Online Store Stories + Adivce

Fukuyama

Hey Guys,

I'm still working away on my idea for an online store whilst at college and my regular job. I'm getting quite excited about it.

Anyway, I have a request. Could people who have ran their own online store (or have experience in the field) share with me their stories and advice?

My main fear is that I open the store (in Jan 2011) and then ... nothing. No sales. I have a broad, untapped customer base and will be getting promotion on some great sites. To break even in the first three months I need to make 1.6 sales per day.

Any tales and words of wisdom?

Thanks,
Dean.

TheCostumeShop.ie: Ronan

Hi Dean,

It shouldn't be a risk, all the data is there. Make sure you test small before you spend big. Use the google keyword tool to estimate market sizes etc. Whats the product and export potential?

Fukuyama

Product is niche novelty clothing (funny tshirts, mugs) to a big, very active online, untapped market.

Thanks!

How did you get started?

TheCostumeShop.ie: Ronan

Long story, but in short it was a dare.

Not an easy niche to break to be honest, but there's good market opportunities in it. Do your market research and testing carefully. The success factor in that niche is the buying part. Best of luck.

bigneacy

Dean0088 wrote: »

Product is niche novelty clothing (funny tshirts, mugs) to a big, very active online, untapped market.

Eh?

colours.ie
hairybaby.com
spailpin.com
tshirtireland.net
tshirt-express.ie
peoplesrepublicofcork.buy.ie
teeandtoast.com
chargrilled.eu
wearonthetear.com
sheepthrill.com
tshirts.ie

And they are just the Irish ones....!

Fukuyama

bigneacy wrote: »

Eh?

colours.ie
hairybaby.com
spailpin.com
tshirtireland.net
tshirt-express.ie
peoplesrepublicofcork.buy.ie
teeandtoast.com
chargrilled.eu
wearonthetear.com
sheepthrill.com
tshirts.ie

And they are just the Irish ones....!

You've just put up addresses of online clothing stores.

My store is aimed at a certain large group of people whom I'm a member of. These guys would not be in competition with me.

bigneacy

Dean0088 wrote: »

You've just put up addresses of online clothing stores.

My store is aimed at a certain large group of people whom I'm a member of. These guys would not be in competition with me.

Ah, I see.... I thought you were under the impression that the novelty t-shirt market was untapped, I was putting up those addresses to illustrate how saturated the market is.

Didn't realise that you were aiming at a particular niche. No worries

Fukuyama

bigneacy wrote: »

Ah, I see.... I thought you were under the impression that the novelty t-shirt market was untapped, I was putting up those addresses to illustrate how saturated the market is.

Didn't realise that you were aiming at a particular niche. No worries

LOL no...

I dont know how Irish companies even turn a profit in that field with all the big UK and US competition...

TheWaterboy

As already mentioned - start small. You cant expect to make a fortune in the first year...

The site will take time to get setup and get a decent amount of traffic so dont get too despondent early

One of most important thing with an online store is trust..You need your customers to be able to trust that you are genuine and offer a good honest service...Simple things like contact details, privacy policy, secure credit card processing, testimonials will all help with this.

J_Wholesale

Dean0088 wrote: »

My main fear is that I open the store (in Jan 2011) and then ... nothing. No sales.

That will happen. The idea that If you build it, they will come, is a myth. While it's true that once your website goes live, anyone in the world can find it, it's equally true that nobody will find it if they don't know about it.

Getting the site up and running is the easy part. Getting the word out and bringing the visitors in is the difficult part. You'll need to be working this from Day 1, and you'll never stop.

Bluetonic

Dean0088 wrote: »

You've just put up addresses of online clothing stores.

My store is aimed at a certain large group of people whom I'm a member of. These guys would not be in competition with me.

Whats to stop them being in competition with you when they see your offerings?

Fukuyama

Bluetonic wrote: »

Whats to stop them being in competition with you when they see your offerings?

Nothing.

Which is why I have to launch hard, fast and strong.

Anyone have any advice?

oterra

Dean0088 wrote: »

Nothing.

Which is why I have to launch hard, fast and strong.

Anyone have any advice?

Just make sure you have done your homework regarding the potential sales of your product and its credibility. Don't sell yourself short with your pricing, still bearing in mind that you have to be competitive. Its a very fine line with little room for error. Stay true to the product and try not to come across gimmicky. Try get backlinks with relative websites that are already well ranked by google. Check out your competitor's sites and see what they are doing, try do it better and more unique. Remember its all about Traffic Traffic Traffic. Without it - no sales. Be patient and and work on the SEO of you site.
I also am in the same boat as yourself with an new online canvas printing printing service. A lot of ground work was needed. Its quite a competitive market, but the way I looked at it was if I could get 1 sale I could get 10,000 sales and so on. I got 4 sales on day 1 and was over the moon!!
Anyway the best of luck with your business venture.;)

Fukuyama

Could anyone possibly give me a figure on the average start up costs of a small web store? My product will cost ME around E8 and I plan on a 100% mark up (a good RRP for the customer still).

I'm thinking around E400?

Cheers,
Dean.

Chet Zar

Dean0088 wrote: »

Could anyone possibly give me a figure on the average start up costs of a small web store? My product will cost ME around E8 and I plan on a 100% mark up (a good RRP for the customer still).

I'm thinking around E400?

Cheers,
Dean.

Hey Dean,

For an ecommerce website - not so much €400:) You'd be looking at more like €4000+. Depends on what you are looking for exactly but you're talking thousands rather than hundreds.

fintan

Dean0088 wrote: »

Could anyone possibly give me a figure on the average start up costs of a small web store? My product will cost ME around E8 and I plan on a 100% mark up (a good RRP for the customer still).

I'm thinking around E400?

Cheers,
Dean.

400 isn't a lot of money for a new web store / ecommerce, however not impossible, for example:

1) .ie Domain Name for 1 year = 20 euros (Blacknight.com)
2) 1 Years Hosting = 60 euros (Blacknight.com)
3) OS Commerce Website = Free
4) OS Commerece Theme + Installation = 189 USD (TemplateMonster.com)
5) Paypal for payment processing = Free to set-up

If your semi comfortable with tech, the above is extremely simple and cheap way to get started.

However if you are not, you will need to pay someone who could charge anything from 500 euros to 5k+ depending on what you need done.

If you know exactly what you want and can explain it very clearly in writing, you'll be able to find people on elance.com who can do a lot of work for not a lot of money (relatively speaking).

Keep in mind the 400 euros also doesn't take into account any advertising, SEO work, Google Adwords etc

Cheers
Fintan

oterra

Dean0088 wrote: »

Could anyone possibly give me a figure on the average start up costs of a small web store? My product will cost ME around E8 and I plan on a 100% mark up (a good RRP for the customer still).

I'm thinking around E400?

Cheers,
Dean.

I had an E-Commerce site custom built using the wordpress platform. The total cost was €1600 and thats with me doing a lot of the work. You can see an example of the site in my profile!!

Atlas_IRL

Should you not have an ssl cert for your payment Oterra?

oterra

Atlas_IRL wrote: »

Should you not have an ssl cert for your payment Oterra?

Whats an ssl cert?
Please advise, I dont want to be doing anything dodgy!

oterra

oterra wrote: »

Whats an ssl cert?
Please advise, I dont want to be doing anything dodgy!

I thought was paypal ok?

nice1franko

You don't need one if you're not processing payments on site