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New Niche, New Brand - Amazon > eCommerce > Retail

A detailed account of a Fastlane process...

DrkSide

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A little over a year ago I started my fastlane journey. It has had its ups and downs but nonetheless I was able to exit the rat race with some savings that I had and given myself a 9-12 month launchpad to grow my current Amazon business to support myself. I was having problems adding value beyond a good product to the niche that I started in so I decided to pivot.

I found a new niche that ticked off 3 of my necessities: I could add value, not saturated, provide for an easier transition to off of Amazon. I started selling one product with this brand about 6 months ago but had horrible supplier problems with inferior product and shipping delays. After quite a bit of searching I was able to track down a different supplier with much better product quality.

I am now going to be launching an entire line under this brand name on Amazon with different products. I have one selling now and I will be launching 2 more within the next month. I have 6 product samples arriving tomorrow to test and evaluate and will be picking the strongest two to launch.

One product will receive a full launch via a review service where I am going to give 50 units out for reviews. The second due to budget constraints will be launched using free review methods that I have used in the past. This will be my first foray into the paid review service but it should accelerate the product launch and sales.

This week I secured 8k in capital via a loan to purchase the first round of inventory and finance the initial round of advertising. After that I will dedicate 5-10% of inventory for review samples if needed.

Amazon will be the initial launchpad because I am familiar with it and it will get product in front of the most people to start with. I am beginning to brainstorm and research setting up an ecommerce platform as well to diversify income to bring control back to myself. I will also be exploring wholesale options to small retailers and shops. I have already had a few reach out to me via Amazon for bulk orders.

This thread will serve as a play by play on what I do as well as a method to keep myself accountable to keep moving forward.

tl;dr - Launching new brand on Amazon and ecommerce and keeping myself accountable to progress.

ETA: For anyone that wants to see the original journey see this thread https://www.thefastlaneforum.com/community/threads/put-up-or-shut-up-progress-thread.50591/
 
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MoneyDoc

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Good luck man!

Subscribed as I sell on amazon too (supplement line).
 

James Beattie

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Awesome, sounds like your starting to get up and running. I will be following the thread to see how it goes. I have been hunting for a product to sell on amazon to begin with but still do not know what niche to enter.
 

amp0193

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I've been at this 7 months, and am in a similar place to you. Will be following your progress!

PM me if you have any questions about getting reviews. I've tried a few different things. Some good, some, not so much.
 
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pds

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You're on the right path @DrkSide - looking forward to seeing your progress!
 

DrkSide

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Thanks everyone!

Yesterday did not go quite as planned. I was hoping for 2 of my samples to be in ready to launch condition when in fact none of them were ready. Each one had something wrong with it that will have to be changed. The basic use of the items were great but the small things need to be changed. I looked up this morning and see my competition selling them as-is from the manufacture and guess what? The complaints on the product are the exact things that need to be changed.

Today is going to be a day of deep research to look at what I am doing and the direction that I want to take. I think I know it in the back of my head but I want to be absolutely sure. This will not change my plans but it will decide which direction I go to get there.
 
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DrkSide

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Sent a list of the little things that need to be tweaked on the samples to be ready for sale. I still have to test the durability of some of them but I have some equipment coming today to be able to complete that.

Since I don't fully trust that the changes will be made I have began sourcing for 2 products from different manufactures. After looking at all of the normal importing sites I decided it was going to be difficult to track down the actual manufacture of the items that were up to the quality I was needing. I can find low quality units all day long but that is not the price point or market that I am going after. Therefore I decided to get the help of a sourcing company already in China so they could track down the manufactures. I am waiting to hear back from them.

The holiday weekend was not good for sales. I was at about a third of normal volume compared to normal. I am hoping to recover this week to normal but will be looking into reasons other than the holiday that could cause it.

I am waiting on my next shipment and then I will be giving some product away for reviews. Instead of going through the normal channels I am going to try to do this myself using facebook advertising + landing page. I think I will be able to target a good demographic that will give more technical reviews than most of the review groups that I have seen. Also, I will be capturing email addresses and start building a list for new product launches. Currently researching the best combination of software to do this.
 

GenYJourney

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These kinds of posts provide tremendous help for newbies (aka yours truly) in the Amazon/Ecommerce realm. Thanks for taking the time to share, best of luck!
 

DrkSide

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Ok, So I had been going back and forth with using a review company to launch the product. I am still not sure I want to make the initial capital investment in a service (or that I will have it by the time I am actually to production) so I decided to see what I could do on my own with one of my current products that needs some review love.

Created a landing page on my website with a simple call to action, picture, and an email opt in. I am now just starting to run facebook ads targeting what my audience should be (Note: I should be able to narrow this down after some data on the ads) and currently waiting to see the results. Also setup google analytics to track users. This is the first time doing something like this so with 3 hours into the development I don't have a lot to loose but quite a bit to gain if my plan works.

Now I just have to sit down and go over details of the two new products and specifics that I want with them and send some reference samples to my agent.
 
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DrkSide

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35 minutes in and 2 signups already. I may be on to something here.

analytics.PNG
 

DrkSide

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So the results are in (partially)...

It took less than 24 hours to give away all of the product that I am doing for this round which will be a total of 22 units. It was going to be 20 but I didn't turn the ad off in time and I also had someone email me about one for a friend. Spent a whopping total of $14.04 on ads to do this may with 56 clicks with about a 35% conversion rate.

Now I will be tracking to see if they are acutually redeeming the codes and to see what % are going to leave reviews. I am going to let my backend review request email follow up with them about 2 days after delivery. I am not sure how accurately I will be able to track the reviews if they don't leave their real name but time will tell.

This method so far seems much better than the normal review groups and definitely better than the paid services if they leave a review.

I will be going over this method in detail and how I did it once I have all of the data. Basically the only cost to me was the $14 in ad spend as I already had web hosting and themes purchased for wordpress that allowed me to do this.
 

DrkSide

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Needed a little motivation this morning and I got it when I opened my Amazon page. Got the #1 Best Seller badge in my subcategory. Now lets see how long I can keep it.

It looks like the hours put in this week with keyword and copy optimization along with the little giveaway (only 5 units claimed so far out of the 22 codes that I gave out) I did are paying divedends. Unfortunately my new shipment of product was delayed and wasn't shipped out when it was supposed to be. I was hoping to be able to send it out to Amazon on Monday after quality checks this weekend but looks like it is going to be after the weekend before I get it.

Normally I would increase the price to slow sales and stay in stock but with coupon codes out I can't do that at the moment.
 
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DrkSide

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Small update.

My shipment was delayed a week so it will be early next week before I am able to get more to Amazon. Kept the best seller badge all weekend until I eventually sold out on Sunday.

A couple of takeaways:

1. I should have ran the promo earlier. Even if I don't see any reviews from it the best seller badge that I got more than made up for the lost profit from the items. I only had 8 people claim the discount after giving 22 codes away.

2. I should have had more cover on inventory instead of cutting the order time so close to stock out. I would have had to "finance" the order with some savings but it would have paid back by keeping the best seller position.

Both of these things I knew but just didn't do.

May numbers are below. I was just shy of hitting my goal and may not be able to this month either with the delay in stock. $7300 of that number is the new product line with 1 products. I am hoping to launch the next product in July. Going to reassess my goal of $100k by the end of the year and bump it up.
amazon_stats_may.PNG
The same time last year I had one product in another line and I was doing some retail arbitrage that I don't do anymore. Not as much growth as I would like but that is only due to my own fault.
 

DrkSide

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Update-

Back in stock with the best seller and I have already started a promo to get back to the best sellers rank quickly.

Working on getting the changes made on the samples that I received still. Slow going mainly with the language barrier. I have been using photos with comments on them to let them know exactly what needs changed. Going to place an order for 100 units of one product to test when the changes are made.

Therefore I decided to get the help of a sourcing company already in China so they could track down the manufactures. I am waiting to hear back from them.

2 1/2 weeks have been fruitless in this endeavor. They requested a sample of the product that I had in my hand. Sent me and invoice for the courier fees which I paid and then confusion on which shipping company to use and other questions.

I don't mind paying for expertise but I don't want confusion and drama. Especially since I was prepared to make a large purchase which would put most of my capital on the line. I am going back to the way I was sourcing and looking for another agent possibly. I like the idea of a sourcing agent to speed up the process of finding suppliers and quality checking but I jumped in to this one without doing enough due diligence.
 

DrkSide

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Small update while I take a break from the grind this morning.

Set 2 daily records this week. The first was Thursday with $759 in sales and the second was yesterday with $1029! My first over 1k day.

Went from about 12k rank this week to high 2k. Not sure if I can keep this sales volume up or not but time will tell.

Specifications have been sent for the next product and I have 2 samples coming with the next resupply to test out.
 
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BlakeIC

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hey drkside what payment software are you using that shows units sold and things of that sort (from your image above)
 

DrkSide

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hey drkside what payment software are you using that shows units sold and things of that sort (from your image above)
It is just part of the Amazon Seller Central website. That is just a small little section of the business reports page.
 

DrkSide

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Just dropping this off....
sales snapshot.PNG

Technically I hit my first goal of 10k in a month (although not a calendar month) but I'll take it and also another over 1k day. I am not completely out of stock but only have a couple of units left so I will be shortly. My last order was placed when I was averaging about 10 sales a day and I had a couple where I did 25. I am reordering as soon as this shipment gets to me so I have some overlap and can hold my positioning.

New product has been ordered. Started with just 100 units to test in the market.

2 new samples inbound for testing as well.

4 new product quotes came in today.

Time to reinvest the profits.
 
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DrkSide

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Are you currently running traffic to your website to sell?
No, currently I am only selling on Amazon. I have started on the website but I am going to wait until I have a few products to launch it. Should be by the end of next month.

Amazon gets me in front of customers now and provides the capital to grow faster than my own website would.
 

Jurffy

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Hi DrkSide,

I enjoy following your thread. I want to design a hat, and I want to create my own custom-design. I have found a manufacturer in China. Would you be able to tell me how to proceed? In your experience, what steps are needed to take place before reaching a test-product stage?

Would I create images, provide information on materials for the various parts of the hat, etc.

I have no knowledge of this process, and am hoping you can help me out.


Thank you!
 
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DrkSide

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Jurffy the only steps I took are to find a manufacture and get samples. Request changes that need to be made (if any) and get another sample. Then do a small test order and see if it sells. Repeat.

Don't worry about anything except for the next step that you need to take.

Start off by taking a look at the threads in HERE specifically THIS one and THIS one. Read first, digest what you read, and then put it into action.
 
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Jurffy

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Jurffy the only steps I took are to find a manufacture and get samples. Request changes that need to be made (if any) and get another sample. Then do a small test order and see if it sells. Repeat.

Don't worry about anything except for the next step that you need to take.

Start off by taking a look at the threads in HERE specifically THIS one and THIS one. Read first, digest what you read, and then put it into action.
Thank you, DrkSide. I'm slowly reading through those links, Walter's thread is full of knowledge! I'm going to start my own progress thread, or else this'll turn into a thread-bomb. :)
 
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DrkSide

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Quick update,

Due to an issue I am just now getting back in stock. It really hurts the bottom line to go 2 weeks without your best selling product but I am going to make sure it won't happen again. I have already reordered another round of stock so I will be able to keep levels up. Depending on how the sales go the rest of the month will depend on a reorder.

Product 2 - I approved photos of the design that I am having printed on it this week and it was put into production. I am doing a small run the first batch and will double the size for the next. From my research this will sell as good or better than product 1 with the same retail price and margin.

Product 3 - has been decided on. Going to be placing an order for it later this month. It is a lower priced item and I want to get it in and build up some reviews before the holidays.

Product 4 - Doing research on this but I believe that I have found it and I already have a sample in my hand. Very good quality and a good price. It is also a lower priced item directly in the "gift" territory for Christmas. This one will have to have no customization aside from packaging so it will be low cost to get started.

I have began searching for an office to rent around town. While I am not keen on the idea of spending money on a non income producing asset I am not in a position to buy an office building at this point. It was also a deal I made with my wife that I would eventually move out of working in the house to a real office. I did look for the virtual office type but with as small of a community that we live in there is nothing like that. I am still looking at the numbers to decide if I want to go ahead and jump on it or if I want to wait.
 
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brandonrush

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Launch one product with its sole purpose being to fund the office. Get that one product to netting $2-3k a month and you are set, just set the profits from that product aside for office related expenses instead of reinvesting into other products. If that product takes off and starts selling much more than you need to fund the office, great, now you have extra cash from that one to reinvest, but make sure you're still setting aside the office fund out of the profits. Once you've got more successful products under your belt the success of that one "fund the office" product becomes less and less important to you keeping the doors open on your office.
 

Jesse Dallenbach

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Hello DrkSide,

Congrats on your much deserved success--the process is working for you tremendously! :) I was curious what type of products you are selling. Can you give me the category and I can look it up and and amazon and Narrow it down? I understand if you don't feel comfortable doing that to or if that is against forum rules.

Thanks!

- Jesse
 

DrkSide

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Thanks @brandonrush I like that Idea. That was sort of the way it was working in my mind but I couldn't put it as well as you did.

@Jesse Dallenbach Short answer is no. Long answer is HERE.
 
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Jesse Dallenbach

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Thanks @brandonrush I like that Idea. That was sort of the way it was working in my mind but I couldn't put it as well as you did.

@Jesse Dallenbach Short answer is no. Long answer is HERE.

No worries DrkSide just curious is all...I find this thread very interesting. It's like reality TV for "Fastlaners In Training"! :)

- Jesse
 
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DrkSide

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Forgot to add this earlier. Had a customer call me as I had given him my phone number when he was asking some in depth questions. He called me today and he is with an organization that uses my product professionally. He wants to get more for others in his organization to use.

The funny thing is that I had never even considered the uses for what they are using them for and as they are going to use and abuse them. He agreed to give some reviews on the new stuff I have coming in as well.

It was really funny as he was just about an hour away from me as well. I will be hand delivering the other units for them to test.
 

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