at all creating my stores in the past couple weeks. I've been enjoying life. After 6 months of living on a glacier (away from the woman I've fallen in love with, despite my best efforts to avoid such things) I've been having a bit too much fun spending time with my her and living life. Another issue, I really enjoy my job so I keep doing it. I've been doing remodel and construction work since I moved to Idaho and keep learning a ridiculous amount of new skills. Why I want these skills I have no idea. It doesn't hurt that it pays great and I get to leave work at work.
The other thing that has been holding me down (or maybe just giving myself reason to make excuses) is my travel schedule in the next 6 months. Most notably I'll be out of reliable internet service in Alaska for most of February and a bunch of March. Back in the summer my hope/plan had been to be established enough that I had an assistant that could run stores while I was gone. Reality of the above reasons set in and that doesn't seem to be realistic. So that leaves me with that to do? I hate the idea of having to pause ads/stores while I'm gone and I hate the idea of trying to hire an assistant to run things that I haven't fully figured out myself.
Possible solution: slow down a bit, create several concept stores, and wait until I get back from Alaska to actually launch them.
Any input, folks? Am I just making excuses for inaction or do I have a valid issue? I understand no one can truly answer that but me. The truth is probably somewhere in the middle but any input is always appreciated.
There's nothing better than spending quality time with your loved ones.
And if you love what you do, so much the better.
The result of that is a lack of incentive to do something else. You currently don't have the drive to build up something new. Nothing wrong with that, but then don't put any energy into it.
Forget about it and do what you love doing.
Everything else is a waste of money and energy.
Just my 2 cents..
I could not agree more with Pekadis.
Internet commerce, in all its forms, ain't going anywhere.
Enjoy your life, spend time with your SO, learn new, fun, and well-paying skills.
Come back to the world of ecommerce when you're ready!
You can always learn, read and test whilst you're not actively running things.
One thing I've recently suggested to someone in a somewhat similar situation - find a bunch of products you think could work for a niche store, and order them for yourself for when you're away. Then whilst you're away, evaluate them, take videos and pictures, write guides and content, etc, using those products. Then when you return you'll be ready for the kind of marketing push that people who try to start faster can only dream of.
Thanks guys!
I'm honestly kinda relieved to hear that I'm not totally crazy and making up excuses.
Next steps, ordering a bunch of products, and getting some real photos/videos taken. Honestly, that was another hangup on taking immediate action. The fact that the photos on Aliexpress are total shit and I kinda hate the idea of having to use them.
Current plan: order products, take photos, have stores ready to launch when I can more fully devote myself to it while not giving up some awesome experiences.
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