How to Set Up Your First Online Store

GringoMonkey

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This thread is intended as an overview for people who want to set up a shop online and do not already have a successful traffic driving strategy.

I made it due to being asked the same questions over and over again by various people in relation to a few posts I made. So I figured it was easier all around if I set up this thread.

1 - The #1 thing you need to figure out BEFORE you even set up your online store is how are you going to drive targeted traffic to it?

Now here is kicker #1, you cannot do it for FREE!

You can spend 6 months of your life creating an Instagram account with 50000 super engaged followers, or traffic generating SEO website or whatever. But you have spent 6 months of your life doing it and what is that worth? And who says it will work at the end of it anyway?

You need to learn to FAIL fast, because you will not have a super profitable business from day 1. But if you focus and learn it will grow into a profitable business.

It is a lot easier and quicker to pay for advertising and learn to fail fast that way, than spending months trying to test something for “free” and failing.

SO IF YOU ARE NOT PREPARED TO SPEND ANY MONEY ON ADVERTISING YOUR STORE DO NOT SET ONE UP AND DO NOT BOTHER READING THE REST OF THIS POST.

2 – Now you have accepted you will have to spend money on advertising a store, your next problem, is what store to set up.

Now here is kicker #2, that is a terrible idea you do not know anything about running a store or driving traffic to it!

You don’t understand anything about manufacturing, sourcing, shipping, tax, dealing with customer service, returns etc or indeed the entire minutia of running an online store.

IT IS TERRIBLE ISN’T IT YOU ACCEPT YOU HAVE TO SPEND MONEY ADVERTISING BUT YOU DON’T KNOW HOW TO RUN A STORE. SO HOW DO YOU SET UP A SUCCESSFUL STORE FROM THERE?

This is where the fun starts…

3- You first have to learn to drive targeted traffic that converts and the easiest way to do that is join an affiliate program of a similar shop that you would like to set up. Then you do not have to worry about running a shop, only concentrating on learning to drive traffic to it that converts. Once you have worked that out now set up your own shop, safe in the knowledge you know how to drive targeted traffic to it that converts. Then learn how to set up and run a store. In the meantime your being paid affiliate commission.

4- So what is the best affiliate program to join? By reading this far you now have a massive advantage over most people. You accept you are going to have to spend money on advertising. So you now understand that advertising has a cost which has to be recouped from the sale. You are also new to this, so you will make mistakes. That means your advertising costs won’t be as efficient as they could be. So the solution is go for high ticket products, typically where your commission is over $100. And if you can find something that is on a monthly recurring commission even better.


5 –To recap, the key is first learn to drive traffic that converts, then worry about the store. That is exactly how I set up multiple successful online stores.

Hope you all find that useful and now you have got this far and if agree with everything above feel free to PM me and I will do my best to help you sort out which is the best affiliate program for you to join and how to drive targeted traffic to it.

Regards

GM
 
agree with most of it, but there are alot of free traffic sources out there (fb,youtube,blogs,reddit..etc) but sure they aren't as effective/targeted as paid ads simply because the latter is laser focused. Thanks for writing these tips ;)
 
The key is to fail fast, because it will take you a few goes to get it right and then scale what works.

Free traffic does not enable you to do that.

The problem with any free traffic methods is you need to learn the method and then you become a slave to it and it becomes a full time job scaling and sometimes you simply cannot scale free traffic.

For example following 1000 people everyday on twitter to get 200 to follow you back. Then engaging with them means it can be months before you make a sale! And you won't have enough engaged followers until you have thousands and thousands, who you then have to turn into paying customers.

It is just quicker to pay for traffic in the initial phases, see what works and scale that by reinvesting some of your profits.

Increasing your budget is all you have to do to scale not building, managing and engaging with 27 twitter accounts. Then they get banned and you have to start again, because any free traffic works by gaming the system. One algorithm change and bye bye business.

You can be up and running in a day or so with paid traffic as opposed to months and months with any free traffic method. Then what if it doesn't work? You have wasted a day and a few dollars as opposed to 6 months of your life! Surely that has a greater value?

So in my opinion you should pay to see what does/does not work and if you have no money to invest, get a job and save up, because you won't make a scaleable, consistent business online with your own store unless you can pay for traffic.
 
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absolutely agree, you sure do know alot about ecom, will you be willing to take a look at my store quickly and let me know how can i improve it ? i have budget for advertising but i just dont want my store to look like a potatoe
 
of course send me a pm with a link to your store and we can take it from there
 
Nice read..
I feel that this is just one side of the story to run a successful store..Well written!
 
What is the best free engine to create my own online shop? Theme had to be something like alieexpress. I try wordpress but to create that webiste I had to buy some theme for 100$.
 
This thread is nothing but tricking people to DM you so you can give them your referral link for some affiliate sites...
 
This thread is nothing but tricking people to DM you so you can give them your referral link for some affiliate sites...

No it is not - You have miss read the thread, I am suggesting readers first become affiliates of a similar store to that which they want to set up and learn to drive paid traffic to that, before setting up a store of their own.

I know how to operate an online store, so I do not make money from affiliate deals, I own/run stores.
 
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What is the best free engine to create my own online shop? Theme had to be something like alieexpress. I try wordpress but to create that webiste I had to buy some theme for 100$.

I think you need to reread the thread.
 
Hey Gringo! could you possibly pm me? I made a shop over the past few days and almost made sales. I took the whole day to remodel the site and change niches. could you possibly take a look at it and help me out? i also have a question or two.. best!
 
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