Ask me anything about eCommerce (2012)

[ddzc]

Honestly the only thing I thought of when reading your post is that I would never import something for $20 that sells for $40.

The margins are too low. Can you sell it for $80?

I researched extensively, I wouldn't get more than $40, $45 would be pushing it.

FYI, the $20 is priced CIF, so that's priced to my door...I believe duties are covered by the shipper as well with CIF, correct? What are your thoughts?

 

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

[LibertyForMe]

He already told you his thoughts... get bigger margins.

 

[chrisbiz4444]

I would go with a real shopping cart? Why so you want to go with wordpress?

Wordpress just seems more cost effective to get up and running, however that might just be my ignorance to eCommerce.

 

[biophase]

I researched extensively, I wouldn't get more than $40, $45 would be pushing it.

FYI, the $20 is priced CIF, so that's priced to my door...I believe duties are covered by the shipper as well with CIF, correct? What are your thoughts?

You still have duty fees to pay. It's alot of risk for a low payoff. You are sending out $2000 to make $2000. You bank account is going to slowly drain. Let's say you decide this is the product you want to sell and you are making $10k profit a month.

Your first order is for $10,000 of stuff on January 1st, you get it on Feb 1st and start selling. You move it all by March 1st. In order to do this, you need to order another $10,000 worth on Feb 1st, so you have stock on March 1st.

So you have $20,000 out of pocket before your first dollar comes in.

On March 1st, you have sold your Jan 1st shipment, so you have $20,000 in the bank. You use $10,000 to place your March 1st inventory order. You put the other $10,000 in the bank. So now you are moving along, making $10,000 a month and have a steady inventory monthly supply.

This is all great if everything moves like this. In reality your shipments can take 1-2 months maybe. You won't sell everything out every month. Sometimes you will be short, sometimes you will have too much inventory.

All I'm saying is that you will find yourself cash poor with this margin just because of the manufacturing and shipping times. Contrast this to dropshipping at this margin. You get an order for $40, send $20 to dropshipper, profit $20 immediately. You never run out of cash this way.

When importing you will have tons of money spent before the first dollar comes in. So you need to make alot more on each dollar spent.

 

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

[biophase]

Wordpress just seems more cost effective to get up and running, however that might just be my ignorance to eCommerce.

Cost effective meaning free vs $25 a month? You should go with a cart, you will spend way less time working on the website and more time making money.

 

[ddzc]

You still have duty fees to pay. It's alot of risk for a low payoff. You are sending out $2000 to make $2000. You bank account is going to slowly drain. Let's say you decide this is the product you want to sell and you are making $10k profit a month.

Your first order is for $10,000 of stuff on January 1st, you get it on Feb 1st and start selling. You move it all by March 1st. In order to do this, you need to order another $10,000 worth on Feb 1st, so you have stock on March 1st.

So you have $20,000 out of pocket before your first dollar comes in.

On March 1st, you have sold your Jan 1st shipment, so you have $20,000 in the bank. You use $10,000 to place your March 1st inventory order. You put the other $10,000 in the bank. So now you are moving along, making $10,000 a month and have a steady inventory monthly supply.

This is all great if everything moves like this. In reality your shipments can take 1-2 months maybe. You won't sell everything out every month. Sometimes you will be short, sometimes you will have too much inventory.

All I'm saying is that you will find yourself cash poor with this margin just because of the manufacturing and shipping times. Contrast this to dropshipping at this margin. You get an order for $40, send $20 to dropshipper, profit $20 immediately. You never run out of cash this way.

When importing you will have tons of money spent before the first dollar comes in. So you need to make alot more on each dollar spent.

That made a whole lot of sense when explained in detail...some pointers there which I wasn't aware of. Also, just starting off..there would be a slim chance of pushing all of the inventory out in a months time.

Thank you sir, much appreciated.

 

[ddzc]

Wordpress just seems more cost effective to get up and running, however that might just be my ignorance to eCommerce.

If your low on start up funds, check out http://www.opencart.com. It's the most recommended "freebie" ecommerce software on the market.

 

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

[contract]

What are your best traffic sources generally.. Of course, without revealing too much.

Are you doing social promotions to build your brands, and if so do they get attention. Or are you focused on more traditional things like SEO/SEM. Have you done any advertising in smaller niches or sponsored anything, if so has the ROI been worthwhile working at a smaller scale.

For new traffic I should say.

Also.. Is there anything you have noticed that will make a product sell or not sell. Or a store fail or grow. Is there any key to this aside from simply having a good design and product. Looking for hidden traps so I can prepare myself early.

 

[lolo08]

Hey,

whats your favorite Shop Cms and do you set it up by your own?

 

[MZhang]

d use Amazon's sales rankings. But it's still har

I would use Amazon's sales rankings. But it's still hard to tell. Some products can rank #1 in a small niche and not have alot of traffic. For instance, my soap thread, I got the product ranked #1 in Amazon for a certain search term and I was only seeing 100 visits a day. That's a tiny niche.

Hello Biophase,

How do you monitor in this case 100 visits a day for that certain product?

 

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

[biophase]

What are your best traffic sources generally.. Of course, without revealing too much.

Are you doing social promotions to build your brands, and if so do they get attention. Or are you focused on more traditional things like SEO/SEM. Have you done any advertising in smaller niches or sponsored anything, if so has the ROI been worthwhile working at a smaller scale.

For new traffic I should say.

Also.. Is there anything you have noticed that will make a product sell or not sell. Or a store fail or grow. Is there any key to this aside from simply having a good design and product. Looking for hidden traps so I can prepare myself early.

Right now it's Google search, PPC and then Yahoo. I have FB and Twitter but I don't use them alot.

The main thing I noticed about products is that you need a product that will improve performance or enhance an activity. Other products like cases, bags, etc... that don't benefit the activity just aren't needed when money is tight.

 

[biophase]

Hey,

whats your favorite Shop Cms and do you set it up by your own?

I use Bigcommerce

 

[biophase]

Hello Biophase,

How do you monitor in this case 100 visits a day for that certain product?

I log into the seller page and look at the business reports.

 

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

[FastLaner007]

Right now it's Google search, PPC and then Yahoo.

What generally gives you more ROI bio? I know Adwords has got volume, but margins are hard to keep up in big markets. I found Bing/Yahoo to produce more ROI for me in even high competition area? Your thoughts Sir?

 

[GravyBoat]

Biophase,

Not sure if it has been mentioned already in here, but I had a quick Q about PayPal accounts.

I plan to start out using my personal PayPal account on my website, then once it grows large enough, get an LLC and create a Business PayPal account to go with it. Would you recommend this or should I start out with a business account?

Let me know your thoughts on this. Glad to be able to get a master opinion on here!

Thanks

GravyBoat

 

[wilddog]

Bio,

Are you using any of the authorize.net add-ons like Fraud Detection, and Customer Information Management?

Also, does BigCommerce have a large degree of customization, such as one-page checkout, guest accounts, etc?

Cheers

 

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

[Caroline]

Hi Biophase,

That is amazing that you're willing to answer all these questions. I haven't gone through the threads, so I don't know if anyone has asked yet... I was thinking about selling online on a consignment basis, which I know is different from your model. One day maybe I'll design my own products, but I know today that I have a lot of girlfriends that want to get rid of a lot of stuff but they don't know what to do with it. Do you think I should have each store specialize like designer purses, jewelry, ect or do that them all in one store? I've heard good things about shopify, but was thinking about trying Etsy/Ebay to gain traffic. However, do you think it would be better to buy a lot on Ebay first to get some feedback then try sell? I don't want to hold onto the items for a long time.

One thing I was thinking about doing was making a blog dedicated to the local street fashion (taking pictures of peoples on the street with fashion I like) and then giving them my card with my link to check out my page. I've heard good things about Wordpress, so I'm thinking about going there, but can you also have a store on it? I am a massage therapist, so I could add health tips as well. I would love to figure out a way to combine massage and vintage fashion but I don't know if they would go together in anyway, so I may need to keep them separate.

 

[MZhang]

Hello,

Thank you very much for answering my previous questions. My wife started a online eCommerce site selling clothing. Would you mind checking it out and let me know your feedback? What are somethings that you see that you can improve on already? She is not getting the traffic/sales that she would like. What do you think is the best place to start?

www.sansnaivete.com

 

[biophase]

What generally gives you more ROI bio? I know Adwords has got volume, but margins are hard to keep up in big markets. I found Bing/Yahoo to produce more ROI for me in even high competition area? Your thoughts Sir?

I really don't know. I probably should be on this stuff a little more, but I just run ads and make sure I'm making more than I spend. I don't do Yahoo ads, only Google and Bing.

 

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

[biophase]

Biophase,

Not sure if it has been mentioned already in here, but I had a quick Q about PayPal accounts.

I plan to start out using my personal PayPal account on my website, then once it grows large enough, get an LLC and create a Business PayPal account to go with it. Would you recommend this or should I start out with a business account?

Let me know your thoughts on this. Glad to be able to get a master opinion on here!

Thanks

GravyBoat

I think that should be fine. It's really easy to change Paypal accounts on any of the carts.

Opening a paypal account is super easy, why wouldn't you open up a second one for your business from the start? You can use a separate Capitalone 360 savings account that is linked to your bank account so you don't need a real separate bank account.

 

[biophase]

Bio,

Are you using any of the authorize.net add-ons like Fraud Detection, and Customer Information Management?

Also, does BigCommerce have a large degree of customization, such as one-page checkout, guest accounts, etc?

Cheers

I'm using the Fraud Detection addon which is $10/mo. I'm not using any other ones. BC has a one page checkout that is decent. You can customize it, but it takes a little more coding knowledge. Yes, they do have guest accounts for check out.

 

[biophase]

Hi Biophase,

That is amazing that you're willing to answer all these questions. I haven't gone through the threads, so I don't know if anyone has asked yet... I was thinking about selling online on a consignment basis, which I know is different from your model. One day maybe I'll design my own products, but I know today that I have a lot of girlfriends that want to get rid of a lot of stuff but they don't know what to do with it. Do you think I should have each store specialize like designer purses, jewelry, ect or do that them all in one store? I've heard good things about shopify, but was thinking about trying Etsy/Ebay to gain traffic. However, do you think it would be better to buy a lot on Ebay first to get some feedback then try sell? I don't want to hold onto the items for a long time.

One thing I was thinking about doing was making a blog dedicated to the local street fashion (taking pictures of peoples on the street with fashion I like) and then giving them my card with my link to check out my page. I've heard good things about Wordpress, so I'm thinking about going there, but can you also have a store on it? I am a massage therapist, so I could add health tips as well. I would love to figure out a way to combine massage and vintage fashion but I don't know if they would go together in anyway, so I may need to keep them separate.

I don't know. This sounds like a small etsy shop to me. Why wouldn't you just use etsy? I would probably just list their stuff on Ebay and take a cut of the sales. When you say "a lot of stuff", how much stuff are we talking about? Probably not enough to make it worth opening up a store.

Not sure what the blog would have to do with the ecommerce store. Making a fashion blog about a small local area to me doesn't sound like it will make money. That's a very small audience.

 

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

[biophase]

Hello,

Thank you very much for answering my previous questions. My wife started a online eCommerce site selling clothing. Would you mind checking it out and let me know your feedback? What are somethings that you see that you can improve on already? She is not getting the traffic/sales that she would like. What do you think is the best place to start?

www.sansnaivete.com

Just some quick observations.

Your first banner image is bad in choice and color. First, I can barely read it due to the colors. Second, why is the first thing you want people to do to Like you on Facebook? Don't you want them to buy clothes?

The second image is about free shipping. Why again is it not about clothing?

I'm not a big fan of the name. I don't understand it and it doesn't to me saying clothing. But that's just me.

The store looks a little plain in the category pages.

I find the text a little too light and small.

 

[GuestUser152]

Hi Biophase,

That is amazing that you're willing to answer all these questions. I haven't gone through the threads, so I don't know if anyone has asked yet... I was thinking about selling online on a consignment basis, which I know is different from your model. One day maybe I'll design my own products, but I know today that I have a lot of girlfriends that want to get rid of a lot of stuff but they don't know what to do with it. Do you think I should have each store specialize like designer purses, jewelry, ect or do that them all in one store? I've heard good things about shopify, but was thinking about trying Etsy/Ebay to gain traffic. However, do you think it would be better to buy a lot on Ebay first to get some feedback then try sell? I don't want to hold onto the items for a long time.

One thing I was thinking about doing was making a blog dedicated to the local street fashion (taking pictures of peoples on the street with fashion I like) and then giving them my card with my link to check out my page. I've heard good things about Wordpress, so I'm thinking about going there, but can you also have a store on it? I am a massage therapist, so I could add health tips as well. I would love to figure out a way to combine massage and vintage fashion but I don't know if they would go together in anyway, so I may need to keep them separate.

Theres several stores/apps that handle this already. The most Popular being Poshmark. If you believe you still have something to offer, I would suggest wordpress multisite with the ecommerce plugin. It will allow you to setup a network of sites like Etsy and allow you to receive a cut of all transactions...

http://premium.wpmudev.org/

 

[Atown512]

Quick question. I've found several products that I'm interested in testing and I'm about to contact the suppliers. For a few of them, I can't seem to find anyone in the US selling it. I have a template that I will be using for my initial messages, and I was wondering if you thought it would be a bad idea to ask them if they have any other buyers in the US for that particular product.

 

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

[wilddog]

Thanks for the information Biophase,

Ever since Google shook up ranking with Panda/Penguin, do you think it's still important for a domain to contain the product description?

 

[Chazmania]

I suggest that you (and everyone else) learn SEO yourself. It is probably the best investment you can make in yourself if you are going to go the Ecommerce route

Bio,

Is learning SEO the same these days with the Panda/Penguin changes? Do you still recommend learning it for ecommerce? Things change so damn fast these days!

 

[biophase]

Quick question. I've found several products that I'm interested in testing and I'm about to contact the suppliers. For a few of them, I can't seem to find anyone in the US selling it. I have a template that I will be using for my initial messages, and I was wondering if you thought it would be a bad idea to ask them if they have any other buyers in the US for that particular product.

I would ask them. You don't have anything to lose. Maybe don't ask them on the initial email, but after you've established some type of rapport.

 

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

[biophase]

Thanks for the information Biophase,

Ever since Google shook up ranking with Panda/Penguin, do you think it's still important for a domain to contain the product description?

I have seen that the keyword in the domain name still ranks easier.

 

[biophase]

Bio,

Is learning SEO the same these days with the Panda/Penguin changes? Do you still recommend learning it for ecommerce? Things change so damn fast these days!

I don't do SEO anymore. I use PPC and brand building. It's tough to stay with SEO because all your investment in it can get wiped out in a single update.