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A detailed account of a Fastlane process...

ygtrhos

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Hey guys, new update from me.

This thread is nice because when I see how things change in only 45 days. It is quite amazing really.

Like I said in my last post, I started selling on amazon now for about 1.5 months. The results are spectacular really.

At the beginning, I had maybe an average of 1-2 sales a day, driven by ads. Now I am getting 5-6 a day at least, with occasional blasts (12-15 a day), with reasonable prices. It is really crazy, how much potential e-commerce has. I added a graph of the sales numbers for the last 30 days.

I was also experimenting with prices, so maybe the number of units do not really make a lot of sense. I varied the price between 20-30$ from time to time. I currently get 6$ in hand for 30$ price. That is only 20%, but it has the potential to increase to 35% if I increase my sales volume, then I would not need ads as strongly as I do right now. (Problem 1: Profitability)


I saw my first batch as an experiment to see how the market reacts to the product. Thank God, it accepted the product very well and I am glad that the product sticks in the market. I made 2k$ loss, which is an amount I can cover, but the information I got was very important. On the forthcoming batches, I will have more volume, which means lower costs and I have a better ranking now, so I have better cards for profits.

I need profits for growth and not for takeaway money really. I want to grow my volume and sell more.

Currently, I have only 60 units in stock and I want to replenish, so I ordered a second batch with 500 units. This will arrive probably just before Christmas time, I will probably be out of stock for 2-3 weeks.


The main problem was the storage limits Amazon incurred on new sellers. When you open a shipment in Amazon sellers central, it automatically occupies the volume necessary for it. I opened one shipment to learn the interface etc. and I opened one shipment for the real thing. So I occupied actually twice the volume I needed. One single batch is about 40 cubic feet for me, and I had 10 cubic feet limit (until I get an IPI score, which you get in 9 weeks), so I was hugely over the limit.

After a few mails to Amazon seller help and improving my sales-through numbers, I have managed to get UNLIMITED storage TODAY. (Problem 2: Logistics and storage)

Until today, I was looking for warehouses and tried to solve this limit problem. Now I am glad that I can create shipments, and there is no logistical problem for me now. Huge gain for me, especially when I have a profitability problem.

In the following two weeks, I will be sending my second batch to USA.

In the meantime, I am still living humbly. The only luxury I buy is the trip I bought to Asia. I did not take any vacation this year, so I have taken whole December for myself and will travel to Phillipines after 12.12. until New Year's. I will really be a digital nomad for 1-2 weeks. :)

If anyone is around Phillipines, Bali or Hong Kong in December, let me know and we can try a good restaurant together. ;)

Cheers everyone! Hope the rest of the year will bring profits to us all! :)
 
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ygtrhos

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Time for an update.

On December 3rd I went out of stock, seeing that the product comes well on. I used to sell at least 3-4 units even above my price target daily before I ran out of stock. So I ordered another batch before beginning my December vacation.

While I was in vacation, my products were being produced and they got on the ship as of Christmas. They arrived US at New Years' Eve and took a lot to go through customs (about 2 weeks). Of course my old ranking was gone.

Nevertheless, I have been selling for 3 weeks now and I am getting my old ranking back at last. Sold 70 units out of 504.

I am currently at the price, where I make breakeven, but I want to make 20-30$ of daily profits at least. My strategy is mentioned below.

My goals this time is to become profitable. I have launched this product to create an income stream, not to pay my hard-earned money to Amazon.

My product sells. If people see it enough, it really sells. But I need to get the visibility.

Currently, there are a few keywords, I am specifically trying to rank on. These are not maybe the first keywords you might think, but they get search volumes of 500 to 4000 views a day and I am aiming to be on the first page for these 3-4 keywords. It is my short term goal to solidify my position to rank in the first page for these keywords. Because once I get the visibility, my product sells. I will be increasing my price gradually.

My second priority is to order at the right time, before I run out of stock. I guess I will be running out of stock at the end of April maybe. (420 units in stock , 3-5 units per day, 120-150 units per month, makes roughly 3 months) So I can still allow myself some time, which allows me to reinvest some of the gains I make in my first sales.

Last but not least is that I am currently running this whole thing over my person, which is taxed quite heftily. I have to apply a company and transfer the whole action to this company. I will do this until the end of February definitely.

I was sick from a hefty flu I caught in Asia and I was recovering from a motorbike accident I had in Phillipines, so I could not achieve much in January. I am staying on the path though and I believe that making a 6-figures income a year is not a very far-fetched goal for 2020 or 2021. (excluding my dayjob income)

I have also changed to another job in railway sector. Better salary, indefinite contract with labor union protection, free rides in German trains, more interesting job and I can save 50-60% of my income for my investments. I cannot wish for more than this in a dayjob.

I continue to live humbly in my shared flat, which is only 4 stations away from my work, 30-40 minutes commute. I am getting laid quite well also. Life is good and the Earth is ready to give sprouts for me. ;)
 

Exhosa

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Nice to see anothe Turkish person here :) Seems like you’ve made a good progress so far. If you had to start from the beginning now, would you do something differently? Looking forward to see more updates. Good luck!
 
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PeterKN

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Hello, welcome from Germany, too. Can you explain a little more in detail how you plan to build a legal company? In my opinion it ist not too bad to have the business on your name. Accounting etc. takes a lot of money. By the way, we just want to sell our GmbH,
 

ygtrhos

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Nice to see anothe Turkish person here :) Seems like you’ve made a good progress so far. If you had to start from the beginning now, would you do something differently? Looking forward to see more updates. Good luck!

Thank you very much. :)

If I were to start again, I would choose a product that is more expensive. I would have chosen a different strategy. I would sell stuff that makes more profit in one unit, instead of trying to sell 10 units everyday.


Hello, welcome from Germany, too. Can you explain a little more in detail how you plan to build a legal company? In my opinion it ist not too bad to have the business on your name. Accounting etc. takes a lot of money. By the way, we just want to sell our GmbH,

I am planning to apply a UG, I do not have that much money to build a GmbH. But firstly I need to increase my sales velocity. I am selling way too little currently. For 1-2k$ revenue a month, it is not worth building a company.
 

ygtrhos

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Yea, maybe I should update you on this one. :)

After Trump raised customs and so on, I have lost my hope on this product. I need to spend 21-22$ to sell a product for 25-26$. The margins does not validate the continuation of the product really.

I currently have about 120 units in Amazon warehouse. I am trying to melt my stocks down and let the listing die. It was a nice experiment, but I am not going to continue on this.

I will also not continue on Amazon FBA. Nowadays everyone is bandwagonning the FBA train. The entry barriers are way too low for me. Every idiot can buy from China and sell in US.

I would list the lessons learnt as such:

- Sell higher margin products, for rather low volume. If you have larger margins, you have larger margins for errors. (In my case, it was Amazon ads)
- Do something with higher entry barriers. Every idiot can flip items from Alibaba onto Amazon. What makes you distinct, unique?

I would answer any questions, if you guys have. And if you have any parties or occassions where you can use party stuff, let me know, I will give you a discount. :D
 

Fastlane Liam

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Yea, maybe I should update you on this one. :)

After Trump raised customs and so on, I have lost my hope on this product. I need to spend 21-22$ to sell a product for 25-26$. The margins does not validate the continuation of the product really.

I currently have about 120 units in Amazon warehouse. I am trying to melt my stocks down and let the listing die. It was a nice experiment, but I am not going to continue on this.

I will also not continue on Amazon FBA. Nowadays everyone is bandwagonning the FBA train. The entry barriers are way too low for me. Every idiot can buy from China and sell in US.

I would list the lessons learnt as such:

- Sell higher margin products, for rather low volume. If you have larger margins, you have larger margins for errors. (In my case, it was Amazon ads)
- Do something with higher entry barriers. Every idiot can flip items from Alibaba onto Amazon. What makes you distinct, unique?

I would answer any questions, if you guys have. And if you have any parties or occassions where you can use party stuff, let me know, I will give you a discount. :D
I think theres still big opportunity, but respect your decision since there is no barrier to entry. What do you think you will try next? You've earned alot from trying: experience and knowledge. Thats worth more than any profit or loss. You have skin the e-commerce/amazon game, and chances are if you launch any product you'll be re-using that knowledge :D
 

ygtrhos

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My product was a plastic cups & napkins party pack. I was doing something against the trends with throwaway plastics, that is also something I forgot to mention.

There might be opportunities, I do not deny it. I still consider choosing a 70-80€ product.

Whatever I will try, I will do the following:

- I will definitely store my products myself, here in Europe and I will also sell it in Europe, over my own distribution channels as well. I will sell over Amazon AND my own webshop.

- I will try to sell it offline as well.

- It will definitely be a product with at least 50-60% margin. 10-20% margins do not allow for errors.

Some months ago, biophase has given advice about starting a whole brand, rather than starting one single product. I think that was solid advice.

I would also try to source it from Europe instead of China. The whole customs&stuff is too much hassle and I find China too expensive to be honest.
 
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Fastlane Liam

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My product was a plastic cups & napkins party pack. I was doing something against the trends with throwaway plastics, that is also something I forgot to mention.

There might be opportunities, I do not deny it. I still consider choosing a 70-80€ product.

Whatever I will try, I will do the following:

- I will definitely store my products myself, here in Europe and I will also sell it in Europe, over my own distribution channels as well. I will sell over Amazon AND my own webshop.

- I will try to sell it offline as well.

- It will definitely be a product with at least 50-60% margin. 10-20% margins do not allow for errors.

Some months ago, biophase has given advice about starting a whole brand, rather than starting one single product. I think that was solid advice.

I would also try to source it from Europe instead of China. The whole customs&stuff is too much hassle and I find China too expensive to be honest.
Interesting and good points. Amazon takes about 30% of your margin on average I'd say, 15% commission on sales and 15~ for fba. If customs is too much hassle use a freight forwarder.

If you're going to take pretty much everything into your own hands, would be interesting to know what your product research approach will be, and if you plan on just inventing your own product. Because you won't be chasing demand thats from just Amazon, or if you will anyway because the demand is already there
 

ygtrhos

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You do not consider ads. With ads, they come up to 40%.

For customs, I always use forwarders anyway. I am not going to organize a whole plane or train for me. I rather mean the German customs and the customs fees that we have in Europe, I would avoid them.

I currently do not have an idea about your last point, to tell you the truth.
 

Fastlane Liam

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You do not consider ads. With ads, they come up to 40%.

For customs, I always use forwarders anyway. I am not going to organize a whole plane or train for me. I rather mean the German customs and the customs fees that we have in Europe, I would avoid them.

I currently do not have an idea about your last point, to tell you the truth.
Well, yeah. Ad spend eats into profit, not hard to know that.

Product research is the most important part so good luck to you
 
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ygtrhos

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Thank you very much.

I am also not sure about if I will go into ecommerce again, but experience is a huge factor of course.
 

Jadpapi

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My product was a plastic cups & napkins party pack. I was doing something against the trends with throwaway plastics, that is also something I forgot to mention.

There might be opportunities, I do not deny it. I still consider choosing a 70-80€ product.

Whatever I will try, I will do the following:

- I will definitely store my products myself, here in Europe and I will also sell it in Europe, over my own distribution channels as well. I will sell over Amazon AND my own webshop.

- I will try to sell it offline as well.

- It will definitely be a product with at least 50-60% margin. 10-20% margins do not allow for errors.

Some months ago, biophase has given advice about starting a whole brand, rather than starting one single product. I think that was solid advice.

I would also try to source it from Europe instead of China. The whole customs&stuff is too much hassle and I find China too expensive to be honest.
Everyone using the same software, everyone wants to rank on the first page, everyone almost using the same strategy. Everyone sale on Amazon now... this is a losing game for sure, the only way to win is to creat your own products period. And the only big winners are the creators( amazon, jungle scout, etc ) creat something.
Creating your own unique product will definitely help.. finding product that already exist, and thinking better pics or listing or bundling is going to make you Rich no it won’t.
you did what i told you not to do, but it's ok the lesson is more important, and next time you will have better luck.
 
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gloriusubiquity

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Hey ygtrhos,

Did you try any other marketing channels besides Amazon PPC like Facebook Ads or Google Ads?

Did you make your own Shopify or e-commerce site and drive traffic to it?

Just curious since I didn’t read any mention of it besides the Amazing Seller course and spending money on PPC.

Thanks!
icemat
 

Monkeycom

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If you came back to ecom, you may consider a coaching with Biophase.
As I often say, the skeletal of any ecom business should be an email list, that you fully control.

Feel free to pm me after reading my threads if you need help.
 

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