People skills!

[markec123]

Hi! I've been reading this forum for some time now and after reading all this stuff, I decided I'll enter fastlane path also.

What I am planning to do is make site and sell products other people or companies made. Now, I know this sounds like standard affiliate marketing, but what I am actually planning to do is contact some companies in my area that don't have online stores and ask them to sell their products on my sites. The country I live in, or better to say people living here are not yet on best terms with online shopping and using their cc that way, but looking on things, this is about to change...

Now, I have a few questions on how to start this..
Setting up sites and technical stuff is not really a problem, but I need some help with people skills.

I guess the first problem would be how to approach this companies and offer them my services. What prices to set and all this legal stuff like contracts etc.
How to actually present myself and how to explain them what I am actually trying to achieve.

I guess some of you have already had similiar problems and solved them, so I would be grateful if you could share your experiences.

Thx in advance!!

 

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[tincho1492]

Hey markec123, where are you living?

I'm currently doing the same in my country, offering small businesses to sell their products on my website. It's a city focused site so I think it helps to narrow your efforts and to make people feel more approachable to you.

Just call some of them and offer publishing their products for free for one month, so when you launch you will have something to show. Try to figure out the shipping and selling process. What about buying some books about Sales and trying to apply that knowledge inmediately?

You can use Woothemes to start and its ecommerce plugin for WordPress.

 

[markec123]

Well what i am actually thinking to do is to offer companies choice to decide their own price and on that price i would add some additional percentage that would go to me. Basicly, they would get everything for free, I would just process the money transfer and give customer order to company, which they would then process.
I think most companies would like that approach, since it offers them ability to choose their own product price and beside giving me some info (how much products they have in stock etc.), they don't have to do anything except ship the goods to customer.

Also, this approach would be directed towards smaller, family companies, since i think they actually offer good, unique products that people would buy.

Btw, I am from Croatia.

 

[tincho1492]

Are you referring to a comission-per-transaction model? How many people are in your city? Just curious.

 

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[markec123]

Yes, I guess I am referring to that model.
But my goal would actually be to sell quality products online. As I said, I'm thinking of contacting some small family companies that make unique products and offer them my services.
I realize that pretty much every company this days have a website but not much of them are selling online, atleast not here. Ability to actually sell online, would greatly benefit them, as it could attract people from other regions that are not familiar with language to call them, or are just lazy to do so (like me sometimes).

Now, my goal would be to find some niche that would have enough companies to be profitable for me. That part is not actually that hard, but again, my biggest problem is hoe to contact this companies and offer them my services.
Also, I wouldn't be doing one site for every company, but I'm thinking of making niche site with blog, info, maybe forum etc. Having all the companies in one place with online store would be great for customers.
The problem is, how would companies react on that? I mean, they are all selling maybe unique, but still very similiar products. Thats pretty big competition...

And for your question, my town population is 50k or so people. Though, I don't see how that is relevant, since whole point of going online is to be avaliable to more customers, not just my town folks

 

[tincho1492]

What about going with an online store for your local businesses? I mean, building city-focused websites.

And for your question, my town population is 50k or so people. Though, I don't see how that is relevant, since whole point of going online is to be avaliable to more customers, not just my town folks

As I said, just curious

 

[markec123]

Do you have any examples of good city focused sites?
I guess that could be one way to aporoach this, but i guess my city is little too small for this...even my whole local region since its population is like 150k ppl. But if I could get manufacturers in certain niche from all over the country to join together, I could put this products on bigger scale, not just local.
Actually, idea came when i was surfing on chaincyclesreaction.com site, selling bikes and cycling parts. This site is selling alot of different brands. I was thinking of doing sometging like that, just in different niche. Ofc, they have their products in stock, that is, they are actually real online store, where I would actually just be doing marketing.

So again, there is problem, how to get people to do what I wanna? Maybe some recomendations on books with that topic?

 

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[PatrickP]

Better to hear what others think now rather than after you have started your business.

I do not like the business model you are thinking of at all for a variety of reasons.

So let's say you do find companies who want to you to sell their products. You have very LITTLE control over this. Control is one of the tenants of a Fast Lane Business. If you start selling quite a few products for a company they may decide to cut you out and sell direct on line. OR another company can come along and start an online business selling the exact same products you are.

I would STRONGLY encourage you to create a brand by selling your own unique products. THAT meets the qualifications of a Fast Lane business.

 

[tincho1492]

PatrickP: Agree in part with you. I'm working right now on a city focused website where local businesses publish their products on my website paying a monthly fee. Although I have only one business publishing, I think that the project has potential.

* I'm creating a brand of online local shoppings, giving businesses the opportunity to sell on a site that has good traffic (not right now, but working on that).
* They don't need to spend time developing their own website, and for a little investment they can be online and I AM who has to market the website/products to keep them paying me monthly.
* You're right about the Control, but what if I'm able of creating a website with lot of local traffic?
* About the competition, you ever will be in control of that, even if you have a business where you have your own products. It's in your hands to create a great product.

Once you stablish the model on your city, you can expand it to other places if you want it to be truly Fastlane.

If you're not still sure, why not test if you have response? Download the free theme and plugin from Woothemes, install WordPress and talk to a business owner (if you know one that could be great) and publish his products for free. Then start to market the website and see if people could be interested. This won't take you too much time (you can work on other project if you want).

I'm living on a 20.000 people city and am having a good response.

 

[mdlevy2004]

People skills are so important. In fact, we all need to sharpen our saw and network with others so much more. Networking is key and word of mouth marketing is the most powerful that is out there. I continue to have to work at this. After so much reading, this idea of relationship networking is the key to success. A business I work at is sending greeting cards to clients when a prompting in life happens. It is so fun to send cards to people. Your friends love it and it makes you feel good.

 

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[Vigilante]

F*cking NETWORK MARKETING GREETING CARDS?

 

[Vigilante]

Send Out Cards Scam | Are The Send Out Cards Scam Claims True? The Truth Inside - YouTube

If you have to make a YouTube business because everyone thinks your MLM is a scam... um.....

 

[wade1mil]

People skills are so important. In fact, we all need to sharpen our saw and network with others so much more. Networking is key and word of mouth marketing is the most powerful that is out there. I continue to have to work at this. After so much reading, this idea of relationship networking is the key to success. A business I work at is sending greeting cards to clients when a prompting in life happens. It is so fun to send cards to people. Your friends love it and it makes you feel good.

Isn't this a MLM? :smx8:

 

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[The-J]

People skills are so important. In fact, we all need to sharpen our saw and network with others so much more. Networking is key and word of mouth marketing is the most powerful that is out there. I continue to have to work at this. After so much reading, this idea of relationship networking is the key to success. A business I work at is sending greeting cards to clients when a prompting in life happens. It is so fun to send cards to people. Your friends love it and it makes you feel good.

I do lots of things to feel good, and none of them involve greeting cards...