An Ecommerce Journey (Road to $10k+)

[nextlvlig]

Update:

1. Shopify store is set up and ready to go.
2. Products will be dropshipped from ali (had issues with my own designs so shipping times are booty)
3. Instagram affiliate network size 3.5 mil followers
4. Will set up instagram link cloakers soon so link doesn't get banned
5. Launching store on April 6th

Expenses: $105
Profit: nada

7 day free trial for instagram cloakers then $50 per month. Hopefully I'll make enough sales to purchase cloakers (net profit $10 per sale) since this is necessary for my store to get traffic.

Agh very nervous.

 

[nextlvlig]

Update:

I've opened up shop today. It's been around 2 months since my first post and I've learned a few things even though I haven't really done much besides setting up my store.

1. Don't count on people coming through. As I said in my earlier post, around 75 affiliates agreed to promote my store. They had around 3.5 mil Instagram followers total. When I started giving out my affiliate sign up link, not everyone came through. Only 55 affiliates came through which was about 1.5 million followers. This audience was a lot smaller than expected.

2. Don't find affiliates too early. I started finding affiliates in the beginning of February. By the time April came around to let them know the shop was finally opening, they barely remembered who I was and what I was about. You should either find affiliates closer to your launch date or send messages weekly reminding them about your store with marketing tips for your store or smth.

3. So I tried to give valuable information to my affiliates to help them in getting sales. But it seems like some of them were too lazy to even read my essay long message. I think it would've been a lot easier for people to take in the information if I gave it to them in small parts. They would instead feel less overwhelmed and more likely to read it.

4. If you're going to set a date, stick to it. I set a total of 3 dates for my store launch. I finally finished on the 3rd date I set. Two times I had to push back the launch date with my affiliates and it was very unprofessional.

I've gotten around 300 people to my site today. Only 2 purchases though. But it's only the first day so can't judge on how my store will do.

Net Income(Loss): (80.67)

 

[nextlvlig]

Almost one week update:

I've made 4 sales total for the past week which is $88.83 gross sales and $45.56 net sales.

I currently have 30 active affiliates promoting my store. The other 30 have signed up but haven't done anything to promote, so I'll dm them tomorrow.

I am getting on average around 100 sessions per day (except for the first day which was around 350)

I am going to play around with the prices and ads. Currently watching hotjar videos and trying to figure out why people aren't buying. Going to recruit more affiliates.

If anyone has any tips for improving conversion rates, please let me know!

Attached below is my shopify analytics. Will update next week.

Net Income (Loss): ($28.40)

 

[share4win]

Almost one week update:

I've made 4 sales total for the past week which is $88.83 gross sales and $45.56 net sales.

I currently have 30 active affiliates promoting my store. The other 30 have signed up but haven't done anything to promote, so I'll dm them tomorrow.

I am getting on average around 100 sessions per day (except for the first day which was around 350)

I am going to play around with the prices and ads. Currently watching hotjar videos and trying to figure out why people aren't buying. Going to recruit more affiliates.

If anyone has any tips for improving conversion rates, please let me know!

Attached below is my shopify analytics. Will update next week.

Net Income (Loss): ($28.40)

View attachment 114830

Good progress..so how you're paying to your affiliates? Net 30 and how much percentage they have agreed For?

 

[nextlvlig]

Good progress..so how you're paying to your affiliates? Net 30 and how much percentage they have agreed For?

Currently I am using an affiliate website called refersion. It's a really great website. Refersion is free until I get my first 50 sales (since I have a development store)

The catch is that after the free trial is over, refersion costs $89 a month which is too much. So i don't know what I am going to do after my first 50 sales are up.

At the moment, my affiliates are getting paid $2.50 which is 20% of the profit for each sale. I already subtracted this from my gross profit. So my net profit is truly $45.



I forgot to mention two things in my last post so I'll type it out here.

My paypal got limited so I am going to have to purchase a fake id and all that jazz.

Cloaking: I couldn't figure out how to implement it with shopify so I just gave up. Hopefully Instagram doesn't punish me.

Also if anyone doesn't know how to create a free shopify store (for the first 50 sales), check out this thread https://www.blackhatworld.com/seo/how-to-create-unlimited-free-shopify-stores.1015335/

 

[augustwu]

Interested
Where do you find the affiliates?
Refersion?

 

[nextlvlig]

Interested
Where do you find the affiliates?
Refersion?

Nope. I individually dm Instagram accounts with my 30k account and see if they are interested in being an affiliate for my website.

 

[augustwu]

Nope. I individually dm Instagram accounts with my 30k account and see if they are interested in being an affiliate for my website.

what is the success ratio?

 

[augustwu]

I have tried YouTube,and give them 20% ,never get responses

 

[nextlvlig]

what is the success ratio?

I have tried YouTube,and give them 20% ,never get responses

My success ratio is very small. I don't keep track. Maybe out of 20 accounts I dm, 1 of them become an affiliate? This ratio could be even worst tbh.

Hm i haven't tried youtube. How did you contact them and how many did you try to contact?

I feel like trust is a big factor in finding affiliates, so using an account with a big following is important in building trust. If I were to use an IG page with 0 followers, I wouldn't expect many responses to my dms.

 

[augustwu]

My success ratio is very small. I don't keep track. Maybe out of 20 accounts I dm, 1 of them become an affiliate? This ratio could be even worst tbh.

Hm i haven't tried youtube. How did you contact them and how many did you try to contact?

I feel like trust is a big factor in finding affiliates, so using an account with a big following is important in building trust. If I were to use an IG page with 0 followers, I wouldn't expect many responses to my dms.

I hire people to send email one by one
can't get one message back,so we give up.

 

[nextlvlig]

I hire people to send email one by one
can't get one message back,so we give up.

Hm not really sure. Did you use a business email when contacting them? Did you share your site with them?

 

[Giples]

Interesting
Following your journey

 

[nextlvlig]

Week 2 Update:

Sales were lower this week but that's alright. I am getting a lot more people to add products to cart and get to checkout. Still not converting though.

My affiliates are still bringing in around 100 people daily. I don't feel this is enough traffic for my site. So this coming up week I will be purchasing promos from larger accounts in this niche and see how that goes.

I am trying to improve my store a bit by adding more products and adding fake reviews for each product. I have also added a limited time only sale to a few products. These products on sale haven't been purchased, so I don't know how effective this is - might not do sales for products.

Screenshots:
- As you can see, I am averaging 100 daily visitors.
- Another thing is that my conversion rate is terrible - 0.38%. I'm still trying to figure out what's wrong with this so if anyone has any tips on increasing conversion rates, that would be greatly appreciated.

I have made a total of 7 sales (3 in the last week).
Gross Sales: $150.77
Net Sales: $134.02
Net Income: $84.37

Total Net Income: $10.41 (yay finally positive!)






Also a random thing that I am doing to make money, not related to my store, is getting BAT. If you don't that is it's this currency for Brave browser users that you get whenever you view an ad. I currently have 4.60 BAT which roughly converts to $2.00. It isn't much but it's fun to see that I am earning money for viewing ads lol

Will update again next week.

 

[nextlvlig]

Week 4 Update:

Didn't have time to post an update last week. School is crazy rn.

First off, I bought a $40 shoutout which went alright. Made $34.

Affiliates are starting to slow down and not drive enough traffic to the site so I am going to have to focus more on paid IG promotions.

Brought up conversion rate a bit. I think the fake reviews helped build trust with the customer. Also the one paid shoutout I did helped bring a lot of targeted customers the store.

Now I am trying to find more products to add to the store.

I have made a total of 19 sales
Gross Sales: $388.14
Net Sales: $367.49
Net Income: $234.78

Total Net Income: $78.19

The only issue is that I've got $100+ stuck in paypal since they need verification. Had to spend $40 for ID, still need a supplier invoice and ali supplier doesn't supply this. Wish me luck that I get accepted!



Had an idea about another shop. This time I would create my own products. Probably will open during summertime.

Will try and update next week.

 

[micpitt]

Good luck mate. You are very young and catching up on what is making money, I remember when I was your age I was into facebook apps.
Shoot me any question if you like. Doing Ecom for 4 years now.

 

[Naijalife]

Following good luck in your journey

 

[mcblai]

Following

 

[Inezz]

Following this, good luck OP
One question, I heard that Shopify stopped enabling sales for development stores, is that right ?

 

[nextlvlig]

Good luck for you

Following good luck in your journey

Following

Following...

Thanks for tagging along.

Following this, good luck OP
One question, I heard that Shopify stopped enabling sales for development stores, is that right ?

I am currently running a development store and everything is still working. I can make sales and withdraw money without an issue.
Maybe they added this limitation to new development stores? Not really sure.