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Selling Physical Products?

by oceans555
1 replies
Hi there! What is a good strategy to start selling products like hot cakes online? I'd rather touch and make the products but I don't right now have the money for supplies, ingredients, empty bottles, etc. so the products are online. This is what I know and have heard and read for years, the only way usually to succeed is be yourself, have your own brand, and have quality products to sell. Although I've seen videos and read about a lot of people who do well dropshipping products too.

I also listed my products on equitynet.com which matches funders to entrepreneurs. I received a few messages but don't have the $900 to join. You can't message anyone unless you join.


I have really good products that are natural, vegan, I don't have any qualms about the quality of the products. One similar company to my products I have, although I didn't copy them directly, I found them afterwards and actually noticed I have their products around my house and they are delicious!!.. is making 3 to 4 million dollars per year with about 30 employees. I could aim for 10 or $20,000 for the year at this point.
I've had four social crowdraising campaigns hit $0, most of them were charities or animal-based or art. There wasn't any traffic or interest. Maybe I had to drive the traffic somehow. I have a new idea that I'm putting up there now for a community juice bar and a nut milk brand and hope it gets funded. I do not know how! My personal Twitter? It was disappointing to try four of these and no one funded anything, I thought they were great ideas and it's a lot of work to post these campaigns, plus you get really excited about doing the project or venture. Seems it's all about having a great video, I didn't have one, a friendI knew a few years back did really well, I actually noticed hers, she got hers right up and flew to Europe for research for the project!

I've put a few products on ebay that I can make myself (and later if it expands others can make them or I can go into a factory)...anyways, no one noticed the products so far and it's been about 6 months with these products sitting on ebay. They don't have the greatest pictures and logos because I don't have the money to do that right now.

Traffic:
I've now seen to drive traffic to your store with Facebook ads. Is this the key because so many people are on Facebook? I'm also trying reddit, I post the store link.
What about an Adwords ad to the store ebay link?


Sending traffic to these products on ebay is the only thing I can think of to do right now?
Later I could make an e-commerce site but for now they are on ebay.



What about putting your product on jet.com or Walmart.com or overstock.com?
I applied to Walmart, didn't hear back, sheesh. Maybe they have a lot of people applying, thought that would be easy. I have to fulfill the products myself right now, I don't have the money for supplies and ingredients to ship off a few cases to their warehouses, so not sure what Jet or Overstock does. I think with Jet, I've seen their warehouse pictures online, you have to ship them your products.
Or is there another site other than these? I can't get on to Amazon, I've never even sold there but they closed my seller account.
#physical #products #selling
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  • Profile picture of the author GordonJ
    Originally Posted by oceans555 View Post

    Hi there! What is a good strategy to start selling products like hot cakes online? I'd rather touch and make the products but I don't right now have the money for supplies, ingredients, empty bottles, etc. so the products are online. This is what I know and have heard and read for years, the only way usually to succeed is be yourself, have your own brand, and have quality products to sell. Although I've seen videos and read about a lot of people who do well dropshipping products too.

    I also listed my products on equitynet.com which matches funders to entrepreneurs. I received a few messages but don't have the $900 to join. You can't message anyone unless you join.


    I have really good products that are natural, vegan, I don't have any qualms about the quality of the products. One similar company to my products I have, although I didn't copy them directly, I found them afterwards and actually noticed I have their products around my house and they are delicious!!.. is making 3 to 4 million dollars per year with about 30 employees. I could aim for 10 or $20,000 for the year at this point.
    I've had four social crowdraising campaigns hit $0, most of them were charities or animal-based or art. There wasn't any traffic or interest. Maybe I had to drive the traffic somehow. I have a new idea that I'm putting up there now for a community juice bar and a nut milk brand and hope it gets funded. I do not know how! My personal Twitter? It was disappointing to try four of these and no one funded anything, I thought they were great ideas and it's a lot of work to post these campaigns, plus you get really excited about doing the project or venture. Seems it's all about having a great video, I didn't have one, a friendI knew a few years back did really well, I actually noticed hers, she got hers right up and flew to Europe for research for the project!

    I've put a few products on ebay that I can make myself (and later if it expands others can make them or I can go into a factory)...anyways, no one noticed the products so far and it's been about 6 months with these products sitting on ebay. They don't have the greatest pictures and logos because I don't have the money to do that right now.

    Traffic:
    I've now seen to drive traffic to your store with Facebook ads. Is this the key because so many people are on Facebook? I'm also trying reddit, I post the store link.
    What about an Adwords ad to the store ebay link?


    Sending traffic to these products on ebay is the only thing I can think of to do right now?
    Later I could make an e-commerce site but for now they are on ebay.



    What about putting your product on jet.com or Walmart.com or overstock.com?
    I applied to Walmart, didn't hear back, sheesh. Maybe they have a lot of people applying, thought that would be easy. I have to fulfill the products myself right now, I don't have the money for supplies and ingredients to ship off a few cases to their warehouses, so not sure what Jet or Overstock does. I think with Jet, I've seen their warehouse pictures online, you have to ship them your products.
    Or is there another site other than these? I can't get on to Amazon, I've never even sold there but they closed my seller account.
    OK. You, right now, can make a product NO one wants. Six MONTHS on eBay with no sales? No one notifced the products?

    You need, if really sincere about doing this, to take a deep breath, put away your calculator, and focus on ONE product. It appears to be a consumable, unless you consider Tide Pods to be "delicious".

    You are in the VEGAN marketplace with a consumable product, is this correct? Make one of your products, in your opinion, you're very best product in small quatities and offer to friends and family, neighbors for feedback.

    YOU think they are delicious, what do others' think?

    What are the costs involved? To make one batch? What is your ingredient list?

    Then you figure out what the scaling would look like. Since you want to sell like "pancakes", I'll use those as an example.

    I make a gluten free, wheat free, OATMEAL flour pancake. I can make 4 6" pancakes with 2 cups of oatmeal, a cup of egg whites, tsp of baking soda, 1/2 cup of applesauce.

    My COSTS for this little batch would be .33 for oatmeal, .22 for eggs, .02 for baking soda and .11 for applesauce for a cost of .68 / 4 = .17 per pancake not counting cost of heat.

    Add the packaging, shipping, other overhead cost to get an idea of your costs.

    Options, I could bake the pancakes and freeze them, find those in Walmart already, and in some health food stores. Like the scores you see here:
    https://bit.ly/2siv8Pm

    Not feasible for a home biz. I could put the ingedients in a baggie, and they add their own eggs, sort of like Jiffy and Aunt Jemima.

    I could simply sell the recipe as part of my initial strategy. To get funds.

    I mean, this doesn't even begin to scratch the surface of the THOUGHT process behind bringing an edible to the market, and the above pancake example doesn't include licensing, fees, or leases if you need them.

    Step one; PROOF OF CONCEPT. Prove other people find your goodies delicious.
    Step two; Figure out your costs and learn about the economies of scale.
    Step three; Decide on the business model you want.

    If you are honest to yourself, you KNOW you are no where near ready to be thinking about fund raising for your idea, no one wants it, not on eBay, not on the shelves of Walmart, not as an investor.

    Go back to Square One with a dose of reality to your dreams. You have the false idea that money is going to solve your problems, but you're still several steps away from even getting any money to prove your concept.

    GordonJ
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