Setting up an online only business

Hi,

I have a business idea which is an online only business re-selling goods, i.e. i contact a manufacturer in Tokyo and re-sell it. What is the best way to go about setting one up? How do you conduct market research for such an idea? (online questionnaires etc?)

Any advice from people who operate online only businesses.

niceirishfella

hi,
more info needed here to asscess the viability of this idea - you are going to "contact a manufacturer in Tokyo and re-sell it"?

Are you going to have a product made in Tokyo, shipped here and then sell it online on your site?
Is that it?

Sorry -

Tokyo was just a hypothetical example, the country could be China or America wherever these goods are manufactured. I intend on offering something that is not available here yet. It is in some shape or form but I intended on offering a larger variant of it via an online, dedicated website.

Basically, I was going to contact international suppliers, import the goods over and then sell via the website. Or another more ideal(from my perspective and to keep costs down) idea is to not stock anything or else stock very little of each product, then order from suppliers when the customer places an order.

I need advice in how to do something based around this idea really.

niceirishfella

This all seems quite impossible to do re; keeping no stock on hand.
far east suppliers in my experience (and i've done it, sourced,imported and sold) willonly sell to you by the container, by the month for best deals.
more details is needed here, the products,industry,the scope etc

information

Deleted User wrote: »

Hi,

I have a business idea which is an online only business re-selling goods, i.e. i contact a manufacturer in Tokyo and re-sell it. What is the best way to go about setting one up? How do you conduct market research for such an idea? (online questionnaires etc?)

Any advice from people who operate online only businesses.

Doing the above you would be effectively just a marketing company promoting the product so this is where your area of expertise would need to be.

Conduct Market research on what ?
you need a product/service first, to conduct market research on.

niceirishfella

niceirishfella wrote: »

This all seems quite impossible to do re; keeping no stock on hand.
far east suppliers in my experience (and i've done it, sourced,imported and sold) willonly sell to you by the container, by the month for best deals.
more details is needed here, the products,industry,the scope etc

Ok so it's impossible to do it that way?

See that's what I am looking for. I just want advice on how to conduct business in this way. So now I know it's impossible to not keep any stock on hand so that means I must order stock in.

I don't want to give away information about the industry itself or the products as then I could be screwed over by one of the million people that visit this site each month.

information

information wrote: »

Doing the above you would be effectively just a marketing company promoting the product so this is where your area of expertise would need to be.

Conduct Market research on what ?
you need a product/service first, to conduct market research on.

No, not a marketing company. I'm basically an importer/supplier who is offering something to the market that is not available online yet. My website domain will be based around the goods I am importing and re-selling. And is currently available

Culchie

Deleted User wrote: »

No, not a marketing company. I'm basically an importer/supplier who is offering something to the market that is not available online yet. My website domain will be based around the goods I am importing and re-selling. And is currently available

and what is to stop another website offering same service, or an existing website adding your product to their producy list?

Will you have exclusivity agreements in place? You'll need a warehouse/storage area, logistics and/or fulfilment operational to get your goods to end user.

Culchie

Culchie wrote: »

and what is to stop another website offering same service, or an existing website adding your product to their producy list?

Will you have exclusivity agreements in place? You'll need a warehouse/storage area, logistics and/or fulfilment operational to get your goods to end user.

This is where I need the help of you guys! Is it possible to get exclusivity agreements in place? Or will I just have to continuously innovate to differentiate myself? How do i do it? And also, how do i judge how big an online company will grow?! In theory, it seems easier than setting up a retail unit company but harder to judge how things are done, well at least for me who has never done anything like this before.

And also the reason why I am not giving away too much, just the gist of it. This is why Darragh29's idea is a great one in my opinion: http://boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055388217 would be of great benefit to me and like minded people!

drunkmonkey

Deleted User wrote: »

Basically, I was going to contact international suppliers, import the goods over and then sell via the website. Or another more ideal(from my perspective and to keep costs down) idea is to not stock anything or else stock very little of each product, then order from suppliers when the customer places an order.

I need advice in how to do something based around this idea really.

Have you tested your idea using eBay? it could be a very good place to start your market research....buy from china and resell on ebay.....turn a profit and you'll be on your way......;)

That's the very very very first part of my plan drunkmonkey. Thanks for the suggestion. My biggest problem at the minute is importing goods, knowing what taxes etc I would have to pay if I ordered from say, Europe, America, Asia etc? And how to sort out the logistics and anything else I may need to get business underway.

drunkmonkey

follow this thread and you'll know shortly what taxes and duties you have to pay.....i'm just waiting on my first shipment from china;)

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=57419649#post57419649

information

Deleted User wrote: »

No, not a marketing company. I'm basically an importer/supplier who is offering something to the market that is not available online yet. My website domain will be based around the goods I am importing and re-selling. And is currently available

supplier - makes the goods - so you are not a manufacturing company
shipper - ships the orders to the customer so you are not a logistic company
administration - orders will processed by the website - so you are not an admin company

your job is to sell and market the product.

If you had 10 staff what would there jobs be, they would be in marketing.

Dell sells computers, but their business is manufacturing, they are now trying to move away from that to become a sales & marketing company for their brand and let someone else handle the manufacturing.

Lidl sells food but their business is logistics.

Companies product/image is usually different to their actual business, the very successful ones know that.

Ok fair enough. That would be my job, to sell and market the product.

How do you advertise and promote an online only business? Should I rely on search engine optimization techniques to get myself high up in the google rankings. I was thinking of that and branding my vehicle. I couldn't sleep last night at all over this idea and I just wish I could set it up today.

kazzer

Please post back and let us know how you are getting on with this idea

information

Deleted User wrote: »

How do you advertise and promote an online only business?

first thing you need to do is work out who your customers are going to be.
That will give you the information to create a marketing plan.

This is a personal pet hate of mine.
Q: What do you do ?
A: Well we're an online business.

There is no such thing as an online business, if you sell stuff online you sell stuff, you're not an online business.

Hey Information, that works for me. I'd much rather tell people what I sell rather than just saying "We're an online business" i.e. "We sell flying cars that run on air online"

Regarding target market etc, hypothetical example here, say if i wanted to find out how much women spend on make up in Ireland, where do I find that out? CSO? Or do I have to pay somebody in a marketing research company?

kazzer

kazzer wrote: »

Please post back and let us know how you are getting on with this idea

Will do.

information

Deleted User wrote: »

Regarding target market etc, hypothetical example here, say if i wanted to find out how much women spend on make up in Ireland, where do I find that out? CSO? Or do I have to pay somebody in a marketing research company?

In the above example the target market is women.
- women who wear make-up
- - are you going to do all make-up or a specific type (high end stuff, cheap stuff, personalised make-up)
This will help you refine your market, young hot execs, who don't mind spending €100+ on a little jar of cream, older ladies who have their lifelong product, etc
- - - CSO might given you the disposable income levels of these women, another way is to do competitor analysis, get the accounts of make-up shops and see what there income is each year.
- - - - the best way would be to get a job in a make-up shop and gain the first hand experience or ask some who works there.
You could also ask the ladies of the ladies lounge.

Your goal is to get a 'Sweet Spot Customer' and build your company around that customer, so that you can defeat any competition and make massive profits.

Information, I like your style. I am probably going to ask a stupid question here (or it will come across as stupid to some), but would the likes of Dunnes or any other multiples release info to me about how much people spend on say makeup or say shorts in the summer etc if I asked politely.

Have you any tactics in order to get the information?

I don't mind asking people straight up for information and for them to say no, well I'll mind that they said no, but I won't take personally the fact they rejected my advances.

lanod2407

Entrepreneur - not surprised that you're not sleeping - you seem to be racing in circles. You really need to get your thoughts and ideas organised and to get some form of basis for a business plan.

You would probably benefit from attending a Business Start programme - there are great programmes run by the various bodies around the country - contact your local Enterprise Board. I know that the Enterprise Acceleration Centre in Limerick runs a great Business Start programme every year and its less than €300 to attend - but you need to submit an application form and be accepted. You'll also need to tell them what your business is about - but they're covered by NDA's, so I would not have fears there.

Business Plan - get online and buy Wendy Kennedy's book "so what, who cares, why you?" Strange name, but it walks you through the development of a business plan and if you follow the book through step by step it really forces you to think and work out how and if this will work for you. It's not cheap (~€60 I think) but it's well worth while and it really helped me pull my business plan together and develop a plan that is robust. ( www.wendykennedy.com ) Having said that, I'm a month away from my business launch - so I've not found a real, live customer or made a cent yet! 22 Days to go!

Finally, I'm rather dubious about your fear of being scammed or otherwise by other people on this site - believe me there are not many great untapped ideas out there that are top secret. Most of the time people start new businesses that simply do the same thing as other people, but maybe faster, better, cheaper, more conveniently, or with a slight twist ......... sometimes you need to put your idea out there to a greater extent to enable people to provide more meaningful feedback or advice ...... oh, and you really need to start researching your proposed supply chain from China to your market. I own and run www.sc3.ie as one of my business streams, and have worked in related industries for many years, so I know what's required here - you've a lot of work to do to get to understand the industries, players and cultures involved.

Best of Luck - keep us up to date and see if you can give us a bit more information upon which we might be able to advise / discuss.

drunkmonkey

information wrote: »

- - - CSO might given you the disposable income levels of these women

Would the CSO give you...

(a) the number of people online in Ireland
(b) their age group
(c) their spending habits online

How would you calculate your market share?

i.e There are only 3 places to buy make up online in Ireland, I want to move in and become number 4, I'm hoping to have 10% market share online buy the end of year 3....

Women currently spend €200 million online on makeup in Ireland, I predict I will have Sales of €20 million by year 3....

Would that be correct if those figures were accurate?

Thanks for the post Ianod2407. I am racing in circles. I have two business ideas that I definitely want to and will do something about, my problem is lack of patience! I want to do both of them today, right NOW!: Regarding my ideas, one of them does not exist in this country (what this thread is about) the way I want it to, in fact only the most basic market of it is available online in the UK but is not good enough or near as good as I want it to be.

My other idea is basically a service that is required, it does exist already but not in all places it should be, however this idea has further developed and with what I want to do, there is no other place like it in the country and I didn't just copy the idea from another country. It's a simple service that is different to the competition, and the culture behind the business is innovative and different. I am writing a business plan for this idea at the moment and am close to completion, I just want to do extensive market research and cash flow analysis. I am writing this business plan with Business Plan Pro 2007 which is really helpful for me but not an absolute necessity as I have written business plans before in third level.

As for being dubious, don't be. Over a million people (so I'm told) visit this site every month, of those million people, I'm sure a lot of them could be wealthier than me, more powerful than me or looking for a business idea with a slight twist. The last thing I would like to do is give away something I have spent time thinking of to make my ideas more innovative or different to the competition because I'm going to have enough to deal with when competitors start going after me when I launch my own business.

Ianod, I just constantly think of business ideas I'd like to do which is why I am racing in circles but I am doing something about i.e. writing business plans etc.

I will be going traveling for a while in January(primarily to see what is out there and look for additional ideas) and will be going to trade shows in Asia. For my business idea that will basically be selling stuff online, my biggest supplier and only supplier to this country will be based in America and happen to be one of the largest in the world. Just found this out yesterday as I did research.

lanod2407

drunkmonkey wrote: »

Would the CSO give you...


i.e There are only 3 places to buy make up online in Ireland, I want to move in and become number 4, I'm hoping to have 10% market share online buy the end of year 3....

Women currently spend €200 million online on makeup in Ireland, I predict I will have Sales of €20 million by year 3....

Would that be correct if those figures were accurate?

Drunkmonkey - "I'll have x% of the market by Year Y" doesn't work in a business plan. What matters is how you can demonstrate HOW MANY customers you can get to and how many of those you can get to buy your product. Spinning out a % is meaningless because you invariably do not have the back-up data to show the detail.
If you can show how many customers you can get to and the number who will buy up front, then you can say that you'd have x% of the market when that happens ........ investors and people in the business run a mile when they see someone who says the market is worth $200m and I can get 10% of that ... so $20m revenue.

Trojan

OP, read The 4 Hour Work Week, and most or all of the books in it's bibliography. Some really great info in there.

Trojan

Trojan wrote: »

OP, read The 4 Hour Work Week, and most or all of the books in it's bibliography. Some really great info in there.

Awesome, thanks, you are the second person to recommend that book to me.

I think I just got burnt by Ianod2407!

blue4ever

drunkmonkey wrote: »

follow this thread and you'll know shortly what taxes and duties you have to pay.....i'm just waiting on my first shipment from china;)

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=57419649#post57419649

Fair Fcuks to ye, I mean that!
I had a look as some of the sites - and even knew some stuff where i could flog/pitch it to - i got cold feet from the outset.

I would take a punt - genuine - but I have this vision of me being 'taken' - not good with that particular emotion!

blue4ever

lanod2407 wrote: »

Entrepreneur - not surprised that you're not sleeping - you seem to be racing in circles. You really need to get your thoughts and ideas organised and to get some form of basis for a business plan.

You would probably benefit from attending a Business Start programme - there are great programmes run by the various bodies around the country - contact your local Enterprise Board. I know that the Enterprise Acceleration Centre in Limerick runs a great Business Start programme every year and its less than €300 to attend - but you need to submit an application form and be accepted. You'll also need to tell them what your business is about - but they're covered by NDA's, so I would not have fears there.

Business Plan - get online and buy Wendy Kennedy's book "so what, who cares, why you?" Strange name, but it walks you through the development of a business plan and if you follow the book through step by step it really forces you to think and work out how and if this will work for you. It's not cheap (~€60 I think) but it's well worth while and it really helped me pull my business plan together and develop a plan that is robust. ( www.wendykennedy.com ) Having said that, I'm a month away from my business launch - so I've not found a real, live customer or made a cent yet! 22 Days to go!

Finally, I'm rather dubious about your fear of being scammed or otherwise by other people on this site - believe me there are not many great untapped ideas out there that are top secret. Most of the time people start new businesses that simply do the same thing as other people, but maybe faster, better, cheaper, more conveniently, or with a slight twist ......... sometimes you need to put your idea out there to a greater extent to enable people to provide more meaningful feedback or advice ...... oh, and you really need to start researching your proposed supply chain from China to your market. I own and run www.sc3.ie as one of my business streams, and have worked in related industries for many years, so I know what's required here - you've a lot of work to do to get to understand the industries, players and cultures involved.

Best of Luck - keep us up to date and see if you can give us a bit more information upon which we might be able to advise / discuss.

Great advice. Honest and well structured. Maith an ...

drunkmonkey

lanod2407 wrote: »

how you can demonstrate HOW MANY customers you can get to and how many of those you can get to buy your product.

In an irish ecommerce business plan, How would you phrase it? There are 500,000? Irish women online, I intend to reach 100,000 of them through online marketing, I think X amount of them will spend a minium of €10 per year on lipstick with me...

how do you put a figure on X, is there an accepted rule of tumb?

lanod2407

Here's an example ........ I think I can get 5,000 Suppliers to register on an online directory and get €49 per supplier annually ......... so my mentor says to me:

- How long per call to each of the 5,000 to sell your pitch - 5 minutes?
- What % of suppliers will sign up? 25% / 50% / 70%?
- How long will the call take to make the actual sale? 10 minutes?
- How long will the creation and admin of each supplier listing take - 3 minutes?

Now, do the maths and tell me how many hours that adds up to, and how many people you'll need to do the work ....... and then assess the overall cost of that resource.

That's the type of stuff that's required. The above example is rough but provides a working example. Often its not so clear-cut - I'm going to an Exhibition in 3 weeks and need to figure out things like - (a) how many footfalls onto my stall will I get on each of the 5 days, (b) how many will I get to listen to the sales pitch, (c) how many will be actively interested and register their interest, (d) how many can I sell to on the day, (e) how many can I sell to after the event by contacting them again ........... the key item I'm looking at is (b) - my projection is that (c) to (e) will be a factor of how many (b)'s I get .............. good night!

lanod2407

forgot about the question on ecommerce business plan .......... forget the ecommerce bit - that's only a vehicle. If you only do online marketing you'll die - but it's OK - it'll be a fast death - this is just my opinion.

Press Releases
Exhibitions or similar events specialising in your area / product
Email-shots
Participation in local groups such as plato or chamber of commerce, etc.
Direct targeting of specific customer groups via post or phone
Publication of papers or articles to build public awareness and a sense of expertise

A few examples of the stuff you can do that need not cost the earth but can target your market more directly

.......... now its definitely good night!

drunkmonkey

lanod2407 wrote: »

forget the ecommerce bit

that's what I said to the bank manager:D

thanks you've given me a good helpin hand, time to put pen to paper....:)

information

drunkmonkey wrote: »

In an irish ecommerce business plan, How would you phrase it? There are 500,000? Irish women online, I intend to reach 100,000 of them through online marketing, I think X amount of them will spend a minium of €10 per year on lipstick with me...

how do you put a figure on X, is there an accepted rule of tumb?

Its based on several factors, here's some of the factors that I used to come up with mine