Hijo De Luna's E-commerce store progress thread

[Hijo de luna]

For those looking to dive in the world of e-commerce I'll let you ride with me on my journey that started about three months ago and has been a constant grind and lots of sleepless nights.

I am not going to disclose my product nor niche but I will provide general updates that might be beneficial to those looking to build a brand online.

First of all, I am a seasoned Ebay seller(over 10 years). I thought about making the leap to Amz FBA but the lack of control, the competition driving down margins, the Chinese selling direct now...so many things turned me off about Amz so I decided to start my own brand using my own platform(Shopify). I don't know if that was the best option, I hear Big Commerce is good as well but I guess I find out.

A couple of things working in my favor: I am a Graphic Designer and I am pretty creative, and I have a business and marketing background. I also know my way around Fiverr which is gold for any aspiring an entrepreneur doesn't have the venture capitalists check book at your disposal.

Not working in my favor: I am a introvert and prefer to stay low key. Putting myself out there is going to be very difficult for me but I do have this insane drive that won't let me just be an average Joe employee.

One thing I have realized about life is that you pretty much always get what you truly desire. When I worked in construction, I wanted a job with air condition. When I worked in the warehouse I wanted the cushy office job with the nice salary and weekends off. I asked and it was given. Which made me wonder why I was aiming so low. But now I realize what I have is not enough, on to the next goal. Entrepreneurship.

So after two years of making money on freelance graphics projects, doing marketing material for people making $50K+ a month I realized I could be doing the same. I found an excellent support group, mostly millionaires that love to share information that they learned along the way. Now I am on my journey and we'll see what happens.

 

[ORDER_66]

 

[Hijo de luna]

So on my first post I will catch you up to speed on what has taken place in the last three months. This thread is actually therapy because I don't sleep much anymore. When ideas hit me I have to go write them down or go take some kind of action.

As you know Amazon is that elephant in the room when it comes to B2C(business to customer)e-commerce. You'd be hard pressed to find an item on Aliexpress or Alibaba that isn't already selling on Amz at bottom of the barrel pricing. In order to compete with the big money grips in ecommerce you really only have a few options: Product improvement(which can be costly if you have to buy moulds and pay patent related costs), you can niche down and build a brand around a product or group of products which is more on the marketing side(If you have the personality you can make this work for you), bundling/subscription boxes(really popular and lucrative right now). I am focusing more on building a brand around bundling and subscription. But for the most part everyone is kind of selling the same shyt right now but in a different way.

I am wearing many different hats right now:

Purchasing - Importing/Sourcing the products, finding the right products(junglescout.com) and the best deal that will allow adequate markup and minimal defects and returns. I will get into why Aliexpress and Alibaba are probably not the best options for finding products to import. I am currently working with about 10 different suppliers. Some are based in the US which are doing my custom branded products. To name a few:

discountmugs.com (messed up my order but credited in a timely manner)
packlane.com(Very slow but highly quality product)
uline.com(Very fast shipping)
uprinting.com(messed up my order corrected in an untimely manner)

Importing- Importing is a complicated process. I am currently learning about the freight forwarders in my area. Trying to wrap my head around duties(import tax), customs clearance, shipping terms(sea freight, air freight, air courier, FOB etc). In the middle of a trade war because of Trump . But I assure you that tariffs do not work and the costs only get passed down to the America consumer. For those that don't know, Aliexpress is not the cheapest way to get products. They are mostly wholesalers and traders that buy in bulk from manufactures and take a 25%+ cut.. To get the best pricing you have to go directly to the manufactures and establish a relationship with them. Most manufactures will have an MOQ(minimum order quantify) but I hear there are ways to get this minimum down to a reasonable amount. I'm working on learning that process now. The Chinese culture is very different from ours. I am also looking to source products from Hong Kong, Bangledesh, Africa, and India. Each will come with it's own learning curve.

Marketing and Design- I am doing most of the design work myself since I know Photoshop and I have the eye for design. Every design from web to product packaging was done by me. As far as web is concerned, Shopify was pretty easy to learn. I know a little bit of HTML/CSS so simple customization is a breeze. The business name came to me one night. Tbh everything is kind of falling in place. When I make a decision I don't really backtrack. I still have to learn about driving traffic via social media ads and contests, and SEO. I still have to set up the social media accounts but I am waiting to get the product photography done first, sigh. There's so much to be done. For marketing and design I'm currently using:

Fiverr.com(graphic design and web copy)
shopify.com(great platform for online store but is rather pricey)
mailchimp.com(Great for building and tracking an email subscriber list)
zohomail.com (business email)
upwork.com(Very talented writers can be found here. Copywriting is the lifeblood of business nowadays)
grasshopper.com(1-800 phone service,nikka want this to be legit)

Business/Legal- Of course I have to get the legals right. That means forming an LLC for asset protection, getting a trademark on the business name. Speaking business name, the domain for the business is actually taken but somewhat inactive so I had to use a dash in my domain which isn't a big deal right now but I plan to get the domain I want later down the road. That's another battle for another day. I completed the first step on the business side this week my purchasing a P.O. Box! A small step but I was walking out of the post office and didn't realize I was smiling. A breh was sitting in a car looking at me like "fukk you so happy for fukk nikka". So on the legal side I have decide to consult with an attorney first since I might go ahead and make them my registered agent. The plan currently is to have an LLC, and a DBA(Doing business as). I'd like to have an umbrella company with the option to have several companies under it rather than naming my LLC after my business and being limited namewise, if that makes since.

After the LLC is completed I'll go ahead and register with the state and get an EIN(Employer Identification Number).

Accounting- My Bachelor's degree is in Accounting but I cannot possible handle another task right now. I have to delegate this at some point. I need to open a business account with One United and learn how the whole funding processing will wok. I know there are some good Accounting software programs avail but I can't even fathom remembering to pay quarterly taxes right now. I'll let somebody else handle that.


My spare bedroom is my warehouse right now.The bulk of which came from Aliexpress and Alibaba. I found out after the fact that I purchased the items from wholesalers and traders and paid 25%+ too much. First order is about $2500 total, just looking to get my business name out and build an email subscriber list. My next order will be more tuned to cost savings.

I was hoping to launch on March 30th with a Facebook contest but that's not going to happen. I have a main product that was lost in the mail and a host of other issues that need to get resolved. It really is one thing after another but it's all part of the process.. This weekend we'll be working on the product photography and web copy. I will check back soon.

 

[monsterpreneur]

Thanks OP. Will definitely be following this. I’m excited for your endeavours. I too want to tap into e-commerce. I worked as a product coordinator for an e-commerce company in 2016 before I moved to New Zealand. I basically had to find products that would fair well online at the lowest cost I could get. I found some random water balloon toy once, that made the company over $100,000 over a course of 2 months. That’s when I decided it was time to start on my own. However, I moved to NZ pregnant, so now I’m a new mom that’s back at work trying to get things rolling. I think your thread will inspire me to do so. Will definitely be looking forward to updates.

 

[SolesKing305]

Sub

 

[Saiyajin]

helpful tip to avoid risk if you wanna try selling a product online but don't have alot of money

put the product you plan to sell on ebay as an auction and see if people bid and buy it, then take that shyt down last minute

tells you the demand for what you're planning to sell without having to order it and all that

 

[MillionMills]

5 star thread

 

[Amerikan Melanin]

I have an idea to sell a hard to source food item. Going to watch this.

@monsterpreneur why dont you start your own site son you can work from home?
How do you like NZ? How the hell did you end up there?

 

[Sohh_lifted]

bless you bruh, needed this thread.

 

[monsterpreneur]

I have an idea to sell a hard to source food item. Going to watch this.

@monsterpreneur why dont you start your own site son you can work from home?
How do you like NZ? How the hell did you end up there?

I will actually. Just got my visa extended. So now I can just work, make money and start this business.

My husband got a job there. It’s cool. Very expensive cost of living. It’s insane. Very relaxing place to be. People are friendly. Work is chill. All around a nice place.

 

[Saiyajin]

Thanks OP. Will definitely be following this. I’m excited for your endeavours. I too want to tap into e-commerce. I worked as a product coordinator for an e-commerce company in 2016 before I moved to New Zealand. I basically had to find products that would fair well online at the lowest cost I could get. I found some random water balloon toy once, that made the company over $100,000 over a course of 2 months. That’s when I decided it was time to start on my own. However, I moved to NZ pregnant, so now I’m a new mom that’s back at work trying to get things rolling. I think your thread will inspire me to do so. Will definitely be looking forward to updates.

How did u approach this task? are there certain methods/strategies when it comes to choosing a niche product?

i cant think of any niche product ideas at all any tips on researching a good product?

 

[monsterpreneur]

How did u approach this task? are there certain methods/strategies when it comes to choosing a niche product?

i cant think of any niche product ideas at all any tips on researching a good product?

Honestly, I just spent hours on aliexpress looking for products. We sold out products on Jane.com, pickyourplum.com and zulily.com, using usa fulfillment centres. I would look though those sites and see how sales were going for products placed by other companies. Most of the time, everyone on there would be selling pretty much the same thing. Toys, leggings and kitchen wear, did the best for us.

So in the water balloon toy case, all I did was search on aliexpress for summer toys. Found it, thought it was cheap and then asked our agent to send it to the fulfillment center for us. Then placed it on those websites for about 10 dollars a piece.

Right now since I’m going to do it on my own, I’ve just been paying attention what society will look like in the upcoming years. One thing I noticed, is that many women are having kids past 30 years old. This is causing an increase of birth of kids with learning disabilities/Down syndrome. So I decided that my niche will be catered to that demographic. Just like how people are becoming more and more stressed out, which is why fidget cubes fair well in the buyers market...

Any products that provide a sense of “escapism” is going to do well. A huge percentage of people are depressed and are looking for something that can entertain them and help them escape from their problems, even for just a second.

 

[Hijo de luna]

Honestly, I just spent hours on aliexpress looking for products. We sold out products on Jane.com, pickyourplum.com and zulily.com, using usa fulfillment centres. I would look though those sites and see how sales were going for products placed by other companies. Most of the time, everyone on there would be selling pretty much the same thing. Toys, leggings and kitchen wear, did the best for us.

So in the water balloon toy case, all I did was search on aliexpress for summer toys. Found it, thought it was cheap and then asked our agent to send it to the fulfillment center for us. Then placed it on those websites for about 10 dollars a piece.

Right now since I’m going to do it on my own, I’ve just been paying attention what society will look like in the upcoming years. One thing I noticed, is that many women are having kids past 30 years old. This is causing an increase of birth of kids with learning disabilities/Down syndrome. So I decided that my niche will be catered to that demographic. Just like how people are becoming more and more stressed out, which is why fidget cubes fair well in the buyers market...

Any products that provide a sense of “escapism” is going to do well. A huge percentage of people are depressed and are looking for something that can entertain them and help them escape from their problems, even for just a second.

This is gold right here. The most successful entrepreneurs have the uncanny ability to see where market trends are going, and solve problems that people don't even know they have. This post is making me rethink my strategy a bit. Rep

 

[monsterpreneur]

This is gold right here. The most successful entrepreneurs have the uncanny ability to see where market trends are going, and solve problems that people don't even know they have. This post is making me rethink my strategy a bit. Rep

Thanks. I appreciate it and the rep.

 

[Hijo de luna]

Update: I probably put in about 20 hours this weekend. I went to bed at 4 this morning and was back up and at it around 7AM. Something magical happened and my store/product design really came together very well. I hooked up with a local photographer, and the breh nailed my product images. I found a super talented business copywriter on Fiverr that hooked my descriptions up. Now what?

I modified my Shopify store and turned it into a pre-launch page. Edited the code and removed the shopping cart and search options. Also removed the blog, about us page, basically everything that wasn't essential. It looks like a basic landing page with a newsletter pop up. There are no prices listed, nor is there an option to buy. I now feel I'm at a good place to hire a marketing consultant. For this task I'm turning to upwork. Lot's of talent on there. I'm really looking for particular type of person, a big dreamer.

So next week my goals are to complete my first video ad(my specialty), meet with a business strategist/consultant, the LLC application process. I'm going to hold off on the trademark until I learn a bit more about that. There are "trademark squatters" out there that will steal your business name, register it before you do then hold it for ransom. But its expensive and laborious so Ill lean on the common law protections until I get some sales. Trademarks, unlike LLC formation, is a hell of a process and can take several months and lots of back and forth before finalization.

Up until now I've been a one man show. But now I am looking to hire a consultant and a social media Manager. I am a really private and introverted person and I will happily pay someone to Manage the social media aspects. Let me focus on design, procurement, and logistics.