Follow Along | Becoming a successful business owner (24)
Hi All,
First off, please let me know if I am posting this in the wrong place or wrong way. I am not very familiar with posting in forums.
I joined Stack That Money today for the second time.
My previous stint with Stack That Money was only for a couple months earlier in the year as I tried to get started with Affiliate Marketing but found myself (1) not having enough time to devote to it outside of my full-time job and (2) discouraged from pursuing it further given the blackhat/shady tactics that seemed to dominate the space.
Over the past few weeks I have been pursuing getting getting started in eCommerce as I now (1) have more time to dedicate to it and (2) I am encouraged that it seems whitehat/not-so-shady and there is the opportunity to build a successful long-term business.
While I believe I have covered some of the 'basics' of getting started in eCommerce, I have run into a roadblock navigating everything by myself and realise I can receive (and hopefully over time provide!) a lot of value to others by engaging with the forum.
My goal is to build an online business that allows me to supplant my current full-time job as soon as possible. I have some savings ($100k+) to invest in being successful in this and am willing to put in the work required (am used to 60+ hour work weeks) to make this happen.
I will post more about where I have got to so far in my eCommerce journey tomorrow.
Thank you for taking the time to read my post.
A short summary of my eCommerce journey so far is as follows.
1. Tried to make a list of good first time dropshipping stores based upon a list of defined criteria (e.g. product less than $100, non-perishable, serves a niche market with a specific need, easily sourced on AliExpress, etc.)
2. Decided on a store selling products to help people sleep better (e.g. eye masks, ear plugs, etc).
3. Setup store on
At this point, I started to have serious doubts about my store and realised I was flying completely blind.
I decided to start using tools like EmpireFlippers and Flippa to understand what a good dropshipping store actually looks like and then began using Facebook spy tools to see what ads these stores were running.
From here, I found that the dental hygiene niche (tooth cleaners, teeth whiteners, etc.) seemed to have many successful stores and fit all of my criteria for a dropshipping store.
I then setup my store by modelling images/copy/etc. on competitors, knowing that even if I'm not 100% where they are at initially, I would at least know I'm somewhere close to the target and not completely out in the wilderness as I felt before.
Once I had the store somewhat ready, I went into launching ads on Facebook.
Will post some more details tomorrow about my experience since launching.
Good start mate -- you're taking action after action, which is good. You'll learn faster by just moving your hands and getting practical experience.
With FB, just be careful to set up a business manager properly, page, ad account, etc. and do everything you can to verify the business manager and make yourself look legit.
The last thing you want is to get your FB account disabled on day 1 and have it block other moves for weeks. It's a touchy period (still) on FB after the US election and their AI going into overdrive with insta-disabling accounts for ridiculous reasons.
To become a business owner you need to get rid of dropshopping. Or is that just for starting phase and after that build a real own brand?
If you rely on dropshopping I have little faith in succeeding, you are on thin ice unless you have like very good terms. Ofcourse there is good and bad but at the end its bad, if you really wanna own something properly imho you need to control the whole chain.
@augustine. That's really impressive product and niche research! And the massive action you've been taking commands massive respect.
I can tell that this will be an amazing follow-along!
I have nothing to contribute at this point, but will do my best in giving suggestions along the way.
What a great thing starting a follow-along at the start of a new year! All the best!
Amy
Sent from my iPhone using STM Forums
Originally Posted by augustine
I honestly think the most valuable thing I did in all of 2020 was geeking out massively on Flippa. It is so insanely educational to actually see what is working and what isn't, and it is also very morale-boosting to see people who make lots of mistakes and have really flawed setups that are still making good profits.
Really excited for your follow-along. I think as long as you're taking massive daily action AND continually educating yourself on the 'best practices' (as you seem to be doing) you'll find what you're looking for.
One thing I noticed from all my time geeking out on Flippa is that you don't have to stick with just dropshipping or just affiliate marketing either. Its definitely possible to do both of those things and making your own products/etc and have everything still remain robust and fluid.
For instance one thing I've seen folks doing (I think I got the idea from a James Van Elswyck interview actually but have also seen on Adplexity) was running listicles where some of the products are affiliate products and some are your own products (either dropshipping or private labelling or whatever).
So if you built up some beautiful site in the dental care niche, you could eventually run a listicle called 'Top 10 Coolest Dental Hygeine Products Of 2021' where some of the products are dropshipping or private labelling ones that you sell on your store, and others are really high epc affiliate ones like Snow or that new 'full-mouth toothbrush' thing, etc. Which is nice because it means you're not 100% wedded to only one strategy.
But yeah, excited to watch your progress!
Continuation of my last post:
I launched my store by running advertising on Facebook.
I don't use Facebook in my personal life (deleted it a few years ago) however had an account that I created a few months ago just to research how Facebook advertising works. This account had two Business Manager accounts attached to it, two ad accounts, and multiple pages that were created to test/explore Facebook advertising, including a page that I had just created for my
I began sending traffic straight away to the leading product on my
The campaign got off to what seemed like a good start (at least based on my expectations), hitting close to breakeven with a sale after spending total $50 over 2-3 days on a $20 per day budget. I quickly wanted to see if this could scale so increased my budget to about $50 per day.
It then all started to go downhill...
Facebook suspended logging in to my accounts (Personal and Business) until I had provided an ID that they could review. While I was waiting for them to approve the ID, the advertisement continued to run for 2-3 days and burned $150+ for no additional conversions.
When I got access to my account again, I turned off advertising and decided to give it a pause while I improved the landing page (I had above average CTR from Facebook but very high bounce rate from product page and my ad quality was in bottom 20% of Facebook).
By the time I had improved the landing page and logged back into Business Manager to launch a new campaign 2 days later, I was greeted with a message stating that my Business Manager accounts were completely restricted from advertising. After an appeal where I very nicely explained that I had reviewed the Facebook Ad Policy and couldn't find where I was non-compliant, I received an unsuccessful verdict and both my Business Manager accounts were permanently suspended, with no option to appeal.
After some Googling, I realised my existing Facebook account and associated Business Manager accounts were as good as dead so I tried creating another Facebook account but realised this is not an easy process - while doing so I got a few newly created Facebook accounts immediately/near immediately banned so decided to stop that until further researching options around how I regain access to Facebook advertising.
I also decided to delete my personal Facebook account along with whatever it would allow me to delete in the Business Manager accounts (pages, ad accounts, etc.) My thinking was that they were useless in their current form given my inability to appeal the permanent ban but at least I may be able to reclaim my personal name and identity legitimately in the future if I recreate a personal account after enough time has passed from the ban (maybe Facebook won't remember?).
Quite the roller-coaster!
I will post next about what potential next steps I have been considering after this setback.
Originally Posted by vortex
Originally Posted by jack_l
I like the listicle idea. Eventually I would like to private label once I have understood and am successful at the basics.
Thanks for the feedback @zeno - I missed your reply when I posted yesterday.
You obviously saw where I was heading as your prediction came true 
I will keep taking action and be far far far more careful when I get my hands back on a Facebook account.
Thanks for your comment @stickupkid - I missed this when I posted yesterday.
Do you think dropshipping is a decent stepping stone before building a real brand and owning/sourcing own products?
I no way see drop shipping as a long-term strategy but have the impression it is a way to learn online marketing/business without burning lots of cash. Once I have enough experience, I would look to invest in a more sustainable venture.
Do you think another approach could serve me better?
Originally Posted by augustine
Quick update with considerations and questions I will be exploring over the coming days about options for moving forward.
As always, interested in feedback if anyone is willing to share.
Option 1: Continue with current
If I continue with my current
Appeal Personal Account Ban
I took heart in @stickupkid's post in this thread and reactivated my personal Facebook account earlier today to continue exploring if there are any ways to niggle Facebook to reactivate my account.
Not sure if this is futile given they have already announced the ban as permanent but I don't want to lose what seems to be such a great traffic source so early in my marketing career and handicap myself.
I would like to believe there is a way to get Facebook to see reason on this eventually if I keep trying...
Purchase Accounts
This seems like a possible approach from what I have seen in the short term - it looks relatively expensive, especially if my account gets quickly banned again, but at least I can continue moving forward with executing campaigns straight away and not need to start learning another traffic source.
Rent Accounts
Did not know this was a thing until earlier today. Will need to look into this more to understand the pros/cons between buying/renting.
Farm Accounts
I have read a few posts about this and it seems to be quite time intensive to farm my own fake Facebook accounts from scratch and to be getting harder and harder to successfully pull off. It also seems I would have to wait weeks/months until I start advertising on these accounts.
Maybe I will move forward with continuing to appeal my personal account ban, purchase a couple of accounts to continue executing campaigns, and then in the mean time try my hand in farming accounts so that I'm not reliant on always purchasing accounts.
Option 2: Continue with current Shopify store on another traffic source
I have read positive things about a number of other traffic sources for dropshipping.
Maybe I can forget about Facebook and focus on other traffic sources such as Google/Twitter/etc.
I would rather stay with Facebook though if I can given the investment I have already made there.
Option 3: Create a new Shopify store on Facebook
Researching more deeply into my competition in the dental hygiene niche, I found:
1. All of the stores seemed to stop advertising around late November / early December 2020.
2. Cases where their store would switch Facebook pages / rename themselves
3. Where a long running successful ad would seem to die suddenly.
While it seems that points 1 and 3 could be explained by spy tools gathering limited information, all three together could indicate that Facebook are banning dropshipped dental hygiene products in general despite them not breaking policy due to too much negative user feedback across the board. Not sure if this is something Facebook would do but it seems plausible.
If this is the case, then creating a new Shopify store in a new niche that has competitors with long running ads would be a potential path to decrease the risk of future account bans.
If I play everything by the book with a purchased Facebook account and still find myself being banned, then maybe the niche itself is the problem.
Option 4: Go back to Affiliate Marketing but this time running Facebook instead of Pop/Push Traffic
I wanted to get into dropshipping because it seemed more white hat and to provide the opportunity for long-term growth.
If that is not the case due to needing to continue to purchase/farm accounts, then I may be better off going back to Affiliate Marketing but this time advertising on Facebook as opposed to Pop/Push Traffic. I would then be less concerned by Facebook account bans as I would be promoting ephemeral offers as rather than trying to establish a store.
I haven't given this option much thought but would consider it most strongly if Options 1-3 don't bear fruit after further research/action.
I would highly encourage you to take a step back. Reading this, there seems to be a strong "sunk cost fallacy" at play. A lot of your decision making seems to be wanting to recoup the money you've already invested/spent on Facebook. While I get that and often feel the same way after having spent or invested money, it can lead you to throwing good money after bad.
I encourage you to look at it with the viewpoint of, "What can I do going forward? Where can I build a business that is long-term?" That may still be on Facebook, but look at it going forward and not as to what you've already done.
If the answer is Facebook, make sure you have a workable plan to get accounts as needed, and to keep accounts alive for extended periods.
@augustine: @stickupkid makes a good point about the detriment of slow shipping times, so if you do want to do dropshipping, choose a setup that can guarantee reasonable shipping times, such as udroppy.
I took heart in @stickupkid's post in this thread and reactivated my personal Facebook account earlier today to continue exploring if there are any ways to niggle Facebook to reactivate my account.
Not sure if this is futile given they have already announced the ban as permanent but I don't want to lose what seems to be such a great traffic source so early in my marketing career and handicap myself.
I would like to believe there is a way to get Facebook to see reason on this eventually if I keep trying...
I'm hoping that your appeal will be successful, but just in case, here are more tips: https://stmforum.com/forum/showthrea...ed-FB-Accounts
As for purchasing/renting/farming accounts - you'll find a LOT more information on these from blackhat forums. STM doesn't have a lot of info on blackhat practices because we're a whitehat forum. I do want to point out that there's another alternative: You can do a purchasing+farming hybrid model, where you buy accounts and nurture them further before running traffic. This model can be a good balance between cost and effort.
Another alternative would be to run traffic through family/friend's accounts:
https://stmforum.com/forum/showthrea...-More-Accounts
Warning: Members have reported getting their personal accounts banned (i.e. their personal profiles) along with their ad accounts, so make sure your family/friend is aware of this risk.
Great point about niche selection and longevity! If you can find a correlation, and also identify a niche that seems to have more longevity, that would be great!
Either way: I would suggest NOT to limit yourself to just FB. Once you have a store set up, test FB, google and youtube if you have the time and budget. That way you won't be perpetually keeping your finger crossed that FB will spare your account.
Amy
Thank you for the feedback @iwanttofly. My concern is not with the money or time I have spent (less than a couple hundred dollars and only ~10 hours effort) but more with giving up on what seems to be a great traffic source without a fight.
@vortex - thank you for sharing you thread on appealing banned accounts, it is very helpful. I have actioned everything in it but unfortunately no luck so far. All channels refer me back to my Business Manager account, where I am told I am unable to request a review/permanently banned. I will keep at it though.
@vortex - uDroppy looks interesting, I will explore that more. I have not much considered shipping times at this stage as I first want to make sure I can actually sell my products before worrying about shipping times (unless of course shipping times impact first time sales but it seems like they have more to do with customer retention/satisfaction).
@vortex - thanks for pointing out the purchasing+farming hybrid model, I will add that to my options for considering. I'm going to steer clear of using friend/family accounts until I get a better understanding of how to avoid account bans - if I got someone's personal account banned I don't think I would ever hear the end of it!
@augustine. All noted!
Regarding shipping times: This can have an impact on conversion rate as well. Many potential customers will deliberately look for this information before ordering, as it has become somewhat common knowledge that many products that are sold online are being sent from China and may take weeks to arrive. You can state "fast shipping" as a benefit in you ads and website to proactively address this concern and use it to your advantage.
Amy
Sent from my iPhone using STM Forums
Update since my last post below.
Facebook
I now have two farmed accounts on Facebook.
One account is now up-and-running with advertising. The advertising I'm running is a $2 per day likes campaign for my page, after which I will start running a traffic campaign on a low budget and focus on quality to hopefully build up some trust with Facebook and avoid a ban.
The other account I am farming and keeping in reserve in case Facebook bans the first.
Am holding off on purchasing an account until I see how the above two accounts work.
Google
I attempted to get my products on Google however have been hit with an account suspension for misrepresentation. Have appealed this a few times now and removed what I think could trigger this however am still getting knocked back. I will keep appealing as I can't see anything that I am misrepresenting.
AliExpress Alternatives
Have looked into a few alternatives to AliExpress that seem to provide for better shipping and overall customer experience, including uDroppy, Spocket, and Topdser.
If I am able to get traction on any of my products, I plan to go straight to one of these providers rather than AliExpress.
Testing
It seems testing multiple products within a particular niche is more effective than building a new store for every product you want to test.
I will look to start testing multiple products in my store once I start ramping up my Facebook ads.
Nice update!
Regarding testing of multiple products in the same store: That's my approach as well. Then I would take the winners and build a dedicated site for each winner. For initial testing where I don't even know if I could make a product work, making a dedicate site would be overkill. But if by quickly adding the product to the general or niche store and running a test campaign I end up breaking even or better, then I know that by making a dedicated site for it I'd likely get higher conversion rates.
Amy
Sent from my iPhone using STM Forums
@augustine - First of all, decent start. This thread has been a roller coaster for me, so I can only imagine what it must be for you.
I have some experience in drop-shipping, I then moved on to sourcing and finally sold the site.
Now, the part I like about you starting is your corpus. It is a decent amount to build an established brand. But I am going to ask for 10% of that. Not 50%. Not blind spending. Just 10%.
So let's assume, we're playing with $10k here.
Instead of the AliExpress rule and the anti-China sentiment globally, here's what I recommend you to do.
1. Find a supplier of the items in your area. You're going to place a sample order Of 10 units of 20 Products - so 20 SKUs and 200 Units.
2. Two ask the supplier if they dropship.
2a. If they say yes, ask for their pricing plan/shipping costs and compliance needed from your end (Company Registration/Tax Codes/Return Address)
2b. If they say no, look for a "Order Fulfilment Service Provider". If you're in the US, I cannot say enough good things about Shipmonk.com (But do your research, there are alternatives).
Have the manufacturer, ship the 200 units to Shipmonk (or another provider) and they'll take care of the rest.
Consider it like FBA - but for your own site.
3. Now you have two benefits. Your shipping times are almost non-existent. You can offer next-day delivery and every other perk that your provider provides - this already gives you an edge over the others. You have a stock of inventory and a supplier. If the inventory doesn't sell, you can ask the supplier if they accept returns. If they don't, reduce the price or give it away for free with another product.
4. Slowly and gradually increase your product portfolio.
Go for low hanging products. Don't go for expensive products.
Add 10 more products to your site, but list them as out of stock with a "Notify me" button. This will help you gauge interest.
Supplier directories are a dime a dozen and most suppliers would be happy to send you a sample for a reduced cost. Be upfront that you're an online seller and are looking to dominate the niche, but don't want too much overhead. If it sells, you'll be placing constant orders.
Here are a few tips - while you get your Facebook account and Google Merchant Account in order.
1. Invest in Content Marketing. Creative Content goes a long way.
2. Invest in Influencer Marketing. You may either take a direct approach, by DMing influencers or emailing them (most have their email in their Bio) or go through one of several brokers.
3. Consider yourself your own affiliate - Use guides from @vortex and other members here. Use push marketing, popunders - to sell your own products.
4. Build a list. A strong email list.
5. Advertise locally - people still read newspapers.
6. Get listed on Coupon Sites as a brand. Offer unique codes 10% off, 20% Off etc.
7. Buy Guest posts.
8. Get a Press Release done.
9. Stick to your niche, never dilute it.
10. Keep an active Social Media Presence. If it is overwhelming for you, hire someone to do it for you.
11. Work on your brand identity. Placeholders, unprofessional/semi-professional sites even though they're built on no-code platforms like
__________
Once you're done with the above. As @vortex suggested - use a friend or family member's account to advertise. Change the domain and the Credit Card used though.
Hi @contentistic - Thank you for the detailed comment - I really appreciate it!
I have done some research based on your suggestions and found both dropshipping suppliers and order fulfilment service providers where I live.
This will be a priority for me to put in place to reduce shipping times however I am waiting to pull the trigger on it until I am actually getting orders.
Do you think this is a good approach?
Update: 27 January 2021
I am now running campaigns on my new Facebook account.
So far, so good.
I am doing a few things ensure I stay on Facebook's good side this time, including:
- Focusing on Ad Quality metrics, and dropping any ad that comes back with a 'below average' quality ranking.
- Focusing on user comments/engagement with my ads, ensuring my ads aren't perceived as spammy and are well liked.
- Focusing on submitting ads that align fully with Facebook policies to avoid them being rejected and raising any red flags.
- Removing any information from my website/landing page that could possibly be perceived as misleading or low quality by Facebook.
From researching my competitors more in-depth on AdSpy and the Facebook Ad Library, I have learned that many are/were (most seem to get banned accounts very quickly) using what I will refer to as 'pump and dump' tactics that I will look to avoid.
These include:
- Fake Reviews on the landing page
- Fake Comments/Likes on their Ad (can't confirm this 100%, but the comments seem a bit 'off')
At the same time, I found one competitor that has top notch legitimate marketing and seems to be killing it.
I will look to emulate this competitor as I am looking to build something for the long-term, although this will mean I need to be a better marketer/businessman and not take short cuts.
So far, my ad campaigns have gone as follows:
- Page Likes Campaign: Spent a few dollars on this and was at over $1 per like. From what I understand, I should be aiming clsoed $0.20 per like. I might look to tweak my creative/copy to see if I can build more likes for greater following/page presence.
- Video Engagement Campaign: Spent about $100 on this across a couple of products. Goal being to engage users with the video before remarketing to them with an offer. Overall average playtime across a few different videos was 8-9 seconds. Nearly all the videos were bottom 20-35% in terms of quality ranking, with engagement and conversion ranking mostly average/above average. I will look to get these metrics up by tweaking the copy/videos/ad sets, as I understand average watch time I should be targeting is 10+ seconds and I should be looking for at least 'Average' quality ranking to reap the rewards of being on Facebook's good side.
- Conversion Campaign: Only spent about $15 here on remarketing to video viewers who watched 10+ seconds of my videos with an offer and link to a product landing page. The very limited testing of this showed very poor click throughs rate (less than 0.5%) so I paused the campaigns. Will test more whether it is my ad that is the issue here, the 'engaged' video users were not really as engaged with my product as I presumed, or it is something else (e.g. the product, the remarketing tactic itself, etc.)
Very open to hearing feedback on my approach to all of this and if there is anything I am missing or should be more focused on.
Update: 28 January 2021
Further to my post yesterday, a couple more short updates.
Have looked more into @contentistic's suggestion about finding a local supplier and have found a wealth of potential suppliers for other potential dropshipping store niches where I live (Australia).
Over the next few weeks, I will explore the different potential niches and contact suppliers about the prospect of dropshipping/private labelling. My limited research so far suggests that at least a few are open to this.
This will hopefully fix the shipping time issues outlined by @stickupkid and @vortex with importing from China/Overseas (targeting days rather than weeks for shipping) and be more insulated from competition.
Concurrently, I will also continue experimenting with Facebook Ads /
Interesting progress! And lots of helpful information from @contentistic - thank you!
Originally Posted by augustine
(No pressure though! I'd completely understand if you want to keep the product(s) secret.)Regarding Page Likes:
$1/like is far too expensive for something that doesn't contribute directly to ROI. Is your sole purpose to just make your page look more authoritative? If so, then you don't need the likers to be super-duper relevant to the product. However, having likers that ARE somewhat interested in what you have to offer will allow your future posts to get free likes in the future.
A few tips off the top of my head that have worked for me in the past:
-Ask a question or make a statement that will attract the desired audience. e.g. If you're selling dental hygiene supplies, maybe something like "Want healthier teeth?" or "Racking up dental bills?"
-Ask for the LIKE, and give people a reason. e.g. "LIKE us to learn how to take better care of your teeth to prevent oral issues." (Maybe put the word "LIKE" in bold using https://yaytext.com/bold-italic/.)
-And of course, use an eye-catching image - that's what will stop users from scrolling past your ad.
Regarding Video and Retargeting Campaigns:
I have a feeling that the less-than-ideal results from the conversion campaign may be because your "engagement" videos are not attracting the right audience.
How many audiences are you testing? And what do the vids entail?
Amy
Home > Paid Traffic Sources > eCommerce