Building A New Product Brand From Scratch

[JDawg]

As long as you aren't making up the numbers

I'm feeling the love...

For reals though - this is my calculation based off of a very small amount of sales data, so there is definitely room for error.

feel free to choose another product and grab the 25% of that too.

For sure, that's my goal.

And yes, haha, I do understand that you are trying to help out & I appreciate it. Although this business is new, it doesn't mean that I have no idea what I'm doing.

*Please understand that this is not an Amazon business. I mentioned in my original post that this is simply a platform that I'm using to help launch my business in the early stages.

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[Carnage]

Great stuff! will be following

 

[HyperFocus]

Hey JDawg, when you have time can you write the steps you use when contacting a factory in China?

What do u think of this?

1. Introduce your business, say what you are looking to buy, say u are looking for long term relationships based on trust amd reliability and ask what exactly they are selling./then try calling (i can speak Chinese but cant write it)

2. If they reply ask for their address, phonenumber and preferred method of communication.
Ask more info about the product
Ask if they offer to send a sample
Then payment options
Then more about my business to create more trust.


What u think?

 

[NewJamesBond]

"Not your average business podcast...." - Pat Flynn's thing...

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[JDawg]

Hey JDawg, when you have time can you write the steps you use when contacting a factory in China?

What do u think of this?

1. Introduce your business, say what you are looking to buy, say u are looking for long term relationships based on trust amd reliability and ask what exactly they are selling./then try calling (i can speak Chinese but cant write it)

2. If they reply ask for their address, phonenumber and preferred method of communication.
Ask more info about the product
Ask if they offer to send a sample
Then payment options
Then more about my business to create more trust.


What u think?

Sure HyperFocus! This is very similar to the questions that I ask & the process that I use. (I quoted the exact verbiage that I use below) But do know that this process is not foolproof - as Walter mentioned as well. This is simply what has worked for me thus far.

These questions ultimately help weed out a lot of the scammers, particularly the more obvious ones & also give you a much better chance of dealing with a legitimate supplier. But they do not help you determine whether or not you are dealing with a manufacturer/trader (A lot of suppliers will claim to manufacturers while in reality they are not), or ensure that you will not be scammed. There is still risk with these methods. I am no importing expert - I am simply sharing my experience and what has worked for me and my business. I'd suggest reaching out to other members on the forum (such as Walter) if you want more clarity on the issue, as they have years of experience in importing.

I wish you the best!

Once I make initial contact with a potential supply, I ask the following questions:

1) Could you tell me more about your business?
- What is your current business address?
- What is your business phone number?
- How long have you been in business?
- How many employees work for your business?
- Can you provide any references, specifically from the US (Some suppliers don't feel comfortable sharing their client's information, while others are happy to share. This isn't extremely important, but it does create more credibility to talk to others that have dealt with the supplier in the past.)

2) Are you able to offer a sample of the product? (Most all suppliers will, but typically expect you to pay for the freight)

3) What payment options do you offer?

*I also will later ask if I can come and visit the business in person.

 

[JDawg]

Now for an update (and a little rant... )!

After being out of stock for nearly 2 months, most of my inventory has been received by Amazon. I was a bit worried that rankings would drop significantly (since the products were out of stock for so long), but it wasn't too bad. While rankings were a bit lower, I was still able to manage 6 sales in the first 24 hours. While this isn't great, and is nowhere near where I was 2 months ago, it is a good sign right off the bat - especially since not all of my products have been received. Now I will be working to get that ranking back up in the coming weeks!

I am beginning to promote and giveaway my newest products in order to kickstart sales.

Now for the rant... Amazon can be SO stupid sometimes.

I sent in 150 units of a certain ASIN, and each of those products individually weighed 1 oz.

Amazon took the liberty to change the originally listed weight to 3.2 LBs per unit (Which was the total weight for ALL 150 units).

So now I am being extremely overcharged for each product that is sold. And as we all know, Amazon support is not known for speedy action on these types of issues. So now I must wait 3+ days to have the products re-sized and re-weighed. Who-whoo.

Another reason you can't depend on Amazon as your only sales funnel.

 

[JDawg]

Update!

One of my products is now ranking #1 on Amazon for a relevant keyword. This should really boost sales moving forward!

In the first 4 days of having new inventory, here are my sales numbers:

Total Units: 34
Product Sales: $446

I have SO much work to do to improve my keyword rankings, but I'm making progress.


Now for some late-night product packing with my business partner.

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[iAmTrade]

It doesn't do anything to your productivity, but what dollar margins are you working with?

If you sell 34 units in 4 days...lets say 11 sold avg a day.

Perhaps a 10$ profit, per unit?

$110.00 a day.
365 x 110$ = 40,150$

Dam.

That right there makes me a happy man to see you're doing it.

All you need is to double those figures and you'd be part of the top 20% of Americans...

Those are real numbers.
Keep up the good work champ.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[JDawg]

It doesn't do anything to your productivity, but what dollar margins are you working with?

If you sell 34 units in 4 days...lets say 11 sold avg a day.

Perhaps a 10$ profit, per unit?

$110.00 a day.
365 x 110$ = 40,150$

Dam.

That right there makes me a happy man to see you're doing it.

All you need is to double those figures and you'd be part of the top 20% of Americans...

Those are real numbers.
Keep up the good work champ.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Thanks man, I appreciate your support and contribution to this thread!

Unfortunately, those numbers aren't a true representation of my actual profits.

Here's what it actually looks like:

- 34 sales in 4 days = 8.5 sales/day.

- Net profit per unit = $6 average (This is after all fees and product costs)

- $6 X 8.5 sales = $51 a day

- $51 X 365 days = $18,615/year


So nowhere near on pace for $40K, but you've gotta start somewhere, right?!

 

[JDawg]

Update!

It has now been a full week since my products were received by Amazon, so I thought I'd give an update on my sales:

As I mentioned in my first post, I added 4 new products this time around. Going back, I would have just ordered just 1 new product in a higher quantity, so a lesson was learned as I feel I may have spread myself too thin.

I sold a handful of products at a discounted rate via Social Media to kickstart my products, so the following numbers are only counting full-priced sales.

1/20/16 - 1/26/16 Amazon Sales

Product #1 = 10 sales x $5 profit = $50 profit

Product #2 = 6 sales x $5 profit = $30 profit

Product #3 = 35 sales x $6 profit = $210 profit

Product #4 = 4 sales x $6 profit = $24 profit

Product #5 = 1 sale x $6 profit = $6 profit

Product #6 = 0 sales x #6 profit = $0 profit

Total Profit = $320

• Product #3 is now out of stock, so my sales have slowed down quite a bit.
• I haven't given any discount codes away for products #5 & #6, so the non-existent sales are OK for now.

I've been a bit frustrated that my #1 and #2 products have not sold well thus far. When I initially listed those products 2 months ago, I was selling 5-10 a day, and now I am selling 5-10 a week. I think that the extended amount of time that my product was unavailable really hurt my keyword rankings.

So What's Next?

• I've decided to lower the price for products #1 & #2 to a break even price point. Already today I've seen the keywords move up, and I hope this helps get me back to where I was 2 months ago.
• Chinese New Year is preventing me from re-ordering any of the products #3-6, so I'll have to wait a bit before getting that order rolling. This time around I will be ordering just product #3 in a much larger quantity (and potentially #4) so that I can focus on maximizing those sales before moving on to additional products.

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[JDawg]

Sales Update!

After an okay first week of sales, I tried reducing my price to a break even point for 3 days in order to improve ranking for product #1 & #2.

Over that 3 day span, I only had 42 total orders between the two products that were offered at lower price point. However, once I moved the price back, the keywords moved up significantly!

So - here are the sales from the previous week at full-price (I have removed the "break-even" sales):

1/27/16 -2/2/16 Amazon Sales:

Product #1 = 24 sales x $5 profit = $120 profit

Product #2 = 5 sales x $5 profit = $25 profit

Product #3 = Out of stock

Product #4 = 14 sales x $6 profit = $84 profit

Product #5 = 10 sales x $6 profit = $60 profit

Product #6 = 0 sales x $6 profit = $0 profit

Total Profit = $289

Considering that product #3 was out of stock, and product #1 & #2 were offered at a lower price for 3 days, I'm happy with the progress. Almost every product saw an increase in sales this past week, and the last few days of sales (that aren't shown above) have been solid.

So What's Next?

• I may lower the price again for product #2 or do some promotions via social media, as it just didn't gain the traction that I wanted.
• Re-order products #3 & #4 on the 17th of February (After Chinese New Year).