Wanna learn how to sell with Shopify, even while you sleep?
From t-shirts to kitchen sinks (literally), you can start your e-commerce business around anything.
Adrien from MissEcom.com started out selling dancewear on eBay and soon grew her e-com empire to arbitrage (buying low & selling high) and now has multiple successful high-ticket Shopify stores.
When looking at options for your online store, you’ll be faced with several choices. Etsy, eBay, Woo Commerce & Shopify are the most common. While each platform has it’s pros & cons, Shopify is the stand out solution for a successful shop.
Benefits of using Shopify (vs other online retail platforms):
- Your store is fully branded with YOUR brand
- Connects seamlessly with your email service provider
- Ability to send custom abandoned cart emails
- Add buyers automatically to your email list
- You are in control of your own content
- SEO friendly
- Connect with Pinterest
- Sell on Amazon
With Adrien’s method of selling on Shopify, what you are doing is technically called “drop shipping”. What that means is that when someone purchases a product, the supplier ships the product directly to the consumer – meaning you don’t have to keep track of a million boxes in your basement or lug a bunch of packages to the post office. It’s all taken care of you behind the scenes!
Shopify has tons of options for “apps” or integrations so you can add multiple product lines to your online store. You can quickly expand from simple t-shirt to mugs, baby clothes, custom engraved jewelry … and yes, even kitchen sinks!
If you want to dip your toes into the print on demand e-commerce model, there is no money up front except for your monthly Shopify store expense ($29.99/month). Adrien has been kind enough to share her FREE 14-day trial link with us so you can get set up and start selling before your first payment is even due!
Product mark-up, profit margins & taxes
With drop shipping & print on demand, you want to make sure your mark-up (the amount you sell a product vs your wholesale price) is enough to generate a profit. Adrien recommends a 40% mark-up as a general rule. Since you’re selling a niche product, your want your prices to be slightly above what your customers could buy a similar item for at big box stores like Target.
Another thing to consider is your shipping rates. You can either charge a flat shipping rate or increase your price point in order to absorb the shipping costs. Amazon Prime has spoiled most online shoppers with free shipping. By baking your shipping costs into your pricing model, your customers won’t pay separate shipping fees and you’ll be able to advertise “free shipping” so you can keep up with the trend in online shopping.
When it comes to taxes, Shopify will automatically charge state taxes but it’s your responsibility to keep up with Federal taxes. This is one of those situations that is best left up to a tax professional. Until you’re able to hire someone, Shopify keeps detailed records of each sale for you. That way, when the time comes, you’re able to present your tax professional with all the details of each sale.
Product suppliers & scaling
Shopify has TONS of drop shippers and print-on-demand options. A great print-on-demand apparel and accessory supplier is Printful. From t-shirts to fanny packs, they have a great selection of best selling & trendy products. What’s great about them is that they already have SEO rich keywords in each product description so all you have to do is upload your design, customize the product description and they take care of the rest.
Once you’ve found a winning design or product, your next step is to scale up. Drop shipping is super-easy to scale up with since you don’t have to worry about inventory or fulfilling orders by hand. If you have a winning design, you can easily use that same design on multiple products and if you have a winning product, you can scale by offering different designs and versions. The sky is the limit wit how far you can go with this business model, including scaling up to high-ticket items like Adrien has with her Farmhouse sink store!
Final thoughts & words of advice
First of all, don’t give up. This is a fun business and your income is limitless but you have to get going to be successful at it. Keep trying and start small. Once you get a small success, scale up! The business model is one of the most scalable business models out there!
Drop shipping and print-on-demand is an excellent way to add additional income streams to your blog or other income sources. If you’re a coach, you can have branded shirts or mugs. If you’re a fitness instructor, your studio can offer swag for your members. The possibilities are endless with this!
// This episode is brought to you by:
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// Adrien’s Info
Free Designs for T-Shirts and Physical Products delivered to your inbox every month. https://missecom.com/freedesigns/
Free Shopify “Brooklyn” Theme Store Set-up Exclusive for Inbox Besties
https://missecom.com/inboxbesties
Use this Shopify Link for free 14 day trial (can be used in conjunction with the Free Shopify “Brooklyn” Theme Store Set-up https://www.shopify.com/?ref=adrien-walker
Bling Your Blog Shop which helps you create your first physical products and feature them in your Shopify Store. Use Code INBOXBESTIES to get the course for only $24 https://missecom.com/bling-your-blog-shop
21 Free Ways to Market Your Blog and Online Store [Infographic] from Pinterest https://www.pinterest.com/pin/348817933639735565/
We didn’t talk about it on the episode but here is my work with me page link. Code INBOXBESTIES gets 10% off any service. Store Express is #1 recommended to quickly get store up and running. It is a done for you Shopify Store Set-Up
Social Media
Miss Ecom Hangout https://www.facebook.com/groups/MissEcom/
Pinterest https://www.pinterest.com/startanonlinestore
Twitter https://twitter.com/MissEcom1
Hen & Tilly Farmhouse Sinks: https://htfarmhousesinks.com/
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