Getting started again E-Commerce

[Sisyphos]

Hi,

as i already mentioned in my Intro I already had an ok going e-commerce store in the past. I will now completely rebrand it create the company under my own name (not my parents like it was in the past) and try to scale through different forms of advertising and also SEO.
The first steps for me to take are:

• Opening up the company on paper
• Reconnecting with my old manufacturers and asking if the prices have changed and if we can make a deal
• Doing testing on the product and figuring out a good dosage via research
• Designing the packaging or hire someone to do it
• Designing the website
• Getting good copy for my products
• Come up with a good shipping method, that was one of my biggest painpoints in the past
• Coldcalling businesses once the Product is out in the market again so I have the opportunity to sell in their shops via commision
• Opening up an affiliate programm via Shopify
• Getting into alternate payment methods since PayPal probably won't work (CBD)
• Getting into Native Advertising and maybe Snapchat/Twitter/Tiktok since CBD is banned from Facebook

This is just the beginning for me. Since I am in university I sadly won't have to much time during my semester to work on this business but once the summer rolls around time shouldn't be the limiting supply anymore. I am looking forward to updating this post as little as possible but as often as necessary since I don't want it to turn into action faking. Have a good one!

 

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[naz10101]

Hi,

as i already mentioned in my Intro I already had an ok going e-commerce store in the past. I will now completely rebrand it create the company under my own name (not my parents like it was in the past) and try to scale through different forms of advertising and also SEO.
The first steps for me to take are:

• Opening up the company on paper
• Reconnecting with my old manufacturers and asking if the prices have changed and if we can make a deal
• Doing testing on the product and figuring out a good dosage via research
• Designing the packaging or hire someone to do it
• Designing the website
• Getting good copy for my products
• Come up with a good shipping method, that was one of my biggest painpoints in the past
• Coldcalling businesses once the Product is out in the market again so I have the opportunity to sell in their shops via commision
• Opening up an affiliate programm via Shopify
• Getting into alternate payment methods since PayPal probably won't work (CBD)
• Getting into Native Advertising and maybe Snapchat/Twitter/Tiktok since CBD is banned from Facebook

This is just the beginning for me. Since I am in university I sadly won't have to much time during my semester to work on this business but once the summer rolls around time shouldn't be the limiting supply anymore. I am looking forward to updating this post as little as possible but as often as necessary since I don't want it to turn into action faking. Have a good one!

Hey mate, best of luck! I am excited to see your progress!

 

[Sisyphos]

Sorry was busy a lot the last weeks and didn't get to do some posts nor really work on my business but something life altering happend to me yesterday and I wanted to update on that and on a few other things regarding the business.

My phone got stolen which is a blessing in disguise because my ridiculous 4-8 (sometimes even 12 wtf) hours of screentime are now gone so I have time to focus on other things like starting a business with a lot more time.

I reconnected with my suppliers, and they said they would love to get into business with me again at in my opinion very fair prices. Now my main problem is regarding who I should sell to and how to sell my product because selling D2C starting out will be very cash intensive which I at this point can't afford nor want to risk.

So, I thought about selling my product on different markets to different people at different price points. I figured trying to target everyone would be inefficient. To start things of with my limited budget I will setup my first legal structure now and start selling to B2B to small retail shops via commission. This way I can figure out if my product sells on the shelf and they don't really have a reason to say no since they have no upfront cost.

With this cashflow I would then venture out to selling D2C but with another brand since this one would be 100% focused on selling via Native Advertising. I think this should do very well in this space but since Native Ads are a bit sketchy, I don't want this to have to do anything with my B2B Brand. Afterwards one would go into the D2C Millennial's market and afterwards into the luxury market where a lot of branding has to be done.

Concrete Steps right now are:

1. Filing Legal Paperwork (This is the biggest barrier for me since I am a bit scared, if anyone has any tips Id much appreciate them)
2. Build a website as a front for the B2B selling (No actual selling on there just so the small retailers think I am a kind of big firm at least)
3. Start dialing and sending emails via the help of ChatGPT for finding addresses and phone numbers.
4. Once the first people agree I would get the smallest quantity of product and ask them to lable it so I am not involved in that
5. Writing copy for flyers because I think they would do well in a Retailing scenario.

That's it for now if you have any input, I would love to hear it and until then have a wonderful day!
Cheers

 

[Sisyphos]

Very quick update:

Pretty busy with university since exams are coming up but I came up with a quite cool solution to my shoestring budget problem. I will start cold emailing business before setting up the company legally. (I am not sure about the legality of that, but I think unless I sell before opening the company, I should be ok)
I created a list with about thirty nearby shops which could sell my product in quantities from 10-50 units per month. I will offer them the first batch via commission, so they don't have an upfront cost and thereby lower their barrier to say yes to my proposal. I will post the next update once I have my first meeting/reply.

To-Do:

1. Study for my exams during the day
2. Get the legal work done for the business so I can open it up at any point.
3. Buy a domain name for the email address. (Have to figure out my brand name for the B2B branch)
4. Start working on the packaging again.
5. Sending out the first 10 emails and waiting for responses --> revert to calling if email doesn't work.

That's it for now have a wonderful day!

 

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