First Journey: POD with Shopify

[unsungking]

Hello BHW! Welcome to my first ever journey, I just made this account to be able to document this with all of you! I've lurked around here for many years, have had a few successes and a lot of failtures. Like most millenials ive been mindlessly scrolling TikTok and I came across a person running a clothing brand and I was really hooked into the whole process. It wouldnt make much sense for me to jump straight into it and buying $5000 worth of equipment. But it is a possibility for the future because I have somehow sparked a little flame in my heart for clothing, but first im going to test myself and see if i can build little store strictly from POD.
I've been working on the site for 4 days and this is what I have done.

1. Started a Shopify store and bought a domain through them. $1/month for 3 months and $18 for the domain
2. Subscribed to Midjourney AI for $10/month
3. Subscribed to Placeit and Canva+ $12/each
4. Subscribed to ZOHO mail and got my business email connected to my domain for $12/year
5. Subscribed to Printify Premium for $29/month
6. Made LOGO and finished setting up website, used a free theme from shopify.
7. Used Midjourney AI to come up with 10 designs for my niche. (Ultra competitive niche, but im just testing it out for now)
8. Fixed bugs on my website and made it look a bit better using mockups from placeit.
9. Ordered 6 samples from printify that totaled around $80 then $25 for shipping
10. Setup social accounts ;' Facebook page, tiktok, instagram, pinterest
11. Watching youtube videos on how to promote the site and best way to organically grow the brand.
12. Motivating myself to make 2 designs a day

Investment: $200

I understand that i probably bought too many things I didnt need, and thats okay! I feel like these would make my initial journey a little easier, I might not renew some of the services. I mainly bought the printify premium because I was ordering my samples and I would basically save the amount I was paying for the premium anyways. My site isnt perfect but I've had a couple friends test it out and they said it feels fine! For now I am only focusing on T-Shirts as ive read to hyperfocus on a single product usually leads to better results. I am in the ultra competitive pet niche, I know its satured and whatknot but I think using the power of tiktok and facebook groups I could still be successful. Im going to try and update the thread weekly or whenever something major occurs! Ill make sure to post once I get my first sale, if i ever get it! If you have any questions or any tips, you can post here or send me pm! Thanks for reading my journey!

 

[SERP Tank]

• Started a Shopify store and bought a domain through them. $1/month for 3 months and $6 for the domain from namecheap
• Subscribed to Midjourney AI for $10/month/ group buy available
• Subscribed to Placeit and Canva+ $12/each/ group buy available
• Subscribed to ZOHO mail and got my business email connected to my domain for free- using cloudflare and gmail
• Subscribed to Printify Premium for $29/month

You can cut the cost easily.

 

[GeeLark AI]

Goodluck with your journey dude

 

[paisawaisa]

Keep us updated. And reach the target ASAP. Why did you choose shopify platform?

 

[frankygoldberg]

good luck! and don't throw too early, POD is a lot about the design and you should try out a lot.

 

[unsungking]

UPDATE #1
I ordered samples to see the quality of shirts and decide what shirt I would use moving forward. I decided on the bella canvas 3001. I showed people from work and I sold all my samples except my hoodie that I’m keeping. I also got an order for 10 more shirts! I created TikTok, Instagram, and Pinterest accounts. I bought 2000 followers for the TikTok and instagram accounts to make the brand a bit more trustworthy.
My plan is to buy or grow organically accounts in this niche and then promote my business through it. I’ll be real, the t shirt business is not a big money maker, I’m trying to branch out to different POD products to make a higher margin. I’m currently selling the shirts for $20, the cost to make the shirt is $9-10 and $4.75 shipping for the first item then $2.50 for every item after. So I’m only making $5-7 a sale. I was hoping to try and get approved for the TikTok shop feature but they require 3 day shipping and I can’t fulfill that with my printify.
I have around 15-20 designs on the website up and I’m going to try and put another 15 by the end of the weekend then really focus on the social channels. Any ideas or tips would be helpful!

 

[sunbros]

$20 seems too low for a Bella Canvas 3001. I mean, even the basic colors are [S-XL $9.34, 2XL $11.40, 3XL $13.25] Plus $4.75 shipping for single item (Additional item: + $2.40)
Which is pretty expensive.

You should increate your price and add flat rate.
Or 2 tshirts for some certain price. Your goal should be increasing your aov (average order value)

 

[unsungking]

$20 seems too low for a Bella Canvas 3001. I mean, even the basic colors are [S-XL $9.34, 2XL $11.40, 3XL $13.25] Plus $4.75 shipping for single item (Additional item: + $2.40)
Which is pretty expensive.

You should increate your price and add flat rate.
Or 2 tshirts for some certain price. Your goal should be increasing your aov (average order value)

You're completely right, I just noticed that difference. I was just assuming they were $10 each. Imma have to readjust for this, what do you think about adding neck labels?

 

[sunbros]

You're completely right, I just noticed that difference. I was just assuming they were $10 each. Imma have to readjust for this, what do you think about adding neck labels?

And there is also Shopify fee.
Neck label is extra a $1 i believe. imo it's pretty early for neck labels, but you should add thank you card (10% off for next purchase - returning customers are important) i think it was free. double check it's under branding option.

 

[achiever2011]

All the best for the journey.

 

[elison58]

Do you make the designs with midjourny ? or something else ?
How do you bring traffic to your store?

 

[Mastineo MARKETING]

Try your best and keep it up .
Best of luck on your journey dude .

 

[jonathan101]

Good luck on your journey mate

 

[karupoiss]

How is it going @unsungking ?

 

[JEFFERY266]

Wishing You Luck On Your Journey

 

[Marco69]

Shopify I must ask you guys;

can I create a "category" page where all specific topic items are listet, then when I click on one item an individual product page will open?
Or must I do this manually for both which would be a huge pain the the ass worksfow for me.

Second, say you start with 100 items in 4 categories (each category with 25 items) how to upload them to the category page? With the shopify csv file for each category? Then create manually each individual item product page manually?
Or is it like wordpress: create first the individual product page then checkup in a sidebar box to which category the item should be shown?
That's too, is an akward slow workflow you have 200-300 products or more who is doing such tasks manually today?

For pod; there are dropship suppliers out there, first I must create my own design then upload that to the POD dropshipping dashboard, then connect it with my shopify to upload all my designs into the shopify store? Or how this whole thing works?

 

[ValentineWallace]

Good Luck On This Journey.
Keep Doing Hard Work, Success Will Come Soon.

 

[KalseoAgency]

How can build a dropshipping website in WordPress, any recommended theme and plugins?

 

[bonzo90]

Good luck with this journey I always like seeing pod journeys hope you can make this into a big brand one day.