Starting a new e-commerce business...with the Mrs!
Discussion
Gents,
Excuse the long post.
I'm about to embark on a new e-commerce business venture with my wife. Am I crazy?
Background:
I have experience of building an e-commerce business in the past (5-6 years ago) which had some success but was always a side-line for me as I put my efforts into a service based business which is now my bread and butter.
During that time, I gained experience in the following:
- Built website using wordpress/woocommerce
- Built a social media presence
- Created content regularly - photography/videography/graphic design/built community
- Dealing with overseas factories/suppliers
- Stock management/Picking-Packing Orders/Postage
- Book keeping
- Customer relations
- All other general business admin
My wife:
Previously worked for large company in marketing, but after having our first child 4 years ago has not returned to full time employment. Last year she established her own small business creating handmade wooden toys which has been a real labour of love. With my help, we established a website and she took control of the social media which has put her feet firmly back into the marketing world (which I suppose has moved on drastically in those 4 years).
- Gained experience creating a brand through social media
- Created a loyal, targeted community incl. brand ambassadors
- Worked with social media 'influencers'
- Created content and constant engagement with target audience
I have been highly impressed with what she has achieved so far, but looking forward could not see how it would ever get to the point of scaling and making enough money to even support a small salary. The products are very labour intensive and require hand-painting which fill up her evenings and difficult to outsource, but when we sat back and look at the margins against the time invested it just doesn't stack up.
The New Business:
I won't go into too much detail until everything has been finalised, but we have been given the opportunity to buy an innovative piece of furniture for the baby/child market (which my wife is now familiar with). All IP, rights and current stock.
The business will mainly revolve around a single product with one or two additional up-sells.
We've conducted some market research which has proved very positive.
As a startup I'm looking to keep things as lean as possible and automate as much as I can to reduce workload.
So in terms of website > book keeping > inventory > shipping (and doing it all myself) what are your suggestions?
My previous model was WooCommerce > sage one > excel > parcelmonkey/Royal Mail
Most of these did not integrate with one another and meant I spent a lot of my day manually inputting information from one to the next which I'm sure can be avoided.
I'm hearing a lot about Shopify which I've yet to use, but would really appreciate feedback from those in the know!
Should you all be interested I'll keep this post updated with the progress of the business
Excuse the long post.
I'm about to embark on a new e-commerce business venture with my wife. Am I crazy?
Background:
I have experience of building an e-commerce business in the past (5-6 years ago) which had some success but was always a side-line for me as I put my efforts into a service based business which is now my bread and butter.
During that time, I gained experience in the following:
- Built website using wordpress/woocommerce
- Built a social media presence
- Created content regularly - photography/videography/graphic design/built community
- Dealing with overseas factories/suppliers
- Stock management/Picking-Packing Orders/Postage
- Book keeping
- Customer relations
- All other general business admin
My wife:
Previously worked for large company in marketing, but after having our first child 4 years ago has not returned to full time employment. Last year she established her own small business creating handmade wooden toys which has been a real labour of love. With my help, we established a website and she took control of the social media which has put her feet firmly back into the marketing world (which I suppose has moved on drastically in those 4 years).
- Gained experience creating a brand through social media
- Created a loyal, targeted community incl. brand ambassadors
- Worked with social media 'influencers'
- Created content and constant engagement with target audience
I have been highly impressed with what she has achieved so far, but looking forward could not see how it would ever get to the point of scaling and making enough money to even support a small salary. The products are very labour intensive and require hand-painting which fill up her evenings and difficult to outsource, but when we sat back and look at the margins against the time invested it just doesn't stack up.
The New Business:
I won't go into too much detail until everything has been finalised, but we have been given the opportunity to buy an innovative piece of furniture for the baby/child market (which my wife is now familiar with). All IP, rights and current stock.
The business will mainly revolve around a single product with one or two additional up-sells.
We've conducted some market research which has proved very positive.
As a startup I'm looking to keep things as lean as possible and automate as much as I can to reduce workload.
So in terms of website > book keeping > inventory > shipping (and doing it all myself) what are your suggestions?
My previous model was WooCommerce > sage one > excel > parcelmonkey/Royal Mail
Most of these did not integrate with one another and meant I spent a lot of my day manually inputting information from one to the next which I'm sure can be avoided.
I'm hearing a lot about Shopify which I've yet to use, but would really appreciate feedback from those in the know!
Should you all be interested I'll keep this post updated with the progress of the business
Simple answer is that there are two competing packages for your type of market:
- quick to set up
- easy to use
- do most of what you want without customisation
- integrate the process
- etc.
BigCommerce & Shopify
both are good - they are different, and you will have supporters of each - we manage client systems on both for our clients and have written code to adapt / modify etc. and both have that capacity - by the time you grow out of them you should be making enough money to look at more bespoke solutions...
but for now - take your pick - compare - choose one - set up a test store (under an invented brand if you prefer) and play with it
start making money
biggest issue in setting up a business like this tends to be getting the financial side right - bank accounts / paypal / stripe / card handling / etc. - not unknown to have money frozen for periods of time / for it to take time to get sorted - so start looking into that sooner rather than later...
but yes, shopify (or BigCommerce) will do what you want and is a good solution - and very easy to use
- quick to set up
- easy to use
- do most of what you want without customisation
- integrate the process
- etc.
BigCommerce & Shopify
both are good - they are different, and you will have supporters of each - we manage client systems on both for our clients and have written code to adapt / modify etc. and both have that capacity - by the time you grow out of them you should be making enough money to look at more bespoke solutions...
but for now - take your pick - compare - choose one - set up a test store (under an invented brand if you prefer) and play with it
start making money
biggest issue in setting up a business like this tends to be getting the financial side right - bank accounts / paypal / stripe / card handling / etc. - not unknown to have money frozen for periods of time / for it to take time to get sorted - so start looking into that sooner rather than later...
but yes, shopify (or BigCommerce) will do what you want and is a good solution - and very easy to use
Thanks for your responses, I'm going to give the Shopify free trial a go and see how I get on!
In terms of fulfilment we have some storage space, and in order to minimise costs from the outset I will be handling this.
Certainly something to look at in the future though should things take off!
I will report back with any progress.
In terms of fulfilment we have some storage space, and in order to minimise costs from the outset I will be handling this.
Certainly something to look at in the future though should things take off!
I will report back with any progress.
raw said:
Thanks for your responses, I'm going to give the Shopify free trial a go and see how I get on!
In terms of fulfilment we have some storage space, and in order to minimise costs from the outset I will be handling this.
Certainly something to look at in the future though should things take off!
I will report back with any progress.
Let us know if you get stuck, happy to help off the meter.In terms of fulfilment we have some storage space, and in order to minimise costs from the outset I will be handling this.
Certainly something to look at in the future though should things take off!
I will report back with any progress.
UPDATE:
I decided to pursue the Shopify route. All in all, it's a fantastically easy way to build an e-commerce site and I got to grips with it quite quickly.
I've started using a free theme 'Narrative', I think it looks pretty good and works well on mobile which I imagine will be a majority of our target audience will be using.
A few gripes:
- The ease of creating the homepage with the 'sections' is great. But I can't understand why this functionality can't be used across additional 'Pages'.
- Having registered the domain through a 3rd party, it bugs me that we can't have email accounts using the same domain? We've used .com for the website and .co.uk for our emails
The Business:
- We've now completed the purchase of the previous businesses stock, IP etc.
- Our website is now up and running using studio shots of the product - it looks great, although a little clinical at the moment
- I've submitted sitemaps etc to Google webmasters
- Social media accounts are now live and the Mrs is slowly feeding some content to friends/family/mummy groups
- Facebook ads - I'm constantly researching best methods, pixel is set up and currently running a couple of ads, one towards facebook posts and one towards instagram posts. I aim to get some video established soon so we can push for instagram stories.
Still to do:
- Content shooting - We need some imagery with kids/parents to warm the website up and for social media content
- Marketing, marketing, marketing - testing audiences with different interests and advert types
- Analyse Marketing performance - I want to ensure our ad spend is being used effectively, I'm still researching best practices for this.
- Testimonials - The product had some great testimonials from bloggers back in 2016, we're hoping to re-engage with them to bring in some fresh testimonials.
- Shopify Apps - There are tonnes of them out there, I've played with a few, but don't want to overcomplicate things so will be testing these.
It's all exciting stuff, feedback has been good so far, but no sales yet...I imagine it's going to take some time to get some brand awareness and customer confidence. I'll keep you updated!
I decided to pursue the Shopify route. All in all, it's a fantastically easy way to build an e-commerce site and I got to grips with it quite quickly.
I've started using a free theme 'Narrative', I think it looks pretty good and works well on mobile which I imagine will be a majority of our target audience will be using.
A few gripes:
- The ease of creating the homepage with the 'sections' is great. But I can't understand why this functionality can't be used across additional 'Pages'.
- Having registered the domain through a 3rd party, it bugs me that we can't have email accounts using the same domain? We've used .com for the website and .co.uk for our emails
The Business:
- We've now completed the purchase of the previous businesses stock, IP etc.
- Our website is now up and running using studio shots of the product - it looks great, although a little clinical at the moment
- I've submitted sitemaps etc to Google webmasters
- Social media accounts are now live and the Mrs is slowly feeding some content to friends/family/mummy groups
- Facebook ads - I'm constantly researching best methods, pixel is set up and currently running a couple of ads, one towards facebook posts and one towards instagram posts. I aim to get some video established soon so we can push for instagram stories.
Still to do:
- Content shooting - We need some imagery with kids/parents to warm the website up and for social media content
- Marketing, marketing, marketing - testing audiences with different interests and advert types
- Analyse Marketing performance - I want to ensure our ad spend is being used effectively, I'm still researching best practices for this.
- Testimonials - The product had some great testimonials from bloggers back in 2016, we're hoping to re-engage with them to bring in some fresh testimonials.
- Shopify Apps - There are tonnes of them out there, I've played with a few, but don't want to overcomplicate things so will be testing these.
It's all exciting stuff, feedback has been good so far, but no sales yet...I imagine it's going to take some time to get some brand awareness and customer confidence. I'll keep you updated!
raw said:
Having registered the domain through a 3rd party, it bugs me that we can't have email accounts using the same domain? We've used .com for the website and .co.uk for our emails
how have you got it set up?https://help.shopify.com/en/manual/domains/add-a-d...
normal practice with registering the domain through a third party is as the above link...
you point relevant DNS entries (A record / cname / etc.) at Shopify - however, that leaves you in control of the rest of the DNS and you can point MX records etc. as you wish and should be able to use that same domain for email...
do feel free to pm if you want help...
akirk said:
how have you got it set up?
https://help.shopify.com/en/manual/domains/add-a-d...
normal practice with registering the domain through a third party is as the above link...
you point relevant DNS entries (A record / cname / etc.) at Shopify - however, that leaves you in control of the rest of the DNS and you can point MX records etc. as you wish and should be able to use that same domain for email...
do feel free to pm if you want help...
I have followed the linked advice and changed A record / Name etc. When it comes to MX records that goes a bit above my head. I will have a look into it and PM if I get lost, thank you!https://help.shopify.com/en/manual/domains/add-a-d...
normal practice with registering the domain through a third party is as the above link...
you point relevant DNS entries (A record / cname / etc.) at Shopify - however, that leaves you in control of the rest of the DNS and you can point MX records etc. as you wish and should be able to use that same domain for email...
do feel free to pm if you want help...
akirk said:
raw said:
Having registered the domain through a 3rd party, it bugs me that we can't have email accounts using the same domain? We've used .com for the website and .co.uk for our emails
how have you got it set up?https://help.shopify.com/en/manual/domains/add-a-d...
normal practice with registering the domain through a third party is as the above link...
you point relevant DNS entries (A record / cname / etc.) at Shopify - however, that leaves you in control of the rest of the DNS and you can point MX records etc. as you wish and should be able to use that same domain for email...
do feel free to pm if you want help...
raw said:
akirk said:
how have you got it set up?
https://help.shopify.com/en/manual/domains/add-a-d...
normal practice with registering the domain through a third party is as the above link...
you point relevant DNS entries (A record / cname / etc.) at Shopify - however, that leaves you in control of the rest of the DNS and you can point MX records etc. as you wish and should be able to use that same domain for email...
do feel free to pm if you want help...
I have followed the linked advice and changed A record / Name etc. When it comes to MX records that goes a bit above my head. I will have a look into it and PM if I get lost, thank you!https://help.shopify.com/en/manual/domains/add-a-d...
normal practice with registering the domain through a third party is as the above link...
you point relevant DNS entries (A record / cname / etc.) at Shopify - however, that leaves you in control of the rest of the DNS and you can point MX records etc. as you wish and should be able to use that same domain for email...
do feel free to pm if you want help...
depends who you registered the domain with, and who you want to use for email - if for example you decide to use Outlook for the email, then setting up your domain on Outlook should give you instructions on what to add to the DNS - typically it will first ask you to add a txt entry to validate that you own the domain, and then it will ask you to add half a dozen or so other lines and then hey presto your email will work on the same domain!
"I've started using a free theme 'Narrative', I think it looks pretty good and works well on mobile which I imagine will be a majority of our target audience will be using.
A few gripes:
- The ease of creating the homepage with the 'sections' is great. But I can't understand why this functionality can't be used across additional 'Pages'."
It's a free theme, it's not a particularly robust one either and has limitations you will start to notice as you trade, on the plus side it's easy to "re-theme" and for a few hundred $ you can get some really good ones with decent navigation and variations.
A few gripes:
- The ease of creating the homepage with the 'sections' is great. But I can't understand why this functionality can't be used across additional 'Pages'."
It's a free theme, it's not a particularly robust one either and has limitations you will start to notice as you trade, on the plus side it's easy to "re-theme" and for a few hundred $ you can get some really good ones with decent navigation and variations.
DSLiverpool said:
"I've started using a free theme 'Narrative', I think it looks pretty good and works well on mobile which I imagine will be a majority of our target audience will be using.
A few gripes:
- The ease of creating the homepage with the 'sections' is great. But I can't understand why this functionality can't be used across additional 'Pages'."
It's a free theme, it's not a particularly robust one either and has limitations you will start to notice as you trade, on the plus side it's easy to "re-theme" and for a few hundred $ you can get some really good ones with decent navigation and variations.
As a single product business at the moment it seems to do the job and as it was my first time using Shopify I wanted to get to grips before spraying money about! If things start to get traction I may well look into a different theme!A few gripes:
- The ease of creating the homepage with the 'sections' is great. But I can't understand why this functionality can't be used across additional 'Pages'."
It's a free theme, it's not a particularly robust one either and has limitations you will start to notice as you trade, on the plus side it's easy to "re-theme" and for a few hundred $ you can get some really good ones with decent navigation and variations.
super7 said:
akirk said:
raw said:
Having registered the domain through a 3rd party, it bugs me that we can't have email accounts using the same domain? We've used .com for the website and .co.uk for our emails
how have you got it set up?https://help.shopify.com/en/manual/domains/add-a-d...
normal practice with registering the domain through a third party is as the above link...
you point relevant DNS entries (A record / cname / etc.) at Shopify - however, that leaves you in control of the rest of the DNS and you can point MX records etc. as you wish and should be able to use that same domain for email...
do feel free to pm if you want help...
If you grow to need more customer service / order people, I find it best not to add email accounts (too much silo thinking), but instead to put something like Help Scout in front of a single mailbox, allowing multiple staff to work on things whilst seeing very bit of historical correspondence.
Each Help Scout user can have access to each mailbox (sales@, support@ etc) meaning job-sharing is easy. But you can a single view of all correspondence without the old chasing around to find out who saw / answered / dealt with what.
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